Trying to Reach Ziusudra
Part Eight of the Epic of Gilgamesh Series
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Shortly after Gilgamesh left the Garden of the Gods, he found himself on the seashore near the edge of the world. If he could find a boat to take him across, surely, he would be able to reach his goal—Ziusudra, the survivor of the Great Flood. From him, Gilgamesh could learn the secret of eternal life, perhaps even bring Enkidu back from the dead.
That last part Gilgamesh thought but didn’t dare speak for fear of attracting even more adverse attention from the gods. He suspected that most of them, with the possible exception of Utu, told him his quest was impossible because they didn’t want him to have eternal life, not because there was no way for him to obtain it. They certainly raised an impressive range of obstacles to block his path. But that was when the stakes were relatively low—life or death for one man. If Gilgamesh sought even more than that, would they raise the barriers against him still further? He could not afford to risk that.
As he walked toward the shore, he saw Siduri, the maker of wine, standing near a golden vat in which her latest crop of grapes must have been fermenting. But instead of greeting Gilgamesh, she ran to her nearby home, bolted the door, and climbed the stairs up to the roof.
Gilgamesh knocked on the door, but Siduri didn’t answer him.
“Why are you being so inhospitable?” yelled Gilgamesh. “I am a traveler looking for food and rest. Is it not your obligation to provide for travelers if you are able?”
“You are no god,” Siduri yelled back. “Yet only a god could reach here. But you don’t even look like a proper man. Clad in lionskins, sunburned, weary, your cheeks sunken, your hair matted, and your eyes bloodshot—you look like some kind of savage rather than a civilized visitor. You look like a man who chases the wind in vain. Hence, I barred my door against you.”
“If I am here, where you say no man can come, then does it not stand to reason that I am exceptional?” asked Gilgamesh.
“For all I know, a beast could make it here,” said Siduri. “A beast in human form.”
Gilgamesh hesitated for a moment. Her words reminded him too much of Enkidu. “If I wanted, I could break down the door. I could snap the bolt.”
He had been wandering alone for so long that it didn’t even occur to him that his words were hardly reassuring. When he got no response, he tried a different strategy.
“I look so savage because I have traveled so far and suffered so much. I have lost my friend, the one who helped me kill Huwawa and the Bull of Heaven. He was dearest to me, closest to my heart, but now Death has taken him. He is dust, and I might as well be. I wander now in search of the secret of eternal life, which alone may save me from sharing his fate.”
“If you speak the truth, your quest is pointless,” said Siduri, though her voice was more gentle than before. “The gods kept eternal life for themselves and allotted death to mortals. Nothing you can do will change that. Go, fill the life you have left with joy. Eat, drink, rejoice. Bring pleasure to your wife, hold the hand of your child. These things you can all have. Eternal life you never will.”
“I cannot hear your words, Maker of Wine,” said Gilgamesh. “For the dying words of my friend drown out everything else. Tell me, I beg of you, how to get to Ziusudra. You are the only one who lives here. You must know.”
“I do,” said Siduri. “But my knowledge will do you no good, for the journey is impossible. Utu crosses the great sea every day, but no mortal could make so long a voyage. The way is treacherous, and the Waters of Death guard the approaches to Ziusudra’s home. One drop could kill you instantly.”
“Surely, there must be some way around that obstacle,” said Gilgamesh. “The gods have made the passage difficult, but not impossible. The obstacle is a test rather than an absolute restriction. That must be true. I would not have gotten this far if it were not.”
Siduri sighed. “Wishful thinking is blinding you to the truth. But if you insist on pursuing such a foolish course of action, there is one way you might pass the Waters of Death safely. In the nearby forest, Urshanabi, Ziusudra’s ferryman, is felling pine trees. With him are beings of stone who make it possible to cross those lethal waters. If you can find him, and he will take you, you might have a chance. Otherwise, you must give up your quest, lest your desire to avoid death bring it about, instead.”
Without a word of thanks, Gilgamesh hurried toward the nearby pine forest.
The woods were vast, far larger than he could have imagined. However, after wandering for quite a while, he heard the sound of Urshanabi chopping wood and followed it until he came upon the ferryman.
Neither Urshanabi nor the beings of stone were expecting a visitor, and, shocked by Gilgamesh’s appearance, they attacked him without waiting for an explanation.
Exhaustion and constant rejection had already worn Gilgamesh raw. Instead of trying to reason with Urshanabi, he drew his own axe and rushed at the ferryman. The sound of their blades colliding echoed throughout the forest.
Urshanabi was an exceptional man, for he would never have been picked to serve Ziusudra if he had not been. Even so, he was no match for Gilgamesh, even in his current, weary condition. The king forced him back over and over, wearing him down. Urshanabi’s strength failed him at last, and he fell to the ground.
The beings of stone looked like small statues, but they moved like men and got in Gilgamesh’s way. Enraged more than the Bull of Heaven had been, Gilgamesh smashed them to bits with his axe. Just in case they possessed some harmful magic even when broken, Gilgamesh gathered up all the stone fragments that remained and threw them into the nearby river. Only then did he turn back to Urshanabi, who still lay on the ground, exhausted by Gilgamesh’s earlier assault.
“Take me across the Waters of Death to the land where Ziusudra dwells,” said Gilgamesh, sounding very much like the king he had once been.
“Foolish man!” said Urshanabi. “The magic of the beings of stone is the only thing that kept me alive while traveling across the Waters of Death. By destroying them, you have closed that route forever. I could not take you across even if I wished it—which I do not.”
Gilgamesh ached to chop off the ferryman’s head, but if he did so, who else might he go to for answers? There was no one else. Urshanabi might be stubborn, but he was the only hope Gilgamesh had left.
“There must be some other way,” said the king. “You know the waters better than anyone else. An answer will surely come to you if you think about it.”
“Why should I think about it?” asked Urshanabi. He was still too weak to pick himself up off the ground, but his tone was hard as stone. “Ziusudra trusts me to refuse anyone who would visit him uninvited. Why should I make an exception for a man as violent as you are?”
“You attacked me first,” said Gilgamesh. “I defended myself.”
“You didn’t have to destroy the beings of stone to do that. They weren’t strong enough to have been a threat to you.”
“I am a king,” said Gilgamesh. “You must obey me.”
Urshanabi looked at him and laughed bitterly. “Perhaps you were a king, but you are king no more. Do you suppose that the people you abandoned for this quest are just waiting patiently for you to return? No, they have filled your throne already. Now you are nothing more than a wanderer in the wilderness who has neither home nor family—much less a kingdom.
“Besides, Ziusudra, whom I serve, was once king of Shuruppak in the time before the Great Flood—long before you were even born. The gods chose him and his wife to survive. No other people were so blessed. Thus, when I serve him, I serve the gods. Can the same be said if I serve you? You look as if the gods have forgotten you. If they favored you, I doubt you would be roaming in a pine forest, looking for a way to do the impossible.”
With great difficulty, Gilgamesh unclenched his fists. “You are goading me because you want me to kill you.”
Urshanabi, who had been glaring defiantly at the king, looked down and would no longer meet his eyes.
“I have failed my master,” he said slowly. “I could not preserve the beings of stone, and now I can never return to him. It would be better if I died.”
“But what if you could return to him?” asked Gilgamesh. “Working together, could we find a way to cross those treacherous waters?”
“Even if such a thing were possible, how could I ever trust you?” asked Urshanabi, still not meeting Gilgamesh’s eyes. “How do I know you will not try to harm my master?”
“I seek only information. I will swear any oath you propose that I will do no violence to Ziusudra or to anyone in his household.”
Urshanabi raised his eyes and looked at Gilgamesh so long that the king feared the ferryman might be turning into stone himself. But at last, Ziusudra’s servant spoke.
“Without the beings of stone, it is impossible to row the boat because the Waters of Death immediately infect any pole that touches them. But if we had enough poles, it might be possible to make the voyage by using each one only once.
“If you are determined to do this, go forth with your axe, fell trees, fashion three hundred poles from their trunks using measurements I shall provide, and dip each of the poles in pitch. When you have done with that, return to me, and we will make the attempt.”
Reinvigorated by his new sense of purpose, Gilgamesh did exactly as Urshanabi had directed. When the king returned with his newly made poles, the ferryman inspected them and, once satisfied, led Gilgamesh to the boat.
Once they had set sail, Urshanabi navigated while Gilgamesh rowed, using an ordinary pole at first. Since the boat had powerful magic, they were able to make a journey of a month and a half in only three days. At that point, they reached the Waters of Death.
Even had Gilgamesh never heard of the Waters of Death, he would have recognized their unnatural nature from their darkness. They appeared to be some kind of unholy combination of water and shadow. Just looking into the fluid darkness made Gilgamesh uneasy. He didn’t doubt a single drop of it could kill him.
Following Urshanabi’s instructions, Gilgamesh rowed only once with each pole, after which he tossed it into the water and used another. Using that method, he pushed the boat slowly through the Waters of Death—only to run out of poles just before the boat was out of danger.
Had Urshanabi miscalculated, or was this a deliberate effort to kill Gilgamesh? The king looked at the ferryman, whose expression was unreadable. Gilgamesh thought about using Urshanabi in place of that last pole, but he couldn’t be sure the man was guilty.
Instead, Gilgamesh held up one of his lion pelts, using it as a sail. There had been no breeze earlier, but now, there was just enough of one to move the boat out of the Waters of Death. Gilgamesh could now use the ordinary pole to push the boat the rest of the way.
Standing on the shore, Ziusudra watched suspiciously. The boat was Urshanabi’s and the ferryman was at the helm, but where were the beings of stone, and why was their a stranger onboard?
“I suspect some kind of treachery,” muttered Ziusudra. “No good can come from uninvited guests.”
The man who was thousands of years old but looked only a little older than Gilgamesh pulled himself up to his full height and frowned at the stranger. “He will be sorry he ever came here.”
Nice cliffhanger at the end! Gilgamesh, what a bumbler.
In a way, the gods brought this on themselves. You shouldn't create a demi-god if you can't control him and he doesn't respect you. All because Inanna wanted a king for her people, they got this uncontrollable person. All because they took his friend, he wants to be a full god.