Nimrod thought to be Sargon

In the movie Is Genesis History? Doug Petrovich, Archeologist at Oriental Institute Museum at the University of Chicago, comments on the location of Babel (he thinks that it was at Eridu). So I begin reading about Dr. Petrovich on the internet and found his compelling paper that Nimrod is Sargon. He lists five reasons for his conclusion:


The fourth and final step in the task was to present the case for Sargon of Akkad as the proper candidate for Nimrod. The evidence for this connection consists of five arguments that were presented and supported: (1) Sargon’s geographical origin of Kish may be associated with Nimrod’s genealogical origin of Cush. (2) Both Sargon and Nimrod were credited with bringing Akkad into prominence. (3) Both Sargon and Nimrod were involved in initial building projects in Assyria. (4) Both Sargon and Nimrod had a lasting influence related to Assyria. (5) Both Sargon and Nimrod were legendary for their military exploits and brutality. The detailed evidence presented for each of these arguments leads the objective student of the Bible and ANE history to the inescapable conclusion that Sargon is not only the best candidate for historical Nimrod, but the proper candidate. The biography of Sargon of Akkad, recently illuminated by the discovery and publication of inscriptional and material cultural evidence provided by epigraphy and archaeology, matches that of Nimrod perfectly. The divine and human authors of the Bible, knowing that Israel soon would be a monarchy, provided this vivid picture of how far a king or kingdom could stray from God if given over to the lust for power.

http://www.etsjets.org/files/JETS-PDFs/56/56-2/JETS_56-2_273-305_Petrovich.pdf



Oriental Institute photograph of the remains of the ziggurat at Eridu, thought to be the tower of Babel. For a slideshow of sixteen photographs of the Eridu ziggurat, click here.

Archaeological Site Photographs: Mesopotamia: Eridu | The Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago

 

It has been awhile since I read it, but I recall thinking that a military leader who swept the area constantly to maintain power would also be a good hunter. I will look over the white paper again. The Oriental Institute in Chicago has one of the best collections in the world. Do you know Chicago? The University of Chicago has fourteen hospitals. It is built of limestone in Gothic style and is not far from Lake Michigan on the southside. I would like to go but the area is dangerous and Chicago is very expensive.

 

Actually, Dr. Petrovich disputes the translation of the passage about Nimrod's being a hunter and he thinks that Moses meant that he was a butcher of mankind:

The same noun appears in Gen 25:28, where Moses notes that Esau had a taste for game, the food that is provided via the hunt. This passage most likely has drawn interpreters and translators en masse to render –'™8 as “hunter” in Gen 10:9, since this rendering is found virtually across the board in the standard translations (KJV, NASB, NASU, NIV, NRSV, etc.).27 Scholars who attempt to identify Nim 21 Ibid. 1:806, 811. 22 Van der Toorn and van der Horst, “Nimrod before and after the Bible” 1. Van der Veen and Zerbst opted for rendering :LC–E as “the first potentate” (“Nimrod the Mighty Hunter” 32), but there is no such word for “first” in the original language, and “potentate” seems to be a term that—while capturing the overall character and leadership style of the man—goes beyond the description that Moses offers here. 23 Van der Veen and Zerbst, “Nimrod the Mighty Hunter” 33. 24 Wakely, “:,” in NIDOTTE 1:811. 25 Livingston, “Who Was Nimrod?” 67; Levin, “Nimrod the Mighty” 351. 26 Robert H. O’Connell, “'8,” in NIDOTTE 3:799–800. 27 This claim should not be disputed, because as far back as the Midrash Rabbah there were parallels drawn between Esau and Nimrod (Gen. Rab. 37:2–3; 63:13).

JOURNAL OF THE EVANGELICAL THEOLOGICAL SOCIETY 280 rod also seem to support “hunter” almost unanimously.28 The notion of Nimrod as a mighty hunter is extremely attractive to ANE scholars. “The militant hero of ancient times was usually a hunter; the chase of the lion or of the wild ox or of the boar was the next best excitement to war.”29 The western Levantine kings especially were interested in hunting lions.30 The amount of resistance to the “hunter” rendering, and number of alternatives offered, is extremely limited. The context, however, does not favor the use of “hunter” here at all. This notion appears completely out of context in the Nimrod pericope. In Gen 10:8, the text describes how Nimrod had become a powerful man on earth, and in Gen 10:10 it reveals the impressive list of city-states that he subjugated during his conquests. It would be incomprehensible for Moses to sandwich a casual detail, such as Nimrod’s being a mere hunter of animals in his spare time, between two headlines that distinguish Nimrod as virtually unique in human history, at least up until that point in time, as well as uniquely sinister. A better translation than “hunter” must be sought. Thankfully, a viable option is presented with the help of a foreign cognate of the Hebrew verb '8, the Ugaritic word dbȖ (“slaughter, sacrifice”). The Hebrew noun –'™8 finds a cognate with the Punic construct zbȖ ҁyd (“sacrifice of slaughtering”).31 Thus the ANE concept of this word either can focus on the food offered as a sacrifice, or on the slaughtering of the—most conceivably—animal that is offered as a sacrifice. This means that the nominal form of this ANE word can refer to the person performing the slaughtering, who acts as a slaughterer of living creatures. Therefore, given that the context of Gen 10:9 rules out “hunter” as a plausible translation, and that the use of :LC–E to describe Nimrod probably connotes violent, tyrannical power,32 the best translation seems to be “slaughterer,” making him one who powerfully slaughtered a plethora of living humans.

 

I quoted the wrong post accidentally, but it is thought that Nimrod was a derogatory nickname meaning one who slaughtered many, a butcher--as Saddam Hussein was called. The answer is in the post above.

In spite of the evidence of the flood and the memory of Noah and the miracle at the Tower of Babel, Nimrod and others soon filled the earth with violence again and so it remains today.