The Hero Essay Research Paper The HeroThe free essay sample

The Hero Essay, Research Paper The Hero The Mesopotamian society is dead. It has long been buried in the clay of history. Its roots live on through societies that exist today. The swayer of Uruk, Gilgamesh, is besides dead. The popular narrative The Epic of Gilgamesh lives on every bit good, being passed from coevals to coevals. I believe the major subject of The Epic of Gilgamesh is the endeavoring to populate on forever. A society such as Mesopotamia would endeavor to populate on and conquer. They would endeavor to be the most powerful society in the country. The narrative of Gilgamesh is about the historic swayer of Uruk. The narrative tells that he is two-thirds God and one-third mortal adult male. Gilgamesh feels the power of the Gods, but still has to cover with the adversities of mortal adult male, like hurting and decease. He sets out to happen the workss of everlasting life. He thrives to remain alive forever. He does this with his loving friend Enkidu, until he is murdered on one of the episodes of his escapade. I believe Gilgamesh hoarded wealths his friendly relationship the most. He has everything in life he needs ; power strength, and adult female. He lacks merely one thing, friendly relationship. His comrade is brought to life by the other Gods, and the love he feels for Enkidu is like nil he as of all time felt before. Gilgamesh comes from a society much like that of Mesopotamia. We can larn many things about the Mesopotamian society by reading The Epic of Gilgamesh. First we learn something of the people who lived in the land between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in the 2nd and 3rd millenaries BCE. Then we can farther larn that they celebrated a male monarch named Gilgamesh ; we know they believed in many Gods ; we know they were self-aware of their ain cultivation of the natural universe ; and we know they were literate. This narrative helps us view the gift of mortality and how it was percieved by this hero. I call mortality a gift because without decease Gilgamesh s life would be nonmeaningful, and the escapades that make up the heroic poem would vanish. We are supposed to experience as though the heroic poem is existent, by mentioning to Gilgamesh # 8217 ; s ain act of authorship, the nameless storyteller efforts to convert us that Gilgamesh was an existent male monarch and that the narrative that follows is a true narrative. On the other manus, by naming our attending to the act of relation, the storyteller reminds us that the truth of a narrative might lie in the really fact of its being a narrative # 8212 ; the undeniable fact of its narrative. By reading this narrative, we can see that the Mesopotamian society valued things such as Gods and literacy, but besides amusement. This narrative was passed down from each coevals, and now it is popular in our society after being discovered. We have to retrieve that this is a myth, and many of the myths that were formed in the Mesopotamian society trade with the escapade of happening the significance of life and degree Celsius onfronting the world of decease. Hammurabi s Code of Law is rigorous regulations with terrible penalties for their misdemeanor. In fact, these Torahs played a large function in organisation of Mesopotamian society. We can tie in these Torahs with Gilgamesh and we see how offenses were non taken lightly in the society. The Mesopotamian people must hold been a respectful honest people based on the abrasiveness of these Torahs. After reading these Torahs, the reader may larn about ideals the people of Mesopotamia had about offenses, their attitude to the lower and higher societal categories, and legal rights between work forces and adult females. Reading the Torahs you may detect that many offenses were punished by the decease punishment. Many Torahs province that the guilty individual has to pay the same monetary value for the physical injury one did to another individual or one s relation ( Torahs 196, 197, 229, 230 ) . For case: jurisprudence 196 provinces: If a adult male put out the oculus of another adult male, h is oculus shall be put out. In add-on, at that clip, people were sentenced to decease for many offenses or incorrect behaviors that about neer would be penalized with capital penalty at a modern clip. Among such felony and misdemeanours are stealing ( 6, 14, 21 ) , robbery ( 22 ) , accusal ( 2,3 ) , adultery ( 129, 130 ) , and abandonment ( 32, 33 ) . Hammurabi s Code besides, reveals inequality between societal categories. Slaves were non treated by the Torahs the same as freeborn people. For illustration: In jurisprudence 202 it states if any one work stoppage the organic structure of a adult male higher in rank than he, he shall have 60 blows with an ox-whip in public. At the same clip in jurisprudence 203 we read: If a freeborn adult male strike the organic structure of another freeborn adult male or equal rank, he shall pay one gold mine. It will non take much attempt for a freeborn adult male to pay one gold mine for his error, but for the slave it is much more awful and morti fying to have 60 blows with a whip in public. Harmonizing to the Code of Hammurabi, adult females had some legal rights, but these rights were non equal to work forces s. Married adult females had a right to disassociate every bit good as work forces. In fact, in order to get the right for divorce, a adult female had to happen a sensible account for her desire, and merely so the divorce could be possible ( 142 ) . The grounds of inequality between work forces and adult females can be found in the Torahs 38 and 39, which declare that a adult male, who rents belongings can non delegate it to his married woman or girl or give it for debt. Though if a adult male owns this belongings than his married woman and girl have such a privilege. Overall, the Hammurabi s Code of Laws showed that offenses in Mesopotamia were non taken lightly and were followed by terrible penalties. Very frequently these penalties were the decease punishment. The Torahs were non equal between societal categories, and slaves were subjected to the harsher penalties than freeborn. Finally, even though adult females had some privileges, the Torahs provide groundss that there was still inequality between them and work forces.