The Old Testament is the basis of investigation. What the Sumerian and Babylonian legends have to say about Nimrod was written down round about 1800 BC and the Book of Genesis was in existence long before that. But the Genesis narrative is tantalizingly brief. After recounting the names of the sons of Ham, Gen.10. 8-10 says "Cush begat Nimrod; he began to be a mighty one in the earth. He was a mighty hunter before the Lord: wherefore it is said `Even as Nimrod the mighty hunter before the Lord'. And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar".

That is all, but the passage, brief as it is, makes it possible to locate Nimrod approximately on the stream of time, The cities mentioned are well known to archaeologists; the Hebrew text in the phrase "the beginning of his kingdom", is more accurately rendered "his kingdom was the beginning of Babel. and Erech" which means that he lived at the time these places first appeared as small villages at the very beginning of Sumerian settlement. This in turn must have been within a couple of centuries from the dispersion at Babel so that Nimrod must have lived at about that time.

This leads to consideration of his genealogy. V.8 says that Cush 'begat' Nimrod, but he is not included among his sons and grandsons as in v. 7. The inference is that he was a lower descendant of a later generation. If he flourished soon after the time of the dispersion of Babel he could have been anything between the 3rd to 6th generation from Cush. He is distinguished as having been "a mighty hunter before the Lord". This word "before" means "in the presence of", and infers a creditable rather than discreditable position. At this point in time, it must have been that Nimrod stood with his fellows in that what he did, he did as unto the Lord. "Hunter" is 'tsayid', which indicates a man of the field, like Esau, who was adept at hunting game for food or dealing with wild animals. The same word is used for providers of food, which would stress the close connection that must have subsisted in those days between the hunt for food animals and the provision of food for the growing community. This Nimrod must have attained fame and approbation as a skilled and successful exponent of the art of the chase. So one comes to his name. If this man really did live and Genesis 10 asserts that he did, can he be found in ancient history outside the Bible? Here one comes up against a real obstacle. The earliest writers of history or legend, so far discovered, did not live until something like eight centuries after the time indicated in Genesis as that of Nimrod's life. But the old-time legends they recorded do tell of a great hero of ancient time who in the interim had become a god. This god, the special patron god of the city of Babylon in later times, amongst other great exploits, was accredited with having built the Tower of Babel. Here, then, is a point of contact. The name of that Babylonian god, Marduk, when translated into Hebrew, is the Nimrod of Genesis.

Marduk, in the year 2000 BC, was the name of the Sun-god, son of the God of heaven, proclaimed as the "Word of God", by whom all things were made, the executor of the Divine work of creation, the protector and redeemer of mankind. (More can be said about this later when the translation from monotheism to polytheism, the worship of one God to that of many gods, comes to be discussed). The name "Marduk" was the Babylonian equivalent of the Sumerian "Amar-utu" which means "wild ox of the sun-god". The wild ox (Sumerian am, Hebrew reem, translated "unicorn" in the AV. and now extinct), was the most powerful and ferocious beast known in the ancient Middle East. As such, the name could well mean "Champion fighter for the sun-god". There was, however, no sun-god in the earlier days of Babel, and it is not surprising therefore to find that the earlier Sumerian name was "Amaraduk" which means "wild ox of God". Going back even earlier, to about 2500 BC, a temple at Lagash has the name "Nimaraduk" which can be interpreted as "chief champion fighter for God". This name might well be set against the Genesis "mighty hunter before the Lord". (There are grounds for thinking that it was about this time, 2500 BC, that Genesis was first committed to writing in the Sumerian language).

It is this name Ni-marad-uk which was transliterated into the Hebrew language at the time of Moses in Egypt more than a thousand years later. Conscious perhaps of the later association with the sun-god, the Divine suffix "uk" was dropped and the name left as Ni-marad. Centuries later the Rabbis could not resist the temptation to re-interpret the meaning of the name. Israel had contact with Babylon throughout history, culminating with the days of Daniel. Their knowledge of the alleged pagan exploits of the sun god Marduk ‑ Nimrod, had left its mark. In Hebrew, "marad" is a verb meaning "to rebel" and when expressed grammatically in the 3rd person singular passive, is spelt 'Nimarad', meaning 'he was rebellious'. This, of course, was too good to miss, and so Josephus in his history of Israel followed the Rabbis' example with a full description of Nimrod's rebellion at the time of the building of the Tower ‑ all quite imaginary. Whether the historical Nimrod did or did not apostatise from his allegiance to God at some time in his later life may be a debatable point; there is nothing in the Genesis account to say one way or the other. It is quite feasible though, that the later Sumerian legends which assert that he was the leading spirit in the second, and successful, building of the Tower, after the dispersal of the peoples, rest on a basis of truth, and that this led by successive steps to the introduction of paganism several centuries later. The true position is that he was a leader among men who was deified after his death to the status of a god ‑ no uncommon thing in those early stages of the world's history.

The statement that "his kingdom was the beginning of Babel, Erech, Accad and Calneh, in the land of Shinar" indicates, first, that he was an acknowledged leader among men, and second, that he exercised his influence at the time the Sumerian cities began to come into existence. These and other cities commenced as hamlets and villages at a time very soon after the dispersal at Babel. Within two centuries of that event they were in process of becoming "city-states", each exercising royal authority over an area of territory around them. In such case the second ‑ and this time successful ‑ attempt to build the Tower of Babel must have been little more than a century after the first. With this there began the rise of the Sumerian civilisation, which led to the universal worship of the one Most High God becoming superseded by an increasing array of "gods many and lords many", thus creating the idolatry for which Babylon in after years became notorious.

The cities of Nimrod were to the south of Babylon. At the dispersal from Babel the sons of Cush went south. Calneh (Nippur) was the holy city of the Cushite Sumerians, sixty miles south-east of Babylon. Erech (Uruk) was fifty miles farther on. Accad (Agade) was, on the other hand, about sixty miles north of Babylon; it was so thoroughly destroyed by invaders from Iran seven centuries later that its site has never been satisfactorily determined, although the Iraq State Antiquities authorities stumbled upon what they believe is all that is left of the city. There is just the possibility though that where Gen. 10 says "Accad", it is the city of Ur that is meant. Accad first appears in history several centuries later. It was a Semitic and not a Sumerian stronghold and being to the north and not the south of Babylon not so likely to have formed part of the domains of the Sumerian Nimrod. It so happens that the archaic native names for both these places in the Sumerian language is the same ‑ uri-ki. If this name appeared in the early or original version of Gen.10 later copyists or translators may well have been uncertain which city was intended and in the upshot have picked the wrong one. The point is of little importance but it is more likely to have been included in Nimrod's sphere of influence than Accad, even if the latter did exist in his day. If, then, Nimrod did extend his influence over the south and the first four settlemnents were those named, then Gen. 10 is in full accord with the known facts. Babel, Calneh (Nippur) Erech (Uruk) and Ur were all in existence as incipient centres of habitation within a century or so after the Dispersal, four settlements strung along the then course of the Euphrates over a distance of less than a hundred and fifty miles, all destined eventually to grow into powerful and influential city-states. This was the sphere of Nimrod's influence and this, perhaps the first attempt at rulership and empire-building

Nimrod was the man who taught them how to make the best use of what they had and maybe the rapid rise of their civilisation from that time onward might well have been in no little degree due to his insight and organising genius. A thousand years later an epic poem described him as the one who had given them their world. The likeness of it to the creation story in Genesis is apparent as is its local setting in the land of Shinar. The Genesis story had existed in written form for at least eight hundred years when this epic was composed. That much can be deduced from the archaic Sumerian word-forms that are still embedded in the later Hebrew text. So much for the oft-repeated assertion that the Bible account of creation was derived from the Babylonian legends. In actual fact the reverse is more likely the case. One of the most famous epics, the "Enuma Elish" (meaning "When in the eight" the opening words of the first stanza) of about the same date, 18th century BC, shows vividly how the people of later generations came to exalt Nimrod among the gods as idolatry grew and prospered.

So the people of the land praised their hero and it is not surprising that a few centuries later Abraham, the "father of the faithful," found himself alone in the land in his possession of faith in the One God. Neither is it surprising to read the words of Joshua to the hosts of Israel at the beginning of their occupancy of the land of promise. "Your fathers dwelt on the other side of the flood" (the river Euphrates) "in old time, even Terah the father of Abraham and the father of Nachor: and they served other gods" (Josh. 24. 2). The immediate forebears of Abraham were idol worshippers ‑ of Nimrod. That true understanding of God which must have been possessed by the immediate descendants of Noah had by the time of Abraham been submerged in the new worship of this man who by his prowess and enterprise had won the allegiance of the masses. It was left to Abraham to spearhead that return to God that has been marked in subsequent ages, first by the development of Israel and its emergence during the five centuries before Christ as a truly monotheistic people in a polytheistic world and then by all that Christianity has meant to the world during the past two millenniums.

All that is left of the great Temple of Marduk in Babylon, and its mighty Tower, the Tower of Babel of the Bible, is a few lines of mouldering brickwork, rotting away in the middle of a marsh inhabited only by wild creatures. The cities, the temples, the canals, which at one time made this land the zenith of world civilisation have all gone. The name of Nimrod is remembered but all his exploits are in the past. Nothing has remained. He was not a god after all; he was only a man. And he has been dead for more than four thousand years.

(To be continued)