The Styx ( “Hate, Detest”) is a river in Greek mythology that formed the boundary between Earth and the Underworld (often called Hades which is also the name of this domain’s ruler).
The rivers Styx, Phlegethon, Acheron, and Cocytus all converge at the center of the underworld on a great marsh, which is also sometimes called the Styx. The important rivers of the underworld are Lethe, Eridanos, and Alpheus.
Rasa means “moisture, humidity” in Vedic Sanskrit, and appears as the name of a western tributary of the Indus in the Rigveda (verse 5.53.9).
In RV 9.41.6, RV 10.108 and in the Nirukta of Yaska, it is the name of a mythical stream supposed to flow round the earth and the atmosphere (compare Oceanus), also referring to the underworld in the Mahabharata and the Puranas (compare Styx).
The corresponding term in Avestan is Ranha. In the Vendidad, Ranha is mentioned just after Hapta-Həṇdu, and may possibly refer to the ocean (Sethna 1992).
Vaitarna or Vaitarani (Vaitaraṇî) river, as mentioned in the Garuda Purana and various other Hindu religious texts, lies between the earth and the infernal Naraka, the realm of Yama, or Yamarāja, the Hindu god of death, belonging to an early stratum of Vedic mythology, and is believed to purify one’s sins.
In the Vedas, Yama is said to have been the first mortal who died. By virtue of precedence, he became the ruler of the departed. There is a one-of-a-kind temple in Srivanchiyam, Tamil Nadu, India, dedicated to Yama.
Mentioned by the Buddha in the Pali canon, Yama subsequently entered Buddhist, Chinese, Tibetan, Korean, and Japanese mythology as a wrathful god under various transliterations.
Furthermore, while the righteous see it filled with nectar-like water, the sinful see it filled with blood. Sinful souls are supposed to cross this river after death. According to the Garuda Purana, this river falls on the path leading to the Southern Gate of the city of Yama. It is also mentioned that only the sinful souls come via the southern gate.
However, other texts like the Harihareshwara Mahatmya in the Skanda Purana mention a physical river as well, that joins in the eastern ocean; he who bathes in it is supposed to forever be free from the torment of Yama.
It first appears in the TirthaYatra Parva (Pilgrimage Episode) of the Mahabharat, where it is mentioned to be rising from the Vindhyas and falling into the Bay of Bengal after passing through Orissa as present Baitarani River.
Apart from that it appears in Matsya Purana, and Vamana Purana, lastly it is the Padma Purana which reveals the etymology of Vaitarani in Vaitarani Mahatmya, where it is defined as Vai (truly) tarini (saving) and that related the legend wherein it was brought on to the earth from Patala, due to the penance of Parashurama resulting in a boon from Shiva.
It is equivalent to the Styx river in Greek mythology and is associated with the Vaitarani Vrata, observed on the eleventh day of the dark phase of the moon i.e, Krishna Paksha of Margashirsha in the Hindu calendar, wherein a cow is worshiped and donated, which is believed to take one across the dreaded river as mentioned in the Garuda Purana, verses 77-82.
The Sanzu River, or River of Three Crossings, is a Japanese Buddhist tradition and religious belief similar to the River Styx. It is believed that on the way to the afterlife, the dead must cross the river, which is why a Japanese funeral includes placing six coins in the deceased’s casket.
The Sanzu River is popularly believed to be located in Mount Osore, a suitably desolate and remote region of northern Japan.
Important ancient sites such as Tell Halaf, Tell Brak, Tell Leilan (ancient Shekhna) and Urkesh, have been excavated in the Khabur river basin. It has given its name to a distinctive painted ware found in northern Mesopotamia and Syria in the early 2nd millennium BCE, called Khabur ware. The region of the Khabur River is also associated with the rise of the kingdom of the Mitanni that flourished c.1500-1300 BC. In classical times the river was known as Chaboras.
The river plays a certain role in Mesopotamian mythology and Assyro-Babylonian religion, associated with the Sumerian paradise and heroes and deities such as Gilgamesh, Enlil, Enki and Ninlil. The Hubur was suggested to be between the twin peaks of Mount Mashu to the east in front of the gates of the netherworld.
In Sumerian mythology, the Habur, a Sumerian term meaning “river”, “watercourse” or “netherworld”, is equivalent to the River Styx in Greek myth. It is usually the “river of the netherworld” or “river of paradise”.
The river Euphrates has been identified with Hubur as the source of fertility in Sumer. This Babylonian “river of creation” has been linked to the later Hebrew “river of paradise”.
Frans Wiggermann also connected Hubur to the Habur, a tributary of the Euphrates far away from the Sumerian heartland, there was also a town called Haburatum east of the Tigris. He suggested that as the concept of the netherworld (as opposed to an underworld) in Sumerian cosmogeny lacked the modern concept of an accompanying divine ruler of a location underneath the earth, the geographical terminology suggested that it was located at the edges of the world and that its features derived in part from real geography before shifting to become a demonic fantasy world.
In Sumerian mythology, Kur is considered the first ever dragon, and usually referred to the Zagros mountains to the east of Sumer. The cuneiform for “kur” was written ideographically with the cuneiform sign, a pictograph of a mountain. It can also mean “foreign land”.
Although the word for earth was Ki, Kur came to also mean land, and Sumer itself, was called “Kur-gal” or “Great Land”. “Kur-gal” also means “Great Mountain” and is a metonym for both Nippur and Enlil who rules from that city. Ekur, “mountain house” was the temple of Enlil at Nippur. A second, popular meaning of Kur was “underworld”, or the world under the earth.
Kur was sometimes the home of the dead, it is possible that the flames on escaping gas plumes in parts of the Zagros mountains would have given those mountains a meaning not entirely consistent with the primary meaning of mountains and an abode of a god. The eastern mountains as an abode of the god is popular in Ancient Near Eastern mythology.
The underworld Kur is the void space between the primeval sea (Abzu) and the earth (Ma), a Sumerian word meaning “land” that in Sumerian mythology was also used to designate the primeval land.d “
Sumerians believed that once in the Underworld, in order for a soul to reach tha land where the dead dwelled, he would have to cross a river, being carried across by a ferryman, (similar to the Greek concept of the River Styx and the ferryman, Charon). Anyone entering the land of the dead must enter completely naked, having left all of their worldly possessions behind. Sumerians also believed that even gods and goddesses could “die.”
Urshanabi was the ferryman of the Hubur, river of the dead in Mesopotamian mythology. His equivalent in Greek Mythology was Charon.
He is first mentioned in the myth of Enlil and Ninlil, where he is called SI.LU.IGI and described as a man. In the Epic of Gilgamesh, Urshanabi is a companion of Gilgamesh after Enkidu dies. They meet when Urshanabi is involved in the curious occupation of collecting an unintelligible type of “urnu-snakes” in the forest.
Urshanabi’s ferry is at first powered by unintelligible “stone things”, that are destroyed by Gilgamesh, who proceeds to power the boat with 500 wooden stakes he has to make to replace the “stone-things”. He is banished from Kur by the immortal survivor of the flood Utnapishtim for no discernable reason, possibly for conveying Gilgamesh across the Hubur. They both ferry back to Uruk where they behold its splendour. His later Assyrian incarnation is called Hamar-tabal, who is described as a horrible monster.
It was also thought that the Netherworld could be entered through various openings in this world. These openings would allow one to enter through a series of seven steps downward into the land ruled by Ereshkigal, and populated not only by spirits of the dead, but also with her demons. One of these entrances could be found in Inanna’s holy city, Erech.
Sumerians believed that once in the Underworld, in order for a soul to reach tha land where the dead dwelled, he would have to cross a river, being carried across by a ferryman, (similar to the Greek concept of the River Styx and the ferryman, Charon). Anyone entering the land of the dead must enter completely naked, having left all of their worldly possessions behind. Sumerians also believed that even gods and goddesses could “die.”
Sumerians believed that once in the Underworld, in order for a soul to reach tha land where the dead dwelled, he would have to cross a river, being carried across by a ferryman, (similar to the Greek concept of the River Styx and the ferryman, Charon). Anyone entering the land of the dead must enter completely naked, having left all of their worldly possessions behind. Sumerians also believed that even gods and goddesses could “die.”
Urshanabi was the ferryman of the Hubur, river of the dead in Mesopotamian mythology. His equivalent in Greek Mythology was Charon.
He is first mentioned in the myth of Enlil and Ninlil, where he is called SI.LU.IGI and described as a man. In the Epic of Gilgamesh, Urshanabi is a companion of Gilgamesh after Enkidu dies. They meet when Urshanabi is involved in the curious occupation of collecting an unintelligible type of “urnu-snakes” in the forest.
Urshanabi’s ferry is at first powered by unintelligible “stone things”, that are destroyed by Gilgamesh, who proceeds to power the boat with 500 wooden stakes he has to make to replace the “stone-things”. He is banished from Kur by the immortal survivor of the flood Utnapishtim for no discernable reason, possibly for conveying Gilgamesh across the Hubur. They both ferry back to Uruk where they behold its splendour. His later Assyrian incarnation is called Hamar-tabal, who is described as a horrible monster.
It was also thought that the Netherworld could be entered through various openings in this world. These openings would allow one to enter through a series of seven steps downward into the land ruled by Ereshkigal, and populated not only by spirits of the dead, but also with her demons. One of these entrances could be found in Inanna’s holy city, Erech.
Sumerians believed that once in the Underworld, in order for a soul to reach tha land where the dead dwelled, he would have to cross a river, being carried across by a ferryman, (similar to the Greek concept of the River Styx and the ferryman, Charon). Anyone entering the land of the dead must enter completely naked, having left all of their worldly possessions behind. Sumerians also believed that even gods and goddesses could “die.”
In Babylonian mythology, Irkalla (also Ir-Kalla, Irkalia) is the underworld from which there is no return. It is also called Arali, Kigal, Gizal, and the lower world. Irkalla is ruled by the goddess Ereshkigal and her consort, the death god Nergal.
In Mesopotamian mythology, Ereshkigal (EREŠ.KI.GAL, lit. “great lady under earth”) was the goddess of Irkalla, the land of the dead or underworld. Sometimes her name is given as Irkalla, similar to the way the name Hades was used in Greek mythology for both the underworld and its ruler.
Ereshkigal was the only one who could pass judgment and give laws in her kingdom. The main temple dedicated to her was located in Kutha, the name of the capital of the Sumerian underworld, Irkalla.
Kutha, Cuthah, or Cutha (Sumerian: Gudua, modern Tell Ibrahim, Babil Governorate, Iraq) was an ancient city of Sumer on the right bank of the eastern branch of the Upper Euphrates, north of Nippur and around 25 miles northeast of Babylon.
The goddess Ishtar refers to Ereshkigal as her older sister in the Sumerian hymn “The Descent of Inanna” (which was also in later Babylonian myth, also called “The Descent of Ishtar”). Inanna/Ishtar’s trip and return to the underworld is the most familiar of the myths concerning Ereshkigal.
Allatu (Allatum) is an underworld goddess modeled after the mesopotamic goddess Ereshkigal and worshipped by western Semitic peoples, including the Carthaginians. She also may be equate with the Canaanite goddess Arsay.
Allāt or al-Lāt was a Pre-Islamic Arabian goddess who was one of the three chief goddesses of Mecca. She is mentioned in the Qur’an (Sura 53:19), which indicates that pre-Islamic Arabs considered her as one of the daughters of Allah along with Manāt and al-‘Uzzá.
The shrine and temple dedicated to al-Lat in Taif was demolished by Abu Sufyan ibn Harb, on the orders of Muhammad, during the Expedition of Abu Sufyan ibn Harb, in the same year as the Battle of Tabuk (which occurred in October 630 AD). The destruction of the idol was a demand by Muhammad before any reconciliation could take place with the citizens of Taif who were under constant attack.
Especially in older sources, Allat is an alternative name of the Mesopotamian goddess of the underworld, now usually known as Ereshkigal. She was reportedly also venerated in Carthage under the name Allatu.
The goddess occurs in early Safaitic graffiti (Safaitic han-’Ilāt “the Goddess”) and the Nabataeans of Petra and the people of Hatra also worshipped her, equating her with the Greek Athena and Tyche and the Roman Minerva. She is frequently called “the Great Goddess” in Greek in multi-lingual inscriptions. According to Wellhausen, the Nabataeans believed al-Lāt was the mother of Hubal (and hence the mother-in-law of Manāt).
Hubal was a god worshipped in pre-Islamic Arabia, notably at the Kaaba in Mecca. His idol was a human figure, believed to control acts of divination, which was in the form of tossing arrows before the statue. The direction in which the arrows pointed answered questions asked of the idol.
The origins of the cult of Hubal are uncertain, but the name is found in inscriptions from Nabataea in northern Arabia (across the territory of modern Syria and Iraq). The specific powers and identity attributed to Hubal are equally unclear.
Access to the idol was controlled by the Quraysh tribe. The god’s devotees fought against followers of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad during the Battle of Badr in 624 CE. After Muhammad entered Mecca in 630 CE, he removed the statue of Hubal from the Kaaba along with the idols of all the other pagan gods.
The name Nergal, Nirgal, or Nirgali refers to a deity worshipped throughout Mesopotamia (Akkad, Assyria and Babylonia) with the main seat of his cult at Cuthah represented by the mound of Tell-Ibrahim.
Nergal is mentioned in the Hebrew Bible as the deity of the city of Cuth (Cuthah): “And the men of Babylon made Succoth-benoth, and the men of Cuth made Nergal” (2 Kings, 17:30). Although standard iconography pictured Nergal as a lion. He is the son of Enlil and Ninlil.
Nergal actually seems to be in part a solar deity, sometimes identified with Shamash, but only a representative of a certain phase of the sun. Portrayed in hymns and myths as a god of war and pestilence, Nergal seems to represent the sun of noontime and of the summer solstice that brings destruction, high summer being the dead season in the Mesopotamian annual cycle.
In the late Babylonian astral-theological system Nergal is related to the planet Mars. As a fiery god of destruction and war, Nergal doubtless seemed an appropriate choice for the red planet, and he was equated by the Greeks either to the combative demigod Heracles (Latin Hercules) or to the war-god Ares (Latin Mars) — hence the current name of the planet. In Assyro-Babylonian ecclesiastical art the great lion-headed colossi serving as guardians to the temples and palaces seem to symbolise Nergal, just as the bull-headed colossi probably typify Ninurta.
Being a deity of the desert, god of fire, which is one of negative aspects of the sun, god of the underworld, and also being a god of one of the religions which rivaled Christianity and Judaism, Nergal was sometimes called a demon and even identified with Satan. According to Collin de Plancy and Johann Weyer, Nergal was depicted as the chief of Hell’s “secret police”, and worked as an “an honorary spy in the service of Beelzebub”.
Irkalla was originally another name for Ereshkigal, who ruled the underworld alone until Nergal was sent to the underworld and seduced Ereshkigal (in Babylonian mythology). Both the deity and the location were called Irkalla, much like how Hades in Greek mythology is both the name of the underworld and the god who ruled it.
The Sumerian netherworld was a place for the bodies of the dead to exist after death. One passed through the seven gates on their journey through the portal to the netherworld leaving articles of clothing and adornment at each gate, not necessarily by choice as there was a guardian at each gate to extract a toll for one’s passage and to keep one from going the wrong way. The living spirits of the dead are only spoken of in connection with this netherworld when someone has been placed here before they are dead or wrongly killed and can be saved. The bodies of the dead decompose in this afterlife, as they would in the world above.
As the subterranean destination for all who die, Irkalla is similar to Sheol of the Hebrew Bible or Hades of classic Greek mythology. It is different from more hopeful visions of the afterlife of the contemporaneous Egyptians and which later appeared in Platonic philosophy, Judaism, and Christianity. Though it can’t be seen as hell, like from a Christian perspective. Irkalla had no punishment or reward, being seen as a more dreary version of life above, with Erishkigal being seen as both warden and guardian of the dead rather than a sinister ruler like Satan or death gods of other religions.
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