The Marzeaḥ and the Ugaritic Magic Ritual System: a close reading of KTU 1114,

• Autores: Gregorio del Olmo Lete
• Localización: Aula Orientalis: Revista de estudios del Próximo Oriente Antiguo, ISSN 0212-5730, Vol. 33, Nº. 2, 2015, págs. 221-242
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • A close reading of KTU 1.114 allows us to uncover in its composition a very serious religious aim, far away from its bearing, usually accorded to it, as being a mere burlesque historiola. Ilu's behavior is provided as the "hieròs lógos" of the "marzeaḥ", as an institution devoted to the magic, namely necromantic, praxis for contacting the Underworld through the altered state of consciousness reached by drunkenness, for whose aftermath also warrants a cure. In this way, the "marzeaḥ", that is to say necromancy, becomes integrated into the Ugaritic religious world as a legitimated cultic praxis within the magic system under divine and social control, parallel to the sacrificial temple system. The presence and function of different deities are staged in a sort of paradigmatic and thus legitimating celebration of this praxis: religion and magic here meet each other. The distinctive elements that make up this magic institution and its magic praxis are summarized in this text: place of gathering, hierarchical organization, eating of wild food and abundant swallowing of wine, reaching a state of drunkenness up to the point of catalepsis, encounter with the Underworld ghosts, recovering of the normal state of consciousness. The text, found along with others of the same religious aim and magic praxis, has the double function of a theological etiology and a medico-magic prescription, both of them intimately related.