Page Content (OCR)
152 were visible, blooming with gemstones; Carnelian bore fruit hanging in clusters, its vines too beautiful to behold. The foliage was of lapis lazuli; and grapes, too lush to look at, of ... stones were made." The partly damaged verses go on to list other kinds of fruit-bearing trees and the variety of precious stones—white and red and green—of which they were made. Pure water ran through the garden, and in its midst he saw "like a Tree of Life and a Tree of ... that of An-gug stones were made." Enthralled and amazed, Gilgamesh walked about the garden. Clearly, he found himself in a simulated Garden of Eden! Unbeknown to him, he was being watched by Utnapishtim. "Utnapishtim was looking from a distance, pondered and spoke to himself, took counsel with himself:"§ who is this man and how did he show up here? he wondered; "he who comes here is not one of my men"—no one who has been with him on the ark ... As he approached Gilgamesh, Gilgamesh was astounded: the hero of the Deluge from thousands of years ago was not at all older than he, Gilgamesh, was! "He said to him, to Utnapishtim, the Far-Distant: As I look upon thee, Utnapish- tim, thou art no different at all; even as I art thou!" But who are you, why and how did you get here? Utnapishtim wanted to know. And, as he had done with Si- duri and the boatman, Gilgamesh related the whole story of his Kingship, ancestry, comradeship with Enkidu, and_ the adventures in search of Immortality, including the latest ones. "So I thought of going to see Utnapishtim, the Far-Distant, of whom people speak," Gilgamesh concluded. Now, he told Utnapishtim, tell me the secret of your Immortality! Tell me "how you came to join the congregation of the gods, and attained eternal life?" Utnapishtim spoke to him, to Gilgamesh: I will reveal to thee, Gilgamesh, a hidden matter, a secret of the gods I will tell thee. And then followed the story of the Deluge reported in the first person by Utnapishtim, in all its details from beginning DIVINE ENCOUNTERS