The Ark Before Noah, Irving Finkel
The Ark Before Noah, Irving Finkel
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The Ark Before Noah
Decoding the Story of the Flood

Author: Irving Finkel

Narrator: Irving Finkel, Gareth Armstrong

Unabridged: 9 hr 2 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 04/30/2014

Categories: Nonfiction, History, Religion

Synopsis

Since the Victorian period, it has been understood that the story of Noah, iconic in the Book of Genesis, and a central motif in Judaism, Christianity and Islam, derives from a much older story that existed centuries before in ancient Babylon. But the relationship between the Babylonian and biblical traditions was shrouded in mystery. Then, in 2009, Irving Finkel, a curator at the British Museum and a world authority on ancient Mesopotamia, found himself playing detective when a member of the public arrived at the museum with an intriguing cuneiform tablet from a family collection. Not only did the tablet reveal a new version of the Babylonian Flood Story; the ancient poet described the size and completely unexpected shape of the ark, and gave detailed boat building specifications. Decoding this ancient message wedge by cuneiform wedge, Dr. Finkel discovered where the Babylonians believed the ark came to rest and developed a new explanation of how the old story ultimately found its way into the Bible. In The Ark Before Noah, Dr. Finkel takes us on an adventurous voyage of discovery, opening the door to an enthralling world of ancient voices and new meanings.

About Irving Finkel

Irving Finkel is the curator in charge of cuneiform inscriptions on tablets of clay from ancient Mesopotamia, of which the Middle East Department has the largest collection-some 130,000 pieces-of any modern museum. He specializes in ancient Mesopotamian medicine and magic, and he is also interested in literature, religion, and the history of ideas in this part of the world. He is interested in the history of board games throughout the world, especially the preservation of traditional board games in many non-Western societies. Irving is the author of several academic articles and books on ancient Babylon.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Clif on December 25, 2021

This book provides more information about the history of ancient Mesopotamian writing and the art of reading cuneiform texts than the average reader probably cares to learn. The author at one point claims that after 30 years of studying cuneiform texts he believes that he has a feel for the personal......more

Goodreads review by Libby on December 25, 2014

This is one of THOSE books. You know...the type with the big time expert author and the complex and abstruse subject and the 600+ pages. This is a doorstop of a book. It made my wrists ache to hold it up to read. So why did I give it five stars? Well, as I have repeatedly stated in reviews and comme......more

Goodreads review by Daphne on November 04, 2015

I absolutely ADORED this book. Not only did I learn an incredible amount, but the author is a quintessentially British academic - and that makes him adorable. At least, to me. I dig that sort of thing. Page after page is injected with both hard facts, historic discovery, and the dry humor that you e......more

Goodreads review by Dschreiber on April 30, 2015

Before 1872 everyone believed that the story of Noah and the Ark was unique to the Bible, a distinctive part of the story of the Jewish nation. That assumption crumbled one day when an assistant in the British Museum discovered a Babylonian version of the story from the city of Nineveh written on a......more

Goodreads review by Sophia on August 24, 2021

I really enjoyed this book. I can't say I was fully convinced by all of Finkel's arguments, but his passion for the subject is evident and I got swept up in the text. For a casual reader, the sections on cuneiform may seem dry and a slog to get through, I did not mind them at all, and learned quite......more

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