Comparing By the Waters of Babylon and The Epic of Gilgamesh

“By the waters of Babylon” Vs Epic of Gilgamesh. A lot of stories concerning religions and cultures have lot of similarities and differences, despite the fact that they are not from the same era of time. Humans used these stories and writings to express their culture and religious views. “By the Waters of Babylon” is very similar to the writings of the Mesopotamian writings in The Epic of Gilgamesh more specificlay “The story of the flood” and “The Return”. These similarities include many gods in both, a unique quality in the characters of both than can include “born to greatness”, people of both writings lead to their death themselves, John and Gilgamesh Come home with lessons.etc In most of all ancient influences, there are characters in the stories, who are born to some kind of greatness, or we can say, a special type of person. In “By the Waters of Babylon” when John and his father goes to the dead places, John, explains that only priest can touch metal and are believed to have special powers that no other normal human being would have , “and then he who touches the metal must be a priest or the son of a priest” (Benet 75).This shows how is John born to greatness, being the son of a priest and can touch metal wherever he wants. The priests are believed to have special powers that no other normal human being would have. This compares to the Epic of Gilgamesh, when Author of Epic of Gilgamesh said “Two thirds they made him god and one third man” (Prologue).This shows how Gilgamesh was born to greatness by having 1/3 characteristics of man and 2/3 of god and this compares the born to greatness in both the writings . Some religions and cultures believe in one god; monotheistic religions, and others believe in many gods; polytheistic religions. In “By the Waters of Babylon” Benet’s main character, John, speaks of The Place of the Gods, “It is forbidden to cross the great river and look upon the place that was the Place of the Gods