Gilgameshs Quest for Immortality free essay sample

In the epic poem Gilgamesh, the main theme is Gilgamesh’s quest to defeat the demon that is in the back of every human’s mind at all times: death. His quest to defeat mankind’s penultimate battle proves futile in the end, yet could Gilgamesh be considered to be immortal in a different sense? Immortality can exist on two planes: both a physical and metaphorical world. Gilgamesh did fail is his quest to live tangibly forever, and therefore seeks everlasting life in an allegorical sense. If he could create something, an idea or an action that will be remembered forever, such as killing Humbaba, he too can live forever via this accomplishment. So, in a sense, Gilgamesh did actually succeed in his quest for eternal life. We will write a custom essay sample on Gilgameshs Quest for Immortality or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Gilgamesh has everything he could possibly ask for: riches, fame, power, yet he still wants more. He wants to live forever. Since he is used to being instantaneously gratified of everything he wants, he expects the same to occur in his quest for eternal life. After the death of Enkidu, his desire to live forever grows even stronger. Having a sheltered, privileged life, the death of Gilgamesh’s closed friend, essentially his other half, was most likely his first experience with death, and it terrified him. In Book IX, he asks, â€Å"Must I die too? Must I be as lifeless as Enkidu? How can I bear this sorrow that gnaws at my belly, this fear of death that drives me onward? † This does indeed drive him onward and leads him straight to the gods. Gilgamesh is not pleased with what the gods have to tell him, though. After his long journey and the retelling of his story, Shiduri tells him â€Å"You will never find the eternal life that you seek. When the gods created makind, they also created death, and they held back eternal life for themselves alone. Humans are born, the live, then they die, this is the order the gods have decreed. † Yet, instead of accepting his fate (which is the common fate of all mankind), he becomes enraged, demanding knowledge of how to find Utnapishtim. Gilgamesh is told the key to eternal life—an herb. However, once he picks this herb, a snake eats it and Gilgamesh has exhausted all his chances at immortality. The story abruptly ends there. We do not know to what extent Gilgamesh accepts his fate, if he does at all. But if one creates something that will live forever, won’t he too live forever? Shakespeare has been dead in a physical sense for almost 400 years, yet his work is as, if not more, prevalent today than it was then. So couldn’t one argue that Shakespeare is still alive in the context of his sonnets and plays? He is dead, yet he created something that will live forever. One can also live eternally by carrying out an action or initiative that affects people for many years to come. Again, for an example, Martin Luther King Jr. is dead, however, he lives on through all the progress he made for civil rights. Obviously, Gilgamesh will not live on as an immortal forever. However, he manifests himself in an action that will live on forever—killing Humbaba. So, he lives eternally through the execution of this action. The fact that he could live on forever in the minds of men is alluded to several times in the text. When Gilgamesh and Enkidu leave on their quest to slay Humbaba, Gilgamesh says, â€Å"I will cut down the tree, I will kill Humbaba, the whole world will know how mightly I am. I will make a lasting name for myself, I will stamp my fame on men’s minds forever. † His name lives on throughout the centuries, so he does along with it. These allusions are made only early in the text, by both Gilgamesh and Enkidu. In addition to the previous quote, Gilgamesh says in Book V, â€Å"If we help each other and fight side by side, we will make a lasting name for ourselves, we will stamp our fame on men’s minds forever. † The early discussion of living forever through actions rather than in the flesh could show that Gilgamesh or Enkidu might have some awareness of their fate. If either one of them could exist physically forever, what would be the point of killing Humbaba? They’d have all eternity to put their stamp on the human race, so why bother trying to leave their mark through an action that is dangerous and capable of inducing anger in the gods? Gilgamesh was written over 4600 years ago. It’s arguably the oldest written text, older even than the bible. 4600 years is a long time, essentially an eternity relative to the average human’s timeline. And we are still reading Gilgamesh today. So, he has succeeded in his quest for immortality. We all know his name, what he did. He is alive in both our minds and the pages of this book.