It is indeed difficult to imagine that ancient Mesopotamians would have had any cause to regard the dead as pitiably weak and helpless, given the terrible fright and sometimes gruesome physical illnesses alleged to have been inflicted by angry ghosts. Explicit or implicit in arguments that ancient Israelites neither sought assistance from the dead nor feared their retribution is the notion that ancient Mesopotamians (who are generally acknowledged as practicing some form of ancestor cult) did not share the Yahwist view of the pitiable dead as expressed in such passages as Ecclesiastes 9:4ff.
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