pointed out, traditions waver between assigning to Ea or to
Bel-Marduk so fundamental a function as the creation of mankind. In
short, the present form of the creation epic is 'eclectic' and embodies
what the Germans call a _tendenz_. To each of the great gods, Anshar,
Anu, Bel, and Ea, some part in the contest is assigned, but the greatest
role belongs to Marduk.

The second tablet closes with Anshar's decision to send his son Marduk
against Tiamat:

Marduk heard the word of his father.
His heart rejoiced and to his father he spoke.

With joyous heart he is ready to proceed to the contest, but he at once
makes good his claim to supreme control in case he is victorious. He
addresses the assembled gods:

When I shall have become your avenger,
Binding Tiamat and saving your life,
Then come in a body,
In Ubshu-kenna,[716] let yourselves down joyfully,
My authority instead of yours will assume control,
Unchangeable shall be whatever I do,
Irrevocable and irresistible, be the command of my lips.

The declaration foreshadows the result.

The third tablet is taken up with the preliminaries for the great
contest, and is interesting chiefly because of the insight it affords us
into Babylonian methods of literary composition. Anshar sends Gaga[717]
to the hostile camp with the formal announcement of Marduk's readiness
to take up the cause of the gods. Gaga does not face Tiamat directly,
but leaves the message with Lakhmu and Lakhamu:

Go Gaga, messenger (?) joy of my liver,
To Lakhmu and Lakhamu I will send thee.

The message proper begins as follows:

Anshar your son has sent me,
The desire of his heart he has entrusted to me.
Tiamat, our mother is full of hate towards us,
With all her might she is bitterly enraged.

The eleven associates that Tiamat has ranged on her side are again
enumerated, together with the appointment of Kingu as chief of the
terror-inspiring army. Gaga comes to Lakhmu and Lakhamu and delivers the
message verbatim, so that altogether this portion of the narrative is
repeated no less than four times.[718] The same tendency towards
repetition is met with in the Gilgamesh epic and in the best of the
literary productions of Babylonia. It may be ascribed to the influence
exerted by the religious hymns and incantations where repetition, as we
have seen, is also common, though serving a good purpose.

The message concludes:

I sent Anu, he could not endure her[71