A Contribution to the Study of the Moral Practices of Certain Social Groups in Ancient Mesopotamia (Classic Reprint) - Softcover

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Excerpt from A Contribution to the Study of the Moral Practices of Certain Social Groups in Ancient Mesopotamia

The Sumerian and Akkadian peoples were little concerned with speculative ethics. The approach to the Study of the moral ideals of a society now merely historical, our knowledge of which is based on scattered and all too insufficient records, must be a sociological one. Yet sociological development and moral evolution are not identical; for a social structure may be built up or torn down unwittingly. While the rules evolved by any society are not necessarily ethical, it is essential to study varieties of customs, since non-ethical customs are of value in so far as they affect the standard of conduct of the group or individual. In the evolution of a people, influenced as it is by geography, economic conditions, religious concep tions, and other forces, it is difficult to trace the moral ele ments. The purpose of this dissertation is to select from Sumerian and Akkadian literature now accessible to us, such illustrations as seem to indicate most clearly the moral ideals and practices of the group. We are not here concerned with the ideals of the individual as such, but shall confine ourselves rather to customs which reveal some of the principles which regulate conduct within certain social units, as the nation, the family, classes of women, slaves. A study of the laws and customs connected with such groups may serve as a basis for judging the general moral status of ancient Mesopotamia.'

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