The Tale of the Poor Man of Nippur between Mesopotamian and Biblical Wisdom

Abstract

This article provides a tentative new overall reading of the literary composition in Akkadian language known as (The Tale of) The Poor Man of Nippur implying a partial reassessment of former scholarly understandings and grounded in a comparative approach with selected examples of both Mesopotamian and biblical wisdom literature.
At first, a brief philological overview of the extant manuscripts and an outline of the plot (with notes accompanying its most debated and/or obscure passages) are provided, along with some remarks about the information they offer. Afterwards, a review of past scholarly understandings of the tale highlights the hermeneutical impasse interpreters face when dealing with it. The identification of a shared background of tropes and motifs between The Poor Man of Nippur and both Mesopotamian and biblical wisdom literature of the ‘pious sufferer’ lays the foundation for a new reading that circumvents the impasse and allows The Poor Man to be refrained in a new context and envisioned as a ‘hypertext’ conversing with wisdom literary tradition. Ultimately, The Poor Man can be read as a sample of ‘skeptical literature’, in line with other cognate examples stemming from the wisdom tradition.