Property of Sekhmet

Continuing to rummage randomly through my collection of downloads, photocopies, and far too many books :-), I came across a journal article about abominations in Sumerian literature. The English word "abomination" is so intense, meaning hateful, repulsive, obscene; and yet the ancient words it's used to translate seem so mild by comparison.

One of the few places the word is used seriously these days is in opposition to gay rights, based on Leviticus 18:22 (KJV: "Thou shalt not lie with mankind as with womankind: it is abomination"). Apparently there's no agreement on whether this was a serious moral violation, like murder or adultery, or a kind of ritual impurity or uncleanliness, like having sex with a menstruating woman. Other Biblical "abominations" include everything from child sacrifice to fiddling the scales. The Sumerian "abominations" are a similar mixture of moral or ethical violations ("A judge who perverts justice... it is an abomination of Utu."), ritual incorrectness ("Wheat flour is forbidden as an offering to gods.") and general ickiness ("To banquet without washing the hands, to spit without stamping (on the spittle)... these are abominations of Utu.") There are similar admonishments in Akkadian and in Egyptian wisdom literature. In fact, the author argues that the words used in Sumerian, Akkadian, and Hebrew for these forbidden actions have basically the same meaning.

I'm partial to the theory that what Leviticus 18:22 is condemning is ritual anal sex between men - that it's an example of the foreign religious practices forbidden to the Israelites, along with making idols, cross-dressing, and divination. In Deuteronomy, the article argues, the "abominations" are cultic, "and chief among these are precisely those practices most sacred to foreign deities". It was for these practices that Yahweh kicked the other tribes out, and He warns His people against imitating them. If this interpretation is correct, then perhaps "abomination" is too strong a word - it's more like a taboo.*
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Hallo, William W. Biblical Abominations and Sumerian Taboos. Jewish Quarterly Review (new series) 76(1) July 1985 pp 21-40.

* A serious one, of course, since it was one of many activities which could get you the death penalty, at least according to the letter of the law - although I suspect that, as with the Code of Hammurabi, the maximum penalty was not always the actual one.