Gilgamesh Foil

With the recent death of Nelson Mandela a wave of sadness struck the districts. It seemed that not only a man had died but a way of life. For Nelson Mandela was not only a great leader. He was a seemingly god-like figure, capable of doing the right thing despite hatred or his own feelings. He did not look back on the shortcomings of his allies or frown at his captors, rather he learned from his mistakes and the suffering of jail and used the pain that this had brought him in order to do even better things. I can not help bought imagine what a different world we would be living in today if everyone had behaved in the same manner as Mandela. Behind the complex words and deep metaphors of the epic poem Gilgamesh lies a deeper story, one that teaches

He does not yet appreciate life, or death. This is shown when Gilgamesh forces his people to build up his walls only to watch ”the walls go unattended and decay.” (Page 16). For Gilgamesh, life has no meaning. For without suffering the world will not move forward, as if nothing is wrong, why would we strive to make it better? This is paralleled by Enkidu, Gilgamesh’s foil, who is half man and half animal. “Enkidu was ignorant of oldness,” (Page 16) he did not understand the delicate balance of life. He just goes along in life, only seeing his own side of things. Enkidu frees animals from traps, without knowing the other side. In order to go forward and become human, Enkidu must experience pain and suffering. When the prostitute comes in order to aid Enkidu on this journey into humanity, the animals reacted and fled, deserting Enkidu for the first time. Enkidu “felt a strange exhaustion, as if life had left his body.” (Page 18) Only by experiencing this pain and suffering, Enkidu had make the journey into humanity. The only way he could learn was by experiencing pain and learning from that

The resolution to the story, although spanning only a couple of pages, shows us some of the most meaningful things in the whole epic. Gilgamesh returns to Uruk and is “awed at the heights his people had achieved.” (Page 92) He was, for the first time, in realizes the amazing feats that people, his people had accomplished. He realizes that life must come to an end but that must not discourage us from recognizing the amazing things we can do before death. This is the true meaning of Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh had finally learned from his suffering. For Gilgamesh’s journey, throughout all of the hard times,had taught Gilgamesh a very important lesson, one that will lead to Gilgamesh becoming one of the greatest leaders of the