Discuss the ways in which the natural environment influenced religious beliefs in Sumer.

Sumer's natural environment is the rich
agricultural area between the Tigris and Eurphrates rivers. In this place, water was life, and
people depended on nature's recurrent bounty for survival. Fortunately for ancient Sumerians,
their land was good, and the natural environment provided lavishly for their needs. This is one
of the reasons the Mesopotamia area became the "cradle of civilization."

As with many early peoples, the Sumerians were polytheists. This means they believed in
a pantheon of many gods. Among these, gods of fertility were notably important in the early
stages of Sumerian culture. When we think about the importance of fertile fields to agriculture,
it makes sense that fertility gods would be especially compelling for people. As fields die back
each season, only to be reborn anew the following year, these fertility gods might also undergo
an annual "death" and resurrection.

Later, gods took on more human
form and different characteristics. This went hand-in-hand with ancient Sumerians moving
gradually away from agricultural society and more into urban settlement. For example, the
goddess Inanna demonstrates a change in lifestyle and values through the following
story:

In the poem Inanna and the God of
Wisdom, the goddess travels from her city of Uruk to Eridu, home of her father Enki,
and invites him to sit and have a few drinks with her and, as he drinks and becomes more and
more jovial, he gladly hands over the meh to his daughter. Once she has
gathered them all, she runs to her ship and brings them to Uruk, thus making her city preeminent
and diminishing Eridu. Modern-day scholars believe this myth arose in response to the shift from
an agrarian culture (symbolized by Eridu) to the urban development epitomized by Uruk, among the
most powerful cities in the region. [From "Sumerians" article by Joshua J.
Mark]

Here, we can see that the changing lifestyle of
people affected their religious beliefs. The fertility god was no longer as important as crafty
Inanna and other urban deities. The natural environment slowly became less essential in
importance compared with the powerful cities of Sumer.

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