{"collection":"Hypertext Bible","full_text_available":false,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/sacred_texts_v1_bib_fbe_fbe264_htm/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/sacred_texts_v1_bib_fbe_fbe264_htm","id":"sacred_texts_v1_bib_fbe_fbe264_htm","license":"unknown_pending_legal_review","rights_basis":"sacred_texts_v1_preview_gate_primary_text_only; acquisition-method/ToS and compilation-copyright questions still open, not resolved by this gate","source":"sacred_texts_v1","source_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/bib/fbe/fbe264.htm","summary":"This is a narrative excerpt from the Story of Ahikar, an ancient Near Eastern wisdom tale preserved in the apocryphal collection *The Forgotten Books of Eden*. The passage recounts how the Assyrian sage Haiq\u00e2r, serving as an envoy to Pharaoh, defeats a series of impossible rhetorical and practical challenges through wit and lateral thinking \u2014 building a castle between heaven and earth using eagles, making ropes from sea-sand, and turning Pharaoh's trick questions back on him with parallel absurdities. The tale belongs to the courtly wisdom tradition common across Mesopotamian, Hebrew, and Egyptian literature, in which a clever counselor demonstrates the supremacy of his king by outwitting foreign rivals. What distinguishes this excerpt is its sustained comic register \u2014 rare in texts of this antiquity \u2014 with Haiq\u00e2r's responses operating as logical traps that force Pharaoh to concede defeat through his own premises. The story closes on a darker note: upon returning home triumphant and lavished with honors, Haiq\u00e2r's first request is not wealth but revenge on his treacherous nephew Nadan, who is bound in iron chains and thrown into a dark cell. For a prospective reader, this excerpt offers an accessible and entertaining window into ancient popular literature, blending political intrigue, trickster humor, and morality-tale vengeance in a tightly plotted episode.","tags":["Biblical Apocrypha","Forgotten Books of Eden","Pseudepigrapha"],"text":null,"title":"The Forgotten Books of Eden: The Story of Ahikar: Chapter VI","tradition":"Hypertext Bible","translated_text":null,"word_count":1732}