During the 1930s, a glass box in our sun parlor contained a family treasure: the peace treaty of King Entemena of Lagash. Some 4,500 years ago, Entemena issued the contract and commanded his scribes to produce more than forty identical inscribed documents, declaring the peace that had been negotiated with the king of Erech (Gen. 10:10). The identical records were implanted in the temple of the goddess Inana in her temple at Tel-loh, not far from modern Bagdad.

But how did our family come upon this prize? Here the story turns to an early archaeologist named Edgar J. Banks. He had been assigned to the American embassy in Baghdad and spent his spare time examining relics of the ancient cultures that had lain between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. Archaeology became his passion, and in 1902 he was appointed director of the University of Chicago’s Babylonian Expedition, funded by John Rockefeller. It took two years to obtain permission from the Ottoman government, but at last the archaeological work commenced.

There were rich finds, and local inhabitants offered him countless artifacts.

Banks was to accumulate an enormous hoard of clay tablets, pottery, cylinder seals and numerous other artifacts from sites throughout the Middle East. These would later be acquired by a multitude of museums, universities and seminaries through-out America. He understood that these objects represented a precious historical heritage that was not being conserved by the Ottomans. Although at first Banks was primarily concerned with educational and research values, old age, declining health and the Great Depression caused him to turn to private collectors to sell the remainder of his collections. Still mindful of professional integrity, he sold well below the rates of regular dealers of antiquities—indeed, at fire-sale prices. Each piece came with a careful description identifying the find-site, dating and translation—though the letters are now yellowed with age and fragile to handle. Banks’s other ventures took him further afield, including an association with Cecil B. DeMille that appears to have generated the proto-type of Indiana Jones. Like Banks, our family came to the conclusion that the peace treaty, after nearly a century in our possession, would be better placed in an institution where it

could bring an understanding of how the ancients wrote, thought and created enduring records, what values they prized, and how they viewed the society in which they lived. Made of mud clay, our particular piece is shaped like a giant nail with crisp wedge-shaped writing, known as cuneiform, on its lower portion. Unlike the copy on display at the Louvre, ours is still in perfect condition, as good as the day it was minted.

The first institution to which I offered the gift simply was not interested. Even though that ceremonial nail contained the earliest known record of a peace treaty, the existence of forty other copies greatly reduced the value and made it of no interest. A second curator, a graduate of the University of Chicago aware of Banks’s contribution to the knowledge of the Ancient Near East, was delighted to display the object alongside a Greek peace treaty more than a millennium younger.

But the initial rejection caused me to think about peace, whether ancient or contemporary, in a different way. Records of military conquests abound in the Near East, but here was a document that celebrated the arts of diplomacy rather than war. There is much we do not know about Entemena, but it is clear that he cared deeply about the creation of peace and that he was willing to take great pains to ensure there was a lasting and ample record of the treaty.

Had there previously been a lack of peace between Erech and Lagash? One can well infer that a great deal of diplomatic effort had been expended and that there was a profound commitment to keeping the peace. To keep peace requires communication rather than violence, with patience and respect working out manifold differences and difficulties as they arise. Peace is not created all at once but in small increments, as the need arises.

Entemena made a forty-fold proclamation of peace that was then entrusted to divine protection within the safe walls of a sanctuary. Is not this effort to be respected? Do we not need to declare our own commitment to peace forty times over, to preach it from our pulpits, to affirm it in our personal lives, and to promote it in family relationships?

All around us is a society that relishes violence and condones its existence, even in the supposed safety of the home. The Bible tells us to depart from evil and do good, to seek peace and pursue it (Ps. 34:14), while Jesus declared, “Blessed are the peacemakers.” It is good to condemn violence and all forms of abuse. It is even better to build paths of peace.