This composition, probably dating from the second half of the second millennium BC, has sometimes been called "The poem of the Righteous Sufferer". This is because at first glance, it bears some similarity to the Biblical book of Job, especially in its fundamental topic: suffering.
Ludlul is a monologue, written in Akkadian on four Tablets of 120 lines each, in the voice of a Babylonian nobleman called Šubši-mešre-Šakkan (lit. "Create Wealth, O Šakkan!"). Although once rich and powerful, he was forsaken by the god Marduk and suffered all kinds of pains as a result, both moral and physical, before being finally saved by the gods and restored to his former position. Apart from an account of the narrator's suffering, it is also a hymn of praise to Marduk and a justification to exalt him.
- Tablet 1 opens with a hymn to Marduk, for which CTN 4, 201 [/cams/gkab/P363615/] from Kalhu is our main source. The narrator then explains that Marduk got angry with him and punished him. The following passage is better known from the Huzirina manuscript STT 1, 32 [/cams/gkab/P338349/]. As a consequence, his own personal deities leave him, and he becomes homeless. The Tablet then continues with an elaborate litany of the narrator's hardships, beginning with his social decline. He loses favour at court and is the victim of seven conspirators. Then all his friends and family then turn against him and misfortune falls upon those few who wish to help him. Finally he loses all his property and is financially ruined. The Tablet ends with a long lament, yet concluds with few words of hope.
- Unfortunately, the narrator's situation does not improve in Tablet 2, and even worsens (see STT 1, 33 [/cams/gkab/P338350/]). A year later, the diviners are unable to predict his future, and the gods are still against him, despite his pious behaviour and all his offerings. The story proceeds with an exhaustive list of illnesses that fall upon the narrator: the healers cannot provide a cure and death is threatening.
- Unexpectedly, hope comes back in Tablet 3, of which there is no manuscript in Huzirina or Kalhu. In a series of dreams, Šubši-mešre-Šakkan encounters different figures, human and non-human, who perform rituals and incantations in his behalf. Finally, an āšipu named Ur-Nintinugga carries out the ritual that releases him from Marduk's wrath. He is cured of all the illnesses that affected him in the second Tablet.
- At the beginning of Tablet 4, of which there is only one small surviving fragment in Huzirina, STT 1, 27) [/cams/gkab/P338344/], Marduk takes Šubši-mešre-Šakkan's hand, and helps him to punish all those who were against him in the first Tablet. After having accomplished a series of appropriate rituals in the Esagil, Marduk's temple in Babylon, the protagonist walks through a series of twelve doors, where he is given back all that was taken from him in the first Tablet, his property as well as his protective deity. A hymn of praise to Marduk and the expression of the narrator's happiness follow. The final moral recalls how Marduk's praise is sweet.
Manuscripts of this composition have been found all over Mesopotamia, so that it clearly seems to belong to the "classic" scribal curriculum of the first millennium, as Petra Gesche has suggested. It is thus not surprising to find it in both Kalhu and Huzirina; the colophon of the Huzirina manuscript even states that it is a copy by a scribal apprentice (lu2ŠAB.TUR), named Iddi-Meslamtaea PGP .
The sophisticated language and vocabulary used in the text also tend to indicate that it belonged to the second phase of scribal education. The work contains many rare and uncommon words, as well as some puns. Moreover, it has many stylistic features, such as semantic, grammatical and phonological parallelisms. It is thus an example of a composition written by and for a scribal elite, even perhaps serving the interest of the ritual experts' community, as Alan Lenzi has been recently suggested.
Further reading