The Šuilla (Hand-Lifting Prayer)
Hands lifted to a high god: 'I am sick, I have sinned, your servant cries — turn back your anger.'
Also: shuilla · šuilla · hand-lifting prayer · lifted hand prayer · petition prayer · personal prayer
The shuilla — literally 'lifting of the hand' — is the classic Mesopotamian prayer of personal petition. The worshipper raises their hands and addresses a great god: first praising the god's power and mercy, then laying out their trouble, begging relief from sickness, sin, or the anger of a god, and promising future praise. These prayers were typically embedded in rituals conducted by the exorcist-priest (ashipu). Dignified, intimate, and formally structured, they are among the most moving texts of Mesopotamian piety — the voice of an individual reaching up to a god for help.
In short
The 'lifted-hand' prayer (šuilla / Sumerian šu-íl-la), a personal petition to a high god — praise, complaint, request, and thanksgiving — offered with hands raised, often within an incantation-priest's ritual.
Where it’s found
The Akkadian šuilla corpus (akkadian-pending; Foster, Before the Muses; Mayer, Untersuchungen). The Sumerian penitential/petition register is represented in the corpus, e.g. letter-prayers (ETCSL 3.3.*, in corpus)
How the idea developed across Sumer, Babylon & Assyria
Šuilla prayers are mainly first-millennium Akkadian and tied to the exorcist's (āšipu) ritual practice; the Sumerian šu-íl-la designation underlies the genre name. They sit beside the related ershahunga ('to soothe the heart') penitential prayers.