Wisdom from the ANE: “intellectual” (dub-sar!) was not yet become a term of abuse

Apparently the Babylonians did not set much store by small government, and “intellectual” (dub-sar!) was not yet become a term of abuse. Also, it should count for something that all this thinking and writing came from those who were judged to be the best minds, and certainly the best schooled intellects, of their times.—Herman Vanstiphout, in What Is a God?, 18