...There are many different explanations regarding the creation of the Earth. Various cultures and religions all have their own explanations that were passed down through generations that specifically explain the development of Earth. The Modoc Tribe tells their story about the creation of Earth through “When Grizzlies Walked Upright.” The Christian religion explains its version of Earth’s creation through the first two chapters in Genesis in the Bible. Both of these stories have a spiritual head figure, punishments for acting out and an above world, however their differences include a difference in the order of the creation and humans in each story. In “When the Grizzlies Walked Upright” and in the first two chapters of Genesis, each story...
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...The Tale of Two Creations: How Two Creation Stories Can Create a Singular Narrative Genesis sets the stage for the rest of the story told within the Hebrew Bible. It provides the foundation for who the Israelites are and who their God is. As the first book of the Torah and Hebrew Bible, Genesis recounts the creation of the world, the destruction of mankind with the flood, and the foundation of monotheism through Abraham. As Segal explains, “[the Torah] is a narrative, tracing the history of the world, humanity, and then focusing on a particular nation” (13). The Torah as a whole creates a compelling and rich account of ancient Jewish history. The creation of the world and humanity is the starting basis for the Torah, beginning with two separate...
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...Gen 1:1-2:4a World Behind the text Historical and Cultural Context Genesis illustrates the way Biblical writers J (Yahwist), E (Elohist) and P (Priestly) drew upon the cultural and religious legacy of the Ancient Near East (ANE) along with its stories and imagery and transformed it to conform to a new vision of a non-mythological God and a monotheistic, superior religion. “The Pentateuch developed against the background of the Ancient Near Eastern culture first cultivated in and spread by Sumerian, Assyrian, and Babylonian empires”. This exemplifies how Israelite religion, was “shaped by responses to and reactions against this culture due both to contacts with neighboring Canaanites and to conflicts with Assyrian and Babylonian empires”. Genesis 1:1-2:4a can therefore be said to reflect the “Babylonian account of creation, which we call Enuma Elish…known from at least 1700 BCE,” “predating the earliest text of Genesis by at least a millennium.” In both Genesis and the ancient Babylonian myth, water is divided into upper and lower waters. The Enuma Elish is recorded on seven tablets and the Genesis account is completed in seven days. The Babylonians created humans to serve as slaves yet in Genesis God creates humans in the likeness of the divine. The Priestly source penned the creation story with the intent of being a “monumental historiographic composition…with the purpose of portraying both the beginnings of mankind and Israel in the spirit of a monotheistic concept...
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...Popol Vuh and Genesis are both theories on how the world was formed and human beings came to be. Within the story Genesis, god created humans not because he was lonely, or need worshipers but because of his love for creativity. “God is love (1 John 4:8), and because of that love and his wonderful creativity, he made us so we can enjoy all that he is and all that he's done.” The creation story Popol Vuh is based off of the gods needing worshipers and people to admire what they have created. The reason for creating humans in Popol Vuh was a more selfish and greedy matter, rather than caring for the humans. Both of these creation stories are very similar and at the same time very different from each other, In both stories the gods create the...
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...Two Creation Myths HUM/105 September 17, 2012 The two creation stories I chose to write about are The Genesis account (Hebrew) and the Iroquois Creation myth (Sky Woman). There are several different worlds represented in the two myths I chose. The worlds covered in the story of the Sky Woman are sky, earth, water, and underworld. In the creation story of the Iroquois (Sky Woman) starts off with two worlds an upper world and a lower world. The divine lived in the upper world; the lower world was covered with water and the only beings on the lower land were ones who knew how to swim (Ray, , 2006). In the creation story of Genesis (Hebrew) it talks about the elements we see and experience today. In the Genesis creation story we learn according to "Bible Gateway" (2011), God in the beginning created the heavens and earth. God first spoke that there be light, He named light “day” and darkness night ("Bible Gateway", 2011). God saw that the earth was formless and void and He created water, land, and the sky ("Bible Gateway", 2011). In this creation story the worlds that are spoken about are Heaven, earth, sky, land and water. The creator in the Genesis creation is God it doesn’t state but it is assumed the He is a man. In the story of the Sky woman the creator is a woman. The significance of gender in the Genesis story is that God created human beings to be in His image, in which the first person was a man. The significance of the Sky woman being a female is that with...
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...s paper one will discuss two myths from different cultures. The two myths chosen for this paper are the Genesis creation (Hebrew origin) of the Christian culture, and the Norse culture of Iceland (the Vikings). Both of these creation myths start with an emptiness where conflict and chaos eventually develop. The Genesis crearion is between God, nothing, blackness, emptiness, loneliness, and the need to create something. The Norse creation is between the dark cold realm of Niflheim, within the emptiness of Ginnungagap, and the fiery realm of Muspell, where nothing can grow. There are nine classifications of creation myths, which most include more than one motif. The Genesis cosmogonies applies both ex nihilo, and deus faber motifs. The story begins with the ex nihilo myth, which God creates the light, the dark, the sun, the moon, the earth, the stars, plants, animals, birds, and fish, within six days out of nothing. This account is told in Genesis, the first book of the Old Testament. Then God creates a man, Adam, in his own image from the dust of the earth and breathes life into him. When God realizes it is not good for man to be alone, he causes a deep sleep to come upon Adam. Then he takes a rib from Adams side and forms a woman. Therefore, combining deus faber (the "maker-God") with ex nihilo motifs. The Norse creation myths combines secretion, sacrifice, and accretion/conjunction motifs. It combines fire and ice in a random conjoining of elements. The myth begins with...
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...and politics. These controversial topics fascinate and titillate the best of us including William H. Jennings, author of Storms over Genesis and Professor of Religion, Emeritus, at Muhlenberg College. His investigative work into the interpretations of the first three chapters of the most famous book in the world, the Bible, gives the reader insight into the environmentalist views, feminist views, and those of creationists. By seeking clarification of the various creation stories, Jennings tries to illuminate the current scholarly views of this ancient text including the origin and timeline of the Earth. The Earth has been in existence for quite some time. Just how long is still unknown, but scientists, especially environmental Darwinists, estimate the Earth is 4.55 billion years old (Jennings 86). But the date of Earth’s origin and the presence of man are two separate questions depending on if one relies on biblical references or stories, creationism, which put the age of the world, the beginning of creation between 6,000-10,000 years (77) or modern science. A Gallup poll found supporters of each side to be fairly split, forty-six percent towards creationism and thirty-six percent pointing to Darwinism as the correct derivation (88). Why is the question of Earth’s origin so germane? According to many, because Genesis only deals with God’s creation of man in His image, and science can prove the existence of “pre-Adam” man dating back millenniums. By dating the origin of the world...
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...Creation of Man This is the history of Humanity. “In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form and void…” (Genesis 1:1-2) There are two versions or parts of creation in the Bible. The first one is in Genesis 1:1-2:4, and the second, Genesis 2:4-2:24. However, it is all connected into a more detailed and exciting story. From the beginning, God forged us, humanity, with a purpose, but that change after Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of knowledge of good and evil. However, we will first unite the pieces and see the greater picture. As we all know, the Bible starts narrating us on Genesis 1, how from nothing God began his creation, but there were darkness and emptiness. Again he said, “Let there be light,”...
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...Creation Myths Across Cultures Angie Laird HUM/105 - World Mythology Class Group: BSDH16JHC0 University of Phoenix Online Instructor: Gerald Grudzen February 11, 2013 Comparing and contrasting creation myths The two creation myths chosen to compare and contrast focuses on the Norse culture of Iceland Vikings and the Genesis creation of the Hebrew origin of Christian culture. Both creation myths begin with an empty void where chaos or conflict develops. The Norse myth narrates a conflict between the fiery realm of Muspell and the dark, cold realm of Niflheim within the emptiness called ginnungagap and where nothing could grow. The Genesis conflict was between God and nothing, loneliness, and the need to create something beautiful. There are specifically nine classifications of creation myths and many employ more than one motif. Genesis cosmogonies apply both the deus faber and ex nihilo motifs. The story often considered the ex nihilo myth, meaning "out of nothing" is the account in the first book of the Old Testament, Genesis, of God's creation in six days by speaking into existence light and darkness, sun and moon, stars and earth, plants and animals, and birds and fish. God then generates Adam in His image from the dust and breathes life into him and Eve was formed from one of Adam's ribs, therefore combining deus faber (the "maker-God") with ex nihilo motifs. The Nordic creation myths tend to combine accretion/conjunction, secretion, and sacrifice motifs. It features...
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...Cosmic Creation Myths Vanessa Pomi HUM 105 December 1, 2014 Christa Menninger Cosmic Creation Myths There are several creation myths across different cultures. Every different culture has its own unique creation myth that explains how the world and life came to be (Leonard & McClure, 2004). Although each culture has a different way of explaining the creation story, there are similarities and differences among them. Two of the myths that are more divergent in content are the Eddas creation myth from Norse culture and the Genesis creation myth from Hebrew culture. Although both creation stories have more than one realm, they differ in how they break each area down. Both creation myths also have a god or gods as the beginning creators. All cultures have their own creation myths and it is interesting to see the similarities and differences between them. There are many worlds or realms to take into consideration when discussing the Norse creation myth. In the beginning there was a realm called Muspell which was made of fire, and a realm called Niflheim which was made of ice (Leonard & McClure, 2004). Between both of these realms was a sea of emptiness called Ginnungagap (Leonard & McClure, 2004). All three of the realms were not considered to be part of the heavens or the earth but rather before earth. These realms were the beginning or pre-worlds of the Norse creation myths. According to Norse mythology there were two main creators, Ymir and Audumla (Leonard...
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...Campbell expressed in his book Myths to Live By, a sure "solidarity of our species." The characterizing contrasts and similarities between most societies can particularly be found in every society's close to home story of creation. The story of Genesis in the Bible, for instance, could give a lot of knowledge into the comprehension of the world in the brains of a noteworthy part of the United States today. As talked about in Genesis: A Living Conversation, the maker, God, in this section of the book of scriptures, is seen regularly by numerous Americans as a parental figure, and in contrasting this creation story with others, for example, the Greek story of creation by Hesiod and the Zuni myth of rise, one would be connecting the myths of three human advancements as well as the most essential thoughts of these three civic establishments. In this article, I will thoroughly analyze the creation stories of the Bible, the Zuni, and Hesiod through their topics of the primordial void before creation, the fall of mankind into what we now know, and the female central. In numerous myths of creation, there is the real trick of a period before time and/or space and/or request – a thought of nothingness before something goes along to set things in movement. The primary sentence of Genesis states "At the outset God...
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...Scholarly Journal Summary The “Journal for the Study of the Old Testament” had a very interesting topic that is discussed almost an unlimited amount of times in today’s society. The topic is sex, and how it is defined in Leviticus, with particular attention to Leviticus 18:6-23. This is due to the fact that in chapter 18 of Leviticus, it is formatted in such a way where it is laid out as law, or apodictic law. The author tries to deviate from just explaining what the scriptures mean in its context, but instead tries to use the contextual format from the chapters before and after chapter 18 to see what its true interpretation should lay on. Leviticus Chapter 18:6-23 is Lord God talking to Moses about the things that the Israelites shall not do. God speaks to Moses telling him to tell the people of Israel what he is telling him and no to do as others do. “You shall not do as they do in the Land of Egypt, where you lived, and you shall not do as they do in the land of Canaan, to which I am bringing you. You shall not follow their statutes” Leviticus 18:3. (Collins, Harper pg 177) Shortly after God states this to Moses, he describes multiple different ordinances of law dealing with Sexual Relations. A great deal of these ordinances deal with Incest Relationships, such as “None of you shall approach anyone near of kin to uncover nakedness” Leviticus 18:6. (Collins, Harper pg 177) Along with that verse there are multiple others deal with uncovering nakedness of your father, your...
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...Cosmic Creation Myths Across Cultures Arthil Valena Hum 105 May 23, 2016 David Hudson Cosmic Creation Myths Across Cultures There are many creation myths that originate from different cultures. Every culture has its own unique myth that explains creation and how the world and life came to be (Leonard & McClure, 2004). Although each culture has a different way of explaining the story of creation, there are some similarities and differences among them. Two of the myths that are more divergent in content are the Edda creation myth from Norse culture and the Genesis creation myth from Hebrew culture. Although both creation stories have more than one realm, they differ in how they break each area down. Both creation myths also have a god or gods as the beginning creators. All cultures have their own creation myths and it is interesting to see the similarities and differences between Monotheistic and Polytheistic There are many worlds or realms to take into consideration when discussing the Norse creation myth. In the beginning there was a realm called Muspell which was made of fire, and a realm called Niflheim which was made of ice (Leonard & McClure, 2004). Between both of these realms was a sea of emptiness called Ginnungagap (Leonard & McClure, 2004). All three of the realms were not considered to be part of the heavens or the earth but rather before earth. These realms were the beginning or pre-worlds of the Norse creation myths. According...
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...Compare and contrast the Biblical creation myths with other creation myths from Greece and the Ancient Near East. This essay will compare and contrast the Biblical creation myths with other creation myths from Greece and the Ancient Near East. It will first discuss the initial creation of the universe followed by the creation of mankind and finally the recreation of man whilst drawing parallels to Sumerian and Babylonian texts, The Old Testament and Hesiods Theogony. In paying particular attention to the chronology of each myth it will be shown that the creation myths regarding the universe and mankind evolved from as far back as the Sumerian stories. From the fragmented Sumerian tablets discovered throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries , (that date back as far as the third millenium B.C.) Sumerologists, such as Samuel Noah Kramer, have deciphered the oldest cosmogonic concepts ever found . Kramer explains that because the Sumerians lacked "scientific methods of definition and generalization " to make sense of the origins and the working of the universe they attempted to provide explanation through the use of poetry, epic tales and hymns . The only scientific information they had access to was what could be seen around them, that being Earth, Air, Heaven and Water , and according to the Ancient Sumerians it was through these essential elements that the universe came to be and it begins with Nammu, the primeval sea. From the primeval sea was born...
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...By Matthew Dumler (26110162) August 15th, 2014 Contents Introduction 1 Gap Theory 1:1 and 1:2 2 Gap Theory Chapters 2 and 3 5 Before Creation 8 Conclusion 10 Introduction Before Genesis 1:1 God created the heaven of heavens (Nehemiah 9:6) with angels so numerous no one could count (Revelation 5:11). One of God’s most cherished creations, Lucifer, was placed in charge of guarding his royal thrown (Ezekiel 28:12-16). One day Lucifer took pride in his own beauty and his heart was filled with pride (Ezekiel 28:17). He began to think highly of himself and began to think wrongly of God. He began to take what rightfully belonged to God and began to put himself in God’s place. For the first time in all creation, one of his own had sinned against him. God judged him accordingly and placed him in the lake of fire (Matthew 25:41). The sacred scriptures tell us that after the fall, Lucifer was thereafter known as the Devil or the accuser. One question that remains to be answered is this: when did this event occur? Some theologians claim that Satan’s fall occurred before Genesis 1:1. Others contend that there was a gap that took place between Genesis 1:1 and Genesis 1:2. Yet others make the claim that Lucifer’s fall took place between Genesis 2 and Genesis 3. Little scriptural evidence exists to answer the question of when the fall happened. Some suggest the silence of scripture on this topic is done on purpose by Moses...
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