Creation Myths

Comparing the Babylonian, Greek, and Hebrew creation myths provide interesting insight into the beginnings of the world’s varying religions. Although different areas and cultures practice different religious and cultural traditions, many of the basic tenets are the same or, at least, very similar and such is the same with comparing these creation myths. The fundamentals that each society proposes as a beginning to humanity are all very similar, and each has, in effect, the same purpose and commencement of the creation of man.

Beginning with the beginning, the Greek version began with tumult (Greek Mythology.com), while the Babylonian and Hebrew versions began with complete darkness and silence. Interestingly, all three share slight variances in their version of god, but they all end similarly in that the primary god provided the foundation for creating. Regardless of the commencement, all three begin with a primary deity to form our existence. The first creation in the Greek and Babylonian versions is to create “child” gods, who then go on to form the wind, sky, water, and earth, along with light, doom, and love. The Hebrew’s god worked alone for seven days to create those realities (Brians), and each, like the other, completes the universe by creating man in the likeness of the gods for the purpose of entertaining the gods.

The course to creating man, however, involved significant trial. In each version, there arose conflict that required death in one form or another. The Babylonian version utilized the death of Apsu to bring about the beginning, which was the eventual birth of Marduk, or rains and storms (Railsback). Similarly, the Greek version castrated Uranus to release the child gods and form the oceans with his severed testicles (Greek Mythology.com). Whether Uranus actually died as a result of the attack is debated, but the symbolism of the death of his fertility marked the end of his reign as alpha god. Finally, the Hebrew version utilized Adam’s and Eve’s eating of the apple and subsequent death of their innocence to symbolize the beginning(Brians).

The differences that each version presents in the introduction of man to the world still refers back to the gods’ desires to create entertainment and still refers to man being created to emulate the gods. Each version provides the creation of man as the beginning of society leading up to the world we know today.

The social structure is also an interesting consideration. Each version presents a male-dominated beginning in which a woman is introduced who brings harm to the man. Tempting through beauty or coercion, the dominant male meets some extent of demise which then results either in child gods taking over or the death of man (dust to dust) in the Hebrew version (Brians).

The myths seem to have limited impact on today’s society, other than as an interest in the historical beliefs and society’s practices of those beliefs. Whether the practices included live sacrifices or temples built in honor of various gods and goddesses, early societies utilized those beliefs to form the foundations of early religion. Current society utilizes the evolution of those beliefs and the more practical ideas of how our universe formed to practice modern-day religious practice, but the current practice is far removed from the original observations.

In considering the believability of the Babylonian, Greek, or Hebrew versions of the beginning of our universe, the most believable is that of the Hebrews. Current knowledge of the formation of the universe, our world, and the evolution of different species places the birth of a god responsible for creating each aspect of our existence—wind, rain, love, doom—as little more than an unsophisticated society trying to make sense of why they’re on this earth and how they got here. The Hebrew version presents the opportunity to combine current knowledge of evolution with faith-based beliefs in the existence of a higher being and allows us to explain away the early creation myth as the attempt for an uneducated society to come to terms with their origins.

Works Cited

Brians, Paul. "The Hebrew Creation Narrative." 8 December 1998. Washington State University, Dept of English. http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/world_civ/worldcivreader/world_civ_reader_1/hebrew_creation.html. 28 September 2013.

Greek Mythology.com. The Creation. 2010. http://www.greekmythology.com/Myths/The_Myths/The_Creation/the_creation.html. 28 September 2013.

Railsback, Bruce. "Creation Stories from around the World: Encapsulations of Some Traditional Stories Explaining the Origin of the Earth, Its Life, and Its Peoples." July 2000. University of Georgia. Web: http://www.gly.uga.edu/railsback/CS/CSMarduk.html. 29 September 2013.