Creation Myths Vs Greek Mythology

Each religion found a way to explain the origins of both the world and themselves. Many myths seem share different origins and reasons why nature and other parts of the world came into being. Such myths also have a “creator,” and a “void.” Aside from that, some myths in similar areas of the world share a concept of hieros gamos and utilize it within the creation stories. Finally, some of the creation stories share similarities beyond their creators and abysses at the beginning of time.
The ancient creation myths explain the creation of the basic elements of the world in comparable ways. In nearly every myth, Earth was only the second element created. In both the Grecian and Hebrew stories, Earth comes from nothing or a “void.” In the Maya myths, …show more content…
In the Greek myths, the beginning of the world, or being that began the world was Chaos who Gaia or Ge sprang from. Gaia then mated with Uranus, the sky, and the rest of the earthly creations were begot. Amid the Maya creation stories, everything came from the “silent sea and sky,” except for the creator, Heart-of-the-Earth-and-Sky. Heart-of-the-Earth-and-Sky henceforth creates everything on Earth including the animals and plants, although he was joined by other gods in order to create mankind. The Norse myths have two places that could be considered a “void” in their creation myths: Ginnungagap and Niflheim, which are both beyond Mudspell. According to the myths, everything earthly was created from the death of Ymir, for example, the Earth was made “from his flesh.” Ymir could then be considered the “creator” in the Norse myths. Both the Egyptian and Hebrew myths have their creators—Ra and God—call the elements into being, though Ra’s calling creators new deities that embody each element that is called. The Egyptian myths, similarly to the Maya, have the Earth rising out of the surrounding waters. The Hebrew creation story tells of a void before “God created heaven and earth.” The decision to have a creator in every creation myth shows that …show more content…
In almost every myth, the sea was one of the first things—either already in place before the rest of the world was being created or was created by the world’s creator first. Every myth, except for the Maya and Norse, has the creator directly creating the light or the light source. The Hebrew and Egyptian mythologies also called from the man to either look exactly like the creator or for the creator to eventually look like the man—God and Ra in that order. Last, both the Greek and Norse myths have places that were described as “dark”. In the Norse mythology it was Niflheim, which was described as both cold and dark. The Greek myths has Tartarus which sprang from Chaos and holds the evils of the world in Greek