Creation Index
In the beginning all was water. In all directions the sky was clear and unobstructed. A cloud formed in the sky, grew lumpy, and turned into Coyote. Then a fog arose, grew lumpy, and became Silver-Fox. They became persons. Then they thought.
In the beginning there was nothing but water. Coyote and Silver-Fox lived above in the sky, where there was a world Eke this one. Silver-Fox was anxious to make things, but Coyote was opposed to the plan. Finally Silver-Fox got tired of Coyote's opposition, and sent him off one day to get wood.
In the beginning there was Apsu the Primeval, and Tia-mat, who is Chaos. There were no other beings. The waters were not separated; they and the earth mingled, and there was no ground for the growth of anything. Then nothing bore name; no destinies had been ordained.
The Babylonian Legends of the Creation
The baked clay tablets and portions of tablets which describe the views and beliefs of the Babylonians and Assyrians about the Creation were discovered by Mr. A.H. Layard, Mormuzd Rassam and George Smith, Assistant in the Department of Oriental Antiquities in the British Museum.
The Bundahishn: Creation or Knowledge from the Zand
"The Zand-akas, which is first about Ohrmazd's original creation and the antagonism of the evil spirit, and afterwards about the nature of the creatures from the original creation till the end, which is the future existence.
In the beginning there was Yang-yin which is light-darkness, heat-cold, dryness-moisture. Then that which was subtle went upward, and that which was gross tended downward; the heavens were formed from the subtle, the earth from the gross.
China Cosmogony-p’an Ku and the Creation Myth
The most conspicuous figure in Chinese cosmogony is P’an Ku. He it was who chiselled the universe out of Chaos. According to Chinese ideas, he was the offspring of the original dual powers of Nature, the yin and the yang, which, having in some incomprehensible way produced him, set him the task of giving form to Chaos and “making the heavens and the earth.”
Creation Myths Of The Coos People of Oregon
They had five pieces of soot. Now they stopped and dropped one piece into the ocean. The world at that time was without land. Everything was covered with water. Again they dropped one piece. The ocean was rolling over the disk. The next day they dropped another disk. Then they stopped at some small place and dropped another disk into the ocean.
Creation of the World From The Book of Earths
Bhrgu, in the Sanscrit epic, is answering the question, "By whom was this world with its oceans, its firmament, its mountains, its clouds, its lands, its fire, and its winds created? He replies that, first of all, the Primæval Being Manasa created a Divine Being Mahat.
Creation and Its Records, by B.H. Baden-Powell
"Among the recollections that are lifelong, I have one as vivid as ever after more than twenty-five years have elapsed; it is of an evening lecture—the first of a series—given at South Kensington to working men."
Egyptian Creation Legend of Sun Worshippers
AT the beginning the world was a waste of water called Nu. and it was the abode of the Great Father. He was Nu, for he was the deep, and he gave being unto the sun god who hath said: "Lo! I am Khepera at dawn, Ra at high noon, and Tum at eventide".
Enuma Elish: The Epic of Creation
"When in the height heaven was not named,
And the earth beneath did not yet bear a name,
And the primeval Apsu, who begat them,
And chaos, Tiamut, the mother of them both
Their waters were mingled together."
This is the account of how all was in suspense, all calm, in silence; all motionless, still, and the expanse of the sky was empty. This is the first account, the first narrative. There was neither man, nor animal, birds, fishes, crabs, trees, stones, caves, ravines, grasses, nor forests; there was only the sky. The surface of the earth had not appeared. There was only the calm sea and the great expanse of the sky. There was nothing brought together, nothing which could make a noise, nor anything which might move, or tremble, or could make noise in the sky. There was nothing standing; only the calm water, the placid sea, alone and tranquil. Nothing existed.
In the beginning Nyx, who is Night, hovered in the darkness. An egg was laid by Nyx, the black-winged bird. From the upper shell of that egg was formed Ouranos, who is Heaven, and from the lower shell, Gaia, who is Earth.
Ta'aroa was the ancestor of all the gods; he made everything.... He was his own parent, having no father or mother.... Ta'aroa sat in his shell in darkness for millions of ages.... The shell was like an egg revolving in endless space, with no sky, no land, no sea, no moon, no sun, no stars.
Hebrew and Christian Creation Myths
The Book Of Genesis: In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light. God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness.
Hebrew and Christian Creation Myths
Sepher Yetzirah Or The Book Of Creation: In two and thirty most occult and wonderful paths of wisdom did JAH the Lord of Hosts engrave his name: God of the armies of Israel, ever-living God, merciful and gracious, sublime, dwelling on high, who inhabiteth eternity. He created this universe by the three Sepharim, Number, Writing, and Speech.
Hebrew and Christian Creation Myths
The Angels And The Creation And The Fall Of Man: When the Holy One, the Almighty (blessed be His name!) would create the world, the twenty-two that are the letters of the alphabet came from His crown and held themselves before His eyes.Hebrew and Christian Creation Myths
Christian Science Accounts of Creation: ETERNAL Truth is changing the universe. As mortals drop off their mental swaddling-clothes, thought expands into expression. "Let there be light," is the perpetual demand of Truth and Love, changing chaos into order and discord into the music of the spheres.
The Hool-poom'-ne and the Creation of Man
IN the beginning there was a huge bird of the vulture kind whose name was Mol'-luk, the California Condor. His home was on the mountain called Oo'-yum-bel'-le, whence he could look out over the world
In the beginning was Yawning Gap: to one side of it was the Place of Fog and Mist; to the other side was the Place of Fire. Ginnunga Gap, Niflheim, Muspellsheim--these were in the beginning.
Indian Mysteries of Creation, the World's Ages, and Soul Wandering
There was neither existence, nor non-existence. The kingdom of air, nor the sky beyond. What was there to contain, to cover in. Was it but vast, unfathomed depths of water?
Above, in the center of the Blue, people lived before there was any earth down here. In the middle of the village up there stood a tree covered with white blossoms; when the tree was in bloom, its blossoms gave light to the people and when the blossoms fell, there was darkness.
Over a universe wrapped in the gloom of a dense and primeval night passed the god Hurakan, the mighty wind. He called out "earth," and the solid land appeared. The chief gods took counsel; they were Hurakan, Gucumatz, the serpent covered with green feathers, and Xpiyacoc and Xmucane, the mother and father gods.
In the beginning Tú-co-mish (night) and Ta-nó-wish (earth) sat crouching, brooding, silent. Then Tú-co-mish said, "I am older than you." Ta-nó-wish said, "No, I am stronger than you." So they disputed. Then Tú-co-mish caused Ta-nó-wish to go to sleep. When she woke she knew that something had happened, and that she was to be the Mother.
When this world was filled with water, Earth-Maker floated upon it, kept floating about. Nowhere in the world could he see even a tiny bit of earth. No persons of any kind flew about. He went about in this world, the world itself being invisible, transparent like the sky.
The Maya Creation Of The World
It is most necessary to believe this. These are the precious stones which our Lord, the Father, has abandoned. This was his first repast, this balche, with which we, the ruling men revere him here. Very rightly they worshipped as true gods these precious stones, when the true God was established, our Lord God, the Lord of heaven and earth, the true God.
The Creation of the World. From Metamorphoses by Ovid
Of bodies chang'd to various forms, I sing:
Ye Gods, from whom these miracles did spring,
Inspire my numbers with coelestial heat;
'Till I my long laborious work compleat:
And add perpetual tenour to my rhimes,
Deduc'd from Nature's birth, to Caesar's times.
After a while the world cooled off and Wek'-wek came back to Oo'-yum-bel'-le to see his father Mol'-luk and his grandfather O-let'te. He said to Mol'-luk, "O father;" and Mol'-luk answered, "What is it my son?" Wek'-wek asked, "How can we make Mew'-ko (Indian people) and have them in the country?"
Alone was Tepeu, alone was Gucumatz, alone and wrapped in the green and the azure. All was silence, all was motionlessness, all was breathlessness. There was only the boundlessness of the sky, the quietude of the waters.
Creation Vignettes From The Sacred Writings Of Mu
Originally the Universe was only a soul
or spirit. Everything was without form and without life. All was
calm, silent and soundless. Void and dark was the immensity of
space. Only the Supreme Spirit, the Great Self-Existing Power,
the Creator, the Seven-Headed Serpent, moved within the abyss of
darkness. The desire came to Him to create worlds, and the desire
came to Him to create the earth with living things upon it, and
He created the earth and all therein.
In the beginning there was only the mists. There was no world then, only the white, yellow, blue, black, silver, and red mists floating in the air. The mists came together and laid on top of each other, like intercourse, and Supreme Sacred Wind was created.
The Gods were born of the Sky and the Earth--of Rangi the Sky and Papa-tu-a-nuku the Earth. And in those days the Sky pressed down upon the Earth, and there was no difference between the light and the darkness.
Philippine Creation Myths:
In the very beginning there lived a being so large that he can not be compared with any known thing. His name was Melu, and when he sat on the clouds, which were his home, he occupied all the space above.
In the beginning there were no people on the earth. Lumawig, the Great Spirit, came down from the sky and cut many reeds. He divided these into pairs which he placed in different parts of the world.
When the world first began there was no land, but only the sea and the sky, and between them was a kite. One day the bird which had nowhere to light grew tired of flying about, so she stirred up the sea until it threw its waters against the sky.
Then was not non-existent nor existent: there was no realm of air, no sky beyond it. What covered in, and where? and what gave shelter? Was water there, unfathomed depth of water? Death was not then, nor was there aught immortal: no sign was there, the day's and night's divider.
'Be thou split open,' and there came forth, as if by successive efforts of parturition, various kinds of foundation-stuff, then the Earth, then the Sea, and Fresh-water, and the Sky, and 'Prince-Prop-up-sky,' and Immensity, and Space, and Height, and, last of all, Man, as a physical being, but not yet endowed with intelligence.
'They entered an apartment containing nothing except a black painting representing a woman. Her legs reached to the top of one of the walls; her body occupied the entire ceiling; from her navel hung suspended, by a thread, an enormous egg; and the remainder of her body, her head downward, descended the other wall, to the level of the pavement, where her finger ends touched.'
In the Ages, when naught else was, there yawned in space a vast and empty gulf called Ginnunga-gap. Length it had, and breadth immeasurable, and there was depth beyond comprehension.
"SKY was the first who ruled over the whole world. And having wedded Earth, he begat first the Hundred-handed, as they are named: Briareus, Gyes, Cottus, who were unsurpassed in size and might, each of them having a hundred hands and fifty heads. After these, Earth bore him the Cyclopes, to wit, Arges, Steropes, Brontes, of whom each had one eye on his forehead. But them Sky hound and cast into Tartarus, a gloomy place in Hades as far distant from earth as earth is distant from the sky."
"From the Heliconian Muses let us begin to sing, who hold the great and holy mount of Helicon, and dance on soft feet about the deep-blue spring and the altar of the almighty son of Cronos, and, when they have washed their tender bodies in Permessus or in the Horse's Spring or Olmeius, make their fair, lovely dances upon highest Helicon and move with vigorous feet."
Allah, the most gracious God, whose dwelling, place is the seventh heaven, completed the work of creation. Seven planes has the heaven and seven planes also the earth--the abode of evil spirits. In the heavenly ways reside the peris, or good spirits; in the earthly darkness the dews, or evil spirits.
In the beginning, the word gave origin to the Father. A phantasm, nothing else existed in the beginning; the Father touched an illusion, he grasped something mysterious. Nothing existed.
Yana Myths: The Creation of Men
Lizard, Gray Squirrel, and Coyote lived in a big sweat-house at Wamā'rawi. They had no wives or children. Coyote wanted to make people, but the others thought that they themselves were enough. Finally Lizard agreed, "We'll make people, different kinds of people."
It WAS the belief of the Indian that in the beginning the Coyote-man made the world. Then taking the Frog-man with him he set out on a raft into the east. When they reached here the Coyote-man told the Frogman to dive down and bring up some earth, which he did.
In the beginning the waters covered everything. It was said "Who will make the land appear?" Lock-chew, the Crawfish, said: "I will make the land appear."
Life: Its True Genesis By R. W. Wright
This formula of life is as true now as it was over two thousand six hundred years ago, when it was penned by the divinely inspired prophet, and it is as true now as it was then, that "Instead of the thorn shall come up the fir tree, and instead of the briar shall come up the myrtle tree; and it shall be to the Lord for a name, for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off." That is, as the rains descend and the floods come and change the face of the earth, a law, equivalent to the divine command, "Let the earth bring forth," is forever operative, changing the face of nature and causing it to give expression to new forms of life as the conditions thereof are changed, and these forms are spoken into existence by the divine fiat.