Motifs in Creation Myths Essay

One of the most important myths of the Huichols Indians is about the creation of the world. These types of myths are categorized as origin myths which “are typically the most sacred of a culture’s myths and provide the foundation upon which other myths are built” (Lindell “Professor’s Notes 4” 2). The article “Journey of Grandmother Rain” by Jack Eidt tells the story about the first humans, the creation of the land, and the creation of the sun. From a structuralist perspective, the binary opposition that shapes the worldview of the Huichol Indians is apparent in this origin myth. According to Eidt, in the Huichol origin myth the first human, named Watacame, and his black female dog, Tziku Mayuri, had to “withstand five days of monsoons, wind, waves, flooding and storming” (Eidt). After Watacame had successfully survived the storm, the Goddess Takutzi Nakawe (Grandmother Rain)

Have you ever wonder how the world was created from another culture’s perspective? Native Americans used creation myths to explained to their people how the world was developed overtime. Creation myths are a big part of the Native American culture. they have been passed down from generation to generation. In the creation myths, harmony with nature, rituals, and strong social values are shown in each myths. The purpose of having strong social value in these myths is to teach younger Native Americans valuable lesson if they ever do something bad. These myths reveals how the rituals were created and their intentions for doing it. Creation myths has harmony with nature in it to show a very close kinship between them

Who made who? Did God create humans or did humans create god? At first thought one

There was only water and bare, empty land. In the center of this nothingness was a great mountain. This mountain stood tall and proud and it reached all the way into the heavens. At the very top of this mountain lived a pair of every kind of animal. In the center of this heaven grew a tree. This tree was not just any tree, it was the sacred tree of life, and it was not to be harmed in any way.

Myths are of great importance in the Navajo community because it is believed that it was a way to connect to the Holy People. The myth helps recognize symbolized supernatural in chants, translates the meaning of songs, and explains the importance of the ritual objects (Lamphere 1969). For example, there is myth of the two heroes who had gone through some misfortunes but thanks to the supernatural’s aid, the two heroes created a

Some Native American creation stories can be contrasted with the book of Genesis from the Bible. For example, the land is made differently in each story. In the Native American stories “How the World Was Made” and “The Sky Tree”, land was made by “animals bringing up soil from the water,” while God “made the heavens and the earth” in the

The sin stories in the Book of Genesis address theological, cosmic, social, and ethical questions. These sin stories, The Fall of Man, Cain and Abel, and Noah and the Flood, and The Tower of Babel show the functions of myths and demonstrate man's likeliness to sin. These myths let the readers learn of the culture, beliefs, and foundation of the time.

One of the fundamental questions that religions seek to answer is that of origin. How was man put on earth? Why and from what was he created? Who created him? What does his creation imply about the status of human beings? Some or all of these questions are answered by a religion’s creation stories. Every religion’s creation myths attempt to give solutions to problems present to that religious society. Because of this, each religion may have one or more creation stories, each of those different from one another in the questions they ask and the answers they give.

Myths – as they are known to most of the world – give insight into the pasts of various countries and religions as the people saw them. They have been used to explain phenomenons in nature or describe the tales of courageous and important men and women throughout history. Creation myths in particular define how the Earth itself was created, along with the universe, heavens, hell, people, and creatures that exist today. Genesis of Christian mythology, for instance, tells the story of how the single deity God spoke and formed everything from day and night to man and woman. Various African creation myths, such as with the Yoruba, explain the creation of the Earth through at least a couple gods working together and all life

The general purpose for all myths is to bring an understanding of unknown. The ancient people widely used myths to explain new phenomena and occurrences. The lack of scientific modes of theory formulation caused the people of old to come up with myths to fill the vacuum with the knowledge that existed during their time. The need by man to explain his origin and the origin of the universe led him to the formulation of creation and origin myths. Men of olds came up with myths to explain the mysteries they had no clue about including creation.

Although a lot of other cosmogonic myths have presented creations as part of a natural process that has the clear understanding that it is an act of divine and creative will. We all know there are several creation myths across different cultures. It is known that every different culture even has its unique creation myth that also explains how life and world came to be (Leonard & McClure, 2004). The two myths I would talk about when it comes to this topic are Genesis creation (Hebrew origin) of the Christian culture, and the Norse culture of Iceland (the Vikings). From the readings of both, both myths also start with an emptiness where conflict and chaos may even eventually develop. The Genesis conflict is between God, loneliness, blackness, emptiness, and the need to create

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.

Throughout history many civilizations and cultures have had their own ways of explaining the world and its creation. Each of these civilizations has created unique descriptions and accounts of such events. However, when comparing them to each other, are they really different? Look at the ancient Greco - Roman creation myths as told by Hesiod in his Theogony and Works and Days and Ovid’s Metamorphoses, when compared to the creation myths as seen in the Old Testament’s book of Genesis they may not be as different as one would think. Taking a more in-depth look at both Genesis and Hesiod’s and Ovid’s work more closely, the reader can see that on multiple occasions the myths have almost identical similarities which reflect their views in

The next motif: human creation of organic materials. There were many myths that had gods creating humans out of many different things. The Inca used stone, yet they were pitiful and did not know anything, including how to survive. The Inuit’s humans came from a pea-pod, yet the god Raven did not know how. The Yoruba used clay, as well as the Chinese did. The Yoruba shaped the humans out of clay, then breathed life into them. The Chinese formed the humans out of clay, but made it to where they had legs instead of tails. The Enuma Elish used bones and flesh, after the war that took place, using the bones and the making of the flesh. The Mayan used corn paste, after many attempts of making humans. The Norse used trees, that had fallen over. The reason why I think this motif has repeated in so many myths is because even without them knowing, humans are now created from organic materials. Another reason could be that they wanted to create humans to help work and take care of the Earth.

We all know that our mothers and fathers gave us birth, and grandmothers and grandfathers gave our parents birth. However, what about the beginning? What does the beginning look like? Who created the sky, the earth, the mountains and rivers, the plants, the animals, and the human beings? How was the world created? What happened to the creator? These questions have puzzled and are asked by every people. However, no one has yet found the answers, and I have heard people saying that the creation of life is as impossible as the natural creation of an airplane from a stack of waste. With the willingness of knowing the self, ancient people tried to create mythological stories