Creation Myths Around the World: A Cross-Cultural Analysis

Introduction: A Universal Pattern in Creation Myths

It is fascinating to note that creation narratives from all over the world possess certain commonalities. Nearly all proceed from the core point of one deity who stirred Himself to create a world and who involved humans in that act of creation. Another striking commonality is that all have creation emanating from their own perspective, as though they were the sole country in the world and the world was created for them.

To illustrate this point, this essay takes five different narrative accounts — Hopi, Japanese, Hebrew, Indian, and Chinese — and compares and contrasts their similarities and differences. In each, creation culminated in forming that particular nation. In the Hebrew account, the narrative focuses on a mystical land called the Garden of Eden; creation ended in forming the Hopis; the deities created Japan; the Indian god created animals (bulls, cows, and others most central to the Indian people) and, most famously, the Ganges; while the Chinese tale also features symbols of China, specifically the turtle. For people in those days, the world was their country — it was all they knew. Creation myths, therefore, centered on their own nation.

Overview of Five Creation Narratives

The number of creation myths that exist in the world is remarkable, as is the number of similarities that can be found between many, if not all, of them. The five examples examined here center on the Hopi, Japanese, Hebrew, Indian, and Chinese narratives. A brief account of each follows.

God — an omnipotent Creator — created the world in six days, with each day possessing its own typology. On the sixth day, God created man, and from man's rib, woman was created. Creation was initiated by God's metaphysical Spirit "blowing over the surface of the water" when the atmosphere was all that existed and the world was an inchoate, desolate void.

The Creator chose Sotuknang, His agent, to help him create the world in a series of four acts. Sotuknang enlisted the Spider Woman — the first woman — to assist him. She made four men and four women in her own image by taking earth, mixing it with saliva, and singing the Creation Song, thereby bringing all life on Earth into being. The acts of creation culminated in the birth of the Hopi people.

The reeds of the world produced various deities, the last of whom were Izanagi and Izanami, who created Japan through procreation. They gave birth to numerous additional deities, one of which — the fire deity — burned Izanami, who subsequently died. After a series of incidents, tribulations, acts of revenge, and the continuous birth and mating of deities, all of these events gave form to the royal family of Japan.

The Indian God created the world from His mind, desiring to have a self. From His luminance came fire, and, resting, He divided into three parts: fire, sun, and air. Feeling alone, He spread Himself, and this division produced male and female. They mated, and humans arose. Disgusted by this mating, the female changed into a cow and the male into a bull, who mated with her. Through a series of different metamorphoses and matings, the various species of the world were created.

Pan Gu was a giant who dwelt in the vast chaos of the sky. With his death, the sky ruptured, and the parts of Pan Gu became different geographical elements of the earth — mountains, seas, and more. A goddess called Nu Wa created humans for company. Later, the heavens collapsed and the earth cracked, producing beasts. Nu Wa healed the earth and sky and used a giant turtle to support the sky. She died, and features of the earth arose from her body as well.

Differences Between the Myths

There are a number of notable differences between the tales.

First, the amount of time taken to create the world differs across all five accounts, with only the Hebrew Bible stating that the world was completed in six days. The other accounts imply a longer span, although the Hopi account, without specifying how long creation actually took, describes it as occurring in four distinct stages.

The Hopi tale has man and woman created first, while the Chinese tale has humans created before animals — Nu Wa created humans for company, and only later, when the heavens collapsed and the earth cracked, did beasts appear.

The mechanism of creation also differs across the narratives. The Indian account describes a God who mates with Himself to produce creation; the Japanese narrative has creator deities spring from reeds; the Hebrew Bible has God create through His Spirit — somewhat similar to the Indian conception — while the Chinese tale begins with the death of a giant living in the sky.

Conclusion

Each culture produced a narrative about the creation of the world, but analysis of these narratives reveals that almost always the creation of the world centered on the creation of one small plot of land — almost always their own nation. For ancient people, the world often was their own country. That land, and perhaps its immediate neighbors, was all they knew. It was the focus of their existence. It therefore made sense to them that the Deity had been preoccupied with their birth.

Sources

May, Herbert G. (editor). The New Oxford Annotated Bible. New York: Oxford University Press.

The Four Creations, 1987. Online:

Philippi, Donald L. (translator). The Masks of God: Oriental Mythology. New York: Viking Press, 1969.

Radhakrishnan, S. (editor and translator). The Principal Upanisads. New York: Harper and Brothers Publishers, 1953.

Walls, J. & Walls, Y. (translators and editors). Classical Chinese Myths. Hong Kong: Joint Publishing Company, 1984.