The Creation of the World by Religion
Essay by saintpat7 • November 24, 2013 • Essay • 1,656 Words (7 Pages) • 1,545 Views
Since the beginning of time, human beings have always wondered how other human beings
came to existence on this earth, what is their role on earth and why. From this, human beings have
looked for answers. Humans, whether scientist or pope, preacher or atheist, constantly look for
answers about the human race, how the earth was formed and if there is a creator. Satiating a void of
being gives humans a sense of security, confidence, and most importantly: knowledge to know the
history and reason they cam about on this earth. Those who ascribe the creation of man to the work of
a god, there are those who look to science, in theory, a realistic idea, which can be proven through a
series of tests and studies to back up its strong argument and evidence. Genesis: the Hebrew book of
origin, Theogony: of the Greek culture, Metamorphosis: of the Roman culture, and modern scientific
documents tat share the same idea of creation and history of human beings. Comparing the Greek,
Jewish, Roman and scientific texts provide humans discover more about the past, the place humans
come from, and how humans can develop as individuals based upon history and ancestors. By doing
so, humans will not only have a better understanding of the cultures and of the world, but will grow a
richer understanding of different cultures by comparing and contrasting poems and texts.
The creation of the earth from nothing but a higher power is a common principle that is seen in
many creation stories. Genesis is a text written in Old Hebrew that narrates the tale of the creation of
earth, the relationship between man and God and the downfall of mankind. When Adam and Eve were
created, they felt no shame to be naked because they did not posses the wisdom of good and bad. The
curiosity Eve had when persuaded by the serpent lead to disobeying Gods will. This relates to the idea
that curiosity is contrast to obedience. I find it interesting that it was a serpent that told Eve to eat the
fruit. A serpent is a phallic image, which represents a female. With that being said, wisdom is actually
the realization of being, survival, and civilization. When Adam and Eve break God's one and only rule,
obedience, leads to both being banished from the Garden of Eden, followed by the downfall of
mankind. Women are especially targeted negatively throughout the story. Eve was punished more than
the serpent for eating from the tree in the middle and women being used as baby making-machines
exemplify the all too common Greek treatment of women. As the story progresses, mankind becomes
more evil, and God regrets creating man. In retaliation to mankind's misbehavior, God sends a flood to
abolish all evils from the earth, but warns Noah, showing his sympathy for a mortal being who has
been obedient and has not succumbed to acts of violence and treachery. Another trending reason is that
God sends the flood because its God's own responsibility for human nature. After the flood and
immediately after getting off the ship reaching land, Noah gets drunk as a little celebration for being
back on land after forty long days and nights. When awoken, Noah finds that he has been seen naked
and presumably humiliated by Cain and other brothers. This simply doesn't add up, there must be a
Midrajh, that fills in the gap of Cain and brothers making fun of Noah, then taking care of him so that
no one else will make fun of him. God lastly separates mankind and sends them out to different
countries, presumably because God knows what mankind is capable of accomplishing when being able
to speak one single language, enabling humans to work and build as one.
Theogony also deals with the idea of creation, except not from all knowing immortal being. The
story begins with everything originating Chaos: The sky, earth, gods, humans and other living
creatures. One other distinction is, unlike in Genesis, theogony is polytheistic based. I feel that its not
so much the story between man and gods but the story of the Greek gods in general. In fact, human
beings aren't mentioned in the story until the very end. One of the main themes in Theogony is the
theme of Revenge: Revenge is central to Greek conflict. Throughout the story, there is an all too
common theme of son trying to overthrow father. This first begins when Cronos, putting an end to
Ouranos when he ceases Gaia's birth by castrating him. Afterward, Zeus hopes to overthrow Cronos,
and with the inadvertent help of Rhea and Gaia, the motherly figures in the story, Zeus succeeds in
overthrowing the titans with aid from the other immortal gods as well. This shows that Gaia and Rhea
are instigators, whereas mother figures are convincing. One similarity between Genesis and Theogony
is that women are treated as lesser equals, however,
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