Myths of Creation & the Origins of Gods & Humans

North American Native Tribes

Achomawi (California) Coyote began the creation of the earth, but Eagle finished it. Coyote scratched it up with his paws out of nothingness, but Eagle complained that there were not mountains for him to perch on. So Coyote made hills, but they were not high enough. Then Eagle scratched up great ridges. When Eagle flew over them, his feathers dropped down, took root, and became trees. The pin feathers became bushes and plants.

Coyote and Fox together created man. They quarreled as to whether they should let men live always or not. Coyote said, "If they want to die, let them die." Fox said, "If they want to come back, let them come back." But Coyote's medicine was stronger, and nobody ever came back.

Coyote also brought fire into the world, as the people were freezing. He journeyed far to the west to a place where there was fire and stole some of it. He brought it home in his ears. He kindled a fire in the mountains, the people saw the smoke, and went up to get the fire.

Miwok (California) After Coyote finished making the world, he thought about creating man. He called a council of all the animals. They sat in a circle, just as the Indians do. In an open space in the forest, Lion sat at the head. On his right was Grizzly Bear; next Cinnamon Bear, and so on, around to mouse, who sat on Lion's left.

Lion spoke first. He wanted man to have a terrible voice, like himself, so that he could frighten all the other animals. Also he wanted man well covered with hair, sharp fangs and claws. Grizzly Bear laughed at Lion. He said it was foolish for another to have a terrible voice like Lion, because it would frightened away the prey. Rather, man should have great strength, like himself... [So the story goes on where all the animals dismiss the qualities of the others and justify the ones like themselves.]

When it was Coyote's turn, he laughed at the others because they wanted to make man just like themselves. Coyote was sure he could make man better than Coyote himself or any other animal. Of course, Coyote said, man would have four legs with five fingers, feet like Grizzly Bear, so he could stand erect when necessary.... [So Coyote takes into account all the qualities proposed by the other animals.] But no animal was as cunning and crafty as Coyote, so he said that man should have the wit of Coyote.

Then every animal set to work making a man according to their own ideas. They took lumps of earth and modeled them like themselves. All but Coyote, for he began to make the kind of man that he had described to the council. When the sun set and the animals were tired, they stopped work and slept. All but Coyote, for the was the most cunning and crafty of the animals. He stayed awake all night until he had finished his clay man. Then he threw water on the unfinished models of the other animals. So in the morning, Coyote was finished and gave life to his model. In this way, Coyote made man.

Crow. [variation of similar story, including the council of "animal people," the idea of each to make man in imitation of his qualities, each making model from clay.] There was a large bank of reddish clay near by, so the animal people went there and brought back lumps in pieces of bark. Then each began to make a model in his own fashion. Supper was late that night because all of them were so interested in their clay modeling. Eventually, they all fell asleep except Coyote. He wanted to make the real people just as he thought they should be, so he worked hard all night. Now Coyote was very wise. He put his clay model far back under the low spreading branches of a spruce tree. That night it rained. All the models were spoiled except his.

The next morning, only Coyote's model was still complete. He put it out in the sun to bake. Then when all the animal people awoke (they slept late because of working so hard and so late at night), there was Coyote's real man walking around. He wore a beautiful red blanket with a blue and yellow border. [When the other animal people saw him they all started complaining about the qualities he lacked. For example:] Beaver shook his head and said, "No tail, no big teeth; how will he ever build a house? ......

Mesopotamia: Sumerian & Babylonian

[Semitic religions, spreading throughout western Asia, eastern Mediterranean, and northern Africa, can be classified into two large groups: (1) Sumero-Babylonian, in Mesopotamia, to the east and north, and (2) Arabian to the south. In addition, the Hebrew religion developed separately, although influenced by Babylonian mythology (compare stories of the creation and the great flood).]

Babylonian. [One version of the creation begins:] Long since, when above the heaven had not been named, when the earth beneath still bore no name, when the ocean, the primeval, the generator of them, and the originator [the creative principle, or form or word] Tiamat, who brought them forth, their waters were mingled together; when fields were still unformed and reeds no where to be seen. Long since, when no one of the gods had been called into being, when no name had been named, no fates had been determined; then were created the gods, Luchmu and Lachamu [first male and female deities] were called into being as the first. Ages multiplied and days grew old; An-shar and Ki-shar [personifications of the upper and lower worlds] were created. Long were the days, and the years increased. Anu, Bel, and Ea were created. An-shar made Anu, his first born, and equal to himself....

Babylonian. [Another version:] The world was all one sea. At length there was a movement in the sea and Eridu [a heavenly city] was erected.... Marduk created the lesser gods at the same time, and made supreme the glorious city .... Marduk constructed an enclosure around the waters; he formed the dust and heaped it up at the side of the enclosure, to make a dwelling for the gods, dear to their heart. He created mankind. The goddess Aruru [the potter], together with him, created the seed of mankind. He created the beasts of the field and the living creatures of the dry land. Tigris and Euphrates he formed, and set them in their places, and gave them good names. Soil and grass, the marsh plant and the reed, and the forest he planted.... The wild cow and her young, the young wild ox, the ewe and her goat, the lamb of the fold, meadows and forests, the goat and mountain goat he also brought forth....

India: Vedic Scripture

[Vedic scriptures are the oldest in Hinduism and in the Indo-European language (?2000-1400 BC/BCE). The supreme god of Hinduism, Brahma, presides over endless cycles of creation and destruction. One myth common to various versions of the beginning of each cycle of creation has a golden cosmic egg floating on the cosmic water. After 1000 years, the egg bursts open and gives birth to the lord of the universe, who becomes the eternal man whose soul is in perfect unity with the universal spirit.]

Bhagbata. .... By means of a process too lengthy to be given in detail, ... aspects of Nature and Time combined with the Divine Power to generate the Golden Egg. The Lord of the Universe reposed for over 1000 years on that egg devoid of any living creatures and lying on the surface of the ocean. While the Lord was so lying in self-communion, there issued from his navel a lotus with the shining brilliance of 1000 suns together. So large was the lotus that it could be the dwelling place of all the creatures. From this lotus sprang up Brahma, the self-created. Thereupon, being endowed with the powers of the Lord lying on the waters, Brahma created all beings and assigned to each of them name and form....

Manu. The primeval god transformed himself into a Golden Egg which was shining like the sun and in which he, Brahma, the father of all worlds, was born. He rested a whole year in this egg and then he parted it into two parts by means of a word. From the two shells he formed heaven and earth, in the middle he put air, and the eight directions of the world, and the eternal dwelling place of the water.

Rg Veda, 10.129. There was no nonexistence and no existence at that time. There was neither the air above nor the heaven beyond. What stirred [?like a wind]? And in whose control?... There was neither death nor deathlessness; no sign of night or day.... Darkness there was, hidden by darkness, in the beginning. An undifferentiated ocean was everything here. The potential that was hidden by emptiness [the egg: "potential" = yoke; "emptiness" = shell] -- that One was born by the power of heat. Desire evolved then in the beginning, which was the first seed [lit. semen ] of thought. Searching in their hearts through inspired thought, sages found the connection of the existent in the nonexistent.... Were there powers of insemination and powers of expansion?... Who really knows? Who shall here proclaim it? -- whence things came to be, whence this creation.... [Adapted from Sources of Indian Tradition (2d ed.), ed. A. T. Embree (1988)]

China

[There is no early tradition of creation stories. By the time of Confucius, the Yang-Yin theory of opposite but complementary modes, which interact and reconcile opposites, had developed into a strong dualistic philosophy. Yang symbolized: heaven, light, positive, masculine, constructive. Yin symbolized: earth, dark, negative, feminine, destructive. The P'an Ku story comes from a 3d century AD/CE text. It is related to the Indian cosmic egg myths, "P'an" meaning egg shell.]

At first there was chaos. From it pure light collected itself and formed the sky. The darkness remaining collected itself and formed the earth. From this activity arose the two principles, yang and yin -- light and dark, sky and earth. From this movement of like to like, a balancing of forces occurred, and growth and increase brought forth the beginning and the 10,000 creations, all of which take yang and yin as their mode. Yang gives, and yin receives....

As yang and yin separated and mixed, the five agents (earth, water, metal, wood, fire) combined to form P'an Ku. Created in the shape of a man, he immediately set to work giving form to the rest of chaos. His task occupied him for 18,000 years, during which he formed the sun, moon, stars and completed heaven and earth. He increased in stature himself, each day being six feet taller than the previous day, until he died so that his works might live....

Maori (New Zealand)

In the beginning, the Heaven, Rangi, and the Earth, Papa, were the father and mother of all things. In these days the Heaven lay upon the Earth, and all was darkness. They had never been separated. Heaven and Earth had many children, who grew up and lived in this thick night between their parents. They were unhappy because they could not see out. Between the bodies of their parents they were imprisoned, and there was not light. So they consulted on what to do with their parents.

"Shall we slay them or shall we separate them." Tumatuenga (god of war) said, "Let us slay them." "No," exclaimed Tane Mahuta (god of the forest), "let us separate them. Let one go upward, and become a stranger to us; let the other remain below, and be a parent to us." Then the fruit gods, the sea god, the war god (for all the children of Rangi and Papa were gods) tried to tear their parents apart. Last rose the forest god; he severed the sinews which united Heaven and Earth. Then Rangi and Papa exclaimed, "Wherefore this murder? Why this great sin? Why destroy us? Why separate us?" But Tane pushed and pushed.

Rangi was driven far away into the air. They became visible, who had previously been concealed between the hollows of their parents' chests. Only the storm god (the wind) had pity on his father and differed from his brethren. He rose and followed Rangi to live with him in the open spaces of the sky.

Sumerian: Inanna & Dumuzi (myth & ritual of vegetation renewal)

[Myth and ritual related to gods who die and are reborn in the spring, bringing the return of vegetation and blessing to newly planted crops, are common to various cultures around the Mediterranean (from Egypt in northern Africa to the Persian Gulf area). There are similar stories about powerful female goddesses who are associated with fertility (both human procreation and vegetative growth), war, healing: Ishtar (Babylonian [Iraq]), Inanna (Sumerian [Iraq]), Astarte (Phoenician [Lebanon/Syria]), Ashtoreth (Ugaritic, Canaan [Syria]).

Earliest sources have been found in the Mesopotamian region: (1) From the Babylonian region (upper Tigris and Euphrates valley, Iraq), Ishtar, goddess of love and fertility, associated with planet Venus (as morning and evening star), descends to the underworld to bring back her lover, Tammuz, and return sexual and vegetative fertility to the barren land of the upper world.

(2) From the Sumerian region (lower Euphrates valley, Iraq), recent collection and translation of stone tablet fragments dating from about 2000 BC/BCE reveal a more complete early version of stories relating to Inanna, queen of heaven and earth (descended from the first generation of the Earth Goddess, the Water Goddess and the Sky God) and her husband, Dumuzi. Inanna descends to the underworld, for reasons not exactly clear, where she is stripped of her royal symbols (robe, jewels, breast plate, staff, etc.) and killed by the evil "eye of death" of Ereshkigal, queen of the underworld. Inanna is eventually rescued and allowed to return to her world, provided that she send a substitute to dwell in the underworld. She selects Dumuzi, her husband, who was not overjoyed at her return and did not humble himself before her, as all others did. Dumuzi flees from his fate, but is eventually overtaken.]

Below are excerpts from the original; note the repetitions common to the oral tradition of narration. (Compiled from: Diane Wolkstein & Samuel N. Kramer, Inanna: Queen of Heaven and Earth [1983]; S. H. Hooke, Middle Eastern Mythology [1963].)