MYTHS OF CREATION
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6. From Creation
To Catastrophe |
[6.1]
All mythopoeic cosmovisions of all ancient peoples, moreover universally promoted an overall view of nature and humankind as being subject to an unfinished, open-ended succession of consecutive creations, destructions, and regenerative renewals transpiring over extended eras of cyclically recurring time: — a sequential chain of WORLD AGES, each related to, but likewise separated from one another by intervening catastrophes and violently disruptive changes in the regular course of nature, which eventually brought each ensuing new Age down crashing in a quickly collapsing disastrous demise — with successive sequels of this same series of occurrences finally culminating in the creative destruction of the Age immediately preceding our own, followed by the emergence of the modern world order of the present day. ___________________ [6.2 ]
Like-minded parallels were once known in every corner of the globe, and were long held in common by practically all early religious systems everywhere, among primitive & sophisticated societies alike. The well-known Greek sequence of World Ages and Generations of Man characterized by four metals of decreasing value (namely, Gold, Silver, Bronze and Iron) was typical of many cosmogonic models developed by the peoples of the ancient Near East, — where we find it central also to the Hittite and Hurrian mythos, the Egyptian and Babylonian (Akkadian) accounts of Creation, as well as the theogonies of old (Ugaritic) Canaan and Phoenicia. The concurrent presence of matching themes among the older cosmogonies of early polytheistic Hebrew and Arabic peoples seems to have profoundly influenced the ‘sacred scriptures’ later handed down by the legendary founders of the modern monotheistic religions now typical of our era. More or less identical motifs abounded in the monuments, ceremonies and rituals of many antique peoples in pre-Christian Europe, including the mythopoeic German, Scandinavian, Celtic and Etruscan peoples originally indigenous to their respective areas; — while further to the East, fit counterparts can be found among the sacred books of the Hindu peoples, which also spoke of four ages (or yugas) and the accompanying cataclysms (or pralayas) that at different epochs wrecked the world and destroyed much of the human race. The native American peoples comparably looked back to a series of ‘Sun Ages’ and the periodic upheavals of land & sea that accompanied the catastrophic extinguishing of each successive Sun; — while further abroad we find echoes and traces of corresponding elaborations among the Chinese, Japanese, Southeast Asian and Polynesian populations; — with kindred traditions scattered as well as among the islands of Oceania, the South Pacific, and the aboriginal populations of Australia. |