MYTHS OF CREATION
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9. From Macrocosm
To Microcosm |
By comparing and contrasting a large number of these complementary traits, tropes and themes from different parts of the world, it becomes possible for us to outline corresponding elements which frequently reappear in multiple cultural renditions, in such a way that an abundant volume of coincident cross-cultural counterparts, demarcating successive episodes of a longer cosmogonic storyline, can then become much more clearly distinguishable.
— Most significantly, we also find that a multitude of these comparable cultural parallels are more or less readily divisible across THREE contiguous domains or adjoining orders of existence : Sometimes the primary focus of attention 1: is Astronomical, in that the mythos was concerned with interplanetary dynamics beheld in the heavens above; 2: sometimes it’s Geophysical, in that the mythos pertained to formative changes witnessed on land and sea around the globe; 3: sometimes it’s Ethnological, in that the mythos centered on stages of human history observed to have unfolded here below. But overall, we find that most traditional mythic histories attended to all three domains the same, spanning all the way from the local earthly microcosm of man on earth below, to the all-encompassing heavenly macrocosm of planets and fixed stars on high. — Furthermore, these three were so regularly regarded as being inextricably interrelated, it seems to have been virtually impossible for them to speak about one domain without referring to the other two likewise. . . . |