Comparing Creation Myths of Ancient Egypt and The Christian Bible

One parallel between Greek and Egyptian creation stories is that they both begin with a God or Gods being created from the universe. The creation of

Often a topic of debate, there are several different takes on the creation story existent in literature. Dependent on one’s religion, different beliefs about how the world we live in was created may arise. Looking deeper into the literature, one will realize there are also many similarities between creation stories. Based on the strong possibility that Genesis was influenced by the Enuma Elish, there are similarities that stem from the fact that they both describe the creation of a new world as well as differences in their interpretations and approaches to creationism.

Although the stories are very similar, there are some differences, for example the Irish god Eiocha, did not need another god

Genesis and “The World on the Turtle’s Back”, two folklore myths, illustrate the contrasting universal archetypes of one supreme being and multiple god figures. Genesis depicts one male supreme being who created the entire universe, while “The World on the Turtle’s Back” shows numerous gods who created different things within the universe. God, from Genesis, created everything that exists; “the heaven and the earth” (Genesis 1.1), day and night, and “every living creature that moveth” (Genesis 1:21). God made the Sun and the Moon (Genesis 1:16), and he made “man in his own image” (Genesis 1:27). He made “every herb-bearing seed” (Genesis 1:29), and the rain that waters them (Genesis 2:5). All of life and nature and creation was crafted by God. In contrast,

The first creation narrative, from the priestly source (P), is found in the first chapter of Genesis. The narrative begins with a “formless void” and a “wind from God [that] swept over the face of the waters” (New Oxford Annotated Bible, Gen. 1:2). God first created light to separate the darkness and He created Day and Night, “the first day” (Gen. 1:3-5). On the second day, God separated the waters above and below a dome called Sky (Gen. 1:6-8). On the third day, God made dry land appear out of the waters and let the dry land, Earth, produce vegetation (Gen. 1:9-13). The fourth day became the first to have specific lights to rule the day, the “greater light,” and the night, the “lesser light” and the stars (Gen. 1:14-19). The fifth day brought creatures swarming in the sea and flying

A difference between both myths however was the fact that the Sumerians had a different god for each city as well as a god for each part of the Earth, and the Egyptians had one God, who made smaller gods and goddesses. The gods and goddesses of Egypt were as follows: Khepera at dawn, Re at noon and Atum in the evening, the gods of the sun. Shu, the god of wind. Tefnut, the god of rain. Geb, the Earth God. The goddess Nut, who was the sky

All three creations myths begin similarily with the divine being or spirit being in a void. Written in Genesis 1:2, as well as the Enuma Elish with Tiamat, goddess of primeval chaos and bearer of sky and earth, and Aspu, god of water, along with Ahura Mazada from the Avesta. Notice the first three words in both the Old Testament and the Avesta, "In the beginning."

What many people know about Ancient Egypt's religion is that they are a polytheistic religion group - meaning they believe in more than one deity. Egyptian mythology was the belief foundation of ancient Egyptian culture. From the belief of multiple deities and an old tradition of passing down stories orally,"every aspect of life in ancient Egypt was informed by the stories which related the creation of the world and the sustaining of that world by the gods. The significance of Egyptian mythology to other cultures was in its development of the concept of an eternal life after death, benevolent deities, and reincarnation. Both Pythagoras and Plato of Greece were said to have been influenced by Egyptian beliefs in reincarnation and Roman religious culture borrowed as extensively from Egypt as it did from other civilizations"

Myths are clearly important to a mythology, and there always seems to be two very important myths one needs to know about in a mythology. How they believe the earth and the gods came to be and the afterlife for the mortals. The Egyptian creation myth is not very detailed, most likely due to how it was originally written and years of being told and retold. According to Donald A. Mackenzie, in the book Egyptian Myth and Legend, Ra was the first god and was the one who created or helped created the original eight deities. Shu (god of wind and air), Tefnut (goddess of rain), Seb (god of the earth or ground), and Nut (goddess of firmament) where the first four gods, then Seb and Nut created Osiris, Isis, Set, and Nephthys (1-2). Though in some tellings

The Mythical part of the egyptian religion was the way people personalized their Gods. They started to do this in the prehistoric period, where people began to show why things happened through myths. In the very end, the egyptian Gods were born.

Therefor the two creation stories have different names for God and different ways and order of creation. The audience is essentially being told the same story (the story of creation) but it is told from different angles. In the first story God is described as having all dominion , super powers and total dominance and he creates everything by speaking. However , in the second story God is seen as a worker because he preforms physical actions such as planting.

According to historian, Anthony C. Di Paolo, Egyptian religion was mostly based off ancient myths. There most popular myth being the creation of Earth. They believe that at one point only the ocean existed. Then came the sun God, Ra, from of an egg floating in

1.What are three things that you noticed about the Egyptian creation myths?  How do these myths compare to the Enuma Elish?

The creation stories are very fascinating to learn about. There are so many different creation stories that explain how man and earth are made. People have different view point of how the earth was created. So let me give some examples, the Iroquois creation story tells of a father god and a mother god that are caretaker They lived high above the endless sea next to a tree of light. Then one day the winds blew away the tree and the mother caretaker fell into the endless ocean. She landed on a giant sea turtle. Creatures of the ocean began to help her create the earth in addition, she made the land on top of the turtle. She also gave birth to mother earth and this started the creation of man from mother earth’s two sons. One created all the

In the very beginning of heaven and earth, there was nothing to be imagined. God created what we know was earth now, in 7 days. These majestic stories should not be understood as historical and scientific accounts of origins but as proclamations of basic theological truths about creation. “Creation” in Holy Scripture refers to and describes the relationship between God and all God’s wonderful works. Both in the Greek and the Christian creation story there is a God that rules us all, that we obey and take commands from. We are taught that there is an afterlife in both creation stories. After people died they would have somewhere to go beyond the stars God said. There will be life after earth life and it will be glorious. In the Greek creation story, they have