Mythology reflects the cultural and belief elements. By examination of the heroes, tricksters, the creation and the afterlife of the myths of different mythologies, some similarity can be detected. By comparing the Ancient Greek, the native African, the Mesopotamian and the Biblical mythologies, many common belief symbols can be summarized: the human challenge to the God, the human’s reflection of their sinful behaviors, the desire to perform over the human limit, the fear for the almighty power, the desire to explain the world origination and the different destinations for the faithful and unfaithful. Firstly, the fear for the almighty power is one of the original motivations for the existence of all the mythologies, which can be found in different mythologies. All the Gods own the almighty power over human beings and other creatures on earth.
They can be physical parts or concepts (similar to Plato’s idea of the forms). Two main issues come up during discussions of cosmology; how the universe was created and out of what the universe was created. In the Theogony, Hesiod has the world created out of gods that are human by nature and to create this universe the gods reproduced. Hesiod’s theories of the universe can clearly be classified as myth, since there is no scientific background for it. The philosophers to follow Hesiod moved slightly away from this.
The concept of a sacred space or area reserved for a particular deity or purpose was fundamental, as was the corollary theory that such designated areas could correspond to each other. Heaven reflected Earth, and macrocosm echoed microcosm. The celestial dome was divided into 16 compartments inhabited by the various divinities: major gods to the east, astral and terrestrial divine beings to the south, infernal and inauspicious beings to the west, and the most powerful and mysterious gods of destiny to the north. The deities manifested themselves by means of natural phenomena, principally by lightning. They also revealed themselves in the microcosm of the liver of animals (typical is a bronze model of a sheep's liver found near Piacenza, bearing the incised names of divinities in its 16 outside divisions and in its internal
Comparison and Contrast Paper: Medieval Characteristics Shawna Macauley ENG 106: Survey of Literary Masterpieces August 19, 2013 Jason Faulkner, Facilitator Comparison and Contrast Paper: Medieval Characteristics The belief between fate and gods intertwines. A person’s perception of him or herself in relation to his or her God can determine how an individual responds to and controls his or her own fate. In the poems Theogony, Oedipus, and Inferno, readers glimpse at three different views between the gods and humanities vision of who controls fate. These three poems show an illustration of fate controlled exclusively by the gods, fate foretold by the gods therefore controlled by the gods, versus fate determined by an individual’s choice but judged by God. A development influenced by culture, circumstance, and understanding.
The Pharaoh as Horus in life became the Pharaoh as Osiris in death, where he was united with the rest of the gods. New incarnations of Horus succeeded the deceased pharaoh on earth in the form of new Pharaohs. The lineage of Horus, the eventual product of unions between the children of Atum, may have been a means to explain and justify Pharaonic power; The gods produced by Atum were all representative of cosmic and terrestrial forces in Egyptian life; by identifying Horus as the offspring of these forces, then identifying him with Atum himself, and finally identifying the Pharaoh with Horus, the Pharaoh theologically had dominion over all the world. The notion of Horus as the Pharaoh seems to have been superseded by the concept of the Pharaoh as the son of Ra during the Fifth Dynasty of Egypt.
The primeval history, which contains the first eleven chapters, that involves the story of general creation and revelation of God, and the patriarchal history that mainly includes the three important patriarchs which consists of chapters twelve to fifty. The Book of Genesis proposes a share of thematically reoccurring narratives such as creation, protection, and blessing with themes such as power, humanity, obedience, relationships, family feuds, mortality, sin, faith and loyalty. Genesis’ primeval history chapters, open with the Creation account that starts with, Genesis 1:1 “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth”, and probably one of the most famous phrases in world literature. The six days of Creation is a narrative theme of creation. The book of Genesis states that God created the world in six days with order and purpose.
THE COSMOLOGY OF THE AKANS OF GHANA The Akan believe that the universe was created by a Supreme Being, whom they refer to variously as Oboadea (Creator), Nyame (God), Odomankoma (Infinite, Inventor), Ananse Kokuroko (The Great Spider; The Great Designer), etc. The Akan religious thought is essentially theocentric and theistic, with the Supreme Being, God at the center of it all. From this perspective, the Akan use their cultural symbols to portray their beliefs about God, their attitudes towards God and His creation, and the Akan's relation to God and His Creation. The Akan claim the Supreme Being created life and death, and death overcame the Supreme Being. However, the Supreme Being, having the antidote to the venom of death, was able to overcome death.
Because myths are linked historically not just to literature, but also to the experience of the sacred, their use has the effect turning an experience sacrosanct (Clasby xi). The two texts, Wild Thorns and Waltz with Bashir: A Lebanon War Story are imbued with various myths, of heroism and martyrdom, nation and national identity, and the motherland and revolution. Though the myths in the story are born out of a historical and political necessity to create a unified community, the same myths are also far removed from the lived experience, often alienating characters instead, and limiting the exploration of different possibilities and interpretations of history and nation. Myths, as the chosen form of communication of “prophets, poets and rebels” (Clasby xv), offer a symbolic language for articulating experience that can be used as a narrative of the experience of a people. In the light of the fact that many scholars see “modern consciousness” as a fall grace (Clasby 1), myths elevate the ordinary experience to the sacred (Clasby xi).
Creation of Pandora Creation myths explain the origins of things. This myth, Creation of Pandora, is a natural myth that explains the origin of evil. This paper shall identify each character and discuss the recreation of earth; the betrayal and reaction; creation of Pandora and the results of her defiance; and discuss Pandora from the perspective of society relating to today's similar myth. Main characters The main characters involved were Zeus, Epimetheus, Prometheus, Hephaestus, and Pandora. Zeus is the Greek version of the Indo-European chief sky god.
(Lawhead 2011:15-16). However, the pre-Socratic philosophers brought about change through discrediting the accepted mythical thinking that all things can be explained by means of the nature of the Greek gods. They went about removing the negativity surrounding knowledge at the time in order to facilitate human beings to determine truth for themselves instead of blindly believing explanations of a blind nature. This opened up a consideration for knowledge from a naturalistic standpoint (Curd & Graham 2008:8). The theories of the pre-Socratic philosophers were generally characterised by their link to perception.