COSMOGONIA

COSMOGONY. – It is the complex of doctrines that explain the origin and formation of the universe.

The problem of the origin of the world and of man has occupied the human mind from the earliest stages of culture that we can know today. Cosmogony and anthropogony, as a rule closely linked to one another, are traced back to the action of supernatural beings who pre-existed nature or the present cosmic order. This action is presented for the most part in mythical form.

I. PRIMITIVE CULTURES

In the great variety of versions on cosmogony, it is possible to identify a certain number of fundamental motifs, handed down by tradition, which, however, are variously correlated and enriched with legendary or poetic details by the imagination of each culture, each people, and indeed often of each group within the same people. Like all cultural elements, such myths spread and migrate, and may also decline, become impoverished, transform, and disappear. Modern historical-cultural research has nevertheless made it possible, through the critical examination of the rich materials known to date, to ascertain the inexpressible antiquity of the notion of a personal supreme Being, a creator, who in most cases constitutes the central figure of myths about cosmogony. This Being, conceived for the most part anthropomorphically but at the same time with supernatural attributes, sometimes creates from nothing, or more often fashions from pre-existing materials the earth, the stars, animals, and man, acting either alone or with the collaboration of other beings or animals dependent on him. For the most part, the Creator begins his work within or above a formless chaos (sea, stream, primordial swamp, darkness) from which he brings forth the world. The first men are created (in a single pair, in multiple pairs, sometimes only the first male) from clay, wood, reeds, etc.; in some versions, the first man is made from the rib of the supreme Being (Cheyenne of Canada), and the first woman from the rib of the man (Cheyenne, Nandi of Kenya, Vute of Cameroon, Bubi of Fernando Po). Versions such as these, to which other motifs widespread among primitives are added (the sin of the first men, the universal flood, etc.), raise the question of the relationship between the myths of nature peoples and the biblical tradition, a problem that is not always to be clarified by invoking direct or indirect missionary influences, at least as regards Asia and Africa.

Although myth is the most universally widespread form in which the account of cosmic and human origins is handed down, the overall harmonious conceptions of a people may sometimes document among them the presence, albeit faded, of a notion of cosmogony even when that people has not developed (or preserved) explicit myths on the subject. And, on the other hand, the myth may not simply be a narrative told, but may be represented symbolically in the initiations of the young and in the so-called “mysteries of cosmogony” (Arapaho, Cheyenne, Central Australians, etc.); this demonstrates how in certain primitive cultures the problem of origins assumes vital importance at the very foundation of sociological formation.

Among the Pygmies, recognized as the most primitive among the current inhabitants of Africa or even (according to the school of Fr. W. Schmidt) of the entire globe, some fine myths of cosmogony have been collected, in which motifs of naive primitivism are united with relatively elevated conceptions: and this especially among the western groups (Gabon Pygmies). Kivumu (the supreme Being), existing at the origin of time, created the world with his word; he then sits on the bank of a stream near the great village of animals and fashions human figurines from differently colored earth (red, black, white, whence the various races), commanding them to walk. According to another myth, at the beginning, the Creator, alone in the village, is bored; there is no one to prepare his food: so he thinks of making men. Having gathered many nuts, he places them in his canoe on the shores of the ocean and has them towed out to sea by a crocodile; once in the open sea, he blows and spits on the nuts and casts them one by one into the sea, commanding that they become men and women. Equally vivid myths are not found among the other major group of Pygmies (of the Ituri, Belgian Congo), who, however, have the notion of a cosmogony of a supreme Being (Tore), creator of nature and of the first man. A multiplicity of conceptions is observed among the Asian Pygmies. The Semang of the Malay Peninsula do not possess clear notions of cosmogony; it seems, however, that the idea of an indirect cosmogony prevails, either through the work of two mythical brothers, fashioned by the supreme Being, who in turn would have made the mountains and stones from which men would later arise, or by means of an animal (the dung beetle), which would have drawn the earth from the original swamp. Contrasting conceptions are also found among the Andamanese. Among the northern groups, there is the concept of an “autocreation” of man, born from the knot of a large bamboo or tree (a singular parallel with the Melanesians). The name of this protagonist is “the only one”: indeed, he has no wife, but cohabits with an anthill (a lunar symbol, as in certain Sudanese cosmogonies), and from this he has various children, who according to one version are the wind, the storm, the sky, and sea foam. Among the southern Andamanese groups, however, the figure of a supreme Being (Puluga, elsewhere called Biliku and sometimes conceived as female) who creates the first human pair stands out.

Even in the sphere of peoples comparable to the Pygmies for extreme ethnological primitiveness, the concept of cosmogony does not seem to have been foreign to the Tasmanians, now extinct. The only brief myth collected on this subject among this people tells that men were formed (it is not said how) by a benevolent Being; but at the origins they had physical imperfections until another compassionate being descended from the sky to remedy them. No notion of cosmogony is found among the Vedda, pygmoid people of Ceylon; but perhaps the beautiful myth of the Bhils (pre-Dravidian and pre-Munda?) has notable ethnological antiquity among the primitives of India: original solitude of God, who reflects “whom shall I create?”; creation of lesser deities bearing light, which through the intervention of the Evil Spirit are induced to neglect God’s will; His anger, which banishes them to earth after striking them; His renewed solitude and reflection, and finally the creation of man.

Reliable data on the existence of a concept of creation among the Australian peoples recognized as the most archaic (Kurnai, Cepara) are lacking, though they do believe in the existence of a supreme Being (Mungan ngana = “our father”) who pre-existed the proto-ancestors of humanity. A figure of this kind, however, gains greater prominence among the tribes, also very primitive, assigned to the “boomerang culture” (southeastern Australia). The creator Being of the Kulin, called Bungil or Pungel, is the author of the earth, the trees, the animals, and also of man. For this last work, Bungil prepares himself with his great knife, with which he cuts two slices of tree bark; he places mud on them and molds two human beings of the male sex; with other shreds of bark he makes their hair, straight for one, curly for the other; he gives them two names, smooths them with his hands, and finally lies down on each one and breathes his breath into the mouth, nose, and navel of the creatures, which thus come to life. And before these he manifests his joy by dancing around at every successive stage of their making. Bungil, however, is not the creator of women, who instead (also in the number of two) are made by Paliyan, brother (or son) of the supreme Being, who claps his hands over the water of a deep pool until it thickens and assumes human form. Here, with transparent symbolism, is adumbrated the generative value of water (in analogy to the waters of childbirth), a conception widespread among more than one primitive people. The Wiradyuri have the notion of a supreme Being, Boyma (= Bayame), who is self-created, having arisen from the crystalline mountain that serves him as a throne, and who creates ex nihilo all things, including the first man Davamudun. Davamudun is, on the other hand, the name of the supreme Being of the Yuin-Kuri, creator of men and trees: a typical example of a proto-ancestor elevated to divine dignity.

At an ethnological level akin to that of the paleo-Australians are classed in Africa the Bushmen, in America the Fuegians. Among both these groups the figure of a creator god is not absent, and at times has considerable prominence, though it does not have a clear or exclusive function in the work of creation. Among the Bushmen of the northwest, the “great captain” Khu (XU) often shares the creative functions with another figure, Nawa (Gauab), the highest among the evil spirits gauab, who in turn is rather a demiurge than a true creator. Among the Bushmen of the Maluti Mountains (southeastern group) the creator of the human race is Cang or Kaang “lord,” a primordial being with magical powers, who has become evil over time; elsewhere (among the Kham) Kagen is the name of the mantis, who creates the moon by throwing a sandal, or an ostrich feather, into the dark sky. In general, in these myths semi-animal characters, demons of the forest and of the hunt, predominate, whose adventures obscure the clarity of the versions on creation. Clearer is the notion of a supreme Being among the Fuegians, but the creative activity of this Being is mostly ignored, or at least is not reflected in explicit myths.

Watawineua of the Yahgan (as indeed Köl'ash of the Halakwulup) is recognized as lord of creation, in particular of the animals, conceived as his possessions; men say they owe their existence to him, but whether he is the creator of them and of the world the Yahgan cannot affirm, though they declare they have long pondered the question. Better-defined conceptions on this point are held by the Shelk'nam (Ona), who form the most continental Fuegian group and the one most influenced by the matriarchal culture of the Tehuelche. Their supreme Being Tenukukel, living beyond the stars, is the creator of the earth and the empty firmament, but has then ceded the formation of the world to Kenos, his agent and progenitor of humanity.

Among the primitive cultures of America, special mention must be made, for the richness of its cosmogonic myths, of the Central Californians. According to a myth of the Yuki, in the beginning all was water. On this floated a patch of foam, on which floated a feather; and from the feather came a voice and a song. This is the supreme Being (Taikomol = “he who goes alone”) who proceeds to the creation of the earth (from a piece of basketry, which he stiffens with pitch), of the sky (by means of the skin of four whales), and of men (by means of sticks, which Taikomol places at night in his house, and which in the morning rise up in human form). To humans the Creator teaches customs and usages and their respective languages. This is followed by the creation of mountains, rivers, etc., for which he mostly uses condor feathers (a totemic element?). A variant of the Uch-non group tells of errors committed by Taikomol, which cause the newly created world to sink and be submerged by the primordial sea; he then creates a second one, but this too, without sun, without light, and without game, fails and is set on fire; the third attempt, after various difficulties, is more successful. In these myths appears a character, typical of North American mythologies, who stands beside the supreme Being in the role of collaborator and completer of his work (among the Yuki it is he who gives fire, the sun, food, etc.), now as his mocking antagonist: the Coyote. Also typically American is the motif of the creation of the first men by means of sticks (or trees), which, combined with the other motif of successive failed attempts at creation, is found among the higher civilizations of Central America (Maya). According to the Maidu (central California), on the primordial ocean there floated, in the darkness, a raft, on which were the turtle and the culture hero (Peheipe, “father” of the secret society); from the sky a rope made of feathers is lowered, along which descends the Creator, his face covered and his body radiant, who enters the raft, and, at the turtle’s request, consents to make a dry land. The turtle dives to procure the necessary earth, and—after an immersion lasting six years—brings to the surface a few crumbs caught in its claws; the Creator makes a little ball of these, which grows until it forms the earth, on which the raft then runs aground. Again at the turtle’s request, he proceeds to the creation of the “sister” sun and the “brother” moon, then of the stars, which light up in the sky one by one as the Creator calls them by name. Anthropogeny here is presented as the result of a challenge, proposed by the devil Hellokaich (a figure equivalent to that of the Coyote) to the Creator: the latter procures two sticks, which, as in the Yuki myth, become a man and a woman. The devil tries to do the same, but since at the moment when his sticks are about to come to life he laughs, the new creation is imperfect; and the Creator refuses to correct II.
A similar dualism in creation is found among various primitive peoples of America and Asia. The eastern Angolchini explain the coexistence on earth of good and evil by attributing part of the creation to the “Great Spirit” dwelling in the primeval mist (who creates the earth, the sky, the stars, and then the wind that clears the sky and causes the waters of the primordial chaos to flow away), and part to Manito, spirit of evil, conceived also as a powerful sorcerer, to whom is owed whatever in the world is bad (flies, sin, misfortunes, diseases, death). Greater prominence, with regard to creation, is assumed by the function of the “devil” in the (primary) culture of the nomadic shepherds of Central Asia, among whom numerous variants occur—the anthropological schema is as follows: the supreme Being creates man, with the earth, but before completing the creation he abandons II.
Orlando in heaven to seek his soul, meanwhile entrusting the dog with the custody of the unfinished creature and the care of attending to its awakening. The devil then approaches, induced by flattery to persuade the dog to yield him the man’s body; he himself breathes the soul into it or otherwise corrupts II. Hence come human mortality and imperfections. According to some Siberian peoples, the devil also intervenes in creation, assuming the role of “fishing” the earth from the primordial sea—a function more commonly assigned in archaic cultures to seabirds, the mouse, or (as in the cited Maidu myth) the turtle, among others. The motif of “fishing” the earth, or retrieving it after an initial submersion, recurs frequently among more recent peoples, for example in India and in Slavic folklore.

In the ancient cultures of Asia, myths of creation are scarce, except among the Samoyeds, who have a version strikingly similar to some of those in North America (Algonquins), and among the Ainu, among whom the motif recurs—among others—of an aquatic bird collaborating with the Supreme Being in creation. In other versions from this same people, the creation of man is accomplished through wood and earth, or else creation is entrusted to the proto-ancestor, or to two lesser deities. In one Ainu anthropogenic myth, human imperfection is attributed to the carelessness of the otter (as with the dog among the Siberians). Among the neighboring Koryaks of Kamchatka, creation is no longer the work of the Supreme Being (“the one on high,” “the master on high”), but rather of “Great Raven,” a figure endowed with the character of a culture hero or proto-ancestor.

The multiplicity and diversity of conceptions found within a single people demonstrate that belief in a Supreme Being does not always suffice to identify him as the Creator. In general, the preponderant function attributed to a Supreme Creator Being by the most ancient ethnological peoples tends to diminish among many peoples of “primary” and “secondary” cultures, or even to disappear altogether.

Where, for example, influences of (later) matriarchal culture have intervened among North American primitives, conceptions emerge that are entirely different from those seen above. It is the earth itself, conceived as female, that gives birth to the first men (Iroquois, Indians of the Thompson River, etc.). This is the predominant conception among most African Negroes, whose agricultural-patriarchal (“paleometric”) culture conceives the earth as the abode of ancestors and the source of all life; the anthropogenic conception is typically manifest in the prominence of the proto-ancestor figure, who brings forth the first men from the earth (or from caves, ponds, rocks, etc.). Among most Indians of South America (Patagonians, Gran Chaco Indians, Bororo, Caingang, Ges-Tapuya group, etc.), the figure of a Supreme Creator Being is almost unknown; instead, astral mythology takes precedence (the sun is sometimes vaguely conceived as creator), and above all the figure of two mythic twins, culture heroes and sometimes fabricators of individual animals.

Where totemism is most pronounced, it sometimes colors myths in a highly characteristic way. Among the Dieri of southeastern Australia, it is told that at the beginning the earth opened at the center of a lake, and pre-human beings emerged (totemic animals only partially formed), who then lay in the sun and rose transformed into men. In the version of the Aranda (central Australia), the creation of the totems precedes that of human beings. These received their present form through the work of two celestial beings, the Ungambinkula (“those who came from nothing” or “those who exist of themselves”), who merely perfected shapeless creatures—plants and animals already in the process of transforming into men—by freeing limbs from the amorphous mass and carving facial features with stone knives.

The Melanesians (of the “two-class cycle”) believe in two creator beings of unequal rank: one, a benevolent deity (Tagar or Tagaro), the other (called Qat in the Banks Islands, Suga in the New Hebrides, etc.) playfully mischievous and harmful, always at odds with the first in the creation of the first men and in decisions regarding their fate. A myth from the Island of Lepers tells that Tagar made the first two human beings both male; one of them threw a yam tuber at the other, which instantly turned into a woman, crying out that many men would perish in the future because of women. In other versions, it is Qat who fashions the first woman from flexible reeds to make her his wife. The Melanesians of the Gazelle Peninsula (New Pomerania) imagine God drawing two figures, both male, on the ground, then moistening them with his own blood and covering them with two leaves; they become two men. These climb two palm trees, detach coconuts, throw them to the ground, and they split open, turning into women.

II. “SECONDARY” CULTURES. — With the transition to “secondary” cultures, creation narratives become more complex, enriched with elaborate details within the framework of often highly developed polytheistic mythologies. In certain cases, there has been a definite transmission of mythic elements from superior cultures to those of geographically distant regions, a fact now considered certain. Asia offers the greatest abundance of evidence, but examples are also found elsewhere (Africa, Polynesia). A celebrated example is the motif of the “cosmic egg,” known to the high cultures of India as well as to those of Polynesia; from it the world would develop, and within it, according to the Polynesian conception, the god Tangaroa himself would have dwelt for long ages. This motif is also found, rather singularly, in West Africa (Yoruba, Pangwe). The Asian derivation, however, is not always to be accepted. Perhaps independent of it are the Australian versions of this motif, such as that of the Bad (from the egg emerge the rainbow and the flood) or that of the Wimmera (from an emu egg the sun is born, and from that moment humanity originates).

Typical examples of elevated “secondary” cultures are found in Polynesia. A celestial god (Tangaloa in Samoa and Tonga, Tangaroa in New Zealand), conceived in the form of a bird, has the sun for his eye and a huge rock (O-te-papa) for his wife, from whom he has as children other gods, the planets, the sea, and the winds; he also generates the first men or molds them from red clay. According to other myths, the “maker of the sky” is Raithu, son of Tangaroa. On Mangaia (Cook Islands) it is imagined that from an original chaos of mud an invisible, powerful agent evolved the present world. Vari-ma-te-takere, the “great mother” (vari = “principle,” but also “mud”), is the mother of creatures and gods, whom she produces from pieces of her own body. The earth is not “created” but “drawn up from the darkness”; above it are ten or more superimposed heavens, corresponding to various subterranean worlds (another parallel with Indian conceptions). The Maori of New Zealand believe that at the origin of things were sky and earth (Rangi and Papa), joined together in primordial darkness where a pair of human proto-ancestors already lived. It is a son of this divine pair, Tane-mahuta, “father of forests,” who, after a council with his divine brothers, struggles against his parents, placing his head against the mother-earth and his feet against the father-sky, and separates them despite their cries of pain; hence comes light, and the present cosmic order.

The Indonesian mythologies, especially those of Java, are extremely rich. Here the Indian influences are still more evident and historically traceable than in Polynesia, and not only among the peoples of higher civilization. The Batak of Sumatra have the notion of an anthropomorphic Supreme Being, possessor of a fabulous blue hen, Manuk-manuk; from the eggs laid by this bird there is born a triad of gods, one of whom, Batara Guru, creates the world by having a swallow drop a handful of earth into the sea, and then populates it with plants and animals. On Nias it is believed that a celestial Being, Lowalani, caused the first man and his companion to descend from heaven.

In Africa, it is the “Atlantic” cultures of Upper Guinea (Ashanti, Edo, Yoruba, Ibibio) that carry to the most complex development a lofty mythology, which presents points of affinity with those of Polynesia: a heaven-earth couple from which the world originates, a multitude of lesser gods (of the firmament, of thunder, of the sea, etc.) in conflict with one another or against the sky-god the Father, esoteric myths such as that of the birth of hundreds of deities from the body of a female “mother of fishes” goddess, etc. Humanity is often conceived as genealogically descended from the gods. Still within the Sudanese world, mythological and cosmogonic conceptions revealing a mature and perfected metaphysical thought are found among the peoples of the Upper Niger (Bambara, Dogon, Bozo, etc.). According to the cosmic vision of the Dogon, Amma, the unique and omnipotent god, creates the stars by hurling pellets of earth into space, the sun in the form of white-hot pottery surrounded by a spiral of copper, and the moon by a similar technique. The earth, also created by Amma, is conceived as female and is fertilized by water, the divine seed; from this union there arise, among other things, two divine twin genii, possessors of the Word—the basis of the universal system according to a complex symbolism—and participants in the divine force that is water. This pair of genii, a perfect unity, transmits by their speech the original word, bearer of force and initiator of things, and draws upon the ground the souls, male and female. Upon these two “shadows” the first man and the first woman, created by God independently of the Earth as globes of clay cast down from the heights of heaven, are extended, assuming them together.

### III. HIGHER CULTURES

#### 1. Mexico and Peru
In pre-Columbian America two cosmogonic myths are especially characteristic, one from the Maya and the other from the Peruvians. The former held that originally all was sky and water, stagnant and dark. Guacumatz, Tepeu, and Hurakan held council and created the world, formed of mountains, plains, and rivers. First appeared the vegetable kingdom, then the animal; subsequently, with clay, the gods made man. But man dissolved in the water. Then the gods asked the aid of Xyipacoc and Xumcam and created man from the wood of one tree, woman from the bark of another. Thus, however, they lacked intelligence. After a deluge four perfect and intelligent men were created. They were able to see far and near. But the preexistent race, out of envy, struck their eyes, so that they could see only from near. While the men slept, the deities created four women who made possible the multiplication of the race.

For the Peruvians, it is Con, son of the sun and the moon, who makes the world and man by his supernatural power. Con laments with the inhabitants of the coast and transforms the region into a desert, but mitigates the sentence by creating rivers in the region and herbs and fruits of which men may nourish themselves. At this point Con disappears and is replaced by another son of the sun and the moon, Pachamac, who transforms into animals the men created by his brother. He himself then substitutes new ones, the Indians of historical times, whose occupation is the cultivation of fields and the gathering of fruits.

Another Mexican myth says that “in the ages of darkness the world was a chaos wrapped in obscurity, where flowed foam and mire. The soul-god and the soul-goddess floated a rock upon the abyss of waters upon which they placed the sky. There they dwelt for many years and established worship as well as the cultivation of flowers and fruit. With prayers and vows they besought the spirits of their parents to reveal the light and to separate the earth from the waters and to free the dry land from the celestial vault. The earth was peopled, and after a universal deluge that destroyed the first humanity, the world was reestablished by the creator of all things.”

#### 2. China
Ancient Chinese religion, according to all appearances, had neither a doctrine of creation nor cosmogonic myths; but from an examination of certain legends, whose dating is impossible because of their extraordinary fragmentariness, and in analogy with similar legends of Indochina, a modern scholar, Maspero, has wished to see an echo of an ancient cosmogony. The earth, originally covered with water, is populated by one of the sons of the Lord of Heaven sent for that purpose. Heaven and Earth, the greatest gods, thus explain the origin of all. A scientific attempt at explanation is instead represented by the monist-materialist theory of Wang Ch'ung (1st c. A.D.), who makes all things proceed from a homogeneous, vaporous, nebulous chaos. The lighter and heavier elements separated spontaneously: the hot and luminous (fire) remained above; the cold and dark (water) below. Another celebrated doctrine is that of Hsing-li (1st c.), founder of Neo-Confucianism: the Great Ultimate generates in activity the Yang (active principle), in repose the Yin (passive principle); this generation is repeated throughout eternity, since each is the cause of the other. From the union of Yang and Yin are born the five elements, the masculine and feminine principles, and so on.

### Japan

Japanese cosmogony is known to us from the *Kojiki* and the *Nihongi* (composed in the 8th century AD), which aim above all to demonstrate, through the collection of numerous myths, the supernatural origin of Japan. The *Nihongi* asserts the existence of a primordial chaos from which heaven and earth were formed (the Chinese influence is evident). Then, through spontaneous generation, certain deities appear (five according to the *Kojiki* and three according to the *Nihongi*), followed by other divine couples. Of all these, only the last two, Izanagi and Izanami, are important, for they become the cosmogonic couple who descend from heaven on a floating bridge to an island that emerges from the ocean to receive them. Around Izanagi and Izanami, the islands of Japan and various deities are created, leading Amaterasu (v.), who, through magical arts, produce many children; the progenitors of several noble Japanese families.

### Babylon

Of Babylonian cosmogony we are informed above all by the *Enuma Elish*, a poem that recounts the struggle of Bel (Marduk) against the monster Tiamat (the poem, as it has come down to us, is in a recension asserted to be from the 7th century BC). It appears that the origin of all things was the primordial watery chaos, represented by the triad Apsu-Tiamat-Mummu, who initiate the cosmogonic theogony. The third divine couple to emerge from the chaos is that of Ansar and Kišar, the upper and lower parts of the yet unordered universe. Other gods are born, and fearing that his peace is threatened, the primordial mother plans to destroy herself. Marduk, however, defeats her, and having thus attained supreme power, he makes the firmament from one half of Tiamat’s body to contain the waters of heaven, and from the other half the earth as a covering-lid for the netherworld. Heaven, the constellations, and the lunar phases are ordered. At this point the poem

is mutilated; but it can be reconstructed (also from the testimonies of Berossus) in the sense that Marduk creates men so that they may venerate the gods. Various allusions to creation are also found in other documents.

### Egypt

For Egypt too, the origin of all things is attested as deriving from a primordial watery chaos, from which the divine Ennead evolved. According to the system of the priests of Heliopolis, Atum Râ, the solar god, with the magical power of the word creates the air (Shu), the moisture (Tefnut), the earth (Geb), and the sky (Nut). When the sky and earth are separated by the force of the air, Geb and Nut give birth to Osiris, Isis, Nephthys, and Seth, the pairs of fertility and barrenness.

### Phoenicia

For the Phoenicians, according to the version of Philo of Byblos, at the origin of all things there would be a dark chaos, without limits in time or space, which produces from itself the muddy silt (môt) from which all things were born. Evidently this idea of a primordial chaos was a common feature of the ancient Near East, since a recollection of it is also found in Mosaic cosmogony.

### India

Various cosmogonies can be traced in the sacred books of India. Beginning with a famous hymn of the *Rg-veda*, in which one is transported to the time when there was neither non-being nor being; there was no atmosphere nor the sky above. What moved? Where? Under whose protection? What was the inscrutable, unfathomable water of the sea?... Without producing wind, that One breathed by its own force (tad éhanu); beyond it there was nothing else... Whence has this creation come, whether it was produced or not, he who is the overseer of this (world) in the highest heaven certainly knows, if perhaps he does not know (Rg-veda 10, 129; trans. by V. Papesso, Bologna 1931). Elsewhere the origin of the world is attributed to Viśvakarman (Rg-veda 10, 81 and 82) or to Prajapati (Rg-veda 10, 121). Elsewhere again Prajapati is called Viśvakarman (“creator”). In the *Brahmanas* it is usually Prajapati who shapes the universe from his own essence, and through ascetic exercises produces the earth, the atmosphere, and the sky. Other descriptions of creation, little different from these, are found in other texts; in all of them there appears the sacerdotal preconception that creation is the work of the magical power of religious ceremonies. Until speculation is refined and in the *Upanishads* all appears to proceed from Brahman, the absolute existing by itself, which creates the gods and assigns them governance of the worlds. From this interpretation the purified texts do not depart greatly.

In Jainism there is no place for a cosmogony, inasmuch as the universe has neither beginning nor end.

Nor does Buddhism take a great interest in the cosmological problem, in relation to the Buddha’s doctrine on the finitude or infinitude of the world. Buddhists reject the supreme personal creative power attested by the *Brahmanas*; nevertheless, the Buddha himself gives a cosmological interpretation when he answers Ānanda, who questions him about the causes of earthquakes (Dīgha, 11, 107), that the earth is built upon the waters, the waters upon the wind, and the wind upon space, and that, therefore, an earthquake is due to the blowing of the wind which stirs the waters and causes the shaking of the earth. Even before the appearance of Mahāyāna texts, a cosmogony had certainly been formed, attested by various works but more systematically by the *Prajāpatisāstra* of the Sarvāstivādin school.

### Iran

Among the Iranians the most important texts on the creation of the world are the *Vendidād* and the *Bundahišn*. According to these, Ormazd (Ahura Mazda, v.) and Ahriman (Angra Mainyu) existed from all eternity. The two were separated by the ether, and Ormazd reigned in endless light, while Ahriman dwelt in the abyss of infinite darkness. Discovering a conflict between them, Ormazd creates beautiful regions and Ahriman seeks to ruin them by bringing against them physical and moral evils (here the dualism of Zoroastrianism is already manifest). The period of creation, according to the system of Zoroaster, covers twelve thousand years, divided into four periods: in the first is placed spiritual creation, while Ahriman creates demons and rejects the peace offered by Ormazd. In the second epoch the Amesha Spentas (v.), heaven, water, earth, plants, animals, and man are created. The third period is characterized by the offensive of Ahriman

### Biblical Cosmography

— miniature depicting the cosmos seen from the side, contained in the *Christian Topography* of Cosmas Indicopleustes: Cod. Vat. gr. 699, f. 43r (9th century) — Vatican Library. Graphic reconstruction of the same miniature.

— the earth, round, surrounded by the sea. On the shores of the sea the three gods find two trees and from them create the first men, Ask and Embla.

From the news, very scarce and of doubtful value, concerning the religion of the Balto-Slavs, it does not seem possible to derive the outlines of a cosmogonic belief (v. also: CREATION; HEXAEMERON).

Cosmogonia Biblica: V. esamerone.