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131-766: Various authors have also used it to refer to other mythological and allegorical elements found in the Bible , such as the story of the Leviathan . The term has been applied to myths and legends from the Middle Ages , such as the story of Saint George and the Dragon , the stories of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table , and the legends of the Parsival . Multiple commentators have classified John Milton 's epic poem Paradise Lost as

262-447: A Canaanite myth in which God creates the world by vanquishing the water deities: "Awake, awake! ... It was you that hacked Rahab in pieces, that pierced the Dragon! It was you that dried up the Sea, the waters of the great Deep, that made the abysses of the Sea a road that the redeemed might walk..." The first creation account is divided into seven days during which God creates light (day 1);

393-404: A genre of folklore consisting primarily of narratives that play a fundamental role in a society. For scholars, this is in contrast to more vernacular usage of the term "myth" that refers to a belief that is not true. Instead, the veracity of a myth is not a defining criterion. Although Orthodox Jews and "fundamentalist Christians" attribute the authorship of Book of Genesis to Moses "as

524-583: A literary device or artistic form, an allegory is a narrative or visual representation in which a character, place, or event can be interpreted to represent a meaning with moral or political significance. Authors have used allegory throughout history in all forms of art to illustrate or convey complex ideas and concepts in ways that are comprehensible or striking to its viewers, readers, or listeners. Writers and speakers typically use allegories to convey (semi-) hidden or complex meanings through symbolic figures, actions, imagery, or events, which together create

655-454: A God who dies and is resurrected ; this figure is sometimes called the " dying god ". An important study of this figure is James George Frazer 's The Golden Bough , which traces the dying God theme through a large number of myths. The dying God is often associated with fertility. A number of scholars, including Frazer, have suggested that the Christ story is an example of the "dying God" theme. In

786-410: A blank wall (514a–b). The people watch shadows projected on the wall by things passing in front of a fire behind them and begin to ascribe forms to these shadows, using language to identify their world (514c–515a). According to the allegory, the shadows are as close as the prisoners get to viewing reality, until one of them finds his way into the outside world where he sees the actual objects that produced

917-411: A certain way, reached out toward that God made man, who, humiliated unto death on a cross, in this way opened the door of life to all of us." Many cultures have myths about a flood that cleanses the world in preparation for rebirth. Such stories appear on every inhabited continent on earth. An example is the biblical story of Noah. In The Oxford Companion to World Mythology , David Leeming notes that, in

1048-589: A divine hero and a dragon. He cites the Christian legend of Saint George as an example of this theme. An example from the Late Middle Ages comes from Dieudonné de Gozon , third Grand Master of the Knights of Rhodes , famous for slaying the dragon of Malpasso. Eliade writes: "Legend, as was natural, bestowed upon him the attributes of St. George, famed for his victorious fight with the monster. [...] In other words, by

1179-521: A dragon or other monster representing chaos—a theme found, for example, in the Enuma Elish . A number of scholars call this story the "combat myth". A number of scholars have argued that the ancient Israelites incorporated the combat myth into their religious imagery, such as the figures of Leviathan and Rahab , the Song of the Sea , Isaiah 51:9–10's description of God's deliverance of his people from Babylon, and

1310-459: A firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.' 7 And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament; and it was so. 8 And God called the firmament Heaven. And there was evening and there was morning, a second day. On day two, God creates the firmament ( rāqîa ), which is named šamayim ( ' sky ' or ' heaven ' ), to divide

1441-695: A king, God has merely to speak for things to happen. On day one, God creates light and separates the light from the darkness. Then he names them. God therefore creates time. Creation by speech is not found in Mesopotamian mythology, but it is present in some ancient Egyptian creation myths . While some Egyptian accounts have a god creating the world by sneezing or masturbating, the Memphite Theology has Ptah create by speech. In Genesis, creative acts begin with speech and are finalized with naming. This has parallels in other ancient Near Eastern cultures. In

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1572-463: A major part of non-canonical Christian tradition. Folklorists define folktales (in contrast to "true" myths) as stories that are considered purely fictitious by their tellers and that often lack a specific setting in space or time. Christian-themed folktales have circulated widely among peasant populations. One widespread folktale genre is that of the Penitent Sinner (classified as Type 756A, B, C, in

1703-714: A matter of faith," the Mosaic authorship has been questioned since the 11th century, and has been rejected in scholarship since the 17th century. Scholars of biblical criticism conclude that it, together with the following four books (making up what Jews call the Torah and biblical scholars call the Pentateuch), is "a composite work, the product of many hands and periods." The creation narrative consists of two separate accounts, drawn from different sources. The first account, in Genesis 1:1–2:3,

1834-480: A monotheistic creation in opposition to the polytheistic creation myth of ancient Israel's neighbors. Genesis 1 bears striking similarities and differences with Enuma Elish , the Babylonian creation myth . The myth begins with two primeval entities: Apsu , the male freshwater deity, and Tiamat , the female saltwater deity. The first gods were born from their sexual union. Both Apsu and Tiamat were killed by

1965-499: A more "scientific" model as imagined by Greek philosophers, according to which the Earth was a sphere at the centre of concentric shells of celestial spheres containing the Sun, Moon, stars and planets. The idea that God created the world out of nothing ( creatio ex nihilo ) has become central today to Islam, Christianity, and Judaism – indeed, the medieval Jewish philosopher Maimonides felt it

2096-803: A non-canonical story has a connection to a non-narrative form of folklore — namely, folk medicine . Arthurian legend contains many elaborations upon canonical mythology. For example, Sir Balin discovers the Lance of Longinus , which had pierced the side of Christ. According to a tradition widely attested in early Christian writings, Adam 's skull lay buried at Calvary; when Christ was crucified, his blood fell over Adam's skull, symbolizing humanity's redemption from Adam's sin. Examples of (1) Christian myths not mentioned in canon and (2) literary and traditional elaborations on canonical Christian mythology: Some scholars believe that many elements of Christian mythology, particularly its linear portrayal of time, originated with

2227-662: A plot-driven fantasy narrative in an extended fable with talking animals and broadly sketched characters, intended to discuss the politics of the time. Yet, George MacDonald emphasized in 1893 that "A fairy tale is not an allegory." J. R. R. Tolkien 's The Lord of the Rings is another example of a well-known work mistakenly perceived as allegorical, as the author himself once stated, "...I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations, and always have done so since I grew old and wary enough to detect its presence. I much prefer history – true or feigned – with its varied applicability to

2358-443: A rich body of legends that were never incorporated into the official scriptures. Legends were a staple of medieval literature. Examples include hagiographies such as the stories of Saint George or Saint Valentine . A case in point is the historical and canonized Brendan of Clonfort , a 6th-century Irish churchman and founder of abbeys. Round his authentic figure was woven a tissue that is arguably legendary rather than historical:

2489-514: A single God whose power is uncontested and who brings order out of chaos. Creation takes place over six days. The creative acts are arranged so that the first three days set up the environments necessary for the creations of the last three days to thrive. For example, God creates light on the first day and the light-producing heavenly bodies on the fourth day. Each day follows a similar literary pattern: Verse 31 sums up all of creation with, "God saw every thing that He had made, and, indeed, it

2620-441: A society's existence and world order: those narratives of a society's creation, the society's origins and foundations, their god(s), their original heroes, mankind's connection to the "divine", and their narratives of eschatology (what happens in the "after-life"). This is a very general outline of some of the basic sacred stories with those themes. The Christian texts use the same creation myth as Jewish mythology as written in

2751-600: A variety of reasons: the association of the term "myth" with polytheism, the use of the term "myth" to indicate falsehood or non-historicity, and the lack of an agreed-upon definition of "myth". As examples of Biblical myths, Every cites the creation account in Genesis 1 and 2 and the story of Eve's temptation . Christian tradition contains many stories that do not come from canonical Christian texts yet still illustrate Christian themes. These non-canonical Christian myths include legends, folktales, and elaborations on canonical Christian mythology. Christian tradition has produced

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2882-510: A work much alike to Genesis as known today. The authors of the text were influenced by Mesopotamian mythology and ancient near eastern cosmology , and borrowed several themes from them, adapting and integrating them with their unique belief in one God . The combined narrative is a critique of the Mesopotamian theology of creation: Genesis affirms monotheism and denies polytheism . Scholarly writings frequently refer to Genesis as myth,

3013-399: A work of Christian mythology. The term has also been applied to modern stories revolving around Christian themes and motifs, such as the writings of C. S. Lewis , J. R. R. Tolkien , Madeleine L'Engle , and George MacDonald . Over the centuries, Christianity has divided into many denominations . Not all of these denominations hold the same set of sacred traditional narratives. For example,

3144-418: Is a figurative approach, relying on a set of concepts associated with key terms in order to create an allegorical decoding of the text." Allegory has an ability to freeze the temporality of a story, while infusing it with a spiritual context. Mediaeval thinking accepted allegory as having a reality underlying any rhetorical or fictional uses. The allegory was as true as the facts of surface appearances. Thus,

3275-477: Is also seen in the Genesis flood narrative , where God uses wind to make the waters subside in Genesis 8:1. In Enuma Elish , the storm god Marduk defeats Tiamat with his wind. While stories of a cosmic battle prior to creation were familiar to ancient Israelites (see above ) , there is no such battle in Genesis 1 though the text includes the primeval ocean and references to God's wind. Instead, Genesis 1 depicts

3406-417: Is ambiguous and can be translated in other ways. The NRSV translates verses 1 and 2 as, "In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void   ..." This translation suggests that earth, in some way, already existed when God began his creative activity. Biblical scholars John Day and David Toshio Tsumura argue that Genesis 1:1 describes the initial creation of

3537-520: Is called Elohim (translated "God"). He creates the universe over a six-day period, creating a new feature each day: first he creates day and night; then he creates the firmament to separate the "waters above" from the "waters below"; then he separates the dry land from the water; then he creates plants on the land; then he places the Sun, Moon, and stars in the sky; then he creates swimming and flying animals; then he creates land animals; and finally he creates man and woman together, "in his own image". On

3668-513: Is central to the Christian narrative. According to Christian theology, by Adam disobeying God in the Garden of Eden, humanity acquired an ingrained flaw that keeps humans in a state of moral imperfection, generally called "original sin". According to Paul the Apostle, Adam's sin brought sin and death to all humanity: "Through one man, sin entered the world, and through sin, death" (Romans 5:12). According to

3799-505: Is complex, since it demands we observe the distinction between two often conflated uses of the Greek verb "allēgoreīn," which can mean both "to speak allegorically" and "to interpret allegorically." In the case of "interpreting allegorically," Theagenes appears to be our earliest example. Presumably in response to proto-philosophical moral critiques of Homer (e.g., Xenophanes fr. 11 Diels-Kranz ), Theagenes proposed symbolic interpretations whereby

3930-532: Is from what scholars call the Priestly source (P), largely dated to the 6th century BCE. The second account, which is older and takes up the rest of Genesis 2, is largely from the Jahwist source (J), commonly dated to the 10th or 9th centuries BCE. The two stories were combined, but there is currently no scholarly consensus on when the narrative reached its final form. A common hypothesis among biblical scholars today

4061-418: Is given dominion over the animals. Eve , the first woman, is created from Adam's rib as his companion. The primary accounts in each chapter are joined by a literary bridge at Genesis 2:4 , "These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created." This echoes the first line of Genesis 1, "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth", and is reversed in the next phrase, "...in

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4192-638: Is mentioned 35 times, "heaven/firmament" and "earth" 21 times each, and the phrases "and it was so" and "God saw that it was good" occur 7 times each. The cosmos created in Genesis 1 bears a striking resemblance to the Tabernacle in Exodus 35–40 , which was the prototype of the Temple in Jerusalem and the focus of priestly worship of Yahweh ; for this reason, and because other Middle Eastern creation stories also climax with

4323-538: Is no complete combat myth preserved in the Bible. However, there are fragmentary allusions to such a myth in Isaiah 27:1 , Isaiah 51:9–10 , Job 26:12–13 . These passages describe how God defeated the forces of chaos. These forces are personified as sea monsters . These monsters are variously named Yam (Sea), Nahar (River), Leviathan (Coiled One), Rahab (Arrogant One), and Tannin (Dragon). Psalm 74 and Isaiah 51 recall

4454-452: Is often the sacred place of creation; this center often takes the form of a tree, mountain, or other upright object, which serves as an axis mundi or axle of the world. A number of scholars have connected the Christian story of the crucifixion at Golgotha with this theme of a cosmic center. In his Creation Myths of the World , David Leeming argues that, in the Christian story of the crucifixion,

4585-484: Is part of a "new myth [...] of a man who is sacrificed in hate" but "sees the inner myth, the old myth of origins and acceptance, the myth of a god who sacrifices himself in love". Related to the doctrine of transsubstantiation , the Christian practice of eating the flesh and blood of Jesus Christ during the Eucharist is an instance of theophagy . The theological concept of Jesus being born to atone for original sin

4716-600: Is that the first major comprehensive narrative of the Pentateuch was composed in the 7th or 6th centuries BCE. A sizeable minority of scholars believe that the first eleven chapters of Genesis, also known as the primeval history , can be dated to the 3rd century BCE, based on discontinuities between the contents of the work and other parts of the Hebrew Bible . The "Persian imperial authorisation," which has gained considerable interest, although still controversial, proposes that

4847-535: Is the creation myth of both Judaism and Christianity , told in the Book of Genesis ch. 1–2. While the Jewish and Christian tradition is that the account is one comprehensive story modern scholars of biblical criticism identify the account as a composite work made up of two stories drawn from different sources. The first account, in Genesis 1:1–2:3, is from what scholars call the Priestly source (P), largely dated to

4978-543: Is used to describe the desert wilderness. Bohu has no known meaning, although it appears to be related to the Arabic word bahiya ("to be empty"), and was apparently coined to rhyme with and reinforce tohu . The phrase appears also in Jeremiah 4:23 where the prophet warns Israel that rebellion against God will lead to the return of darkness and chaos, "as if the earth had been 'uncreated'". Verse 2 continues, " darkness

5109-401: Is viewed as a three storied structure, with the earth in the center, the heaven above, and the underworld beneath. Heaven is the abode of God and of celestial beings – the angels. The underworld is hell, the place of torment. Even the earth is more than the scene of natural, everyday events, of the trivial round and common task. It is the scene of the supernatural activity of God and his angels on

5240-666: The ruach of God [Elohim] moved upon the face of the waters." There are several options for translating the Hebrew word ruach ( רוּחַ ). It could mean "breath", "wind", or "spirit" in different contexts. The traditional translation is "spirit of God". In the Hebrew Bible, the spirit of God is understood to be an extension of God's power. The term is analogous to saying the "hand of the Lord" ( 2 Kings 3:15 ). Historically, Christian theologians supported "spirit" as it provided biblical support for

5371-631: The Aarne-Thompson index of tale types ); another popular group of folktales describe a clever mortal who outwits the Devil. Not all scholars accept the folkloristic convention of applying the terms "myth" and "folktale" to different categories of traditional narrative. Christian tradition produced many popular stories elaborating on canonical scripture. According to an English folk belief, certain herbs gained their current healing power from having been used to heal Christ 's wounds on Mount Calvary . In this case,

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5502-472: The Book of Revelation , the author sees a vision of a pregnant woman in the sky being pursued by a huge red dragon. The dragon tries to devour her child when she gives birth, but the child is "caught up to God and his throne". This appears to be an allegory for the triumph of Christianity: the child presumably represents Christ; the woman may represent God's people of the Old and New Testaments (who produced Christ); and

5633-547: The Navigatio or "Journey of Brendan". The legend discusses mythic events in the sense of supernatural encounters. In this narrative, Brendan and his shipmates encounter sea monsters, a paradisal island and a floating ice island and a rock island inhabited by a holy hermit: literal-minded devotés still seek to identify "Brendan's islands" in actual geography. This voyage was recreated by Tim Severin , suggesting that whales , icebergs and Rockall were encountered. Folktales form

5764-520: The Persian religion of Zoroastrianism . Mary Boyce , an authority on Zoroastrianism, writes: Zoroaster was thus the first to teach the doctrines of an individual judgment, Heaven and Hell, the future resurrection of the body, the general Last Judgment, and life everlasting for the reunited soul and body. These doctrines were to become familiar articles of faith to much of mankind, through borrowings by Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Mircea Eliade believes

5895-503: The Persians , after their conquest of Babylon in 538 BCE, agreed to grant Jerusalem a large measure of local autonomy within the empire, but required the local authorities to produce a single law code accepted by the entire community. According to this theory, there were two powerful groups in the community, the priestly families who controlled the Temple, and the landowning families who made up

6026-625: The books of the Bible accepted by the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox churches include a number of texts and stories (such as those narrated in the Book of Judith and Book of Tobit ) that many Protestant denominations do not accept as canonical . Christian theologian and professor of New Testament , Rudolf Bultmann wrote that: The cosmology of the New Testament is essentially mythical in character. The world

6157-500: The creative word : "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God" ( John 1:1 ). When the Jews came into contact with Greek thought, there followed a major reinterpretation of the underlying cosmology of the Genesis narrative. The biblical authors conceived the cosmos as a flat disc-shaped Earth in the centre, an underworld for the dead below, and heaven above. Below

6288-543: The "elders," which were in conflict over many issues. Each had its own "history of origins," but the Persian promise of greatly increased local autonomy for all provided a powerful incentive to cooperate in producing a single text. The creation narrative is made up of two stories, roughly equivalent to the two first chapters of the Book of Genesis (there are no chapter divisions in the original Hebrew text; see " chapters and verses of

6419-473: The "waters below", and day three the sea from the land. In each of the next three days these divisions are populated: day four populates the darkness and light with Sun, Moon and stars; day five populates seas and skies with fish and fowl; and finally land-based creatures and mankind populate the land. In the second story Yahweh creates Adam , the first man, from dust and places him in the Garden of Eden . There he

6550-465: The 12th-century works of Hugh of St Victor and Edward Topsell 's Historie of Foure-footed Beastes (London, 1607, 1653) and its replacement in the study of nature with methods of categorisation and mathematics by such figures as naturalist John Ray and the astronomer Galileo is thought to mark the beginnings of early modern science. Since meaningful stories are nearly always applicable to larger issues, allegories may be read into many stories which

6681-461: The 6th century BCE. In this story, Elohim (the Hebrew generic word for " god ") creates the heavens and the Earth in six days, then rests on, blesses, and sanctifies the seventh (i.e. the Biblical Sabbath ). The second account, which takes up the rest of Genesis 2, is largely from the Jahwist source (J), commonly dated to the 10th or 9th centuries BCE. In this story, God (now referred to by

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6812-480: The Bible "). In the first story, the Creator deity is referred to as " Elohim " (the Hebrew generic word for " god "), whereas in the second story, he is referred to with a composite divine name; " L ORD God". Traditional or evangelical scholars such as Collins explain this as a single author's variation in style in order to, for example, emphasize the unity and transcendence of "God" in the first narrative, who created

6943-412: The Bible story, as in other flood myths, the flood marks a new beginning and a second chance for creation and humanity. According to Sandra Frankiel, the records of "Jesus' life and death, his acts and words" provide the "founding myths" of Christianity. Frankiel claims that these founding myths are "structurally equivalent" to the creation myths in other religions, because they are "the pivot around which

7074-495: The Birth of the Hero , Otto Rank argued that the births of many mythical heroes follow a common pattern. Rank includes the story of Christ's birth as a representative example of this pattern. According to Mircea Eliade, one pervasive mythical theme associates heroes with the slaying of dragons, a theme which Eliade traces back to "the very ancient cosmogonico-heroic myth" of a battle between

7205-480: The Christian understanding of Satan, archangels, angels, and demons. In Buddhist mythology , the demon Mara tries to distract the historical Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama , before he can reach enlightenment. Huston Smith , a professor of philosophy and a writer on comparative religion, notes the similarity between Mara's temptation of the Buddha before his ministry and Satan's temptation of Christ before his ministry. In

7336-518: The Creation to the Flood and its aftermath. The two share numerous plot-details (e.g. the divine garden and the role of the first man in the garden, the creation of the man from a mixture of earth and divine substance, the chance of immortality , etc.), and have a similar overall theme: the gradual clarification of man's relationship with God(s) and animals. Genesis 1–2 reflects ancient ideas about science: in

7467-462: The Dragon symbolizes Satan, who opposes Christ. According to Catholic scholars, the images used in this allegory may have been inspired by pagan mythology: This corresponds to a widespread myth throughout the ancient world that a goddess pregnant with a savior was pursued by a horrible monster; by miraculous intervention, she bore a son who then killed the monster. Academic studies of mythology often define mythology as deeply valued stories that explain

7598-513: The Earth were the "waters of chaos", the cosmic sea, home to mythic monsters defeated and slain by God; in Exodus 20:4, God warns against making an image "of anything that is in the waters under the earth". There were also waters above the Earth, and so the raqia ( firmament ), a solid bowl, was necessary to keep them from flooding the world. During the Hellenistic period , this was largely replaced by

7729-625: The Gods of the Iliad actually stood for physical elements. So, Hephestus represents Fire, for instance (for which see fr. A2 in Diels-Kranz ). Some scholars, however, argue that Pherecydes cosmogonic writings anticipated Theagenes allegorical work, illustrated especially by his early placement of Time (Chronos) in his genealogy of the gods, which is thought to be a reinterpretation of the titan Kronos, from more traditional genealogies. In classical literature two of

7860-437: The Hebrew bara' , a word used only for God's creative activity; people do not engage in bara' . Walton argues that bara' does not necessarily refer to the creation of matter. In the ancient Near East , "to create" meant assigning roles and functions. The bara' which God performs in Genesis 1 concerns bringing "heaven and earth" from chaos into ordered existence. Day disputes Walton's functional interpretation of

7991-572: The Hebrews had a sense of linear time before Zoroastrianism influenced them. However, he argues, "a number of other [Jewish] religious ideas were discovered, revalorized, of systematized in Iran". These ideas include a dualism between good and evil, belief in a future savior and resurrection , and "an optimistic eschatology, proclaiming the final triumph of Good". The Zoroastrian concepts of Ahriman , Amesha Spentas , Yazatas , and Daevas probably gave rise to

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8122-469: The Jewish version has drastically changed its Babylonian model: Eve, for example, seems to fill the role of a mother goddess when, in Genesis 4:1 , she says that she has "created a man with Yahweh", but she is not a divine being like her Babylonian counterpart. Genesis 2 has close parallels with a second Mesopotamian myth, the Atra-Hasis epic – parallels that in fact extend throughout Genesis 2–11 , from

8253-485: The Judge will come from heaven, the dead will rise, the last judgment will take place, and men will enter into eternal salvation or damnation. In its broadest academic sense, the word myth simply means a traditional story. However, many scholars restrict the term "myth" to sacred stories. Folklorists often go further, defining myths as "tales believed as true, usually sacred, set in the distant past or other worlds or parts of

8384-465: The Memphite Theology, the creator god names everything. Similarly, Enuma Elish begins when heaven, earth, and the gods were unnamed. Walton writes, "In this way of thinking, things did not exist unless they were named." According to biblical scholar Nahum Sarna , this similarity is "wholly superficial" because in other ancient narratives creation by speech involves magic : The pronouncement of

8515-480: The Mesopotamian creation accounts. The gods in Enuma Elish are amoral , they have limited powers, and they create humans to be their slaves . In Genesis 1, however, God is all powerful. He creates humans in the divine image, and cares for their wellbeing, and gives them dominion over every living thing. Enuma Elish has also left traces on Genesis 2. Both begin with a series of statements of what did not exist at

8646-649: The New Testament are in the Gospels and the Book of Revelation. Although the Gospel stories do not lay out the atonement doctrine as fully as does Paul, they do have the story of the Last Supper, crucifixion, death and resurrection. Atonement is also suggested in the parables of Jesus in his final days. According to Matthew's gospel, at the Last Supper , Jesus calls his blood "the blood of the new covenant, which will be poured out for

8777-458: The Old Testament. According to the Book of Genesis, the world was created out of a darkness and water in seven days. (Unlike a Jew, a Christian might include the miracle of Jesus' birth as a sort of second cosmogonic event) Canonical Christian scripture incorporates the two Hebrew cosmogonic myths found in Genesis 1–2:2 and Genesis 2: In the first text on the creation (Genesis 1–2:3), the Creator

8908-540: The Papal Bull Unam Sanctam (1302) presents themes of the unity of Christendom with the pope as its head in which the allegorical details of the metaphors are adduced as facts on which is based a demonstration with the vocabulary of logic: " Therefore of this one and only Church there is one body and one head—not two heads as if it were a monster... If, then, the Greeks or others say that they were not committed to

9039-512: The Promised Land. Also allegorical is Ezekiel 16 and 17, wherein the capture of that same vine by the mighty Eagle represents Israel's exile to Babylon. Allegorical interpretation of the Bible was a common early Christian practice and continues. For example, the recently re-discovered Fourth Commentary on the Gospels by Fortunatianus of Aquileia has a comment by its English translator: "The principal characteristic of Fortunatianus' exegesis

9170-632: The Tree of Life) stands between them and godhood: "The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever" (Genesis 3:22). Although the text of Genesis does not identify the tempting serpent with Satan , Christian tradition equates the two. This tradition has made its way into non-canonical Christian "myths" such as John Milton's Paradise Lost . According to Lorena Laura Stookey, many myths feature sacred mountains as "the sites of revelations": "In myth,

9301-475: The article "Dying God" in The Oxford Companion to World Mythology , David Leeming notes that Christ can be seen as bringing fertility, though of a spiritual as opposed to physical kind. In his 2006 homily for Corpus Christi , Pope Benedict XVI noted the similarity between the Christian story of the resurrection and pagan myths of dead and resurrected gods: "In these myths, the soul of the human person, in

9432-566: The ascent of the holy mountain is a spiritual journey, promising purification, insight, wisdom, or knowledge of the sacred". As examples of this theme, Stookey includes the revelation of the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai , Christ's ascent of a mountain to deliver his Sermon on the Mount , and Christ's ascension into Heaven from the Mount of Olives . Many mythologies involve a "world center", which

9563-452: The assembly", which originates from ἀγορά ( agora ), "assembly". Northrop Frye discussed what he termed a "continuum of allegory", a spectrum that ranges from what he termed the "naive allegory" of the likes of The Faerie Queene , to the more private allegories of modern paradox literature . In this perspective, the characters in a "naive" allegory are not fully three-dimensional, for each aspect of their individual personalities and of

9694-429: The author may not have recognized. This is allegoresis, or the act of reading a story as an allegory. Examples of allegory in popular culture that may or may not have been intended include the works of Bertolt Brecht , and even some works of science fiction and fantasy, such as The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis . The story of the apple falling onto Isaac Newton 's head is another famous allegory. It simplified

9825-511: The best-known allegories are the Cave in Plato's The Republic (Book VII) and the story of the stomach and its members in the speech of Menenius Agrippa ( Livy ii. 32). Among the best-known examples of allegory, Plato 's Allegory of the Cave , forms a part of his larger work The Republic . In this allegory, Plato describes a group of people who have lived chained in a cave all of their lives, facing

9956-579: The blood of the god Kingu . The grateful gods build a temple for Marduk in Babylon . This is similar to the Baal Cycle , in which the Canaanite god Baal builds himself a cosmic temple over seven days. In both Genesis 1 and Enuma Elish , creation consists of bringing order out of chaos . Before creation, there was nothing but a cosmic ocean . During creation, a dome-shaped firmament is put in place to hold back

10087-651: The book would not have ended with the Ring being destroyed but rather with an arms race in which various powers would try to obtain such a Ring for themselves. Then Tolkien went on to outline an alternative plot for "Lord of The Rings", as it would have been written had such an allegory been intended, and which would have made the book into a dystopia . While all this does not mean Tolkien's works may not be treated as having allegorical themes, especially when reinterpreted through postmodern sensibilities, it at least suggests that none were conscious in his writings. This further reinforces

10218-608: The care of Peter and his successors, they necessarily confess that they are not of the sheep of Christ." This text also demonstrates the frequent use of allegory in religious texts during the Mediaeval Period, following the tradition and example of the Bible. In the late 15th century, the enigmatic Hypnerotomachia , with its elaborate woodcut illustrations, shows the influence of themed pageants and masques on contemporary allegorical representation, as humanist dialectic conveyed them. The denial of medieval allegory as found in

10349-473: The center of the Garden (next to the Tree of Life ). Yahweh also creates animals, and shows them to man, who names them. Yahweh sees that there is no suitable companion for the man among the beasts, and he subsequently puts Adam to sleep and takes out one of Adam's ribs, creating from it a woman whom Adam names Eve . A serpent tempts Eve to eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and she succumbs, offering

10480-413: The coming J stories, which use only the name YHWH." The first account ( Genesis 1:1–2:3 ) employs a repetitious structure of divine fiat and fulfillment, then the statement "And there was evening and there was morning, the [ n ] day," for each of the six days of creation. In each of the first three days there is an act of division: day one divides the darkness from light , day two the "waters above" from

10611-409: The connection between the cosmic center and Golgotha in his book Christian Mythology , noting that the image of Adam's skull beneath the cross appears in many medieval representations of the crucifixion. In Creation Myths of the World , Leeming suggests that the Garden of Eden may also be considered a world center. Many Near Eastern religions include a story about a battle between a divine being and

10742-497: The construction of a temple/house for the creator god , Genesis 1 can be interpreted as a description of the construction of the cosmos as God's house, for which the Temple in Jerusalem served as the earthly representative. The opening phrase of Genesis 1:1 is traditionally translated in English as " in the beginning God created". This translation suggests creatio ex nihilo ( ' creation from nothing ' ). The Hebrew, however,

10873-467: The creation narrative. Day argues that material creation is the "only natural way of taking the text" and that this interpretation was the only one for most of history. Most interpreters consider the phrase "heaven and earth" to be a merism meaning the entire cosmos. Genesis 1:2 describes the earth as "formless and void". This phrase is a translation of the Hebrew tohu wa-bohu ( תֹהוּ וָבֹהוּ ). Tohu by itself means "emptiness, futility". It

11004-459: The creation of the material universe. Even so, the doctrine had not yet been fully developed in the early 2nd century AD, although early Christian scholars were beginning to see a tension between the idea of world-formation and the omnipotence of God; by the beginning of the 3rd century this tension was resolved, world-formation was overcome, and creation ex nihilo had become a fundamental tenet of Christian theology. The Genesis narratives are not

11135-494: The cross serves as "the axis mundi , the center of a new creation". According to a tradition preserved in Eastern Christian folklore, Golgotha was the summit of the cosmic mountain at the center of the world and the location where Adam had been both created and buried. According to this tradition, when Christ is crucified, his blood falls on Adam's skull, buried at the foot of the cross, and redeems him. George Every discusses

11266-476: The day that the L ORD God made the earth and the heavens". This verse is one of ten "generations" ( Hebrew : תולדות toledot ) phrases used throughout Genesis, which provide a literary structure to the book. They normally function as headings to what comes after, but the position of this, the first of the series, has been the subject of much debate. The overlapping stories of Genesis 1 and 2 are usually regarded as contradictory but also complementary, with

11397-487: The divine word acted creatively. Its presence or absence is of no importance, for there is no tie between it and God. "Let there be!" or, as the Psalmist echoed it, "He spoke and it was so," [Psalm 33:9] refers not to the utterance of the magic word, but to the expression of the omnipotent, sovereign, unchallengeable will of the absolute, transcendent God to whom all nature is completely subservient. 6 And God said: 'Let there be

11528-461: The earth and the heavens, and no shrub of the field was yet in the earth, and no plant of the field had yet sprouted, for the LORD God had not sent rain upon the earth ..." (Genesis 2:4–5 NASB). It then proceeds to describe Yahweh creating a man called Adam out of dust. Yahweh creates the Garden of Eden as a home for Adam, and tells Adam not to eat the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil in

11659-418: The earth is a flat disc surrounded by the waters above and the waters below. The firmament is a solid dome that rests on mountains at the edges of the earth. It is transparent, allowing men to see the blue of the waters above with "windows" to allow rain to fall. The sun, moon and stars are underneath the firmament. Deep within the earth is the underworld or Sheol . The earth is supported by pillars sunk into

11790-405: The events that befall them embodies some moral quality or other abstraction; the author has selected the allegory first, and the details merely flesh it out. The origins of allegory can be traced at least back to Homer in his "quasi-allegorical" use of personifications of, e.g., Terror (Deimos) and Fear (Phobos) at Il. 115 f. The title of "first allegorist", however, is usually awarded to whoever

11921-587: The first (the Priestly story) concerned with the creation of the entire cosmos while the second (the Jahwist story) focuses on man as moral agent and cultivator of his environment. Comparative mythology provides historical and cross-cultural perspectives for Jewish mythology . Both sources behind the Genesis creation narrative were influenced by Mesopotamian mythology , borrowing several themes from them but adapting them to their belief in one God , establishing

12052-465: The forgiveness of many" (Matthew 26:28). John's gospel is especially rich in atonement parables and promises: Jesus speaks of himself as "the living bread that came down from heaven"; "and the bread that I shall give is My flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world" (John 6:51); "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit" (John 12:24). Allegory As

12183-434: The fruit to Adam as well. As a punishment, Yahweh banishes the couple from the Garden and "placed on the east side of the Garden of Eden the cherubim with a fiery revolving sword to guard the way to the Tree of Life". The Lord says he must banish humans from the Garden because they have become like him, knowing good and evil (because of eating the forbidden fruit ), and now only immortality (which they could get by eating from

12314-529: The grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many" (Romans 5:15). For many Christians, atonement doctrine leads naturally into the eschatological narratives of Christian people rising from the dead and living again, or immediately entering heaven to join Jesus. Paul's theological writings lay out the basic framework of the atonement doctrine in the New Testament. However, Paul's letters contain relatively little mythology (narrative). The majority of narratives in

12445-505: The heavens and the earth by himself. Critical scholars such as Richard Elliot Friedman , on the contrary, take this as evidence of multiple authorship. Friedman states that the Jahwist source originally only used the "L ORD " (Yahweh) title, but a later editor added "God" to form the composite name: "It therefore appears to be an effort by the Redactor (R) to soften the transition from the P creation, which uses only 'God' (thirty-five times), to

12576-446: The heroic monomyth". Leeming regards resurrection as a common part of the heroic monomyth, in which the resurrected heroes often become sources of "material or spiritual food for their people"; in this connection, Leeming notes that Christians regard Jesus as the "bread of life". In terms of values, Leeming contrasts "the myth of Jesus" with the myths of other "Christian heroes such as St. George, Roland , el Cid , and even King Arthur";

12707-527: The idea of forced allegoresis, as allegory is often a matter of interpretation and only sometimes of original artistic intention. Like allegorical stories, allegorical poetry has two meanings – a literal meaning and a symbolic meaning. Some unique specimens of allegory can be found in the following works: Some elaborate and successful specimens of allegory are to be found in the following works, arranged in approximate chronological order: Genesis creation narrative The Genesis creation narrative

12838-475: The idea of gravity by depicting a simple way it was supposedly discovered. It also made the scientific revelation well known by condensing the theory into a short tale. While allegoresis may make discovery of allegory in any work, not every resonant work of modern fiction is allegorical, and some are clearly not intended to be viewed this way. According to Henry Littlefield's 1964 article, L. Frank Baum 's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz , may be readily understood as

12969-592: The information a fifth-century upper-class male needed to know into an allegory of the wedding of Mercury and Philologia , with the seven liberal arts the young man needed to know as guests. Also, the Neoplatonic philosophy developed a type of allegorical reading of Homer and Plato. Other early allegories are found in the Hebrew Bible , such as the extended metaphor in Psalm 80 of the vine and its impressive spread and growth, representing Israel's conquest and peopling of

13100-412: The later hero myths, Leeming argues, reflect the survival of pre-Christian heroic values—"values of military dominance and cultural differentiation and hegemony"—more than the values expressed in the Christ story. Many religious and mythological systems contain myths about a paradise . Many of these myths involve the loss of a paradise that existed at the beginning of the world. Some scholars have seen in

13231-401: The moment when creation began; Enuma Elish has a spring (in the sea) as the point where creation begins, paralleling the spring (on the land – Genesis 2 is notable for being a "dry" creation story) in Genesis 2:6 that "watered the whole face of the ground"; in both myths, Yahweh/the gods first create a man to serve him/them, then animals and vegetation. At the same time, and as with Genesis 1,

13362-519: The moral, spiritual, or political meaning the author wishes to convey. Many allegories use personification of abstract concepts. First attested in English in 1382, the word allegory comes from Latin allegoria , the latinisation of the Greek ἀλληγορία ( allegoría ), "veiled language, figurative", literally "speaking about something else", which in turn comes from ἄλλος ( allos ), "another, different" and ἀγορεύω ( agoreuo ), "to harangue, to speak in

13493-551: The motif of the hero's descent to the underworld , which is common in many mythologies. According to Christian tradition, Christ descended to hell after his death in order to free the souls there; this event is known as the Harrowing of Hell . This story is narrated in the Gospel of Nicodemus and may be the meaning behind 1 Peter 3:18–22. Many myths, particularly from the Near East, feature

13624-484: The one hand, and of Satan and his demons on the other. These supernatural forces intervene in the course of nature and in all that men think and will and do. Miracles are by no means rare. Man is not in control of his own life. Evil spirits may take possession of him. Satan may inspire him with evil thoughts. Alternatively, God may inspire his thought and guide his purposes. He may grant him heavenly visions. He may allow him to hear his word of succor or demand. He may give him

13755-413: The only biblical creation accounts. The Bible preserves two contrasting models of creation. The first is the " logos " (speech) model, where a supreme God "speaks" dormant matter into existence. Genesis 1 is an example of creation by speech. The second is the " agon " (struggle or combat) model, in which it is God's victory in battle over the monsters of the sea that mark his sovereignty and might. There

13886-405: The orthodox Christian view, Jesus saved humanity from final death and damnation by dying for them. Most Christians believe that Christ's sacrifice supernaturally reversed death's power over humanity, proved when he was resurrected , and abolished the power of sin on humanity. According to Paul, "if the many died by the trespass of the one man, how much more did God's grace and the gift that came by

14017-497: The personal name Yahweh ) creates Adam , the first man, from dust and places him in the Garden of Eden . There he is given dominion over the animals. Eve , the first woman, is created from Adam's rib as his companion. The first major comprehensive draft of the Pentateuch is thought to have been composed in the late 7th or the 6th century BCE (the Jahwist source) and was later expanded by other authors (the Priestly source ) into

14148-401: The portrayals of enemies such as Pharaoh and Nebuchadnezzar. The idea of Satan as God's opponent may have developed under the influence of the combat myth. Scholars have also suggested that the Book of Revelation uses combat myth imagery in its descriptions of cosmic conflict. According to David Leeming, writing in The Oxford Companion to World Mythology , the harrowing of hell is an example of

14279-572: The presence of the Holy Spirit , the third person of the Trinity , at creation. Other interpreters argue for translating ruach as "wind". For example, the NRSV renders it "wind from God". Likewise, the word elohim can sometimes function as a superlative adjective (such as "mighty" or "great"). The phrase ruach elohim may therefore mean "great wind". The connection between wind and watery chaos

14410-603: The religion turns to and which it returns", establishing the "meaning" of the religion and the "essential Christian practices and attitudes". Tom Cain uses the expression "founding myths" more broadly, to encompass such stories as those of the War in Heaven and the fall of man ; according to Cain, "the disastrous consequences of disobedience" is a pervasive theme in Christian founding myths. Christian mythology of their society's founding would start with Jesus and his many teachings, and include

14541-421: The right word, like the performance of the right magical actions, is able to, or rather, inevitably must, actualize the potentialities which are inherent in the inert matter. In other words, it implies a mystic bond uniting matter to its manipulator   ... Worlds apart is the Genesis concept of creation by divine fiat. Notice how the Bible passes over in absolute silence the nature of the matter—if any—upon which

14672-465: The seventh day, God rests, providing the rationale for the custom of resting on Sabbath . The second creation myth in Genesis differs from the first in a number of important elements. Here the Creator is called Yahweh elohim (commonly translated "Lord God", although Yahweh is in fact the personal name of the God of Israel and does not mean Lord). This myth begins with the words, "When the L ORD God made

14803-507: The shadows. He tries to tell the people in the cave of his discovery, but they do not believe him and vehemently resist his efforts to free them so they can see for themselves (516e–518a). This allegory is, on a basic level, about a philosopher who upon finding greater knowledge outside the cave of human understanding, seeks to share it as is his duty, and the foolishness of those who would ignore him because they think themselves educated enough. In Late Antiquity Martianus Capella organized all

14934-482: The simple fact that he was regarded as a hero, de Gozon was identified with a category, an archetype , which [...] equipped him with a mythical biography from which it was impossible to omit combat with a reptilian monster." In the Oxford Companion to World Mythology David Leeming lists Moses, Jesus, and King Arthur as examples of the heroic monomyth , calling the Christ story "a particularly complete example of

15065-612: The sky (day 2); the earth, seas, and vegetation (day 3); the sun and moon (day 4); animals of the air and sea (day 5); and land animals and humans (day 6). God rested from his work on the seventh day of creation, the Sabbath . The use of numbers in ancient texts was often numerological rather than factual – that is, the numbers were used because they held some symbolic value to the author. The number seven, denoting divine completion, permeates Genesis 1: verse 1:1 consists of seven words, verse 1:2 has fourteen, and 2:1–3 has 35 words (5×7); Elohim

15196-498: The stars, the " sons of God ", sang when the corner-stone of creation was laid. 3 And God said: 'Let there be light.' And there was light. 4 And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness. 5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day. The process of creation illustrates God's sovereignty and omnipotence . God creates by fiat; things come into existence by divine decree. Like

15327-592: The stories of Christian disciples starting the Christian Church and congregations in the 1st century. This might be considered the stories in the four canonical gospels and the Acts of the Apostles . The heroes of the first Christian society would start with Jesus and those chosen by Jesus, the twelve apostles including Peter, John, James, as well as Paul and Mary (mother of Jesus) . In his influential 1909 work The Myth of

15458-408: The story of the Garden of Eden an instance of this general motif. Sacrifice is an element in many religious traditions and often represented in myths. In The Oxford Companion to World Mythology , David Leeming lists the story of Abraham and Isaac and the story of Christ's death as examples of this theme. Wendy Doniger describes the gospel accounts as a "meta-myth" in which Jesus realizes that he

15589-415: The supernatural power of his Spirit. History does not follow a smooth unbroken course; it is set in motion and controlled by these supernatural powers. This æon is held in bondage by Satan, sin, and death (for "powers" is precisely what they are), and hastens towards its end. That end will come very soon, and will take the form of a cosmic catastrophe. It will be inaugurated by the "woes" of the last time. Then

15720-410: The term "myth" outside academia, describing stories in canonical scripture (especially the Christ story) as "true myth"; examples include C. S. Lewis and Andrew Greeley . Several modern Christian writers, such as C. S. Lewis , have described elements of Christianity, particularly the story of Christ, as "myth" which is also "true" ("true myth"). Others object to associating Christianity with "myth" for

15851-421: The thought and experience of readers. I think that many confuse applicability with allegory, but one resides in the freedom of the reader, and the other in the purposed domination of the author." Tolkien specifically resented the suggestion that the book's One Ring , which gives overwhelming power to those possessing it, was intended as an allegory of nuclear weapons . He noted that, had that been his intention,

15982-540: The universe, the former writing: "Since the inchoate earth and the heavens in the sense of the air/wind were already in existence in Gen. 1:2, it is most natural to assume that Gen. 1:1 refers to God's creative act in making them." Other scholars such as R. N. Whybray , Christine Hayes , Michael Coogan , Cynthia Chapman, and John H. Walton argue that Genesis 1:1 describes the creation of an ordered universe out of preexisting, chaotic material. The word "created" translates

16113-428: The water and make Earth habitable. Both conclude with the creation of a human called "man" and the building of a temple for the god (in Genesis 1, this temple is the entire cosmos). In contrast to Enuma Elish , Genesis 1 is monotheistic. There is no theogony (account of God's origins), and there is no trace of the resistance to the reduction of chaos to order (Greek: theomachy , lit. "God-fighting"), all of which mark

16244-439: The waters. Water was a "primal generative force" in pagan mythologies. In Genesis, however, the primeval ocean possesses no powers and is completely at God's command. Rāqîa is derived from rāqa' , the verb used for the act of beating metal into thin plates. Ancient people throughout the world believed the sky was solid, and the firmament in Genesis 1 was understood to be a solid dome. In ancient near eastern cosmology ,

16375-585: The words of E.A. Speiser , "on the subject of creation biblical tradition aligned itself with the traditional tenets of Babylonian science." The opening words of Genesis 1, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth", sum up the belief of the author(s) that Yahweh , the god of Israel, was solely responsible for creation and had no rivals. Later Jewish thinkers, adopting ideas from Greek philosophy , concluded that God's Wisdom , Word and Spirit penetrated all things and gave them unity. Christianity in turn adopted these ideas and identified Jesus with

16506-602: The world, and with extra-human, inhuman, or heroic characters". In classical Greek , muthos , from which the English word myth derives, meant "story, narrative." By the time of Christ, muthos had started to take on the connotations of "fable, fiction," and early Christian writers often avoided calling a story from canonical scripture a " myth ". Paul warned Timothy to have nothing to do with "godless and silly myths" ( bebēthous kai graōdeis muthous) . This negative meaning of "myth" passed into popular usage. Some modern Christian scholars and writers have attempted to rehabilitate

16637-453: The younger gods. Marduk , the leader of the gods, builds the world with Tiamat's body, which he splits in two. With one half, he builds a dome-shaped firmament in the sky to hold back Tiamat's upper waters. With the other half, Marduk forms dry land to hold back her lower waters. Marduk then organises the heavenly bodies and assigns tasks to the gods in maintaining the cosmos. When the gods complain about their work, Marduk creates humans out of

16768-416: Was the earliest to put forth allegorical interpretations of Homer. This approach leads to two possible answers: Theagenes of Rhegium (whom Porphyry calls the "first allegorist," Porph. Quaest. Hom. 1.240.14–241.12 Schrad.) or Pherecydes of Syros, both of whom are presumed to be active in the 6th century B.C.E., though Pherecydes is earlier and as he is often presumed to be the first writer of prose. The debate

16899-475: Was the only concept that the three religions shared – yet it is not found directly in Genesis, nor in the entire Hebrew Bible. According to Walton, the Priestly authors of Genesis 1 were concerned not with the origins of matter (the material which God formed into the habitable cosmos), but with assigning roles so that the Cosmos should function. John Day, however, considers that Genesis 1 clearly provides an account of

17030-500: Was upon the face of the deep ". The word deep translates the Hebrew təhôm ( תְהוֹם ), a primordial ocean . Darkness and təhôm are two further elements of chaos in addition to tohu wa-bohu . In Enuma Elish , the watery deep is personified as the goddess Tiamat , the enemy of Marduk . In Genesis, however, there is no such personification. The elements of chaos are not seen as evil but as indications that God has not begun his creative work. Verse 2 concludes with, "And

17161-471: Was very good". According to biblical scholar R. N. Whybray , "This is the craftsman's assessment of his own work   ... It does not necessarily have an ethical connotation: it is not mankind that is said to be 'good', but God's work as craftsman." At the end of the sixth day, when creation is complete, the world is a cosmic temple in which the role of humanity is the worship of God. This parallels Enuma Elish and also echoes Job 38 , where God recalls how

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