[1] See John Evelyn's _Diary_ (Oct. 12, 1651).
COSMAS, of Alexandria, surnamed from his maritime experiences
_Indicopleustes_, merchant and traveller, flourished during the 6th
century A.D. The surname is inaccurate, since he never reached India
proper; further, it is doubtful whether Cosmas is a family name, or
merely refers to his reputation as a cosmographer. In his earlier days
he had sailed on the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean, visiting Abyssinia
and Socotra and apparently also the Persian Gulf, western India and
Ceylon. He subsequently became a monk, and about 548, in the retirement
of a Sinai cloister, wrote a work called _Topographia Christiana_. Its
chief object is to denounce the false and heathen doctrine of the
rotundity of the earth, and to vindicate the scriptural account of the
world. Photius, who had read it, calls it a "commentary on the
Octateuch" (meaning the eight books of Ptolemy's great geographical
work; according to some, the first eight books of the Old Testament).
According to Cosmas the earth is a rectangular plane, covered by the
vaulted roof of the firmament, above which lies heaven. In the centre of
the plane is the inhabited earth, surrounded by ocean, beyond which lies
the paradise of Adam. The sun revolves round a conical mountain to the
north--round the summit in summer, round the base in winter, which
accounts for the difference in the length of the day. Cosmas is supposed
by some to have been a Nestorian. Although not to be commended from a
theological standpoint, the _Topographia_ contains some curious
information. Especially to be noticed is the description of a marble
seat discovered by him at Adulis (Zula) in Abyssinia, with two
inscriptions recounting the heroic deeds and military successes of
Ptolemy Euergetes and an Axumitic king. It also contains in all
probability the oldest Christian maps. From allusions in the
_Topographia_ Cosmas seems to have been the author of a larger
cosmography, a treatise on the motions of the stars, and commentaries on
the Psalms and Canticles. Photius (_Cod._ 36) speaks contemptuously of
the style and language of Cosmas, and throws doubt upon his
truthfulness. But the author himself expressly disclaims any claims to
literary elegance, which in fact he considers unsuited to a Christian
circle of readers, and the accuracy of his statements has been confirmed
by later travellers.
The _Topographia_ will be found in Migne, _Patrologia Graeca_,
lxxxviii.; an edition by G. Siefert is promised in the Teubner series.
See H. Gelzer, "Kosmas der Indienfahrer," in _Jahrbucher fur
protestantische Theologie_, ix. (1883) and C. R. Beazley, _The Dawn of
Modern Geography_, i. (1897). There is an English translation, with
introduction and notes, by J. W. McCrindle (1897), published by the
Hakluyt society.
COSMAS, of Prague (1045-1125), dean of the cathedral and the earliest
Bohemian historian. His _Chronicae Bohemorum libri iii._, which contains
the history and traditions of Bohemia up to nearly the time of his
death, has earned him the title of the Herodotus of his country. This
work, which his continuators brought down to the year 1283, is of the
highest value to historians in spite of the fact that its reputation for
disingenuousness and credibility has been greatly affected by the
critical attacks of J. Loserth (_Studien zu Cosmas von Prag_, Vienna,
1880, &c.).
The work was first published at Hanover in 1602, from the imperfect
Strassburg codex. A perfected edition was brought out at the same
place in 1607; this was reprinted, with notes by C. G. Schwarz in I.
B. Menckenius, _Scriptores rer. Germ._ (3 vols., Lips., 1728-1730).
It is included in Pelzel and Dobrowsky, _Script. rer. Bohem._ i. pp.
1-282, after collation with Dresden MS., edited very fully by R. Kopke
in _Mon. Germ. Hist. Scrip._ ix. 1-132, and repeated in Migne,
_Patrol. lat._ clxvi. pp. 55-388, and in _Fontes rer. Bohem._ ii.
(1874), 1-370 (Latin and Czech), by W. Wl. Tomek. See A. Potthast,
_Bibliotheca Hist. Med. Aevi_.
COSMATI, the name of a Roman family, seven members of which, for four
generations, were skilful architects, sculptors and workers in mosaic.
The following are the names and dates known from existing
inscriptions:--
Lorenzo (born in the second half of the 12th century).
|
Jacopo (dated works 1205 and 1210).
|
Cosimo ( " " 1210-1235).
|
+---------------+-------------+--------------+
| | | |
Luca Jacopo Adeodato Giovanni
(1231 and 1235). (1231-1293). (1294). (1296 and 1303).
Their principal works in Rome are: ambones of S. Maria in Ara Coeli
(Lorenzo); door of S. Saba, 1205, and door with mosaics of S. Tommaso in
Formis (Jacopo); chapel of the Sancta Sanctorum, by the Lateran
(Cosimo); pavement of S. Jacopo alla Lungara, and (probably) the
magnificent episcopal throne and choir-screen in S. Lorenzo fuori le
Mura, of 1254 (Jacopo the younger); baldacchino of the Lateran and of S.
Maria in Cosmedin, c. 1294 (Adeodato); tombs in S. Maria sopra Minerva
(c. 1296), in S. Maria Maggiore, and in S. Balbina (Giovanni). The chief
signed works by Jacopo the younger and his brother Luca are at Anagni
and Subiaco. A large number of other works by members and pupils of the
same family, but unsigned, exist in Rome. These are mainly altars and
baldacchini, choir-screens, paschal candlesticks, ambones, tombs and the
like, all enriched with sculpture and glass mosaic of great brilliance
and decorative effect.
Besides the more mechanical sort of work, such as mosaic patterns and
architectural decoration, they also produced mosaic pictures and
sculpture of very high merit, especially the recumbent effigies, with
angels standing at the head and foot, in the tombs of Ara Coeli, S.
Maria Maggiore and elsewhere. One of their finest works is in S.
Cesareo; this is a marble altar richly decorated with mosaic in
sculptured panels, and (below) two angels drawing back a curtain (all in
marble) so as to expose the open grating of the confessio. The
magnificent cloisters of S. Paolo fuori le Mura, built about 1285 by
Giovanni, the youngest of the Cosmati, are one of the most beautiful
works of this school. The baldacchino of the same basilica is a signed
work of the Florentine Arnolfo del Cambio, 1285, "cum suo socio Petro,"
probably a pupil of the Cosmati. Other works of Arnolfo, such as the
Braye tomb at Orvieto (q.v.), show an intimate artistic alliance between
him and the Cosmati. The equally magnificent cloisters of the Lateran,
of about the same date, are very similar in design; both these triumphs
of the sculptor-architect's and mosaicist's work have slender marble
columns, twisted or straight, richly inlaid with bands of glass mosaic
in delicate and brilliant patterns. The shrine of the Confessor at
Westminster is a work of this school, executed about 1268. The general
style of works of the Cosmati school is Gothic in its main lines,
especially in the elaborate altar-canopies, with their pierced
geometrical tracery. In detail, however, they differ widely from the
purer Gothic of northern countries. The richness of effect which the
English or French architect obtained by elaborate and carefully worked
mouldings was produced in Italy by the beauty of polished marbles and
jewel-like mosaics--the details being mostly rather coarse and often
carelessly executed.
An excellent account of the Cosmati is given by Boito, _Architettura
del media evo_ (Milan, 1880), pp. 117-182.
COSMIC (from Gr. [Greek: kosmos], order or universe), pertaining to the
universe, universal or orderly. In ancient astronomy, the word
"cosmical" means occurring at sunrise, and designates especially the
rising or setting of the stars at that time. "Cosmical physics" is a
term broadly applied to the totality of those branches of science which
treat of cosmical phenomena and their explanation by the laws of
physics. It includes terrestrial magnetism, the tides, meteorology as
related to cosmical causes, the aurora, meteoric phenomena, and the
physical constitution of the heavenly bodies generally. It differs from
astrophysics only in dealing principally with phenomena in their wider
aspects, and as the products of physical causes, while astrophysics is
more concerned with minute details of observation.
COSMOGONY (from Gr. [Greek: kosmos], world and [Greek: gignesthai], to
be born), a theory, however incomplete, of the origin of heaven and
earth, such as is produced by primitive races in the myth-making age,
and is afterwards expanded and systematized by priests, poets or
philosophers. Such a theory must be mythical in form, and, after gods
have arisen, is likely to be a theogony ([Greek: theos], god) as well as
a cosmogony (Babylonia, Egypt, Phoenicia, Polynesia).
1. To many the interest of such stories will depend on their parallelism
to the Biblical account in Genesis i.; the anthropologist, however, will
be attracted by them in proportion as they illustrate the more primitive
phases of human culture. In spite of the frequent overgrowth of a
luxuriant imagination, the leading ideas of really primitive cosmogonies
are extremely simple. Creation out of nothing is nowhere thought of, for
this is not at all a simple idea. The pre-existence of world-matter is
assumed; sometimes too that of heaven, as the seat of the earth-maker,
and that of preternatural animals, his coadjutors. The earth-making
process may, among the less advanced races, be begun by a bird, or some
other animal (whence the term "theriomorphism"), for the high idea of a
god is impossible, till man has fully realized his own humanity. Of
course, the earth-forming animal is a preternaturally gifted one, and is
on the line of development towards that magnified man who, in a later
stage, becomes the demiurge.[1] Between the two comes the animal--man,
i.e. a being who has not yet shed the slough of an animal shape, but
combines the powers--natural and preternatural--of some animal with
those of a man. Let us now collect specimens of the evidence for
different varieties of cosmogony, ranging from those of the Red Indian
tribes to that of the people of Israel.
2. _North American Stories._--Theriomorphic creators are most fully
attested for the Red Indian tribes, whose very backwardness renders them
so valuable to an anthropologist. There is a painted image from Alaska,
now in the museum of the university of Pennsylvania, which represents
such an one. We see a black crow tightly holding a human mask which he
is in the act of incubating. Let us pass on to the Thlinkit Indians of
the N.W. coast. A cycle of tales is devoted to a strange humorous being
called Yehl or Yelch, i.e. the Raven, miraculously born, not to be
wounded, and at once a semi-developed creator and a culture hero.[2] His
bitter foe is his uncle; the germs of dualism appear early. Like some
other culture-heroes, he steals sun, moon and stars out of a box, so
enlightening the dark earth. These people are at any rate above the
Greenlanders, but are surpassed by the Algonkins described by Nicholas
Perrot in 1700, and by the Iroquois, whom the heroic Father Brebeuf
(1593-1649) learned to know so well.[3] The earth-maker of the former
was called Michabo, i.e. the Great Hare.[4] He is the leader of some
animals on a raft on a shoreless sea. Three of these in succession are
sent to dive for a little earth. A grain of sand is brought; out of it
he makes an island (America?). Of the carcases of the dead animals he
makes the present men (N. Americans?). There is also a Flood-story, an
episode in which has a bearing on the great dragon-myth[5] (see
DELUGE). The Iroquois are in advance of the Algonkins; their
creator-hero has no touch of the animal in him. Above the waters there
existed a heaven, or a heavenly earth (cf. Mexico, Babylonia, Egypt),
through a hole in which Aataentsic fell to the water. The broad back of
a tortoise (cf. S 6) on which a diving animal had placed some mud,
received her. Here, being already pregnant, she gave birth to a
daughter, who in turn bore the twins Joskeha and Tawiscara (myth of
hostile brothers). By his violence (cf. Gen. xxv. 22) the latter killed
his mother, out of whose corpse grew plants. Tawiscara fled to the west,
where he rules over the dead. Joskeha made the beasts and also men.
After acting as culture-giver he disappeared to the east, where he is
said to dwell with his grandmother as her husband.[6]
3. _Mexican._--The most interesting feature in the Mexican cosmology is
the theory of the ages of the world. Greece, Persia and probably
Babylon, knew of four such ages.[7] The Priestly Writer in the
Pentateuch also appears to be acquainted with this doctrine; it is the
first of four ages which begins with the Creation and ends with the
Deluge. The Mexicans, however, are said to have assumed five ages called
"suns." The first was the sun of earth; the second, of fire; the third,
of air; the fourth, of water; the fifth (which is the present) was
unnamed. Each of these closed with a physical catastrophe.[8] The
speculations which underlie the Mexican theory have not come down to us.
For the Iranian parallel, see S 8, and on the Hebrew Priestly Writer,
Gunkel, _Genesis_[2], pp. 233 ff.
4. _Peruvian._--In Peru, as in Egypt, the sun-god obtained universal
homage. But there were creator-gods in the background. A theoretical
supremacy was accorded by the Incas to Pachacamac, whose worship, like
that of Viracocha, they appear to have already found when they conquered
the land. Pachacamac means, in Quichua, "world-animator."[9] The
"philosophers" of Peru declared that he desired no temples or
sacrifices, no worship but that of the heart. This is conceivable; Maui,
too, in New Zealand had no temple or priests. But most probably this
deity had another less abstract name, and the horrible worship offered
in the one temple which he really had under the Incas, accorded with his
true cosmic significance as the god of the subterranean fire. Viracocha
too had a cosmic position; an old Peruvian hymn calls him "world-former,
world-animator."[10] He was connected with water. A third creator was
Manco Capac ("the mighty man"), whose sister and wife is called Mama
Oello, "the mother-egg." Afterwards, the creator and the mother-egg
became respectively the sun and the moon, represented by the Inca
priest-king and his wife, the supposed descendants of Manco Capac.[11]
Dualistic tendencies were also developed. Las Casas[12] reports a story
that before creation the creator-god had a bad son who sought, after
creation, to undo all that his father had done. Angered at this, his
father hurled him into the sea. We need not suspect Christian
influences, but the parallelism of Rev. xx. 3, Isa. xiv. 12, 15, Ezek.
xxviii. 16 is obvious.
5. _Polynesian._--Polynesia, that classic land of mythology, is
specially rich in myths of creation. The Maori story, told by Grey and
others, of the rending apart of Rangi ( = Langi, heaven) and Papa
(earth) can be paralleled in China, India and Greece, and more remotely
in Egypt and Babylonia. The son of Rangi and Papa was Tangaloa (also
called Tangaroa and Taaroa), the sea-god and the father of fishes and
reptiles.[13] In other parts of Polynesia he is the Heaven God, to whom
there is no like, no second. In Samoa he is even called Tangaloa-Langi
(Tangaloa = heaven). And if he is the sea-god, we must remember that
there is a heavenly as well as an earthly ocean; hence the clouds are
sometimes called Tangaloa's ships. It is true, the popular imagery is
unworthy of such a god. Sometimes he is said to live in a shell, by
throwing off which from time to time he increases the world; or in an
egg, which at last he breaks in pieces; the pieces are the islands. We
also hear that long ago he hovered as an enormous bird over the waters,
and there deposited an egg. The egg may be either the earth with the
overarching vault of heaven or (as in Egypt--but this is a later view)
the sun. The latter received mythical representation in that most
interesting god (but originally rather culture-hero) Maui, who, in New
Zealand practically supplants Tangaloa, and becomes the god of the air
and of the heaven, the creator and the causer of the flood.[14]
Speculation opened the usual deep problem; whence came the gods? It was
answered that Po, i.e. darkness, was the begetter of all things, even of
Tangaloa.
6. _Indian._--India, however, is the natural home of a mythology recast
by speculation. The classical specimen of an advanced cosmogony is to be
found in the Rig Veda (x. 129); it is the hymn which begins, "There then
was neither Aught nor Naught!"[15] Another such cosmogony is given in
Manu. It is "the self-existent Lord," who, "with a thought, created the
waters, and deposited in them a seed which became a golden egg, in which
egg he himself is born as Brahm[=a], the progenitor of the worlds."[16]
The doctrine of creation by a thought is characteristically Indian. In
the satapatha Brahmana (cf. Deluge), we meet again with the primeval
waters and the world-egg, and with the famous mythological
tortoise-theory,[17] also found among the Algonkins (S 2)--antique
beliefs gathered up by the framers of philosophic systems, who felt the
importance of maintaining such links with the distant past.
7. _Egyptian._--In Egypt too the systematizers were busily engaged in
the co-ordination of myths. They retained the belief that the germs of
all things slept for ages within the dark flood, personified as Nun or
Nu. How they were drawn forth was variously told.[18] In some districts
the demiurge was called Khn[=u]mu; it was he who modelled the egg (of
the world?) and also man.[19] Elsewhere he was the artizan-god Ptah,
who with his hammer broke the egg; sometimes Thoth, the moon-god and
principle of intelligence, who spoke the world into existence.[20] A
strange episode in the legend of the destruction of man by the gods
tells how Ra (or Re), the first king of the world, finding in his old
age that mankind ceased to respect him, first tried the remedy of
massacre, and then ascended the heavenly cow, and organized a new
world--that of heaven.[21]
8. _Iranian._--The Iranian account of creation[22] is specially
interesting because its religious spirit is akin to that of Genesis i.
From a literary point of view, indeed, it cannot compare with the
dignified Hebrew narrative, but considering the misfortunes which have
befallen the collection of Zoroastrian traditions now represented by the
Bundahish (the Parsee Genesis) we cannot reasonably be surprised. The
work referred to begins by describing the state of things in the
beginning; the good spirit in endless light and omniscient, and the evil
spirit in endless darkness and with limited knowledge. Both produced
their own creatures, which remained apart, in a spiritual or ideal
state, for 3000 years, after which the evil spirit began his opposition
to the good creation under an agreement that his power was not to last
more than 9000 years, of which only the middle 3000 were to see him
successful. By uttering a sacred formula the good spirit throws the evil
one into a state of confusion for a second 3000 years, while he produces
the archangels and the material creation, including the sun, moon and
stars. At the end of that period the evil spirit, encouraged by the
demons he had produced, once more rushes upon the good creation to
destroy it. The demons carry on conflicts with each of the six classes
of creation, namely, the sky, water, earth, plants, animals represented
by the primeval ox, and mankind represented by G[=a]y[=o]mard or
Kayumarth (the "first man" of the _Avesta_).[23] Four points to be
noticed here: (1) the belief in the four periods of the world, each of
3000 years (cf. S 3); (2) the comparative success for a time of Angra
Mainyu (the evil principle personified); (3) the absence of any
recognition of pre-existent matter; (4) the mention of six classes of
good creatures. Each of these deserves a comment which we cannot,
however, here give, and the third may seem to suggest direct influence
of the Iranian upon the Jewish cosmogony. But though there are in Gen.
i. six days of creative activity, and the creative works are not six,
but eight, if not ten in number, and indirect Babylonian influence is
more strongly indicated. Jewish thinkers would have been attracted by
the emphatic assertion of the creatorship of the One God in the royal
Persian inscriptions more than by the traditional cosmogony. See further
_Ency. Bib._, "Creation," S 9.
9. _Phoenician and Greek._--Phoenician cosmogonies would appear, from
the notices which have come down to us,[24] to have been composite. The
traditions are pale and obscure. It is clear, however, that the primeval
flood and the world-egg (out of which came heaven and earth) are
referred to. See _Ency. Bib._, "Creation" S 7; "Phoenicia" S 15;
Lagrange, _Religions semitiques_, pp. 351 ff. Greek cosmogonies (the
orientalism of which is clear) will be found in Hesiod, _Theog._ 116
ff.; Aristophanes, _Birds_, 692 ff.; cf. Clem. Rom., _Homil._ vi. 4. See
Miss Harrison, _Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion_, chap. xii,
"Orphic Cosmogony."
10. _Babylonian and Israelitish._--Of the Babylonian and Israelitish
cosmogonies we have several more or less complete records. For details
as to the former, see BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN RELIGION. With regard to
the latter, we may notice that in Gen. ii. 4b-25 we have an account of
creation which, though in its present form very incomplete, is highly
attractive, because it is pervaded by a breath from primitive times. It
has, however, been interwoven with an account of the Garden of Eden from
some other source (see EDEN; PARADISE), and perhaps in order to
concentrate the attention of the reader, the description of the origin
of "earth and heaven" as well as of the plants and of the rain, appears
to have been omitted. In fact, both the creation-stories at the opening
of Genesis must have undergone much editorial manipulation. Originally,
for instance, Gen. i. 26 must have said that man was made out of earth;
this point of contact between the two cosmogonic traditions has,
however, been effaced.
The other narrative, Gen. i. 1-ii. 4a, is a much more complete
cosmogony, and since the theory of P. A. Lagarde (1887), which ascribes
it to Iranian influence (see S 8), has no very solid ground, whereas the
theory which explains it as largely Babylonian is in a high degree
plausible, we must now consider the relations between the Israelitish
and Babylonian cosmogonies. The short account of creation first
translated in 1890 by T. G. Pinches is distinguished by its non-mythical
character; in particular, the dragon of chaos and darkness is
conspicuous by her absence. This may illustrate the fact that the dragon
is also unmentioned in the Hebrew cosmogony; to some writers the
dragon-element may have seemed grotesque and inappropriate. We must,
however, study this element in the most important Babylonian tradition,
even if only for its relation to non-Semitic myths and especially to
some striking passages in the Bible (Isa. xxvii. 1, li. 9b; Ps. lxxiv.
14, lxxxix. 10, 11; Job iii. 8, ix. 13, xxvi. 12, 13; Rev. xii. 3, 4,
xx. 1-3). One may also be permitted to hold that the mythic figure of
the dragon, if used poetically, is a highly serviceable one, and
consider that "in the beginning God fought with the dragon, and slew
him" would have formed an admirable illustration of the passages just
now referred to, especially to those in the Apocalypse.
The student should, however, notice that the dragon-element is not
entirely unrepresented even in the priestly Hebrew cosmogony. It is said
in Gen. i. 9, 10, 14, 15, that God divided the primeval waters into two
parts by an intervening "firmament" or "platform," on which the sun,
moon and stars (planets) were placed to mark times and to give light.
This division (cp. Ps. lxxiv. 13) is really a pale version of the old
mythic statement respecting the cleaving of the carcase of Ti[=a]mat
(the Dragon) into two parts, one of which kept the upper waters from
coming down.[25] And we must affirm that the technical term _t[)e]
h[=o]m_ (rendered in the English Bible "the deep"), which evidently
signifies the enveloping primeval flood, and which closely resembles
Ti[=a]mat, the name given to the dragon or serpent in the epic (cf.
_tiamtu_ and _tamtu_, Babylonian words for "the ocean"), can only be due
to the influence--probably the very early influence--of Babylonia.
But we are far from having exhausted the evidence of Babylonian
influence on the Hebrew cosmogony. The description of chaos in v. 2 not
only mentions the great water (_t[)e]h[=o]m_), but the earth, i.e. the
earth-matter, out of which the earth and (potentially) its varied
products (vv. 9-11), and (as we know from the Babylonian epic) the
"firmament" or "platform" of the heaven were to appear. This
earth-matter is called "_t[=o]hu_ and _b[=o]hu_"; there is nothing like
this phrase in the epic, but we may infer from Jer. iv. 23, where the
same phrase occurs, that it means "devoid of living things." For a
commentary on this see the opening of the Babylonian account referred to
above, which refers to the period of chaos as one in which there were
neither reeds nor trees, and where "the lands altogether were sea." As
to the creative acts, we may admit that the creation of light does not
form one of them in the epic (cf. Gen. i. 3), but the existence of light
apart from the sun is presupposed; Marduk the creator is in fact a god
of light. Nor ought we to find a discrepancy between the Babylonian and
the Hebrew accounts in the creation of the heavenly bodies after the
plants, related in Gen. i. 14-18. For the position of this creative act
is due to the necessity of bringing all the divine acts into the
framework of six working days. On the whole, the Hebrew statement of the
successive stages of creation corresponds so nearly to that in the
Babylonian epic that we are bound to assume that one has been influenced
by the other. And if we are asked, "Which is the more original?" we
answer by appealing to the well-established fact of the profound
influence of Babylonian culture upon Canaan in remote times (see
CANAAN). An important element in this culture would be mythic
representations of the origin of things, such as the Babylonian Creation
and Deluge-stories in various forms. Indeed, not only Canaan but all the
neighbouring regions must have been pervaded by Babylonian views of the
universe and its origin. Myths of origins there must indeed have been in
those countries before Babylonian influence became so overpowering, but,
if so, these myths must have become recast when the great Teacher of the
Nations half-attracted and half-compelled attention. More than this we
need not assert. Zimmern's somewhat different treatment of the subject
in _Ency. Biblica_, "Creation," S 4, may be compared.
Popular writers are in some danger of misrepresenting this important
result. It is tempting, but incorrect, to suppose that a docile
Israelitish writer accepted one of the chief forms of the Babylonian
cosmogony, merely omitting its polytheism and substituting "Yahweh" for
"Marduk." As we have seen, various myths of Creation may have been
current both in N. Arabia (whence the Israelites may have come) and in
Canaan prior to the great extension of Babylonian influence. These myths
doubtless had peculiarities of their own. From one of them may have come
that remarkable statement in Gen. i. 2b, "and the spirit of God (Elohim)
was hovering over the face of the waters," which, until we find some
similar myth nearer home, is best illustrated and explained by a
Polynesian myth (see Cheyne, _Traditions and Beliefs of Ancient Israel_,
ad loc.). It is also probably to a non-Babylonian source that we owe the
prescription of vegetarian or herb diet in Gen. i. 29, 30, which has a
Zoroastrian parallel[26] and is evidently based on a myth of the Golden
Age, independent of the Babylonian cosmogony. Gen. i., therefore, has
not, as it stands, been directly borrowed from Babylonia, and yet the
infused Babylonian element is so considerable that the story is, in a
purely formal aspect, much more Babylonian than either Israelitish or
Canaanitish or N. Arabian. We say "in a purely formal aspect," because
the strictness with which Babylonian mythic elements have been adapted
in Gen. i. to the wants of a virtually monotheistic community is in the
highest degree remarkable.
On the literary scheme of the Creation-story in Gen. i. see the
commentaries (e.g. Dillman's and Driver's). On the other Old Testament
references to creation, and on the prophetic doctrine of creation, see
_Ency. Bib._, "Creation," SS 27-29. On the traces of dragon and
serpent myths in the Old Testament and their significance, see Gunkel,
_Schopfung und Chaos_ (1895)--a pioneering work of the highest
merit--and _Ency. Bib._, "Behemoth," "Dragon," "Rahab," "Serpent." On
the connexion of the Creation and the Deluge-stories, see DELUGE. Cf.
also the article on BABYLONIAN AND ASSYRIAN RELIGION; and Cheyne,
_Traditions and Beliefs of Ancient Israel_ (1907). (T. K. C.)