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Encyclopedia entry: creation myths
- Article from:
- The Oxford Companion to the Body
- Author:
Copyright© The Oxford Companion to the Body 2001, originally published by Oxford University Press 2001. (Hide copyright information)
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creation myths
The essential metaphysical question that creation myths seek to answer is that of origins, or where things come from. The emergence of day from night, the growth of plants from seeds, the provenance of weather and the seasons, the birth of living things, all provoke questions regarding the source of these phenomena. Creation myths serve, in most societies, to give an account of such origins.
The central bodily image in most recorded myths of creation is that of human birth. This leads to a widespread anthropomorphization of the original principles or powers of creation as being primeval parents, male and female. In the classical Greek myth of Hesiod, the Earth Mother, Gaia, is ...