The Genesis Site - Myths

Genesis 7

Hundreds of myths about a great flood are found all around the world. Some of them may find their origin in a local flood. But most of them are dealing with a worldwide catastrophe. These myths do (generally) have something in common:

• All human life is destroyed.
  
  
• There are only a few survivors.
  
  
• Often these survivors are warned by a god.
  
  
• Often bad behaviour of mankind is the reason for a flood.

This regular returning of the same themes makes clear we are dealing with one and the same origin of these stories.
I'm not going to tell the story of the Greek Deucalion who, with his wife, was the only survivor of a flood. I'm not referring to Gilgamesh who went looking for Utnapishtim (the Babylonical Noah). I assume these stories are rather familiar. I hope the following myths are more unknown to you.

Jewish legends tell how Noah built the ark. One week before the flood began to descend the animals assembled. On that day the sun was darkened, and the foundations of the earth trembled, and lightning flashed, and the thunder boomed as never before. When the flood burst out hot rain scalded the skin of the sinners. The waters came down when God removed two stars out of the constellation of the Pleiades. To stop the flood He took two stars from the Bear and placed them in the Pleiades. During the flood the sun and the moon didn't shine.

A Persian story tells how the world became wicked through the influence of the king of darkness, Ahriman. The earth had to be cleaned by a gigantic flood. The raindrops that fell down were as great as a bull's head.

The Chinese Miao people told of a wicked world, shaking fists in the face of the Mighty God. So God let it pour for forty days and the waters covered the highest mountains. But the Patriarch Nuah was righteous, as was his wife, the Matriarch Gaw Bo-lu-en. They escaped the drowning of the world by building a huge boat.

The Asian Bahnars remembered how once the kite quarrelled with the crab. The crab's skul was pecked so hard that a hole appeared. In revenge the crab caused the sea and the rivers to rise until they reached the sky. All living beings perished, except a brother and a sister. They were saved in a big chest. These two humans had with them a pair of every sort of animal. They floated on the waters for seven days and seven nights. Then, on command of the spirits, a cock started crowing to let the brother and sister know the waters were descending. So they let the birds fly away, then the other animals were let loose. A black ant brought two grains of rice to the humans and they planted them. The next morning the plain was covered with rich crop.

Another Southern Asian tribe, the Benua-Jakun, believe we are not standing on solid ground. It is more looking like a skin covering an abyss of water. Long ago Pirman, the deity, broke up this skin. So the world was drowned and destroyed by a great flood. Pirman created a man and a woman and put them in a wooden ship. This ship had no opening. They drifted around and finally the ship came to rest. The man and woman came out and stepped on dry land. But it was still dark, because the sun had not yet been created. The man and woman became the ancestors of all mankind.

According the Ami tribe of Formosa the great flood was due to an earthquake, followed by the bursting forth of hot subterranean waters. The mountains crumbled down, the earth gaped, and from the fissure a hot spring gushed forth, flooding the whole earth. In a wooden mortar just a brother and his two sisters escaped this worldwide disaster.

Brazilian Pamary, Abedery and Kataushy tribes remember how once mankind heard a rumble above and below the ground. The sun and the moon turned red, blue and yellow. Wild beast mingled fearlessly with men. A month later they heard a roar. Darkness, accompanied by heavy rain and thunder, ascended from the earth to the sky. Daylight was blotted out. Waters were rising and mankind perished during the darkness. Only one man, Uassu, together with his wife, survived the flood. When the waters were gone they couldn't find one corpse.

Ancasmarca is a province in Peru. Tribes living here tell how once in the old days their sheep refused to eat and were watching the stars by night. Their shepherd asked the sad sheep what was going on. They answered him that the conjunction of stars foreshadowed a coming destruction of the world by water within one month. The shepherd and his six children gathered together all the food they could find and went upon the top of the highest mountain they could find. The waters were rising higher and higher. But while the waters were rising, the mountain still rose higher, so its top was never submerged. When the waters sank, the mountain sank also. The shepherd and his children were the only survivors of the flood.

The Peruvian Incas also had a flood story. They said how waters rose above the highest mountains in the world. All people and all created things perished. No one could escape, only a man and a woman survived, floating in a box on the face of the waters.
Another Peruvian story, heard in the province of Huarochiri in the Andes, says how a man was warned by his llama. The animal told him there was a flood coming within five days. The man was ashtonished to hear the animal speak and asked how they could be saved. The llama told him to take food for five days and to follow him to the top of a high mountain. They had hardly reached the place or the waters began to rise. After five days, having drowned all the people of the world, the waters were sanking. The man was the only survivor and from him, the story says, all the nations of the earth are descended.

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