Original subtitles

hi i'm mike regnetta this is crash

course mythology and today we're going

to talk about a small easy topic

the creation of the universe this is the

first of several episodes on creation

stories and this one will center on

myths that imagine a universe created

out of nothing or possibly something

sometimes out of water

probably water but it's magical water

it's primordial water hey tote do

egyptian gods drink water

[Music]

myths that describe creation as coming

out of nothing are some of the hardest

to get our heads around in latin the

phrase ex-nilo is used to describe this

type of creation and it can cause a bit

of existential dread for people who are

uncomfortable with the idea of absolute

nothing no time no space

just an infinite void like when the

wi-fi suddenly goes down but just much

much worse just ask hephaestus greek god

of technology that guy knows about

unstable router architecture and hammers

the ex-nilo creation story that's

probably the best known in the west

comes from the book of genesis in the

beginning god created the heaven and the

earth and earth was without form and

void and darkness was upon the face of

the deep and the spirit of god moved

upon the face of the waters so in this

story the main character is god and hey

let's take just a quick minute to

remember that this is mythology not

religious studies so we're going to be

referring to the judeo-christian god as

a character so we'll take a second

to just get comfortable with that

and now let's move on so this character

exists before anything we would call the

world

where does god exist

it's unclear there's a void there's

water which are handy if god needs

storage space or is thirsty but that's

about it x nilo creation stories are

common in the ancient near east the

mediterranean world where the abrahamic

religions judaism christianity and islam

originated egypt was part of an

interconnected mediterranean system and

one of its creation myths also posits a

universe coming from nothing as we can

see in this fragment i am the eternal

spirit i am the sun that rose from the

primeval waters my soul is god i am the

creator of the word evil is my

abomination i see it not i am the

creator of the order wherein i live i am

the word which will never be annihilated

in this my name of soul take away the

first person pronoun and the bold claims

and you can see the similarities to the

genesis story there is an eternal god

who creates the world and then there are

waters out of which rise

well in this case it's the sun which is

nice just ask raw egyptian sun god

because eventually humans would realize

that some of us look better with the tan

me especially i don't know about you but

i have a hard time conceiving of

nothingness i'm a lot more accustomed to

thingness i mean isn't nothingness a

thing in and of itself and hey more

importantly can we really even call it

nothingness with all this water around

fortunately for people like me there's a

word to describe the condition before

creation

chaos which mythologist david leming

defines as the primal void or state of

uniform

non-differentiation that precedes the

creation of the world in most creation

myths chaos is something of a background

in many of these myths as it is in the

greek version of creation found in the

theogony by hesiod a poet and sheep

farmer who probably lived in the 8th

century bce according to this version

verily at the first chaos came to be but

next wide bosomed earth not much to go

on there but as we can see chaos is what

we have before

a deity or deities roll up and provide

order and also the earth apparently has

breasts

mother earth i guess makes sense in many

creation myths an inaugural way to put

things in order is to bring light out of

darkness in one creation myth from the

kano people of guinea the darkness

before creation is inhabited by death

his wife and his daughter in the

beginning there was darkness and in it

lived death called sa with his wife and

daughter the three of them were all that

was there was nowhere for them to live

comfortably so sa started it he used his

magic power and he made an endless mud

sea in this mud place saw built his

house after that the god allah tangana

came to visit saw he found asa's house

dirty and dark alatangana thought asa

should do better than that and he said

so nothing can live in such a place that

god told sa this house needs fixing up

everything is too dark so alatangana

thought he'd better take things in hand

he made the mud solid we now know it as

earth the earth feels sad god said i

will make plants and animals to live on

it so he did and that

is how we got home renovation just

kidding i love this myth i love that god

thinks that the earth is sad and so he

gets the earth a puppy to cheer it up a

puppy and some plants you know

spruce up the joint but notice that

there are a lot of similarities between

this myth and the egyptian myth and that

both describe a vast sea one of mud one

of water and that there is a god who

exists previous to and outside of the

void and the darkness though the

konomith differs and that it implies

that death

is the one constant in the universe

oh no and now i'm worried about the

puppy but why all this talk about water

well we don't know exactly but if you're

living in an ancient society

and you try to think through something

as big as the creation of the universe

you'd probably turn your thoughts to the

vastest things you were aware of

the sky and the sea even if you only

experience the ocean from the relative

safety of the shore there is something

unknowable and eternal about it that

makes it possible to imagine the sea

existing for all time and even before

time itself and according to theories of

evolution the idea that all life came

from the sea is

fairly accurate but let's not get into

evolution here we'll leave that to hank

and the scientists over at crash course

biology hey fun fact though the western

hemisphere has water too and we have

some ex-nilo creation stories of our own

one of the most difficult and

fascinating comes from the mayans of

guatemala and is recorded in the papal

vu or the book of the community it's not

as catchy in translation in this complex

story creation occurs

four times but it begins like the gospel

of john in the new testament with the

word and just because i think it's gonna

be fun to watch thought bubble animate

nothingness let's see this myth there

hey tote has popcorn the word began long

ago in a place called kiche where the

kiche people lived there was no one at

first there was not one animal yet and

no birds fish or tree there was no rock

or forest no canyon no meadow there was

sky separated from all things the face

of the earth was invisible there was

nothing that could make a sound there

was the sea so calm and all alone there

was dark and night and sea murmurings

ripplings yet within the dark and night

and sea there was the maker and there

was the feathered serpent and they

brought their words together joined them

with their thoughts planned creation

their words and thoughts were so clear

that whatever they said came to be and

the serpent and the maker thought about

the nature of the world what would be

light and dark who would bring food and

what everything should look like and

then by speaking their thoughts they

brought the world into existence

starting with earth and then moving on

to its features like mountains and trees

followed by wild animals but there was a

problem the wild animals were unable to

speak the names of the maker and the

feathered serpent as well as the other

gods who helped bring about creation and

they were unable to praise the gods thus

the first creation was a failure the

maker had to start over again but not

before explaining to all the wild

animals their lot was to be brought low

which considering the fact that the

maker and the feathered serpent

organized things this way seems at least

a little unfair you bird deer you will

stay where you are where you sleep and

eat in the forest and canyons among the

tree and bush you will be eaten you will

kill and be killed you will stay low and

serve since you cannot talk and praise

your god thanks that bubble this

particular myth is fascinating for a

number of reasons first of all it

reminds me of the story in genesis of

adam giving names to all of the animals

and establishing humanity's dominion

over all non-speaking creatures

providing a single reason why humans

should be considered special among all

animals we have the power of speech and

by extension the power to invent and

tell

creation stories of our own just ask

anansi african spider god of stories

tote don't eat him this is not australia

even though this myth doesn't focus on

chaos or the void or nothingness it does

have the idea that before creation there

was nothing except god or the word and

like the creation myths we looked at

earlier it includes an endless sea a

physical manifestation of things unknown

but also of the source of life since

nothing we can see exists without water

especially people but especially fish

we'll spend a little more time in the

cosmic ocean in our next episode when we

look at eggs seeds and earth divers but

this creation story is elaborate since

creation 1.0 doesn't go so well the

maker and the feathered serpent get back

to work and they have to get all the way

to creation 4.0 before they resolve all

of the major glitches and even then

there are probably still some software

updates like ancient

ancient software like

service packs

but for existence before we leave the

realm of ex-nilo creation i want to give

one more example

the big bang and a lot of you are now

staring at your screens in confusion and

horror and saying that this isn't a myth

at all but remember we're talking about

significant stories

with staying power which the big bang

certainly is so let's try it out hank

and phil plate have gone over this in

detail over at crash course astronomy

and we've talked about it on big history

here we're gonna use a version related

by brian swim in his book the universe

is a green dragon imagine that furnace

out of which everything came forth this

was a fire that filled the universe that

was the universe there was no place in

the universe free from it every point of

the cosmos was a point of this explosion

of light and all the particles of the

universe churned in extremes of heat and

pressure all that we see about us all

that now exists was there at the

beginning in that great burning

explosion of light hey that sounds a lot

like some of the most ancient myths

doesn't it like all ex nilo creation

stories the big bang starts in a time

before time and gives us an origin event

one that seems to conjure light from

darkness heat from cold and okay unlike

earlier myths it doesn't supply a god or

water but you can still appreciate the

structural similarities what's so great

about fish anyways oh

sorry toad so yes ex-nilo creation myths

are

unsettling they ask us to imagine void

absence

chaos

but then we see how each tradition

brings some order to that

order and light

and sometimes mud

thanks for watching

see you next week crash course mythology

is filmed in the chad and stacy emigos

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it try not to eat any spiders especially

anansi