What Are The Similarities Between Babylonian And Hindu Creation Myth

Even though the Babylonian and Hindu creation myths both are stories of origin, they contrast in several apparent ways. In the Babylonian creation myth Tiamat rebels and there is a great war between the gods. When Tiamat is killed, Marduk creates the earth from her body and mankind from the blood of her dead consort Kingu. Humans were born from the violence of war and the blood of a dead god while in three out the the four Hindu creation myths humans and the earth are created peacefully. For example, Non-being produces Being and Being thinks “Would that I were many! Let me procreate myself!” Then this process repeats to make heat, water, and finally food. In another Hindu creation story the divine Self-existent desired “to produce beings of any kinds from his own body, first with a thought created the waters, and placed his seed in them.” He then goes on to grow a golden egg

This myth ends with, “...he created all things.” The Hindu myths are about supreme beings wanting to produce more beautiful things without violence which is very unlike the Babylonian myth. Another difference is that in the Hindu stories everything is created by one Being, or Non-being or That One Thing. In the Babylonian myth, there are several gods that assist in the making of the earth and mankind. In the Babylonian tale Marduk goes into battle with the other gods, kills Tiamat, creates earth and the sky, then tells Ea of his plan to from the “black-headed ones”. In one of the Hindu legends That One Thing creates itself. “He, the first origin of this creation, whether he formed it all or did not form it, whose eye controls this world in the highest heaven, he verily knows it, or perhaps he does not know. These differences show us many things about the civilizations in which they were first formed. The Babylonian myth teaches the Babylonians how to be passive and to listen to all