ON ACCOUNTS OK THE CRKATION. 241 



up of limbs from difi'ereut animals, prodigious pruductiuus 

 with multiplied heads or bodies. The god Bel then cleft this 

 woman in twain. Of one half he made the heaven, and of 

 the other the earth, while at the same time he destroyed the 

 monsters which previously existed. Bel then cut off his own 

 head : the inferior gods mixed the blood which flowed from 

 the wound with clay, and so made men. In this fanciful 

 myth I cannot follow Canon Rawlinson in seeing any resem- 

 blance to Genesis. Rather it belongs to a series of similar 

 legends, in which the creation of the visible universe is 

 described as proceeding from the fragments of the body of 

 a gigantic human being. The Scandinavians had their giant 

 Ymir, the Chinese their giant Pankee, produced from the 

 world-egg, and there are other traces of this strange notion 

 in other countries. 



As there were thus different Babylonian cosmological 

 myths in existence, it is obviously incorrect to speak as if 

 there were only one Chaldean account of the Creation. 



6. Old Persidu and other qvam-historical Gosmologiei^. — It 

 will be most convenient to group together those of the older 

 cosmologies which seem most faithful to the primeval tradi- 

 tion of the nursery of the race. According to Zockler 

 (art. " Scliopfung,'^ in Herzog and Plitt^s B. E. filr protes- 

 tantiscke TheoL), the Zend-avesta represents Ormuzd, in 

 conjunction with the inferior spirits, the Ameska-speutas,* 

 as creating the world in six periods, each of a thousand 

 years, and through his word (Houover). The order of the 

 creative acts is thus given : — (1) Heaven and light ; 

 (2) Water; (3) the Earth, and especially the sacred 

 mountain Albordj, or Elburz ; (4) Trees ; (5) Animals — 

 all derived from the primeval ox; (G) Men — all descended 

 from the primeval man, Kajomort. According to Fran9ois 

 Lenormant, the six creative periods are conceived as together 

 lasting for 365 days. 



It is a very difficult point to settle whether the old Persian 

 theology assumed creation out of nothing. On the whole, it 

 agrees better with the general spirit of their religion to 

 understand their creation as a form of Emanation. Dogmatic 

 assertion one way or the other is obviously what no student 

 with any self-respect will commit himself to. 



Another singular echo of Genesis is found in the Old 



* These are emanations from Ormuzd ; personified attributes. It is 

 ludicrous to compare them with Angels; what they really resemble are the 

 Sophia, Buthos, &c., of the Gnostics. 

 VOL. XX. S 



