CASANOWICZ— COSMOGONIC PARALLELS 



Neo-Platonic philosophy and the Jewish Kabbalah; Awonawilona 

 conceived within himself and projected creative thoughts 1 into the 

 void of night, whereby mists of increase, steams of potent growth 

 were evolved and uplifted. Thus by means of his innate knowledge 

 the All-container made himself in person and form of the sun . 

 with his appearance came the brightening of the spaces with light, 

 and with brightening of the spaces the great mist clouds were thick- 

 ened together and fell, whereby was evolved water in water; yea, and 

 the world-holding sea. 2 With his substance of flesh outdrawn from 

 the surface of his person he formed the seed-stuff of the two worlds, 

 impregnating therewith the great waters . . . 3 



The Iroquois let the earth come out from the water through the 

 falling into it of the original ancestress, or the digging of an am- 

 phibious animal (beaver, otter, or muskrat) ; while according to the 

 Athapascans, the descent of a raven brought up the earth to the 

 surface of the ocean. 



The conception of the original oneness of heaven and earth which 

 subsequently were separated or forced apart, which we meet in the 

 myths of the Old World, is also found in Polynesia and New Zealand. 

 In Riatea a monstrous cuttlefish held the earth and the heavens 

 together, but he was killed by the sun-god Maui, whereupon the sky 

 rose up to heaven. On the shoulders or back of this god the earth 

 rests; and when he moves the earth quakes. 4 The New Zealand tale 

 has earth and heaven "cleave together". Tane, the father of forests, 

 birds, and insects, firmly planted his head on his mother, the earth, 

 his feet he stemmed against his father, the skies, and separated heaven 

 from earth, so that they were rent apart, and darkness was made 

 manifest, and so was light. 5 



An interesting parallel to, or rather illustration of, the expression 

 in Genesis, I, 2, 'And the spirit (or breath 6 ) of God was brooding over 

 the surface of the waters," is supplied by the myths of the Muskho- 

 geans and the Polynesians. In the former is related : "Before creation 

 a great body of water above was visible. Over the dreary waste two 

 pigeons flew to and fro, and at last dropped a blade of grass rising 



1 Cf. Psalm xxxiii, 6 and 9: "By the word of the Lord were the heavens made, and all the host 

 of them by the breath of his mouth. For he spake and it was done, he commanded and it stood 

 fast." 



2 Cf. in the second Biblical account of creation Genesis, 11, 5 f.: "And no plant of the field had 

 yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon the earth and there was not a man to 

 till the ground. But there came up a mist from the earth and watered the whole face of the ground." 



3 Alexander, op. cit., p. 207; Handbook American Indians, I, 971. 

 * Louis H. Gray in Hastings' Encycl. Relig. and Ethics, IV, 175. 

 6 W. M. Flinders Petrie, ibid., p. 125. 



5 The Hebrew word ruah, like Greek Trvevjw. (pneuma), means wind, breath, spirit. 



47] 



