Parallel Myths (7 page)

NOTE
: The religion of Iran before the coming of Islam was Zoroastrianism, a faith based on the teachings of the prophet Zoroaster. There are about 100,000 Zoroastrians in the world, mainly in India and in Great Britain’s Parsi community, as well as in Iran, where they have been cruelly persecuted.

The distinguishing characteristic of Zoroastrianism is its duality: the good god Ormazd is in a constant war against the evil Ahriman. Good will eventually triumph, but only after a fierce battle, reflected in this Creation story.

O
rmazd is the Wise Lord, the eternal and omniscient source of all that is good. His opposite and the enemy of all creation is Ahriman, the source of all suffering, sin, and death. Ormazd, being omniscient, knew of the existence of Ahriman before the creation of the world. Yet the evil one was then unaware of the Wise Lord; evil ones are basically ignorant.

Ormazd began his work of creation by casting some of his pure light into the vast abyss of the cosmos that separated him from Ahriman. Ahriman was so shocked that he declared war on creation at the first glimpse of this light. Ormazd told Ahriman that there was no need for conflict; if Ahriman would only bless the creation and leave it alone, all would be well. Like most evil ones, Ahriman is suspicious; he thought that the Wise Lord was negotiating out of weakness. Thus, Ahriman continued his war against creation.

At this time Ormazd began to recite a sacred verse. Just one word of it so stunned Ahriman that he fell backward into hell, where he remained for three thousand years, allowing Ormazd to continue the act of creation unhindered—for a time.

Ormazd began by creating his Eternal Attendants, the Immortals, the Amesha Spentas. They are the personifications of the principles of good at work in the world. They include Vohu Mana (Good Mind),
Asha (Truth), Sraosha (Obedience), Armaiti (Devotion), and the twins Haurvetat (Integrity) and Ameritat (Immortality). They are collectively called “the children of God.”

Next the Wise Lord created the beautiful worshipful ones, the Yazatas or angels. They serve Ormazd as messengers and warriors who defend all that is good. In times of danger and difficulty, the Yazatas are willing to help humankind when called upon. (After Ahriman was released from hell, he created a corresponding group of evil angels, inferior to the Yazatas. These demons exist for the sole purpose of making humans miserable.)

Ormazd is a spirit without a body. However, he has a male and a female aspect. In creating our physical bodies, he is our Father. In creating our spiritual being, he is our Mother.

Ormazd created all living things and, since he is light, all creatures need light to survive. Ormazd’s last creations were Gayomart, the first man, and his ox. As they came directly out of the hand of the Wise Lord, Gayomart shone like the sun, and the ox, like the moon. Gayomart and his ox lived in peace for thirty years, at the end of which time the evil one was released from hell. Ahriman immediately went to work creating demons, flies, germs, disease, vermin, and every other vile thing. Ahriman is sometimes called the “lord of flies,” because they buzz around filth, manure, and decaying things.

One of Ahriman’s wicked attendants, a demoness named Johi, volunteered to make Gayomart and his ox suffer and die. Johi is the personification of all feminine evil. She is the source of prostitution, vanity, gossip, nagging, and other forms of evil seen in women. Not that women per se are evil, as they are the creation of Ormazd and are even possibly morally better than men.

Johi succeeded in making the ox sick and then turned her efforts to Gayomart. Since Gayomart had no sexual desire for her to prey on, he ignored her at first, which made her even more virulent. She then unleashed horrible diseases on the ox, who began to die. The Wise Lord gave the ox marijuana to chew, in order to ease its pain. Then the ox died.

Gayomart himself became mortally ill. When he died, his shining
body decomposed, depositing gold and silver in the earth. From his sperm, a tiny plant with a male and a female shoot sprang from the ground and grew into a great tree that bore as its fruit the ten races of mankind. The tree separated, and the male part became a man named Mashya, and the female became his wife, Mashyane.

The Wise Lord loved Mashya and Mashyane, supplying them with every need without any work or effort. Ormazd spoke to them directly and told them the story of Gayomart, their father. They learned of Gayomart’s faithfulness to the Wise Lord through many difficulties. Ahriman hated the two humans and sought to deceive them.

One day, the couple, hitherto unaware of evil, began saying to each other that it was Ahriman and not the Wise Lord that had created them. This was the first sin, a lie. And as it always is with lies, more were sure to follow. This first lie was the first of the many sins of mankind. At that instant Ormazd came to earth and told Mashya and Mashyane that they would have to henceforth work for a living. They would have to offer their praises and sacrifices only to the Wise Lord, or they would have no protection and be destroyed by Ahriman. He also instructed them how to have sexual intercourse in order to perpetuate their kind.

But Ahriman and Johi were determined to confound creation, and they took away the human couple’s sexual desire for fifty years. When Mashya and Mashyane were able to produce children, the demons ate them. So the Wise Lord saved humankind by taking away a little of the sweetness of the children, and they became like the children of today.

Ormazd loves the human race and wants it to survive. He needs our help to defeat Ahriman. Likewise, without the help of the Wise Lord, Ahriman would destroy us. But the triumph of good is inevitable.

* * *

NOTE
: The Germanic myths were held by peoples that included the ancestors of the modern Germans, Scandinavians, Dutch, and English. Since the Norse of Scandinavia were the last of these nations to be converted to Christianity, the Norse myths survived later than others. They survived latest of all in Iceland, whence comes this myth from the epic
The Elder Edda
.

L
ong ago there was no heaven above nor an earth beneath, only a vast bottomless deep shrouded in an atmosphere of mist. Somewhere in the middle of the abyss was a fountain from which twelve rivers flowed out like the spokes of a wheel. As the rivers traveled far from their source, they froze.

South of the world of mist, there was a world of light. Once a warm breeze blew out from the south and began to melt the ice. The contact of the warm air and the cold created clouds. These clouds congealed to form the frost giant, Ymir, and his cow, Audhumbla, whose milk nourished the giant. As the ice melted, salt was exposed, which Audhumbla licked. As she licked and licked, she exposed a man buried in the ice. On the first day, his hair was exposed; on the second day, one could see his whole head and shoulders. By the third day, his whole body was free of the ice. This was the first god, the father of Odin, Vili, and Ve.

These three young gods slew Ymir and his salty blood flowed out to make the seas (you will remember that Ymir had been nourished by the cow, who had licked salt out of the ice). The bones of Ymir formed the mountains and his flesh formed the earth. From his hair
sprang up all manner of plants. Among these were Aske, the ash tree, and Embla, the elm. From the ash tree, Odin fashioned a man and from the elm, a woman. From Odin himself, the humans received life and a soul. Vili gave them reason and motion, while Ve gave them speech and motion.

Odin organized the world, separating the darkness from the light, creating night and day. Odin fashioned Midgard, or Middle Earth,
*
for mankind to dwell in. He also fashioned Asgard, home of the gods. The universe is supported by Yggdrasil, a mighty ash tree. One of her roots touches Asgard, another Midgard, and a third lies underground, where the souls of the dead dwell under the eye of Odin’s sister, Hel.

Ymir the giant was not completely killed, part of his body is still alive and sleeps at the foot of the great ash tree Yggdrasil. When his body stirs, the earth quakes.

The Norse Myth of the Creation of Man from an Ash Tree and Its American Indian Parallel

The Norse story of the creation of human beings from an ash tree is often linked to similar stories in North America. Many writers have sought to find Viking influences in the myths of the Algonquin Indians.

Lewis Spencer (1874-1955) writes in
The Myths of the North American Indians
about Norse-like spirits:

Matriarchal Creation Myths

EURYNOME AND OPHION

I
n the beginning was Chaos and darkness. Chaos was a great vast sea in which all elements were mixed together without form. Out of this sea rose Eurynome (“of the good name”), the Great Goddess of all things. She emerged from the waves naked and began to dance on the sea, as there was nothing firm for her to stand on. Suddenly, the south wind blew and spun her around.

It is said that the north wind has miraculous fertility powers and, when she spun around, Eurynome grasped at the north wind. The great serpent of the waters, Ophion, saw Eurynome dancing and was filled with desire. He made love to her immediately. She then assumed the form of a lovely bird and gave birth to the great universal egg. Ophion coiled his tail around this egg until it cracked, spilling out creatures all over the newly formed earth. Eurynome loved Ophion for a time and they went to live on Mount Olympus, home of the gods.

However, Ophion became obnoxious and tiresome, bragging how he had fathered all living things. Eurynome grew weary of him and “bruised his head with her heel” [compare this with the same phrase in the Genesis story of Creation]. He was then cast down to the dark regions of the earth.

GEIA AND URANUS

G
eia, Mother Earth, emerged out of Chaos and then bore her son, Uranus (which means “heaven” or “sky”) while she was sleeping. When Uranus ascended to his place in the heavens, he showered his gratitude on his mother in the form of rain, which fertilized the earth, and all the dormant seeds within her came to life.