Write your own creation myth

[Navigator]

I have wondered what would happen if I posed this question to the talented minds at JREF. What kind of creation myth would you write? What lessons would there be? Would the Biblical story even measure up, given what we know about the universe today?

Okay, I will offer this one.

The old man put the final touches to his invention and turned it on.

The machine hummed quietly and a small dot appeared in the middle of its sphere glass chamber.

The old man smiled and turned his laboratory lights off and quietly closed the door behind him.

He went to his kitchen and boiled an egg, and popped some bread under the grill to make toast.

After eating, he drank some tea, then filled his hot water bottle and went to bed.

At present he is still sleeping, while his machine hums on - the small dot has already increased in size and has separated into many tiny spinning individual spirals spreading out in every direction.

From the old mans bedroom, the soft sound of contented snoring can be heard...above the softer hum of the machine...

 

[Frozenwolf150]

I was born because the Universe knew it couldn't go on without the awesomeness that is Me.


(Sorry, I know this is a serious thread, but I thought of this smart-ass answer and couldn't resist.)

It's not necessarily a serious thread. Pith works just as well as an epic length mythos. Speaking of which...

Brevity? You asked for a creation myth, not a bumper sticker. Yes, it's original. I needed to figure out the setting for a novel so I wrote what the world was like before the novel begins. That is only part of it.

Don't get me wrong, I liked it overall. I felt it repeated itself at times, but that's probably the editor in me talking. If you're using this as the basis for a novel, it seems like you have a solid foundation.

 

[qayak]

In The Beginning

1 In the beginning there was but one man and that man was Qayak.
2 And lo, there were many a fair maiden.
3 And Qayak saw that this was good.
4 And Qayak saw Angelina Jolie and begat 8 rug rats. And it was good
5 And Qayak saw Jennifer Anniston and begat 10 drape apes. And it was good.
6 And Qayak saw Helen Bohnam Carter and begat for the sake of begatting. And it was really good.
7 And Qayak saw Mini Driver . . .
8 And Qayak saw . . .

845612 And on the 7th day Qayak rested.

Granted it's a rough draft . . .

 

[Frozenwolf150]

Here's one of mine, by the way:



Of every last creature that nature created
Arose this one beast who believed he was fated
To rule and subdue all the species of Earth,
Thus duty demanded we measure his worth.

To educate him of this wondrous place
We migrated over the vast ocean face,
This endless horizon, the skies from the deep
Where species first stirred from primordial sleep.
From single-celled life, evolution dispersed
Magnificence teeming in forms so diverse.
Dismissive, he glanced through the shining blue sea
And asked us quite plainly, "What's in it for me?"

We landed thereafter, that we might present
What tectonics had crafted, these vast continents
Where plants spread their roots and began to ascend
To forests of flowering life that extend
Across these great lands. But this green vegetation
Encouraged the beast into crass exploitation
When offered a taste from a fruit-bearing tree
He ravaged them, saying, "They're made just for me!"

Attempting once more to enlighten the beast
Terrestrial fauna were last but not least.
The animals present, we hoped he would name them
But hoisting his weapons, instead he proclaimed them
For hunting in sport and less often for food.
Again, on a whim, he came to conclude
That species on Earth offer one guarantee
As often he stated, "They're here to serve me."

So skyward we sailed to show him the sun
Our furnace of fusion from whence all begun,
Yet steadfast he stood and refused to be swayed
Insisting as always the heavens were made
To prove his position as king of the world--

The very next moment he found himself hurled
Through miles of space towards a flaming demise.
(Remaking him shouldn't take too many tries.)

 

[bruto]

Mine is really simple.

There's this god, who like any proper god is changeless, eternal and perfect, and utterly alone. He can't do anything but imagine a universe full of stories, but he can't tell them. One day he thinks to himself "What's the point of all this?" and "What can I do about it?" The answer, of course, is that a universe with a god like this in it will never quite make sense, and the stories will never happen, so he figuratively holds his nose and blows really hard and BANG! - a universe. The Quakers have it a little bit right when they say there's a little of god in all of us, and there's a feeble hint of the gift in Christian myth, but really there's no god at all any more, for which we can, if we are so inclined, thank god, though there's no-one to hear. We can, however, tell stories, and some of them happen.

 

[blobru]

Nonce upon no time there was nothing.

And the nothing was form. And the form was possibility. And the possibility of change was time. And from the possibility came everything that could be.

Now, most of the everything was nothing. But some of it, not very much, but some, was really something.

And as the really something pondered the nothing it had come from, and which it would return to, it was, frankly, at something of a loss. Really something of a loss.

And so it told itself creation myths (that were something else again of course).

And this is one.

 

[Safe-Keeper]

The Book of Lachis

I've got nothing to say except 'wow'. That was beautiful.

 

[barehl]

I've got nothing to say except 'wow'. That was beautiful.

Thank you.

 

[Soapy Sam]

Once, there was a rabbit.
The rest is his story.