The Universal Myths
According to the course description of this class, Western Man and the Cosmos is a historical examination of man's interaction with nature. In its most general sense, the term cosmos is defined as an orderly or harmonious system. It originates from a Greek term ??sµ??, meaning "order or orderly arrangement." Throughout history, man's understanding of the cosmos has been expressed in a few different ways; through myth, religion and empirical evidence. In this essay I will be analyzing and interpreting the mythological understanding of the history of the cosmos.
What is mythology? It is a collection of stories telling our beliefs and our history. The stories are usually regarding major issues such as the origin of humanity and its traditions, and the way in which the natural and human worlds function. The Universal Myths: Heroes, Gods, Tricksters and Others, by Alexander Eliot is a collection of myths and stories of all nations, throughout the history of man. Many stories in this book are told about the origin of the cosmos, the creation of man, and the meaning of life. I found all the stories in this book to be very fascinating, but I narrowed it down to four that I found to be the most relevant to the mythological themes that our class has been learning about throughout the semester. The four stories I chose were "Unanswered Questions", "Separation of Earth and Sky", "Isis and Osiris" and "Uranus, Cronus, and Zeus." Each of these stories will be broken down and explained in relevance to the major themes of Western Man and the Cosmos.
The most famous Egyptian myth is the story of "Isis and Osiris" on page 202. It is part of a fascinating story of the how Egypt wa ...