Cosmology

Egyptian

• • The earth was the bottom of a rectangular box
  • The sky was either a flat surface parallel to the earth or a bowl-shaped sky supported by the mountains
  • The stars were burning lamps suspended from the sky

• Babylonian

• • Earth was a flat disk floating in a vast sea
  • Mountains beyond the sea supported the domed sky
  • Gods lived in the heavens, an area off limits to humans

• Hebrew

• • A domed firmament separated the waters and was supported by the mountains
  • High above the waters above the firmament lived God and His heavenly host
  • Below the earth was a great cavern called Sheol where the dead went

• Understandings of the sun

• • Egyptian - the god Amon-Ra floating across the sky in a barge - at sunset he entered the Valley of the Gods and emerged each morning
  • Mesopotamian - Shamash, the sun god, emerged through the eastern gates each morning in a chariot pulled by wild donkeys - one of the wheels was the sun - he would exit through the western gates at dusk and travel through a long tunnel back to the east
  • Hebrew - sun and moon were attached to the firmament and appeared to roll across it each day
  • Greek - Helios arose each day out of the eastern sea in a chariot pulled by four white horses - as he rose up, the stars scattered and dove into the sea - at dusk he approached the western boundaries of the earth and those living too close to that edge would be singed by the chariot's heat

• • Universe was closed and that was comforting
  • Continuous interaction between gods, evil spirits, and people
  • Good tended to happen above, bad below, and both in the middle where people lived

• As we look out into space we look back in time because light takes time to travel from those objects to us
• • About 1 1/4 seconds when look at moon
  • About 9 minutes when look at sun
  • About 4 years when look at second nearest star (Alpha Centauri)
  • About 2 million years when look at nearest galaxy (Andromeda)
  • With telescopes we can look back 10 billion years
• We might be able to see events at the beginning (12 to 25 billion years ago) or near that time, like quasars
• Distances
• • Assuming Pluto is the nearest planet, our solar system is 7 ½ billion miles in diameter (11 light hours)
  • Alpha Centauri is 26 trillion miles (4 light years) away
  • Milky Way galaxy is about 100,000 light years across
  • Our solar system is about 30,000 light years from the center in one of the spiral arms
  • Our galaxy is part of a system of about 2 dozen galaxies
  • Billions of galaxies exist and even what we see might simply be a metagalaxy with others existing
• Our understanding of the size of the universe is far more vast than what Israel understood

Egyptian (2850-2175 B.C.E.)

• • Great emphasis on creation coming from the heart with the tongue repeating the heart's thoughts and speaking them into existence
  • Atum was the first deity
  • He created twin children, Shu and Tefnut, by either spitting them out of his mouth or through masturbation
  • The twins made love in the usual way and produced two more children, the twins Nut and Geb
  • Geb was the earth with Nut as the sky
  • Their love created more twins like Osiris and Isis who were suffering and sorrowing deities very sympathetic to humans and Set and Nephthys who were more destructive but still needed to replenish the earth
• Mesopotamian - "Enuma Elish" (2000-1500 B.C.E.)

• • When things began Tiamat, the sea and salt water, and Apsu, the fresh water, already existed
  • Tiamat and Apsu mixed just as salt and fresh waters mix in the marshes of southern Mesopotamia - in the delta the mixing of waters allows reeds to grow which then trap silt and build up new land - with the gods, mixing created the potential for creation
  • Tiamat and Marduk fought
  • Marduk won and used Tiamat's body for creation, with half for earth and half for the firmament
  • The evil deities who had been defeated when Tiamat died were forced to till the ground - when they complained, Marduk killed Kingu, mixed his blood with dirt, and formed humans
  • Humans thus were created to serve the gods
• Phoenician (1000 B.C.E.)

• • Winds existed first and tied themselves into a love knot
  • After a long time, a watery slime named Mot was born
  • From this slime came living things without consciousness
  • From these simple creatures more complex and conscious beings came who began to ponder the universe
• Greeks (ancient, probably Middle Eastern in origin)

• • Two stories
  • • Involving the gods
    • • Chaos came first
      • From him came Gaea, Mother Earth
      • From Gaea came Uranus, Father Sky
      • Uranus showered rain and sunshine upon his mother and vegetation, insects, birds, and animals were born
      • Uranus also filled the rivers and seas with life and from her caverns came the Titans and Cyclopes
      • Uranus was afraid of the Titans and condemned some to the underworld
      • Gaea begged the 7^th and youngest Titan, Cronus, to push Uranus away from her
      • Cronus castrated Uranus and threw his testicles into the sea - from his blood the Furies were born and from the foam in the sea came Aphrodite, goddess of love
      • Uranus retreated to the farthest reaches of the heavens and there watches, with his two star eyes, the violence done on earth
      • Zeus, the son of Cronus, was ultimately able to defeat the Titans, his uncles, and from their ashes humans arose
    • More abstract and philosophical
    • • Night arose out of Chaos and stirred up a wind named Ophion
      • Night assumed the form of a dove, rested upon the waters, and laid a silver egg
      • The World Egg hatched with the bottom half becoming the earth with its inhabitants and the top half becoming the sky, sun, moon, and stars

• Big Bang Model
• • All matter in the universe was pulled into a huge, hot ball which of incredible density
  • As gravitational forces increased the ball exploded
  • The universe was created by the debris as it cooled down
  • The universe is running down and will eventually grow cold and die
• Pulsating Model
• • Like the Big Bang but believes the expanding universe will slow down and stop but then collapse back upon itself into another ball
  • This complete procedure will occur once every 80 billion years
  • Thus creation cycles - there may have been universes before ours
• Multi-bubble Universe
• • We are one of several or an infinite number of pulsating universes
  • We may only see ours but others may exist