The Cosmic Egg

 How the universe began according to mythologies. First, there was emptiness, nothingness. Then the almighty thought of an egg. His soul entered that egg. After maturing the egg finally hatched and the cosmic being came out of it. He broke the egg into two parts. The one above became heaven or the skies. The one below became the earth. The cosmic being was sacrificed to create other elements in the world. This is a common story that exists in various world mythologies with variations.

In the Vedas, the egg is the Hiranyagarbha or the golden egg or womb. The cosmic being is Purusha or Prajapati. The upper half is Dyaus and the lower half is Prithvi. The Purusha is sacrificed and various social classes emerge from his body parts. In the Orphic Greek myth, the upper half is Uranus (sky) and the lower half is Gaia (earth). The cosmic being can be Protogonous or Phanes or it is Chronus, depending on the sources.

In the ancient Chinese myth, the cosmic being is Pangu, whose body parts break down to become various things in the environment, and the cosmic egg he separates is Ying and Yang that becomes Earth and Heaven. Basically, two opposites. In the Mesopotamian myth, the upper half is Anu, the sky god, and the lower half is Ki, the earth goddess. The cosmic being is Enlil, a god of thunder and storm. Basically, he symbolises the atmosphere that exists between the earth and the sky. Ancient Egypt had similar myths where genders of earth and sky are swapped.

Human imaginations and interpretations created variations to this basic concept. But as a basic concept, the cosmic egg is the creation of universes of myths. Something similar to the modern big bang theory of physics. A neutral nothingness is broken into two opposites – light and darkness, earth and sky, heat and cold, day and night, and so on.

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