Historical Perspectives

 

Introduction:

'In the beginning' is a story (Parker, 1993). The 'Universe' is its central character. All characters have an ancestry that has made them what they are. A character's ancestry is one of the mysteries that the story must reveal. Even a shadowy character is defined by his, or her, shadowy ancestry. The cosmologist tells us that the first ancestor of the Universe was the Singularity which begat the four forces of nature, which together formed the Wald, (German, wald , 'the wild', 'wilderness') and in turn begat energy and matter and space and time. An un-named No-thing transformed, becoming Some-thing - everything in fact. This is a modern scientific cosmological tale full of action and suspense, drama, destruction, birth and rebirth, in which the scientific storyteller describes the origins of everything that is. The plot devised by a proponent of string theory might well be different to that offered by the Big Bang theorist but the core narrative structure remains - back as far as we can go, 'such and such' originating state of affairs was disrupted by 'such and such' event, followed by 'such and such' sequence of events and thus, inevitably, the universe came into being.

This exploration of creativity is a kind of contemporary cosmology, a story about the phenomenon out of which emerges all that is - all that is 'human creation'. In this story 'Creativity' is the main character with a background to recount, a family of origin, an ancestry to describe. At this point in the story though, it is just an idea (albeit our big human idea) without form and family - an idea which, like an expanding Universe, has dimension, evolves through time and space, across all cultures through all human time. This section of my story is concerned with conceptual underpinnings, with the cross-cultural evolution of the 'big idea' that became 'creativity', the 'character' that emerges in this text. How have people, through time and across geographical and cultural boundaries, thought about what we now call 'creativity' and related concepts? The place to begin answering that question is with cosmogonies. 

Cosmogony \Cos*mog"o*ny\ (-n?), n.; pl. Cosmogonies (-n?z). [Gr. kosmogoni`a; Jo`smos the world + root of gi`gnesthai to be born: cf. F. cosmogonie.] The creation of the world or universe; a theory or account of such creation; as, the poetical cosmogony of Hesiod; the cosmogonies of Thales, Anaxagoras, and Plato. (Merriam-Webster, 1998)

A cross-cultural conceptual evolution

Creation myths are defining narratives, cosmogonies that describe the primal ordering of the universe, the process by which chaos is transformed into cosmos and no-thing becomes some-thing (Leeming & Leeming, 1994). Like all myths, creation myths are etiological, using narrative symbolism to give structure and accessibility to highly complex ideas of how the universe and humans came into being. They are the stories at the centre of all religions and at the heart of all cultures, seeking to answer the core questions of existence: how the world and we came into being; who or what was responsible for that creation; what relationship human beings might have to that creative agency; and what purpose there might be for our existence.

Mircea Eliade describes a primordial progression which is apparent in many traditions; for example Australian Aboriginal, in which the primordial Great Father precedes the Dreaming; the Assyro-Babylonian where the primordial Tiamut is conquered by Marduk; the Greek which has Ouranos superseded by Zeus; and the Hindu which has Dyaus preceding Varuna, then moving through the consecutive supremacies of Indra, Shiva and Vishnu; an episodic unfolding in which the first stage of the creation is seen as a 'speculative' primordial time, during which the all powerful creator(s) emerges from the formless, chaotic state, the primordial soup of potentiality. This 'celestial' epoch is then followed by a passage to a 'creative' primordial epoch "rich in existential values" (Eliade, 1973 pp. 40-41)when the gods responsible for the creation of the world as we know it come into their own. Time and space, energy and matter emerge from the chaos to give physical form to a universe imbued with the life force of the divine. From this point all creation is possible.

Australian Aboriginal cosmological stories emanate from the creative epoch of 'the Dreaming' in which ancestral beings created features of the physical landscape which embody their spirit and imprint their power in the landscape. These ancestral events are recorded in ritual, song and story that the people refer to as the 'telling of the land'. The stories explain how certain topographical features were created and remained behind as the body of the Dreaming spirit. Natural phenomena and rock carvings left by the ancestral beings indicate places where significant events occurred as they passed through the land. Some mark the exact places where ancestors departed from the land, and all provide potent reminders of the continuing reality of ancestral events. "Aboriginal metaphysics is based on the belief that the land, and all that emanates from it, is sacred" (Horton & Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies., 1994 p. 49, vol 1). The song-cycles of these sacred ancestral events subtend the totemic creation mythologies sacred to each family grouping and each individual dreaming and define relationship, custom and law. The 'telling of the land' defines familial relationship to 'country' and the custodial responsibilities that attend that relationship. Each individual holds a part of the song-cycle that pertains to the corresponding place where they were conceived. "Holes" occur in the songs when landforms are fundamentally altered and/or knowledge of country is lost (Berndt & Berndt, 1974; Cowan, 1994). As the people are part of the land and the land part of the people, these losses rob the people of their wholeness.

This idea of an embodied temporal, spatial relationship with 'country' contributing to the wholeness of the individual and the community has deep resonance for me in respect of my understanding of creativity. Traditional Aboriginal culture has both a physical and metaphysical relationship with the world embodied in daily life, in 'ordinary' activity - fishing, hunting, gathering honey, lighting fires, creating images, singing songs, telling stories. This continually unfolding Aboriginal cosmology, that part that non-initiates are permitted to share, gives a clue as to what a life might be like lived in constant dialogue with the earth, in a constant collaborative world-creating process. This dialogue has been driven out of the governance and daily life of most contemporary cultures in favour of a monologue of domination of the earth in the service of short-term material wellbeing. Replacing any dialogue with a monologue leads inevitably to disruption and a state of imbalance.

The Aboriginal cosmological stories give a strong sense of the world becoming known, not only to the people, but to itself, singing its own song, revealing its form, describing itself in living symbols. The Hindu 'celestial' cosmogony begins with a universe in a wordless, formless, unperceived state, a world in complete darkness, unattainable by reasoning, unknowing and unknowable - a 'preconscious' universe, the universe before it knew itself, or was known by us. This 'knowingness' and 'being known', seems to be a crucial element in many of the beginning stories. The Egyptian cosmogony begins in the primordial ocean, Nun (Chaos), and the New Zealand Maori with the Supreme Being, Io, dwelling within the 'breathing-space of immensity'(Hongi, 1907).

In Genesis the universe is "tohu ve vohu" (unformed and void) until God speaks and the void is transformed. Each story ends with the unknowable becoming known, the genealogy revealed and the relationship between the people, the ancestors and the earth laid down.

The Assyrians had Anu and Enlil (sky and earth), along with Shamash (the sun) and Ea (water) create the earth and the heavens (Larousse Encyclopaedia of Mythology, p52-53). They sit back after this monumental effort, surveying their handiwork. While justifiably pleased, they feel that something is still lacking. Firstly, there is no-thing to appreciate their handiwork, and secondly, no purpose for this world they have created. They decide to make the first human beings, Uligarra (abundance) and Zalgarra (plenty) to till the fields and to celebrate religious festivals, thus satisfying both considerations. This story sets the precedence for work (or productivity) and worship as the primary justification for (and goal of) human existence, thereby adequately rewarding the gods for their world-creating efforts.

These stories progress through a hierarchy of explanations from the great cosmic mystery through mysteries and conundrums ever closer to home, from speculative metaphysical symbology to very human existential imagery. The Babylonian god Marduk, for example, was said to have created land and sky by splitting in two the body of Tiamut, the primordial earth goddess, after killing her in violent battle. This symbolic conquering of the primordial allows for the old order to be overturned and transformed so that creation can continue. Marduk won this battle with the aid of the seven winds, entities he had created to hold fast the corners of the net set to entangle the goddess. Having ridden into battle on the back of the tornado, Marduk sends the tumid wind, Imhullu, to enter the gaping mouth of Tiamut as she tries to suck him down. Her belly swells as the wind rages through her body. Marduk fires his arrow, splitting her belly and her womb. He straddles her and ends her life, her blood flowing down the north wind to the unknown ends of the world. (Larousse Encyclopaedia of Mythology, p3). A battle of opposing forces, male and female with renewed vitality springing forth from destruction. Tiamut may be overthrown but she remains crucial to the story as the beginning of everything.

In contrast to the imagery of procreative violence in this story, the New Zealand Maori story of Ranginui and Papatuanuku is gentler, more tender. The progenitors (the sky father and earth mother) lie entwined in a passionate embrace - an embrace that blocks out the light of the life-sustaining sun. Between them their progeny wilt in the suffocating darkness. Finally, they are wrenched apart by their son, Tane Mahuta, in his attempt to bring light into the world and to make room for himself and his siblings to stretch and grow. Tane must stand between them forever, his feet planted firmly on the body of his mother pushing upward against his father to hold him from her. Rangi grieves the loss of Papa for eternity, his tears bathing her beloved body and flowing on to form the rivers and the oceans. Papatuanuku's sighs rise to meet him as the morning mist, and her tears gather as the dew. In this way, despite the grief of separation from each other, Rangi and Papa participate in the process of renewal.12 Love, loyalty, grief and renewal stemming from a unity severed. Whether violent and vengeful, or tenderly passionate, these stories contain obvious biological metaphors (as do many other creation stories eg the great mound of the Choctaw from which the original people emerge having crawled through a long dark tunnel). The Maori story appeals to a contemporary Western 13 (psychologically oriented) sensibility, its imagery, at a deeper level, suggestive of the individuation of equal and opposite natural powers (masculine and feminine). In the Upanishad creation myth the 'creator' rather than the 'creators', 'creation' is split into the male and female progenitors (Hillman, 1983).

The Egyptian cosmological progression also deals with the ancestral severing of the male and female (Larousse Encyclopaedia of Mythology, p3). Floating in Nun, enclosed within the bud of a lotus flower, Artum - the germ of all things, all gods and all beings - sits motionless with firmly shut eyes. Wearying of this state of unrealised potential, and fearing the loss of his wondrous lustre, Artum rises, by force of will, out of the primordial ocean, transforming into the supreme sun god, Ra. Ra unilaterally begets twins Shu (male) and Tefnut (female) who, in turn, together produce Geb and Nut. Nut and Geb secretly marry against the will of Ra. From this point on the Egyptian story bears strong resemblances to the Maori story of Rangi and Papa. This time Geb (earth father) and Nut (Sky mother) cling to one another in a passionate embrace. Ra demands their separation, commanding their father Shu to slip between the two and force them apart. Shu, with the help of Tefnut, must hold his children Geb and Nut apart forever (as Tane Mahuta was required to hold apart his parents). Geb remains inconsolable, as Rangi was, as a result of the loss of his beloved.

It is the images from the 'celestial epochs', however, that seem to reflect the human desire to understand the 'awakening' that leads to the act of creation itself. Eliade explains that the cosmogonic myth (Io emerging from the 'breathing-space of immensity') "constitutes, for the Maori a paradigmatic model for every kind of creation: the procreation of a child, the inspiration of a poet," (Eliade, 1963, p3). The 'Darkness become(s) a light possessing darkness', and all creation is possible (Hongi, 1907). This image of darkness becoming light has been universally absorbed as a metaphor for inspiration - the flash of insight heralding great discoveries, the illumination of the imagination leading to wondrous works of art, the sudden flash of understanding accompanying the relinquishing of long held, debilitating prejudice.

The primordial stories unconcerned with the business of human procreation and the mundane materiality of the world would seem to be grappling not just with questions of how the universe and everything in it came to be, but with questions about the awakening of human consciousness as well, the emerging of the human mind from the darkness of unknowing into the light of self awareness. They theorise, not only about how the universe came to be, but how the universe came to be as it seems to us; the 'why' of our 'need to know' about it; the 'how' of our 'ability to know' about it; and finally, perhaps most importantly, our capacity to communicate our knowing.

Hence the importance of 'the word' in the cosmologies of the majority of the world's major religions. There would seem to be no reason for the supreme being to speak in the beginning - after all there was no other being, mortal or celestial, to listen - other than the need to set a precedent for communication, begin the progression of dialogue that would link the Godhead to us. The over-riding notion here being that God created the world and that human creativity derives from God as the means to continue the dialogue. The supremacy of human beings above all other creatures is, thus assured.

Biblical views

The Hebrew Bible, from which western culture has drawn its fundamental monotheistic cosmology, its views on salvation and righteousness, and its moral and ethical constructs of love, duty and justice, presents the idea of God creating 'man', alone amongst all the swarming living creatures he has created "in His own image". Human beings have conferred upon them the ability to do more than simply replicate themselves but the capacity (albeit a reduced capacity) to create in their own right - to bring into being something new. God is good. All of God's works are good. God created the world, ergo Creation is good. 'Man' has the power to create conferred by God, ergo, creativity is good - however derivative it might be. The Tower of Babel, (Genesis, 11) however, is the cautionary tale that warns against 'man' overstretching the limits of human creation and provoking God's jealousy. The story reminds us that we are expected to "walk in his ways", but several respectful steps behind. Getting beyond ourselves is a blasphemy. Each culture has defined limitations upon the scope of creativity, limiting, by custom and law, what it will allow to be created 14 and defining what will be considered valuable and what will not. The Romans, for example, placed high value on community conformity and the stability of the empire. To this end they favoured propaganda by poetry, prescribing that the role of theatre would be confined to the moral education of the public (Chronicle of the World, 1991, p. 173c). Poetry which challenged the status quo or offered alternative interpretations of the character, virtues, exploits, or conduct of the gods or heroes (the principle subject matter of all poetry), portraying them in any degenerate, flawed, irresponsible or ignoble light, were disallowed in public theatres, (as was any seating arrangement which might prove too comfortable, thereby encouraging slothfulness and dereliction of duty). The spoken word was thus a conduit to righteousness.