Hesiod's Poetry and Yahwist History

 

The Creation

To begin, the cosmos was described in similar terms by Hesiod and Genesis I—“void” and “chaos”, the creation of light and darkness, the sky above, the ocean below, and the earth. In Theogony, it says that Chaos came first, then Gaia (earth); in Genesis 1:2, it stated that “the earth was a formless void”. Both statements show that the creation came from nothing; these also depict an allusion to the Mesopotamian goddess of chaos in the Enuma Elish, Tiamat. With this, scholars argue that both Hesiod’s Theogony and Genesis I was familiar with the ancient Near Eastern accounts of creation. There are other statements that were found similar such as Hesiod’s use of “Erebos” (darkness) and “Aether” (day) and the Bible’s (Genesis 1:4-5) separation of “light and darkness”, the concept of “starry Sky”, “the barren sea seething with its swell, Pontus” from Theogony and the “sky above”, “seas below” of Genesis 1.

The similarities between the two ended as Hesiod speaks of the gods, and the Bible continues with the creation of the world. Reading closely, the Theogony talks about the creation of the world for the emergence of gods and cosmogony or how the solar system is formed. On the other hand, the Bible speaks of the world as a habitat for its people and other things. The Biblical author values the existence of human beings unlike in Hesiod’s Theogony which did not speak of the creation of humans. This also lead backs to a comparison of Genesis 1 and 2 which states that chapter 1 is cosmological, and chapter 2 is anthropocentric. Nonetheless, both Greek and biblical texts may share similarities, further analysis would reveal how contrast it is.

Genealogies

By the title itself, “Theogony”, it means the genealogy of a group. It presents Greek mythology through its lineage from titans, gods, and humans. There are different texts that can be compared to how Hesiod presented genealogy but the book of Genesis is arguably the closest. One of the most obvious example which is the segmented genealogical lines wherein both of the authors listed multiple descendants that came from an ancestor. To compare these texts, Hesiod presented the major ancestors starting from Erepos, to Ouranos, Kronos, Zeus, and Athena whereas something of the Book of Genesis started from Adam, to Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph.

Fall of Humanity

The Woman refers to Eve in the Bible, while the “Fall” refers to Pandora in the Theogony. In Genesis 2-3, a woman named Eve was brought to life the help man. She came to be good and was defined positively in the texts. In Theogony 585-595, the woman was brought to life to be the “fall” of men. She came as a punishment from the gods. When the woman from the Bible came, she was accountable for eating the forbidden fruit along with man. When the woman from the Theogony came, she was in.

The way they were introduced was not alike—one was described positively, the other was not. To be called the “fall” rather than “woman” makes a huge difference, even though both of the women in the texts were accountable for the “fall” of humanity. Although they were the first woman mortals, their purpose and characteristics were not alike.

Distance Between God and Man

After the “Fall” happened in the Bible, God started to gradually distance Himself from humanity. From the expulsion from the Garden of Eden, God limited His communication and appearance to mankind. All of this was caused by the nature of humans as sinful beings. Similar to Hesiod’s work, it also showed how gods were distancing themselves from the mortals; however, they have a different reason for treating them in this manner. Gods believed that humans are simply supposed to be their subjects. They lived in mount Olympus separately from humans, not because they were wronged by those people, but because of their entitlement. Nevertheless, gods and people have their alliances in a matter of worship and blessings.