The following essay was submitted to Tyndale University for Introduction to Literature I, Fall 2023.
~*~
Ovid’s Metamorphoses and the Bible present two accounts of the creation of the world. At first sight, these two accounts appear very similar. In both narratives a god brings the universe into order, mankind is made in a unique fashion, and times begin well, but eventually fall into decay and toil. However, closer examination reveals that these stories are essentially different. The creation narratives in Ovid’s Metamorphoses and the Bible present very different accounts of the state of the world in the beginning, how the world was created, how mankind was created, and how the world deteriorated into its current state.
Ovid’s creation story begins in chaos. The elements of earth, fire, water, and air are lumped together and are warring against each other. He writes, “This was a shapeless uncoordinated mass, nothing but a weight of lifeless matter, whose ill-assorted elements were indiscriminately heaped together in one place…Nothing had any lasting shape, but everything got in the way of everything else” (Ovid 29). Finally a god intervenes. He assigns each element to its proper place: the fiery aether to the highest heaven, the air below it, and the earth at the bottom. This god brings order out of chaos, but he does not create anything—he only separates what already exists. The biblical account of creation begins differently. There is no chaos, only emptiness. Genesis says, “The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep” (English Standard Version, Gen. 1:2). No aether, air, or earth existed, and there was no chaos, for chaos cannot exist if there are no elements to war against each other. Genesis says that God was present in this emptiness and that he spoke the world into being. He said, “‘Let there be light,’ and there was light” (Gen. 1:3). While Ovid’s god has to rearrange pre-existent elements and bring order to chaos, the God of Genesis creates the elements from nothing.
Both Ovid’s account and the Bible go on to describe the creation of mankind as a distinctly different process from the creation of plants, birds, and beasts. However, Ovid is uncertain how mankind was created, while the Bible offers a confident explanation. Ovid writes,
“[E]ither the Creator, who was responsible for this better world, made [man] from divine seed, or else Prometheus, son of Iapetus, took the new-made earth which, only recently separated from the lofty aether, still retained some elements related to those of heaven and, mixing it with rainwater, fashioned it into the image of the all-governing gods” (Ovid 31).
According to Ovid, mankind is either of divine decent, or else he is a mere mockery of the gods—a child’s well-meant, but crude attempt to imitate the likeness of his father. At first, this appears similar to the creation of man in Genesis, but it is fundamentally different. In the Genesis account, God says, “‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.’…So God created man in his image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. And God blessed them” (Gen. 1:26-28). The God of Genesis does not make man from “divine seed”; he creates him as a separate being in the image of himself. Unlike Prometheus who, though a god, is not the primary creator of the world, God himself makes mankind in his own image. Furthermore, he blesses his creation so that it may flourish. Later, Genesis describes how God made the man from dust: “then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature” (Gen. 2:7). God does not merely make man out of dust, but he breathes into him with his own life. Such an intimate interaction is not implied in Ovid’s account.
Both accounts also describe a fall from the original perfect state of the universe to a decayed, toilsome one. Again, however, this similarity is superficial. In Metamorphoses, after the god has brought order to the chaotic elements, the world enters the Golden Age: trees and fields produce bountiful crops of their own accord, there is no need for work, and no dissention among mankind. Ovid writes, “Men of their own accord, without threat of punishment, without laws, maintained good faith and did what was right…The peoples of the world, untroubled by any fears, enjoyed a leisurely and peaceful existence” (Ovid 31). However, the gods eventually war against each other, and Jupiter exiles his father to the “darkness of Tartarus” (32). Jupiter divides the year into four seasons, shortening the warm months and adding cold ones. Men are obliged to build shelters to live in and must till and plow the fields. Throughout the following ages, men become increasingly hostile and evil.
In Genesis, the world began in peace, but work was always part of it. God himself worked to create the world and, when he made man, he placed him in the garden “to work it and keep it” (Gen. 2:15). Instead of attributing the decay of the world to a battle between the gods, Genesis describes how the man and his wife disobeyed God. As a consequence, God curses the ground and says to the man, “in pain you shall eat of [the ground] all the days of your life” and “by the sweat of your face you shall eat bread” (Gen. 3:17, 19). However, Genesis also contains a promise that evil and toil will be overcome when a child of the women will destroy the snake who tempted her to disobey God (Gen. 3:15). While Ovid describes toil and evil as the inevitable process of chaos and time, Genesis declares that they are a result of the Fall. Ovid offers no consolation or hope for the end of toil, but Genesis presents the promise of victory.
The creation accounts in Ovid’s Metamorphoses and the Bible seem similar on the surface, but they are essentially different. Ovid describes a world of chaos, where mankind is merely an imitation of the gods, and the decay of the world is depressingly consistent. In Genesis, God creates the world out of nothing and forms mankind in his own image, breathing into him the breath of life. While Genesis tells of the Fall and decay of the world, it also holds the promise of victory over evil. These aspects significantly differentiate the creation story in Genesis from the one Ovid writes in his Metamorphoses.
Note:
Ovid. Metamorphoses. Translated by Mary M. Innes. Penguin Books, 1955.
Remembered Lore 