Claim CG201:
Many cultures around the world have flood myths, indicating the
universality of the Flood.
Source:
LaHaye, Tim, and John Morris, 1976. The Ark on Ararat. Nashville:
Thomas Nelson Inc., pp. 231-241.
Brown, Walt, 1995. In the Beginning: Compelling evidence for
creation
and the Flood. Phoenix, AZ: Center for Scientific Creation, p. 35.
Response:
- Flood myths are widespread, but they are not all the same myth. They
differ in many important aspects, including
- reasons for the flood. (Most do not give a reason.)
- who survived. (Almost none have only a family of eight surviving.)
- what they took with them. (Very few saved samples of all life.)
- how they survived. (In about half the myths, people escaped to high
ground; some flood myths have no survivors.)
- what they did afterwards. (Few feature any kind of sacrifice
after the flood.)
If the world's flood myths arose from a common source, then we would
expect evidence of common descent. An analysis of their similarities
and differences should show either a branching tree such as the
evolutionary tree of life, or, if the original biblical myth was
preserved unchanged, the differences should be greater the further one
gets from Babylon. Neither pattern matches the evidence. Flood myths
are best explained by repeated independent origins with some local
spread and some spread by missionaries. The biblical flood myth in
particular has close parallels only to other myths from the same
region, with which it probably shares a common source, and to versions
spread to other cultures by missionaries (Isaak 2002).
- Flood myths are likely common because floods are common; the commonness
of the myth in no way implies a global flood. Myths about snakes are
even more common than myths about floods, but that does not mean there
was once one snake surrounding the entire earth.
References:
Further Reading:
Dundes, Alan (ed.), 1988. The Flood Myth. Berkeley: University of
California Press.
created 2001-2-18, modified 2005-5-25