loving art, science and creative kids

THE GREATEST OF MYSTERIES

Where do we come from? What are we?

Where are we going?

Life is a riddle and a mystery.

Mystery, mystery.

  The congregation I belong to occasionally sings this song as a round during services. Whenever we do it, the lyrics start me wondering about the universe and my place in it. The questions are as old as humanity itself. Where did we come from? Why are we here? What are we? Where are we going? Does what we do—and the way we live—matter in the greater scheme of things?

For thousands of years, human beings could see only a tiny portion of the universe with their own eyes. They watched the sun cross the sky, the moon change shape, and the stars appear each night. They could not know that the stars were distant suns or that many of those stars were orbited by planets of their own. Today, astronomers have confirmed thousands of planets beyond our solar system, and the Milky Way is thought to contain billions of planets. Yet we still have no evidence that life exists anywhere beyond Earth.

The mystery has changed, but it has not disappeared. Where did we come from? It is a question humans have always struggled with because we seem to have an almost irresistible desire for certainty. Creation myths may have helped people make sense of a world they could not explain. Archaeological discoveries give us glimpses into ancient civilizations and the ways they understood their existence. The details differ enormously, but many creation stories ask the same fundamental questions that science asks today: How did the world begin? What existed before it? And how did we come to be part of it?

The ancient world: In ancient Mesopotamia, the Babylonian creation epic Enuma Elish begins with primordial waters. The freshwater god Apsu and the saltwater goddess Tiamat give rise to other gods. Eventually, conflict erupts, and the storm god Marduk defeats Tiamat. He divides her body to form the heavens and the earth. Humanity is later created from clay mixed with the blood of a defeated god, with humans given the task of serving the gods.

The story is striking not because it resembles modern cosmology, but because it reflects an ancient attempt to explain how order emerged from chaos.

Hindu traditions offer a very different vision. Rather than describing a single creation followed by a single ending, many Hindu cosmological traditions envision an immense cycle of creation, preservation, destruction, and renewal. Brahma is associated with creation, Vishnu with preservation, and Shiva with destruction and transformation. The universe passes through enormous cycles of time rather than moving along a single, irreversible timeline. One of the most fascinating ideas in Hindu cosmology is that this universe is not necessarily the first—or the last. Creation and destruction are part of a continuing cosmic cycle. That concept has influenced Hindu thought about life, death, and reincarnation, although it would be an oversimplification to say that one creation story alone explains practices such as vegetarianism.

Raven and the creation of the world: The creation stories of Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest are many and varied, and they should not be treated as though all tribes share a single mythology. One story that has always fascinated me comes from the Haida tradition.

Raven is a powerful and complicated figure—trickster, transformer, and creator. In one well-known story, Raven discovers the first humans inside a giant clamshell on a beach and coaxes them out into the world. The story was famously interpreted by Haida artist Bill Reid in his sculpture The Raven and the First Men. Other Northwest Coast traditions tell stories of Raven bringing light into a world that was once dark. In Tlingit tradition, for example, Raven releases the sun, moon, and stars that have been kept hidden away.

I include the Raven story for another reason. My partner, a totem-pole and mask carver and I used to tell this particular story when we performed at public gatherings. For me, it is more than an ancient creation myth. It is part of a living cultural tradition that I have had the privilege of encountering personally.

The Abrahamic traditions: The creation stories of Judaism and Christianity are found in the Book of Genesis. In Genesis, over seven days, God creates the heavens and the earth, separates light from darkness, creates the land and seas, vegetation, celestial bodies, animals, and finally human beings. The first humans, Adam and Eve, live in the Garden of Eden until they eat from the forbidden tree and are expelled. Islam also teaches that God created the heavens and the earth six days, but the Islamic creation account as found in the Qur'an varies slightly from the Genesis narrative.  There is no day of rest. Creation occurred during six distinct cosmic phases or stages of development. The Qur'an states that time is relative to God and that a 'day" can equal 50,000 years or more. He chose to unfold the universe slowly to establish the laws of nature, cause and effect, and to serve as a lesson in patience for humankind.

A world born from eggs: The creation story in Finland's national epic, The Kalevala, could hardly be more different. Ilmatar, a spirit or maiden associated with the air, descends into the primordial waters. A water bird, often identified as a duck or goldeneye, mistakes her raised knee for a piece of land and builds a nest there. It lays seven eggs—six golden and one of iron. When the heat of the nesting eggs becomes unbearable, Ilmatar moves, and the eggs fall into the sea and break apart. Their fragments become the earth, sky, sun, and moon.

It is a beautiful image: the universe emerging from the broken pieces of eggs. And perhaps that is part of what creation myths do so well. They take something unimaginably large and mysterious and give it a form the human mind can grasp. Despite their differences, these traditions share a profound conviction: the universe is not meaningless. It has an origin, and human beings have a place within a larger order.

The mystery remains: Every culture seems to have wrestled with the same fundamental questions. Today, scientists are approaching those questions from a very different direction. Telescopes allow us to look billions of years into the past. We know that the universe is about 13.8 billion years old, and we have compelling evidence that it has been expanding from an extremely hot, dense early state. But the Big Bang theory does not provide a simple answer to the question, "What happened before?” In fact, scientists do not yet know whether that is even a meaningful question in the way we normally understand it. Our current theories can take us astonishingly close to the beginning, but they do not tell us what caused the initial expansion or what, if anything, preceded it. NASA notes that scientists are still unsure what came before cosmic inflation or what powered it.

The mysteries do not stop there. How did the first living organisms arise from nonliving matter? Why did life emerge on Earth? Is life common throughout the universe, or are we extraordinarily rare? We have discovered thousands of planets beyond our solar system, but so far Earth remains the only place where life is known to exist. And then there is perhaps the most intimate mystery of all: How did matter become conscious? We can look outward through increasingly powerful telescopes. We can look backward through the fossil record and the geological history of our planet. We can examine cells, genes, atoms, and galaxies. Yet after all we have learned, we still cannot answer the simplest questions with certainty; Where did we come from? Why are we here? Where are we going? Does what we do matter?

Perhaps science will answer some of these questions. Perhaps new discoveries will reveal mysteries we cannot yet imagine. Or perhaps the mystery itself is part of what it means to be human.

Where do we come from? What are we?
Where are we going?

Life is a riddle and a mystery.

Mystery, mystery.

_________________

I look forward to knowing what you think about the universe and your place in it. Comment below. 

  Art is always for sale through my website. https://www.eichingerfineart.com/workszoom/6655778/the-greatest-of-mysteries#/ 

Questions? Contact me at [email protected] 

_______________

  Resources: 

Website (2026) Creation Myths Indept.Timeless Myths. https://www.creationmyths.org/#myths

  Website (2026) Hindu Creation Story. Holy Cross College. Retrieved from https://college.holycross.edu/projects/himalayan_cultures/2006_plans/sswift/Hinducreationstory.htm

  Website. Creation story as told by Charlie Depoe in 1900. Center for the Study of the Pacific Northwest, University of Washington. Retrieved from https://www.washington.edu/uwired/outreach/cspn/Website/

  Website.  Spirits of the West Coast Gallery. Retrieved by https://spiritsofthewestcoast.com/en-au/blogs/news/the-many-stories-of-raven

  Website (2026)  Creation, cosmogaphy, and cosmology. Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/topic/Finno-Ugric-religion/Mythology#ref533361

  Website (2026) Can We Find Life? NASA Retrieved  from https://science.nasa.gov/exoplanets/can-we-find-life/?utm_source=chatgpt.com

  Website (2026) Big Bang. NASA. Retrieved from https://science.nasa.gov/mission/hubble/science/science-behind-the-discoveries/hubble-big-bang/?utm_source=chatgpt.com 

Website (2026) Early Universe. NASA. Retrieved from https://science.nasa.gov/mission/webb/early-universe/?utm_source=chatgpt.com 

The breakdown of the six periods comes directly from the Qur'an.

______________

Why would a God create such a beautiful planet that puts people on it who pollute and deplete its resources? It doesn't make sense. To  read about the impact of greed on the lives of ordinary people delve into the Rightfully Mine Series.  My books bring to life what happens when people don’t act honestly with compassion, creating a world of suspicion and crime. Is that how you want to live. Like my characters, you can do something about it. Would you like me to give a book talk to your group? Book topics cover water, air and ocean pollution, logging, youth homelessness, and science museums? 

To purchase books go to https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Books+by+Marilynne+Eichinger