Oahspe Study
Stories of the Flood (the Deluge) Part 4 |
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Flood Stories from Around the World ~ Continuing from Part 3, flood stories as many as there are, repeatedly contain common themes that are confirmed in the light of Oahspe's revelations regarding the Great Flood or Deluge, which was the actual submergence of a great continent in the Pacific Ocean some 25,000 years ago.
As in the Flood story of Noah in the Ezra bible, other tales from diverse places elaborate on what people ate after the flood. The Ezra bible elaborates on permission for man to eat flesh after the flood without revealing that there were vegetarians following the flood. For Noah, who was supposed to be vegetarian supposedly sacrificed and ate animals after the flood (the animals saved on the arc, no doubt is the invention of meat-eaters who could not imagine a world without animals to eat). Yet in other flood stories, vegetable foods were stored in the boats or discovered following the flood. In various American Native stories, survivors brought or discovered corn, legumes and other vegetable foods. Yet in Mexican and Central and South American stories survivors cooked food such as fish. Why did survivors eat animals and fish while others relied on vegetable foods?
Some stories may be the result of storytellers embellishing stories, but common details such as a lack of cooking fire seems too co-incidental, and indeed this detail is also explained in the account in Oahspe. For accordingly, following the flood, there were changes in what humans ate and how they prepared their food after the flood. Once Pan was submerged, there was no cooked food eaten by any humans for a period, for the original survivors were I'hins who were herbivorous, and their food did not require cooking to be palatable. Then some hundreds of years later, a new race appeared, they were the offspring of the I'hin and native Druks (who also neither killed animals to eat nor cooked their food) who were the I'huans. The I'huans began to eat fish and flesh, learning from their familiar spirits how to cook their food to make it palatable.
The following story alludes to the first cooked food after the flood. Those who ate the food were transformed into carnivorous animals which also alludes to the carnivorous disposition of the I'huans:
|| Tarascan (northern Michoacan, Mexico): When the great flood came, God built a house. Everyone tried to crowd into it; those who failed were drowned. The house floated on the waters for twenty days, striking the sky three times. When the waters receded, some of the survivors were very hungry, and although God told them not to eat anything, they started to cook tortillas inside the house. God sent down an angel to tell them not to light any fire, but the smoke was already drifting into the sky. God sent the angel again with the same message, but the people said they were hungry and continued cooking. After the message was ignored a third time, God told the angel to give those people a good kick. They became dogs and buzzards and cleaned up the earth. ||
|| .....When the flood started going down, the man sent out a raven, but it stayed out to eat dead bodies. He next sent out a dove, which returned to tell what the raven was doing, and ravens have been cursed to eat carrion since. God ordered that no fires be kindled, but one man disobeyed and was turned into a dog. ||
|| Chiriguano (southeast Bolivia):.....The flood rose, covering the earth and killing the rest of the Chiriguanos, but the two babies survived and eventually landed on solid ground when the flood sank. There, they found fish to eat, but they had no way to cook it. Fortunately, before the flood, a frog had taken some hot coals in his mouth, and it kept them alight during the flood by blowing on them. He gave the fire to the children, and they were able to roast their fish. In time, they grew up, and the Chiriguanos are descended from them. ||
New kinds of food such as corn and beans were brought by the survivors:
|| Tarahumara (Northern Mexico): People were once fighting among themselves, and Father God (Tata Dios) sent much rain, drowning everyone. After the flood, God sent three men and three women to repopulate the earth. They planted three kinds of corn which still grow in the country. ||
|| When all the world was flooded, a little boy and girl climbed the mountain Lavachi ("Gourd") south of Panalachic. They came down when the flood subsided, bringing with them three grains of corn and three beans. The rocks were so soft that their feet sank into them, leaving footprints that can still be seen today. They planted the corn, slept and dreamed, and harvested. All Tarahumares are descended from them. ||
As well as food provisions there are also the remarkably similar theme as found on the Asian Pacific Rim --- work done by day, is undone by someone who tells the workers that a flood is coming and instead of cultivating, preparations for the flood should be made.
|| Huichol (western Mexico): A man clearing fields found the trees regrown overnight. On the fifth day of this, he found that the Grandmother Nakawe, goddess of the earth, did this, because she wanted to talk to him. She told him that he was working in vain because a flood was coming in five days. Per her instructions, he built a box from the fig tree and entered it with five grains of corn and beans of each color, fire with five squash stems to feed it, and a black bitch..... ||
|| Tepecano (southeast of Huichols): A man cleared trees every morning and found them regrown overnight. He spied and found an old man had been doing this. The old man told him not to work anymore because a flood was coming, and instead to build an ark and take on it pairs of all animals, corn, and water..... ||
And as with Eastern Asian flood myths. In America there are also references to development of languages:
|| Nahua (central Mexico): The deluge overwhelmed mankind. Only a man named Coxcox (some call him Teocipactli) and a woman named Xochiquetzal survived in a small bark. They landed on a mountain called Colhuacan and had many children. These children were all born dumb until a dove from a lofty tree gave them languages, but different languages so that they couldn't understand each other. ||
|| Tlaxcalan (central Mexico): Men who survived the deluge were turned into monkeys, but they slowly recovered speech and reason. ||
Just as there are references to pre-flood giants in Oahspe, they are in some flood stories of the Americas:
|| Zapotec (Oaxaca, southern Mexico): The earth was dark and cold. The only inhabitants were giants, and God was angry with them for their idolatry. Some giants, feeling that a flood was coming, carved underground houses for themselves out of great slabs of rock. Some thus escaped destruction and may still be found hidden in certain caverns. Other giants hid in the forests and became monkeys. ||
|| Pawnee (Nebraska): The first people on the earth were giants, very big and strong. They did not believe in the creator Ti-ra-wa. They thought nothing could overcome them. They grew increasingly worse. At last Ti-ra-wa grew angry and raised the water to the level of the land so that the ground became soft. The giants sank into the mud and drowned. Their bones can still be found today. Ti-ra-wa then created a man and woman, like people of today, and gave them corn. The Pawnees are descended from them. ||
||Totonac (eastern Mexico): A flood destroyed mankind. The children became flowers when they jumped up to where the star is..... ||
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All Oahspe references are from the modern language edition: Oahspe Standard Edition 2007
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Stories of the Flood Part 5