DivisionTheory puts a new face on humanity's Creation Myths, showing them to all be describing the origin of the division between soul and spirit, which DT calls the "Primordial Division".

In the Bible, this division is signified by the division of Eve from Adam's body. The early Christian gnostics taught of this at considerable length, blaming this division as the cause of all death.

Both the DivisionTheory books explore the Primordial Division. The following is an excerpt from the first book, The Division of Consciousness :

In the beginning, working backwards from Division Theory, there would have been only `Soul' and `Spirit', joined together in an eternal embrace. The Spirit would have had a purely objective perspective, the Soul, a purely subjective one; the Spirit would have been the decision- maker, but the Soul would have always been placing conditions and restrictions on those deci sions. The Soul's `water-like' feeling and the Spirit's `wind-like' thought would have thus been intertwined together like husband and wife, like male and female twins occupying a single egg. The two would have functioned as one, comprising a dynamic, self-sufficient whole complete unto itself.

But this original idyllic condition must have changed, according to Division Theory; there must have been some great `falling-out' between these two primordial parts, some catastrophic fracture of their perfect unity. The Spirit seems to have risen up against its partner, perceiving the Soul's programming as dictatorial, unnecessarily limiting its freedom of behavior and self-expres sion. By overpowering the Soul and forcing it down into submission, down into unconsciousness, the era of the Soul's overt control over the behavior and expression of the Spirit would have effectively ended.

Following such a primordial conquest, the Spirit, believing it had legitimately won the right to all power and authority, would have seen itself as a great conqueror, a champion of intel ligence, rational order, and vitality. However, the Soul, while defeated, would not have been out of the picture entirely; although condemned to a lower status, it would have nonetheless continued to exist and function in the unconscious depths of the psyche. Once there, though, it would have only been able to make itself felt and known as something dreadful and mysterious, a source of dreams and chaos, a murky, black abyss, an underworld haunt for the dead.

According to Division Theory, before such a change had taken place, before such a `Fall from Grace', there would have been no such thing as death in the human experience. But with the fracture between these two primordial parts, death of the individual would have also entered the picture.

Such a Primordial Division would have been a questionable trade; not only would humanity have ended up paying for the `Freedom From Conscience' it wanted so badly with the price of Death - it would also have had to given up both `Destiny' and `Justice' in the deal as well. Before the Fall, the as-yet uncompromised memory of the Primordial Soul would have made it easy to tell if Justice really did operate naturally and automatically, whether or not a person really did `reap what he sowed' in life (as the reincarnationists' theory of karma maintains today). For, in such an era, both `causes' and their `effects' would have remained ever-present in each person's conscious memory. But with the Fall, the Soul's memory would have been carved up and lost, and thus, not knowing the past, it would have become impossible to anticipate what might happen in the future, what `Destiny' would hold. And since those `effects', or long-term consequences of people's actions and choices, would no longer always be able to be traced back to their forgotten `causes', any natural workings of Justice that actually were taking place would have been rendered unrecognizable and unprovable, and would seem, in fact, to be altogether non-existent. While Justice before the Fall might have seemed obvious and inevitable, Justice after the Fall would have become a beautiful but seemingly impossible dream. A `Cause' could come in one lifetime, its `effect' in quite another, and without the memory of the Soul to connect the two, true and perfect Justice would seem, instead of a certainty, merely a vain hope.

This is the story of humanity's origins that Division Theory would seem to reconstruct. Outside of the scientifically unconfirmable possibility of direct divine revelation, there would seem to be no way to know if this story is true. However, the world does seem to hold a full measure of evidence in favor of this theory, in the form of creation myths that closely echo the very scenario described above.

In many of the ancient civilizations of the Near East, including Babylon, India, Egypt, Canaan, Sumer, and even Israel, the same archetypical creation myth appears, describing a primordial binary system, two parts existing as one at the very dawn of time: a negative, feminine, watery chaos-creature (a perfect symbol for the Primordial Soul), and a masculine god of wind and light (a perfect symbol for the Primordial Spirit). At first, these two coexist and interact peacefully, but at some point the wind god raises up against its partner, subduing the primordial watery chaos-creature and dividing it into pieces. In these legends, the feminine chaos-creature originally holds the power to restrain and control the masculine wind-god (just as the Primordial Soul would have held the power to restrain the Spirit in Division Theory), but loses this control when the wind-god rises against it. After the wind-god conquers the chaos-creature, he seems to be in possession of absolute power and authority (just as the Spirit would have felt itself to possess after successfully subduing the Soul and all its restrictive programming). And even after the chaos-creature has been vanquished, somehow it still continues to exist, posing a constant threat to the order of the universe (just as the Soul, although similarly overthrown and exiled in the unconscious, still makes its continued existence known through seemingly irrational urges and impulses which rise up from the depths of the human psyche). Further echoing Division Theory, elements of these myths even declare that death did not enter human experience until after the defeat of the feminine watery abyss, and that some all-important `Record of Destiny', which was originally a possession of the watery chaos, was lost during the conflict.

Babylon's Enuma Elish

This archetypical myth is perhaps best represented by the Enuma Elish, the Babylonian creation epic. In this version, nothing originally existed except a chaos in which male waters, `Apsu', mingled with female waters, `Tiamat'. From these two first parents, male gods were born. Tiamat, the great mother who ruled the universe, was envisioned as a fearsome monster. Feeling that Tiamat was a threat to their free self-expression, the male gods eventually rebelled against her, choosing the storm-god Marduk, the embodiment of youthful strength and creative intelli gence, to be their leader. Tiamat appointed her second husband, the god Kingu, to defend her in this battle, giving him the all-important `Record of Destinies' to guarantee his success, but to no avail. Tiamat was slain, Kingu was deprived of the Record of Destinies, and, splitting Tiamat's body in half, Marduk formed heaven and earth from its parts. Thus crowned the supreme god of heaven and earth, Marduk was given a new function - maintaining order in the universe. Still, the world was never secure; although Tiamat had been killed, somehow she continued to exist, posing a constant threat to the world order.

The Hindu Myth of Indra and Vritra

This story is also found in India's Rig Veda; in this version of the myth, the storm-god Indra overcomes the primordial chaos and brings the ordered world into existence. In the begin ning there were again the cosmic waters, being held in restraint by Vritra, who represented primordial chaos. Although thought of as a `cosmic mother', Vritra's very name means `restrainer', and she was thought of as a giant dragon living in eternal darkness, covering all the space between heaven and earth. In an effort to free up the cosmic waters, Indra, a young storm-god of limitless vitality and creative energy, agrees to fight Vritra, but only on the condition that if he succeeds, he would be granted all power and authority, becoming the leader of the gods.

Indra promises not to kill Vritra either by day or by night, neither with anything wet nor anything dry; but then Indra does kill Vritra, with foam, at the juncture of day and night. This curious detail fits Division Theory perfectly, suggesting that the actual primordial event represented by this legend must have taken place before opposites such as `day and night' and `wet and dry' had first been separated and distinguished from one another in human consciousness, i.e., before "God separated the light from the darkness", before the separation of the subjective perspective of the Soul from the objective perspective of the Spirit.

When Indra pierces Vritra, releasing the primordial waters from the chaos-monster's belly, Vritra asks him "now cut me in two" (this image of the primordial chaos being cut into two parts appears in most of these Near-Eastern myths). After this, Indra uses the pieces of Vritra's body to create the world, while confining the primordial chaos beneath the earth, which becomes the netherworld abode of demons and the dead. And again, although Vritra has been defeated, he still somehow remains as well, in the form of other demons who also represent chaos; whatever their names, they are all really Vritra, who must be battled over and over again to keep chaos at bay.

The Egyptian Myth of Seth and Apophis

A parallel legend is also found in Egyptian mythology, in the story of Seth and Apophis. Apophis, the embodiment of chaos, a demon of falseness and injustice, was envisioned as a monstrous serpent living in an eternally dark abyss, the primordial chaos of the netherworld. Seeking to overturn the order and stability of the world, Apophis tries to restrain the sun-god by drinking up the water on which his boat sailed. But again a young and powerful storm-god opposes him. Now named Seth, the storm-god stabs the chaos-monster and cuts him into pieces, allowing the cosmic waters to flow so the sun-god could continue.

The Canaanite Myth of Baal and Yamm

This archetypical myth finds what is believed to be its earliest fully intact version in Canaanite mythology. In the beginning, the people of Canaan taught, there was a rivalry between two great primordial deities, `Yamm' and `Baal'. Yamm, known also as `Prince Sea', was "identi fied with or accompanied by two fearsome sea monsters, Litan (the Biblical Leviathan) and Tunnan (the Biblical Tannin)". This sea-god Yamm was itself thought to be a sea-monster, being variously referred to as `the dragon', `the twisting serpent', and `the seven-headed monster'. Since this Canaanite sea-god may be an ancient symbol for the Primordial Soul, which would have func tioned as a controlling `judge' over its partner the Spirit, it is worth noting that the other name commonly used for Yamm was `Judge River'. And Baal, in the role of the young storm-god, was variously called `Lord of the Storm', `Rider of the Clouds', and `Conqueror'. Again, at first this sea-god Yamm was master over Baal, holding power and control over him. But Baal ultimately overthrew Yamm:

The Lost Sumerian Myth of Kur and Enlil

In the recently rediscovered mythology of ancient Sumer, one of the oldest civilizations to leave written literature (and the supposed birthplace of Judaism's patriarch Abraham), yet another parallel to this archetypical creation myth has been found. Thought to predate the Egyp tian, Hebrew, and Hindu versions by more than a full millennium, and even the Canaanite version by at least half that time, the Sumerian version may be the original, from which all the others were adapted.

In the beginning, as Sumer's mythology relates, there was originally only the goddess Nammu, the primeval Sea, eternal and uncreated. This Sea brought forth a cosmic mountain, known as Kur, which was itself a binary system, composed of heaven and earth united. Kur, although a mountain, was somehow also recognized as being both the "Great Below" and the Sumerian netherworld, and was even identified with a great dragon thought to live at the bottom of the "Great Below" where it came into contact with the primordial waters and restrained them. This same Kur, Kur the mountain, Kur the Great Below, Kur the dragon, Kur the union of heaven and earth, was split in two by a storm-god named Enlil (`Lord Wind'), thus forever separating the male heaven-god from the female earth-goddess (in some versions of the myth, however, it is Enlil's son Ninurta, god of the Thunder-storm, who conquers Kur). This storm-god Enlil, curiously enough, also had a strong association or identification with a mountain, and is referred to, in certain myths, as `cohabiting' with a mountain, and even as himself being a mountain (this of course further strengthens the connection between this myth and Division Theory's concept of the Spirit originally `cohabiting' with the Soul). After dividing the female earth from the male heaven, Enlil, like all the other storm-gods who followed him, then became supreme in the Sumerian universe; being honored as `Lord of Heaven', and `Prince of the Earth', he was given authority to plan and order the affairs of the entire world, and even organize the universe itself.

It is particularly interesting, in light of Division Theory, that in the Ninurta version of the myth, after Kur is vanquished, Ninurta builds up a great Wall over the body of the dead Kur, to hold back the "mighty waters" which threaten to destroy the land (just as Division Theory suggests that the Spirit's suppression of the Soul also formed a Wall that held back the Soul's flow of input to the Spirit).

There is yet another mythical reference to Enlil which also parallels Division Theory. Enlil, the myths report, once overpowered the female goddess Ninlil, forcing himself sexually upon her, and for this crime he was condemned to death and sent into the netherworld. This, of course, calls to mind Division Theory's image of the primordial male Spirit forcing his dominance over the primordial female Soul, after which death first entered human experience.

Israel's Myth of Yahweh and the Sea

Such an archetypical vision of a `wind-god' defeating a `sea-monster', it seems, also held an honored position in early Hebrew lore; some ancient legend of a storm-god defeating a watery primordial chaos, even though it is never addressed at any length, is hinted at repeatedly in the Jewish scriptures. Enough fragments of this tale remain scattered throughout the Old Testament to recognize it as the same myth that was obviously so well-known throughout the rest of the ancient Near-East.

The Jewish Torah starts, in fact, with the very same creation-myth scenario found throughout the rest of the Near-East: a masculine storm-god interacting with a negative, feminine embodiment of chaos:

While the fuller storyline of the common myth is conspicuous by its absence from the Hebrew texts, an early tradition of Yahweh battling and overcoming a sea-chaos monster is discernable in various passages of the Old Testament, such as Psalms 74:13-14, 89:9, and Isaiah 51:9-10, as well as in the following: