Mythology Explained

Below you'll find nine points in which the Hymn to Aten and Psalm 104 are said to parallel each other. 1 corresponds to 1, 2 to 2, 3 to 3, and so on and so forth. The website from which these were sourced is included at the very bottom.

Hymn to Aten:

1 - How many are your deeds ... You made the earth as you wished, you alone, All peoples, herds, and flocks.

2 - When you set in western lightland, Earth is in darkness as if in death

3 - Every lion comes from its den

4 - When you have dawned they live, When you set they die;

5 - You set every man in his place, You supply their needs; Everyone has his food.

6 - The entire land sets out to work

7 - The fish in the river dart before you, Your rays are in the midst of the sea.

8 - Birds fly from their nests, Their wings greeting your ka

9 - He makes waves on the mountain like the sea, To drench their fields and their towns.

Psalm 104:

1 - YHWH, how manifold are your works! In wisdom you have made them all; the earth is full of your creatures.

2 - You make darkness, and it is night, when all the animals of the forest come creeping out.

3 -The young lions roar for their prey .. when the sun rises, they withdraw, and lie down in their dens.

4 - When you hide your face, they are dismayed; when you take away their breath, they die

5 - These all look to you to give them their food in due season.

6 - People go out to their work and to their labor until the evening

7 - Yonder is the sea, great and wide, creeping things innumerable are there

8 - By the streams the birds of the air have their habitation; they sing among
the branches

9 - You make springs gush forth in the valleys; they flow between the hills ... The trees of YHWH are watered abundantly

https://projectaugustine.com/biblical-studies/ancient-near-east-studies/parallelism-between-the-hymn-to-aten-and-psalm-104/

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Hey everyone, welcome to Mythology Explained. In today's video, we're going to discuss the angelic hierarchy as reckoned by Pseudo-Dionysius, a 6th century Christian theologian who wrote several seminal treatises. His account of the angelic hierarchy has remained influential for hundreds of years, even into contemporary times. The hierarchy he developed comprises nine angelic choirs, nine stratifications organised based on their proximity to God's throne. These nine choirs are grouped into three triads, meaning three groups of three. The number three is significant because it reflects the holy trinity of father, son, and holy spirit. Choirs that are closer to earth are further away from God's throne and vice versa. For example, the archangel choir is ranked second lowest because of its nearness to earth.

From here, we're going to look at each choir, bottom to top, working from those most earthly to those most heavenly.

Let's get into it.

In the third triad we have angels, which are our first entry, followed by archangels and principalities.

The bottom of the celestial hierarchy, angels - ordinary angels, if there is such a thing - account for the ninth and final choir, meaning they are closest to earth and farthest away from God's throne. Indeed, more than anything else, the celestial hierarchy is a positional hierarchy; because of this, the upper echelons are mostly removed from earthly matters, and the lower echelons are dedicated to earthly matters, angels most of all.

Angels, like all the other choirs, are entities of pure spirit and exist to carry out God's will. Chief among their responsibilities are acting as the protectors of humanity and as the messengers that carry the word of God to the mortal plane. As the choir closest to humanity, guardian angels are selected from among them to watch over people, but also places, like churches, towns, and even countries. As the messengers of God, they may bring blessed tidings, such as the birth of Christ, or dark portents, such as the looming destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah; as agents of the divine, they may encourage people towards the light, helping them to endure pain in all its forms and resist the temptation of sin; and as the wielders of the unfathomable power bestowed on them by God, they may reveal the true potency within them, like when one angel single-handedly annihilated an Assyrian army, eradicating 185,000 soldiers.

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How a Greek God Became the Devil in Christianity

Hey everyone, welcome to Mythology Explained. In today's video we're going to discuss how the modern conceptualization of the Devil in Christianity was inspired, both in appellation and in appearance, by Greek Gods. First, we're going to look at how the Greek god Eospherous became the inspiration for one of the devil's most infamous epithets; second, we're going to cover how the Greek god Pan inspired the Devil's horned, cloven-hoofed appearance; and lastly, we're going to wrap up the video by diving into how the Devil became the incarnation of evil in the world.

Let's get into it.

Known as Aurora to the Romans, Eos was the goddess of the dawn. She was the daughter of the first-generation titans Hyperion, a solar deity, and Theia, whose sphere of influence included sight and blue sky, and thus was herself a second-generation titan. Helios, the sun, was her brother, and Selene, the moon, was her sister. Many mortals caught her eye, and she wasn't above abducting them, taking a page out of Zeus' book on several occasions. One was Orion, the giant, incredibly handsome master hunter who was set in the sky as a constellation after his death. Another, Tithonus, Greek mythology's version of Methuselah, the longest lived man in the bible, was cursed with the torturous combination of immortality without agelessness. Eos' first consort was Astraeus, the titan-god of stars, planets, and astrology, and together, they produced a multitude of children, including: the wind gods Notus, god of the South wind, Boreas, god of the North wind, and Zephyr, god of the West wind, and all of the stars of heaven.

One of these stars was Phosphorus, also called Heosphorus and Eosphorus. He was the personification of the morning star, which was the planet Venus as it sparkled in the sky before sunrise. The Latin name for Phosphorus was Lucifer, the name the morning star was known by to the Romans. And this, of course, begs the question: how did the Roman name for the morning star become one of the Devil's names, and not just any name, but one of the most popular throughout the Middle Ages?

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Hey everyone, welcome to Mythology Explained. In today's video, we're going to be discussing Loki.

Let's get into it.

As capricious as the wind, as dependable as a guttering flame, and ultimately, as devastating as an extinction-level meteorite impact, Loki, the wily trickster, is an enigmatic figure in Norse mythology. He's counted amongst the Aesir gods, but he'll fight for the giants come Ragnarok. Despite his antics regularly miring the gods in predicaments, his cunning and cleverness usually extricates them before too much damage is caused, even creating profit for the gods on many occasions. But this pattern ceases to continue in the mythic future. In the end, the darker part of Loki's nature eventually wins out, and the trouble he causes precipitates the death of the gods and the destruction of the world during Ragnarok, the great, ever-looming, all-consuming conflict.

In Norse mythology, what tribe someone belongs to is contingent on their paternal pedigree. This is to say that people took after the father when being categorized. Most of the Aesir gods, the gods who dwell in Asgard are half-giant, but despite their split heritage, are gods, not giants, because their fathers were gods. Similarly, those whose fathers were giants, even if their mothers were gods, are considered to be of giant-kind.

That kinship was reckoned through the paternal line is why it is thought that Loki was a giant, despite him living in Asgard and being counted amongst the Aesir gods. His father was a giant called Farbauti, and his mother, called either Laufey or Nal, was of ambiguous descent, being either a god or a giant.

Loki had two brothers, Byleist and Helblindi, though little is known of either of them, and he had five children. Two of them, Nari and Narfi, were human-like in appearance, and he sired them by his wife, Sigyn. The other three, Hel, who presided over the underworld, Jormungandr, the Midgard Serpent, and Fenrir, a monstrous wolf, he sired by the ogress Angrboda. We'll discuss these children in more detail later in the video as we unpack various aspects of Loki's story.

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Hey everyone, welcome to Mythology Explained. In today's video, we're going to discuss a question of apocalyptic proportions: what would happen if Atlas stopped holding up the sky? In the primordial past, the world existed in different configurations, so with these as precedents, we're given some good insight into what might happen if Atlas abandoned his post. Would the sky simply stay where it is, would it fall, flatten the earth, and eradicate life, would the gods be driven underground, would the gods die?

Let's get into it.

We're going to start this video off by diving into the primordial past, back to a time when the sky didn't even exist. First there was nothing, truly nothing, not even empty space, then Chaos, the great void, emerged, and then, now that there was space for other things to exist, the first-generation primordial deities emerged. There were five of them: Gaia, the earth, Tartarus, the great chasm beneath the earth, Eros, love, Erebus, darkness, and Nyx, night. Gaia independently produced three children, three second-generation primordial deities. These were Uranus, the sky, Pontus, the sea, and Ourea, mountains. She took Uranus, whom she created to envelop her and be a celestial abode for the gods, as her consort, and here is where our story really begins.

Together, Gaia and Uranus had many children. To them were born the 12 first-generation Titans, the trio of Uranian Cyclopes, who were godlike, but only had one eye, and the Hecatonchires, powerful hundred-armed behemoths with unparalleled size and strength. Uranus hated his children, so he kept them trapped deep within the earth. He was able to imprison them because there wasn't, at this time, a divide between the earth and the sky. Uranus was wrapped tightly around Gaia, smothering her in a constant embrace. Consequently, there wasn't any space between the earth and the sky, so though the Titans, Cyclopes, and Hecatonchires were grown, there wasn't space for them to emerge, keeping them imprisoned within Gaia.

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2:03 - Beginning of Cosmogony / Theogony
5:03 - End of Cosmogony / Theogony


Hey everyone, welcome to Mythology Explained. In today's video, we're going to discuss the one weapon that, had the Titans used it, would have vanquished the gods.

Let's get into it.

As we know, the titans were defeated by the gods, but this wasn't achieved through the power of the gods alone. The cyclopes crafted the gods' awesome weapons - the thunderbolt for Zeus, the helm of darkness for Hades, and a trident that could shake and sunder the earth for Poseidon. The gods were also reinforced by the Hecatonchires, towering hundred-armed behemoths with irresistible strength. The titans, on the other hand, while incredibly powerful in their own right - they, too, were gods after all - weren't bolstered in the same way. No colossal monsters, unassailable in strength and unsurpassed in size, bolstered their forces, no magnificent cyclops-forged weapons boosted the combative abilities of any of their number. But what if their situation had been different? What if there was a weapon that could have augmented their power, and would this have turned the tide of the war?

In this video, we're going to discuss the Ophiotaurus, a monster and a somewhat esoteric bit of Greek mythology. Spawned by Gaia, the front half was that of a bull and where the hindquarters should have been was the tail of a snake. The mere fact that it was alive posed an ever-present, existential threat to the Olympians. Supposedly, if its entrails were burned, the person or group that enacted this right became endowed with the power to defeat the gods, a great boon that the Titans were in dire need of, one that would have given them surety of victory.

Before we really dive into the Ophiotaurus, we're going to set the stage by giving an overview of the events that lead up to the Titanomachy, the cataclysmic 10-year war between the gods and the titans, in case anyone watching is unfamiliar with them. If this is a part of Greek mythology you already know or just don't want to hear again, feel free to use the time stamps in the description and skip ahead.

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Hey everyone, Welcome to Mythology Explained. In today's video, we're going to discuss five monsters in Norse mythology that killed gods and /or contributed to destroying the world. Anything humanoid, such as Surtr, the chief of the fire giants, won't be discussed in this video.

Let's get into it.

Starting off our list are Skoll and Hati.

Skoll and Hati are two wolves, and their story revolves around the sun and moon. In the deep past, there was a man named Mundilfari. He had two children, and he thought them so perfect that he named them Mani, "Moon", and Sol, "Sun". The giving of these names, high and mighty as they were, angered the gods, who punished Mundilfari for his hubris by setting his children in the sky amongst the very heavenly objects they were named after. Sol was made to drive the horses that pulled the chariot of the sun. Arvak and Alsvinn, the two celestial steeds drawing the chariot, would have perished in flames, but the gods took precautions and set bellows beneath their shoulders to keep them cool. Mani, henceforth, guided the moon in its arc across the sky and controlled its waxing and waning.

Here is where Skoll and Hati come in. The sun and moon journeyed so swiftly across the sky because they were in constant flight. Skoll was the wolf chasing the sun, and Hati the moon. Tirelessly they pursued their quarry, relentlessly hunting.

Their mother was an ogress that dwelt to the East of Midgard in a fell forest called the Jarnvid, the "Iron Wood". The frightening women that dwell within that dark forest were called the Jarnvidjur, "the Iron Wood Dwellers". It was said that from this ogress came many giant sons, all of them wolves.

When the cataclysm of Ragnarok breaks the world and ends the current age in the mythic future, the long hunt will finally come to an end. The sun and the moon will be caught, and without them, the sky will go dark.

Coming up next is the Nidhogg

A swarm of serpents lived amongst the roots of aYggdrasil, the World Tree. Indeed, so many serpents seethed in the deep places of the universe that it was said no tongue could count them. They constantly gnawed and clawed the tree's roots, maiming its subterranean sprawl, and in so doing, trying to destroy the tree itself - root, stem, and branch - which, if they succeeded, would have apocalyptic consequences. The greatest of these serpents was the Nidhogg. And as there were creatures that dwelt amongst the tree's roots, so were there creatures that dwelt amongst its branches.

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Hey everyone, Welcome to Mythology Explained. In today's video, we're going to discuss ten of the most powerful gods in Greek mythology, gods so powerful that their powers often dwarfed those of the other deities in the Greek mythos.

Just a quick comment before we get started: this list isn't ranked and is by no means comprehensive, so let us know in the comments who else you think deserved to be included. Also, this video will only feature male deities; we'll make a separate video for female deities later on. And lastly, the final five entries are the same as the ones in the top 5 version of this video, so if you've already watched the other one, the halfway point might be as far as you go.

Let's get into it.

Starting off our list is Hyperion.

Called "The One on High" and "He Who Walks above", Hyperion was one of the 12 first-generation titans born to the primordial deities Uranus, the personification of the sky, and to Gaia, the personification of the earth. His consort was Theia, called "Far-Shining", another of the 12 first-generation Titans, and together, they had three children" Selene (the "Moon"), Helios (the "Sun"), and Eos (the "Dawn").

Of Hyperion's three children, Eos most followed in her father's footsteps in that she produced many of the other manifestations of the material world, including: Boreas, the North wind, Notus, the South wind, Zephyr, the West wind, and all the stars in the sky, including Eosphorus, better known by his Latin name, Lucifer, the Morning Star.

Hyperion was a solar deity. Thus he was identified with his son, Helios, and later with Apollo. One thought is that Hyperion's original role was to oversee the cycle in which his children shined in the sky.

Like the other Titans that fought against the Olympians during the Titanomachy, Hyperion was cast into the depths of Tartarus, the cavernous abyss beneath the earth. The only exception to this was Atlas, who was saddled with a special punishment, condemned to bear the vault of the heavens upon his shoulders for eternity.

Coming in at number 2 is Hades.

The Lord of the Dead and the ruler of the Underworld, Hades and his five siblings, Hera, Hestia, Demeter, Poseidon, and Zeus, were born to Cronus and Rhea, two of the first-generation Titans. Like his brothers and sisters, Hades was swallowed by his father at birth. Cronus did this to forestall his usurpation at the hands of one of his children the same way he himself usurped his own father. Zeus, the youngest, of course wasn't swallowed. He was raised in secret and made a triumphant return when the bloom of manhood was upon him. Hades and his siblings were rescued when Zeus caused Cronus to disgorge them, so began the Titanomachy, the cataclysmic 10 year war that raged between the gods and the titans.

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Hey everyone, welcome to Mythology Explained. In today's video, we're going to discuss the five rivers of the underworld: Styx, Acheron, Lethe, Phlegethon, and Cocytus.

Let's get into it.

We're going to start off this video by taking a look at the Titans Oceanus and Tethys, as the vast majority of water deities are their progeny, so beginning with them will allow us to cover the parentage of the five rivers of the underworld in one fell swoop.

The children of Uranus, the personification of the sky, and of Gaia, the personification of the earth, both Oceanus and Tethys numbered among the 12 first-generation titans. Oceanus was the personification of the great river that encircled the world, and Tethys - her sphere of influence more ambiguous - was either the font of Oceanus' sweet waters or a sea goddess, one that personified its fecundity. Together, Oceanus and Tethys produced the Oceanids, a group of 3,000 water nymphs, the greatest of whom were Doris, Amphitrite, and Metis, and more germane to this video, they also produced all the rivers of the world, including the rivers of the underworld.

With that covered, we can start looking at each river in detail without having to delineate the same parental information five times.

Starting us off is the river Styx.

Compared to the other four rivers of the underworld, Styx is really in a league of her own, both in being the only female river deity and in the degree of prominence she has in Greek mythology; the others are quite obscure by comparison. Called Stygos Hydor ("Water of Horror") by Homer, Styx was the foremost river of the underworld. According to Hesiod, she was the oldest of the Oceanids, the female children born to the Titans Oceanus and Tethys. In the version presented by Hyginus, Styx was described as the daughter of Nyx, the personification of night, and of Erebus, the personification of darkness.

Styx was said to flow around the underworld, encircling it nine times. In some versions, it is Styx' waters over which the ferryman Charon ferries the dead across; though other versions have the river Acheron as the one Charon crosses.

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Hey everyone, welcome to Mythology Explained. In today's episode, we're going to take another dive into the Lord of the Rings universe, specifically, into the life of Melkor, whose name means "He Who Arises in Might", the incarnation of evil and nemesis of all that is green and good in the Tolkien Legendarium. The Balrogs served him, he created all the dragons of the world, he created or corrupted every other evil creature, either directly or indirectly, and he was more powerful than any of the other greater spirits that came to Ea, the world.

We're going to start things off with some general, introductory info, and then we're going to do an overview of his whole life.

Let's get into it

Long before the events that take place in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Sauron, the main antagonist of the series, wasn't his own master; rather, he was a servant of Melkor, the true Dark Lord. Melkor was, essentially, the incarnation of evil. In power he was second only to Eru, the One, the only god in the monotheistic structure that underpins the Lord of the Rings Mythos. Melkor was very similar to Lucifer, both as being part of an angelic race and as, driven by lust and hubris, falling from grace and plunging into shadow.

When he first came to earth, his appearance was colossal and elemental, as tall as a mountain, as fell as a black cloud storm laced with lightning, with ice, fire and shadow about him. Later, after his first imprisonment, he assumed a fair form, one that helped convey the pretense of reform he maintained to belie his true thoughts and intentions. And later, after much of his personal power was dispersed - infused into his wicked works, such as corrupting the land, building fortresses and breeding armies - his individual potency was diminished; in this state, he appeared as a giant man plated in black armor, a sable bulwark of shield on one arm, Grond, the Hammer of the Underworld, wielded in the other.

Though Melkor was not technically a god, once he descended to earth from the timeless halls, the power he possessed over life and land was certainly god-worthy when compared to the deities that populated the pagan pantheons of bygone polytheistic religions, like those of the ancient Egyptians and the ancient Greeks

The only way to tell Morgoth's long and wicked story is by winding the clocks back to a time that precedes creation itself. In the very beginning, there was only Eru, the One. In Elvish his name was Iluvatar. He was self-created and, for a time, was the only thing that existed in the void. Omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, in power and province, he was similar to the gods of monotheistic religions. His first creations were the Ainur, an angelic race. They were manifestations of his thought, and using the Flame Imperishable - itself an aspect of Eru - he imbued them with eternal life. The Ainur dwelt in the Timeless Halls, a place Eru created for them.

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