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Literary notes about Cosmogony (AI summary)

The term "cosmogony" has been employed in literature as a multifaceted concept that encapsulates both the questioning of origins and the detailed narratives of cosmic creation. In some works—for example, Byron’s inquiry into the nature of existence—the word becomes a probing existential question, asking what it truly means to come-to-be [1]. At the same time, scholars of ancient literature and religious texts have used "cosmogony" to describe well‐defined, doctrinal systems of creation, such as the Sānkhya influence in Sanskrit literature [2] and even the mythological constructs found in the sacred texts of Japan [3, 4]. It appears as a pivotal element in philosophical and symbolic treatises alike, from the account of darkness and water in Chaldean tradition [5] to its role in elaborating mythic narratives in early Japanese Shinto texts [6] and even in the complex schemes of Parmenides and the Cabalists [7, 8]. Finally, literature shows how later traditions, like certain strands of Buddhism that influenced Gnostic thought, further expanded the concept into realms of fantastical cosmic architecture [9].
  1. which was and is, what is cosmogony?
    — from Don Juan by Baron George Gordon Byron Byron
  2. Nearly half the Purāṇas follow the cosmogony of the Sānkhya, and even those which are Vedāntic are largely influenced by its doctrines.
    — from A History of Sanskrit Literature by Arthur Anthony Macdonell
  3. Paying no attention to questions of cosmogony or theogony, the universe is accepted as an ultimate fact.
    — from The Religions of Japan, from the Dawn of History to the Era of Méiji by William Elliot Griffis
  4. 6.—The New Testament in Japanese. {61} CHAPTER III - "THE KOJIKI" AND ITS TEACHINGS "The Kojiki" mid its Myths of Cosmogony.
    — from The Religions of Japan, from the Dawn of History to the Era of Méiji by William Elliot Griffis
  5. The Chaldean cosmogony taught that in the beginning "all was darkness and water."
    — from The symbolism of Freemasonry : by Albert Gallatin Mackey
  6. Several of the opening paragraphs of this sacred book of Shint[=o] are phallic myths explaining cosmogony.
    — from The Religions of Japan, from the Dawn of History to the Era of Méiji by William Elliot Griffis
  7. Parmenides, his Cosmogony, 44 .
    — from Plutarch's Morals by Plutarch
  8. The Cabalists gave a prominent place to light in their system of cosmogony.
    — from The symbolism of Freemasonry : by Albert Gallatin Mackey
  9. Finally, the many heavens of the Gnostics are evidently derived from the fantastic cosmogony of later Buddhism.
    — from A History of Sanskrit Literature by Arthur Anthony Macdonell

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