East European Studies

Narratives passed on by early civilizations reflect much of their own lives and culture. Narratives were documented through word of mouth, drawings, and text. Stories were shared and were devised for entertainment purposes (Dalley, 1989).
    The account of great flood of the early times was given light through different languages, with different characters, and, somehow, the same perspective. The story of the great flood permeates several cultures. It is said that the Bibles version of the story is the most well-known. Other version of it are that of the Sumerian (Eridu Genesis), Babylonian (Epic of Atrahasis, Epic of Gilgame, and Epic of Berissus), Greek (Stories by Ovid, Hyginus, and Apollodorus), and Mayan (Popol Vuh version). Several other cultures around the world have their own version of the great flood. Similar stories have been passed down from generations to generations and across cultures. Flood stories emerge from the Southeast Asia to the Pacific, from Southwest Europe extending to North, Central, and South America (Dundes, 1988). Is there a significant connection between these regions And what are these if there are any Is the biblical, the well-known version, just a modification of the earlier versions
    Scholars have long been studying stories of the great flood and tales of the same sort looking for parallelism and disparities in them. Of the significant similarities in them is the existence of a powerful being who found distastefulness in his land. As an act of retaliation, he set forth flood (or a phenomenon similar to it) that destroyed majority of the race and leaving only a selected few alive. This similarity may present similar beliefs in the mentioned regions. The early people may have believed in a powerful being that brings forth retribution to mankind because of disagreeable behavior they may have done. There also might have been a major flood that occurred thousands of years ago that its story has been passed on and versions of it have been generated. Another similarity between the stories is the creation of a boatark (Deem, 2009). It can be drawn from this that the regions mentioned were near bodies of water and that people in it were familiar with navigation in water. The Hebrews were believed to have inhabited the land near the Euphrates River. This can possibly be a basis for the Hebrew account demonstrating a more accurate design of the vessel. Moreover, it appears that the Hebrew culture revolved around their belief and worship to their God.
    If, indeed, the Hebrew version was just a copy of the earlier account, some deviations made were needless. Unlike other versions of the great flood, the Bibles version was far from being a myth. The powerful beings described by other versions exhibited behaviors same as that of man. The Bibles version, on the other hand, presented a just God who have seen how mankind have become despite of the His grace and kindness to them.
    Investigations on biblical phenomena are still in progress. Bibles reliability as a historical document cannot simply be taken for granted. It contains accounts from different people who came from different eras and their writings are like puzzle pieces from the past that fits together. And these puzzle pieces gives the present generation a picture of what was thousands of years before.