Editing Creation myth (section)

===''Ex nihilo''===
{{Main|Creatio ex nihilo}}
[[File:Hieronymus Bosch - The Garden of Earthly Delights - The exterior (shutters).jpg|thumb|upright|''Creation'' on the exterior shutters of [[Hieronymus Bosch]]'s [[triptych]] ''[[The Garden of Earthly Delights]]'' (c. 1490–1510)]]

The myth that [[God]] [[creatio ex nihilo|created the world out of nothing]] – ''ex nihilo'' – is central today to Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, and the medieval Jewish philosopher [[Maimonides]] felt it was the only concept that the three religions shared.{{sfn|Soskice|2010|p=24}} Nonetheless, the concept is not found in the entire Hebrew Bible.{{sfn|Nebe|2002|p=119}} The authors of Genesis 1 were concerned not with the origins of matter (the material which God formed into the habitable cosmos), but with assigning roles so that the cosmos should function.{{sfn|Walton|2006|p=183}} In the early 2nd century CE, early Christian scholars were beginning to see a tension between the idea of world-formation and the omnipotence of God, and by the beginning of the 3rd century creation ''ex nihilo'' had become a fundamental tenet of Christian theology.{{sfn|May|2004|p=[https://books.google.com/books?id=eu4RBwAAQBAJ&q=%22tension+between+the+idea+of+world-formation%22&pg=PA179 179]}}

''Ex nihilo'' creation is found in creation stories from [[ancient Egypt]], the [[Rig Veda]], and many [[animism|animistic]] cultures in Africa, Asia, Oceania, and North America.<ref>{{harvnb|Leeming|2010|pages=1–3, 153}}</ref> In most of these stories, the world is brought into being by the speech, dream, breath, or pure thought of a creator but creation ex nihilo may also take place through a creator's bodily secretions.

The literal translation of the phrase ''ex nihilo'' is "from nothing" but in many creation myths the line is blurred whether the creative act would be better classified as a creation ''ex nihilo'' or creation from chaos. In ''ex nihilo'' creation myths, the potential and the substance of creation springs from within the creator. Such a creator may or may not be existing in physical surroundings such as darkness or water, but does not create the world from them, whereas in creation from chaos the substance used for creation is pre-existing within the unformed void.<ref>{{harvnb|Leeming|Leeming|1994|pages=60–61}}</ref>