Note 170-1 — Chapter V · THE MYTH AND THE MYTHICAL CYCLES.

Many interesting references to the Oriental flood-myth may be found in Cory’s Ancient Fragments. See also, Dr. Fr. Windischmann, Die Ursagen der Arischen Völker, pp. 4-10. It is probable that in very ancient Semitic tradition Adam was represented as the survivor of a flood anterior to that of Noah. Maimonides relates that the Sabians believed the world to be eternal, and called Adam “the Prophet of the Moon,” which symbolized, as we know from other sources, the deity of water. Rabbi Moses Ben Maimon, More Nevochim, cap. iv. In early Christian symbolism Christ was called “the true Noah”; the dove accompanied him also, and as through Noah came “salvation by wood and water,” so through Christ came “salvation by spirit and water.” (See St. Cyril of Jerusalem’s Catechetical Lectures, Lect. xvii., cap. 10). The fish (ιχθυς) was the symbol of Christ as well as of Oannes. As the second coming of Christ was to be the destruction of the world, how plainly appear the germs of the myth of the Epochs of Nature in the Judæo-Christian mind!