For thousands of years, six gods and goddesses, all brothers and sisters, lived alone, wandering about the ether. They had neither homes nor realms. They just roamed aimlessly in search of something, a purpose. These immortals lived apart and rarely met up. But when it was unavoidable, they would fight for centuries, until exhaustion. Upon seeing that they could not defeat each other, they would give up and return to the ether.

On one occasion, all six gathered together at the same time. Their eyes met, but they did not fight. They realized that their real strength would come from uniting their powers. Together, they decided to create a world in which each one would dominate a part.

Earth, the first and largest of them all, raised his arms and created a gigantic sphere above his hands. Its contours were perfect. He demonstrated his skill in giving form to matter. The sphere possessed its creator’s virtues: strength and beauty.

The second, Air, was not pleased with the creation’s impeccable form. To be an authentic world, he felt it needed some flaws. For years, this god forcefully blew gusts of wind that sculpted the sphere, forming valleys, hills, mountains and caves, thus transforming its terrain. Air conveyed his audacity and persistence to the world. Those changes left Earth furious, but the giant accepted his brother’s work.

Water then decided to wash away all the dust Air had left behind on the sphere. She moved to the top of the world, carefully observed every detail and opened her immense mouth, disgorging oceans onto the round sculpture. Little by little, liquid filled every depression in the immense rock, giving way to rivers, lakes and seas. Water’s patience and serenity were apparent while she contributed to the creation. Nevertheless, the goddess was disappointed when she saw all the liquid turn to ice because of the sphere’s low temperature. Displeased, she asked Fire for help.

With his fiery hands, Fire felt all the cold emanating from it. The god shrank away, afraid the frigid atmosphere would harm him. But, with courage and drive, he plunged his fist into the ice, melting everything he touched. He endured the pain and pressed on until his finger touched the center of the world, where rock turned to magma. The heat, radiating through the earth’s layers, melted most of the ice. The goddess, his sister, thanked him and they both stepped away, giving Light room to work.

From the beginning, this god seemed troubled. The world was in the midst of a dark, desolate vacuum. Using his knowledge and creativity, Light placed a huge luminous orb he called the sun on one side of the globe, giving life to that part of the world. The rest, however, was left in darkness. He created more sources of light to solve the problem; nevertheless, with his strength taxed by his first endeavor, Light could only create smaller sources, which he tossed into the surrounding vastness. Although unable to light the entire sphere, he had created trillions of stars, filling the emptiness with much more beauty. Drained, Light yielded his place to Darkness.

This goddess, in turn, thought about which virtues she could give this new world. With her clear-sightedness, she realized that something was missing from this creation, something none of her brothers or sisters had thought of. Her ambition dictated that she benefit from this. With one hand, she held the rock from underneath and, in a gentle movement, spun it with the other. The world began to turn and the large orb of light, given by her brother, now lit the entire globe one side at a time. The gods and goddesses appreciated this idea but concluded that their youngest sister’s effort was not as great as theirs had been. Seeing her fellow god’s and goddesses’ dissatisfaction, Darkness asked that they look more closely at their creation. She showed them that, by spinning the globe, she had created Equilibrium, a force capable of controlling all the energy and elements they had placed there. From that moment on, the sphere would have the same proportion of light and dark, of cold and warmth, of happiness and sadness, of good and evil… Without her siblings noticing it, she had placed a little bit of darkness in every small corner of the world.

The Creation of the World

A textbook in Acigam