In Genesis, however, we have an entirely different account, based, apparently, upon a widely different conception of the origin of the Universe, for one principle only appears throughout the whole narrative, be it Elohistic, Jehovistic, or priestly. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth,” and from the first verse to the last it is He, and He alone, who is Creator and Maker and Ruler of the Universe. The only passage containing any indication that more than one person took part in the creation of the world and all that therein is, is in verse 26, where God is referred to as saying, “Let US make man,” but that this is simply the plural of majesty, and nothing more, seems to be proved by the very next verse, where the wording is, “and God made man in HIS own image,” etc. There is, therefore, no trace of polytheistic influence in the whole narrative. Let us glance awhile at the other differences. To begin with, the whole Babylonian narrative is not only based upon an entirely different theory of the beginning of all things, but upon an entirely different conception of what took place ere man appeared upon the earth. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth,” implies the conception of a time when the heavens and the earth existed not. Not so, seemingly, with the Babylonian account. There the heavens and the earth are represented as existing, though in a chaotic form, from the first. Moreover, it is not the external will and influence of the Almighty that originates and produces the forms of the first creatures inhabiting the world, but the productive power residing in the watery waste and the deep: “The primæval ocean (_apsû rêstū_) was their producer (lit. seeder); Mummu Tiamtu was _she who brought forth_ the whole of them.” It is question here of “seeding” (_zaru_) and “bearing” (_âlādu_), not of creating. The legend is too defective to enable us to find out anything as to the Babylonian idea concerning the formation of the dry land. Testimony as to its non-existence at the earliest period is all that is vouchsafed to us. At that time none of the gods had come forth, seemingly because (if the restoration be correct) “the fates had not been determined.” There is no clue, however, as to who was then the determiner of the fates. Then, gradually, and in the course of long-extended ages, the gods Laḫmu and Laḫamu, Anšar and Kišar, with the others, came into existence, as already related, after which the record, which is mutilated, goes on to speak of Tiamtu, Apsū, and Mummu.