For centuries, people have viewed the Bible as the ultimate source of divine truth. But what if I told you that most of its stories weren’t unique at all? What if the epic tales of creation, the great flood, virgin births, and saviors rising from the dead had all been told before—sometimes thousands of years earlier? The reality is that the Bible is a patchwork of older myths, edited and rebranded over time to fit a new religious agenda.

The Creation Story: A Recycled Narrative

One of the most well-known biblical accounts is the story of creation in Genesis. But long before the Hebrews wrote it down, the Sumerians and Babylonians had their own version. The Enuma Elish, a Babylonian creation myth dating back to at least the 18th century BCE, tells how the god Marduk defeated the primordial chaos monster, Tiamat, and created the heavens and the earth from her body. Sound familiar? The Genesis account also features a world born from chaos, shaped by a supreme deity. The major difference? The Babylonians got there first.

The Great Flood: Another Retelling

The biblical story of Noah’s Ark is eerily similar to the Epic of Gilgamesh, an ancient Mesopotamian poem written over a thousand years before the Hebrew Bible. In this story, a man named Utnapishtim is warned by a god of an impending flood meant to wipe out humanity. He is told to build a massive boat, bring animals on board, and, after the flood, release birds to see if the land is dry. The biblical version changes the names and adds a moral spin, but the core details remain identical. Coincidence? Highly unlikely.

Virgin Births and Dying-and-Rising Gods

Christianity is often praised for its idea of a savior who was born of a virgin, performed miracles, died, and resurrected. But this concept predates Jesus by centuries. The Egyptian god Horus was said to be born of a virgin mother, Isis, and was considered a divine savior. The Persian god Mithras was also born miraculously and had a large following in Rome before Christianity gained traction. Even Dionysus, the Greek god of wine and resurrection, had a myth where he died and was reborn. The theme of a suffering, dying, and resurrecting deity wasn’t new—it was just repackaged with Jesus.

Moses and the Abandoned Baby Trope

The story of baby Moses being set adrift in a basket and later growing up to become a great leader is another hand-me-down tale. The older legend of Sargon of Akkad (dating back to around 2300 BCE) tells of a baby placed in a basket and sent down a river, only to be rescued and raised to become a powerful ruler. This wasn’t an original story—it was an archetype reused for dramatic effect.

So What Does This Mean?

None of this is to say that the Bible holds no historical or cultural value. But it does mean that it isn’t the wholly unique, divinely inspired book that many believe it to be. It was written by people, for people, borrowing from earlier cultures and reshaping old stories to fit new religious narratives.

If you’ve ever been told that the Bible is the only source of truth, maybe it’s time to ask: Whose truth? And where did it really come from?

The deeper you dig, the more fascinating the connections become. I encourage you to explore ancient texts like the Enuma Elish, the Epic of Gilgamesh, and Egyptian and Greco-Roman mythology. The Bible didn’t emerge in a vacuum—it was part of a long history of human storytelling. And that, in itself, is worth learning more about.

What are your thoughts? Have you come across other striking similarities between the Bible and older myths? Let’s discuss!

Sources

Beck, R. (2006). The Religion of the Mithras Cult in the Roman Empire: Mysteries of the Unconquered Sun. Oxford University Press.

Burkert, W. (1985). Greek Religion. Harvard University Press.

Dalley, S. (2000). Myths from Mesopotamia: Creation, the Flood, Gilgamesh, and Others. Oxford University Press.

Foster, B. R. (2005). Akkadian Literature: Contexts and Sources. Eisenbrauns.

George, A. R. (2003). The Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic: Introduction, Critical Edition and Cuneiform Texts. Oxford University Press.

Pinch, G. (2002). Egyptian Myth: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press.