Creation of Humans from Clay

The ram-headed god Khnum, also known as "The Guardian of the Cataract" or "The Great Potter", was one of the earliest Egyptian deities and was said to have created mankind from clay.

This article analyzes the apologetic claim that the Qur'an displays scientific foreknowledge by correctly asserting the creation of human beings from clay.

Apologetic Claim

Harun Yahya has used the recent scientific hypothesis of clay particles as catalysts for abiogenesis as evidence of the veracity of the Qur'an.

In the Qur'an, Allah reveals that the creation of the human is a miracle. The first human being was created by Allah shaping clay into human form and breathing a soul into it:

Your Lord said to the angels, "I am going to create a human being out of clay. When I have formed him and breathed My Spirit into him, fall down in prostration to him!" (Qur'an, 38:71-72)

Then inquire of them: Is it they who are stronger in structure or other things We have created? We created them from sticky clay. (Qur'an, 37:11)

When the human body is examined today, it may be discovered that many elements present on the earth are also to be found in the body. Living tissues contain 95% carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorus and sulphur, with a total of 26 different elements. In another verse of the Qur'an we are told:

We created man from an extract of clay. (Qur'an, 23:12)

The Arabic word "sulala," translated as "extract" in the verse, means "representative example, essence." As we have seen, the information revealed in the Qur'an 1,400 years ago confirms what modern science tells us-the fact that the same elements are employed in human creation as those found in the soil

Creation from Clay
Harun Yahya, The Scientific Miracles of the Qur'an

Analysis

The Scientific Hypothesis

Two of the crucial components for the origin of life - genetic material and cell membranes - could have been introduced to one another by a lump of clay, new experiments have shown.

The study of montmorillonite clay, by Martin Hanczyc, Shelly Fujikawa and Jack Szostak at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, revealed it can sharply accelerate the formation of membranous fluid-filled sacs.

These vesicles also grow and undergo a simple form of division, giving them the properties of primitive cells. Previous work has shown that the same simple mineral can help assemble the genetic material RNA from simpler chemicals. "Interestingly, the clay also gets internalised in the vesicles," says Leslie Orgel, an origin of life expert at the Salk Institute for Biological Sciences in San Diego, California. "So this work is quite nice in that it finds a connection between the mechanism that creates RNA and encloses it in a membrane."

Inherit, mutate, evolve

The genesis of genetic material and the emergence of cell structure are hot areas of research, but until now the two had not connected. The birth of genetic material was clearly crucial for life to take on its unique abilities to inherit, mutate and evolve.

And membranes were key to the physiology of cells because they protect their contents, concentrate chemicals to promote reactions and isolate successful genes from unsuccessful ones. "It's clear you really need both these elements to get evolution off the ground and running," says Szostak.

Research has already shown that some of building blocks for RNA-like molecules and membranes are spontaneously created by chemical reactions in outer space and in conditions that may have existed on the primordial Earth. But how these subunits were then assembled is still debated.

For RNA, one popular theory revolves around the unusual properties of montmorillonite clay. The negatively charged layers of its crystals create a sandwich of positive charge between them. This turns out to be a highly attractive environment for RNA subunits to concentrate and join together into long chains.

100-fold acceleration

Szostak wondered whether montmorillonite could also help the assembly of vesicles from simple fatty acid precursors. He remembers the day his colleagues Hanczyc and Fujikawa ran into his office to show him their first results: the clay caused a 100-fold acceleration of vesicle formation.

"It was pretty amazing," he says. Once formed, the vesicles often incorporated bit of clay and were able to grow by absorbing more fatty acid subunits.

His team also showed the clay could hold RNA and form vesicles at the same time. Fluorescently-labelled RNA attached to the clay ended up assembled into vesicles after the reaction. And the researchers were able to get these "protocells" to divide by forcing them through small holes. This caused them to split into smaller vesicles, with minimal loss of their contents.

Szostak admits that in a natural setting the vesicles would rarely be forced to divide in this way. So now his group is searching for different mixtures of membrane-forming molecules that might divide spontaneously when they reach a certain size.

Journal reference: Science (vol 302, p 618 )

Clay's matchmaking could have sparked life
Philip Cohen, NewScientist, October 23, 2003

The scientific hypothesis postulates that the clay merely 'match-makes' RNA and membrane vesicles - and therefore does not form a building block. This is contrary to the Islamic faith which postulates that human beings were created from clay, implying clay was a building block.

Notwithstanding this key distinction, is Islam the only religion which postulated the creation of human beings from clay?

Humans from Clay Story in Other Religions

Many religions pre-dating (and some post-dating) Islam also carry this 'creation of human beings from clay' story. The earliest are the pre-cursors of the Abrahamic faiths - namely the early Mesopotamian religions.

Assyro-Babylonian

Aruru (Ninmah, Nintu, Ninhursaga, Belet-ili, Mami) -She is the mother goddess and was responsible for the creation of man with the help of Enlil or Enki. She is also called the womb goddess, and midwife of the gods. On Ea's advice, she acted on his direction and mixed clay with the blood of the god Geshtu-e, in order to shape and birth seven men and seven women. These people would bear the workload of the Igigi. She also added to the creation of Gilgamesh, and, at Anu's command, made Enkidu in Anu's image by pinching off a piece of clay, throwing it into the wilderness, and birthing him there. Ea called her to offer her beloved Ninurta as the one who should hunt Anzu. She does so.

Canaan-Ugaritic

(Gibson p. 68) men are considered made of 'clay'.

Sumerian

According to Samuel Noah Kramer (Tablets of Sumer, Colorado,1956) Nammu and Ninmah, assisted by deities who are the 'good and princely fashioners', mixed clay which was 'over the abyss' and brought man into existence.

Gods were having difficulty in finding food, and their problems have increased when the later born goddesses joined them. Enki the water god - he was the god of wisdom and in a position to help them - was fast asleep in the sea and did not hear their complaints. Enki's mother Mother of all Gods Nammu brought the tears of the complainants to Enki and told him in their presence: "O! my son, get off your bed... do what is wise. Give shape to (make some) servants to gods. Let them make their own copies.(?)" Enki thinks, decides to head the 'union of good and bright modelists' and says to Nammu: 'O! mother, the creature you have mentioned exists: Put the image of gods(?) on him. Shape his heart from the clay on the surface of the Bottomless Deep. Good and bright modelists will thicken this clay. You make its organs; Ninmah (Goddess of Earth) will work in front of you. While you are making a model…goddesses of birth will be with you. O! mother decide on the faith of the newborn, let Ninmah put the image of gods on it: This is the human."

"Enki and Ninmah"

She is the mother goddess and, as Ninmah, assists in the creation of man. Enki, having been propted by Nammu to create servants for the gods, describes how Nammu and Ninmah will help fashion man from clay. Prior to getting to work, she and Enki drink overmuch at a feast. She then shapes six flawed versions of man from the heart of the clay over the Abzu, with Enki declaring their fates. Enki, in turn also creates a flawed man which is unable to eat. Ninmah appears to curse him for the failed effort. (Kramer 1963 pp. 149-151; Kramer 1961 pp. 69-72)

Other faiths that postulate the 'creation of human beings from clay' stories include the ancient Egyptians, some African tribes and the Incas.

Ancient Egyptian

Khnum, the ram-headed god of Elephantine, the potter, fashioned men on his wheel, making use of the clay in his locality as his basic material.

African

The Shilluk, who live along the Nile in the Sudan, say that Juok (God) created men out of clay. He traveled north and found some white clay, out of which he fashioned Europeans. The Arabs were made of reddish-brown clay and the Africans from black earth.

The Pangwe of Cameroun say that God first created a lizard out of clay which he placed in a pool to soak. He left it there for seven days, and then called ‘Man, come out’, and a man emerged instead of a lizard.

Inca

… the God Viracocha created the earth and the sky and peopled the earth with men. There was no sun and the people walked in darkness. But they disobeyed their Creator and he chose to destroy them, turning some into stone and drowning the rest in a flood which rose above the highest mountains in the world. The only survivors were a man and a woman who remained in a box and who, when the water subsided were carried by the wind to Tihuanaco, the chief abode of the Creator. There he raised up all the people and nations, making figures of clay and painting the clothes each nation was to wear. To each nation he gave a language, songs and the seeds they were to sow. Then he breathed life and soul into the clay and ordered each nation to pass under the earth and emerge in the place he directed.

Ancient Greeks

Prometheus shaped man out of mud, and Athena breathed life into his clay figure.

South Californian Amerindians

Chinigchinich then formed man, both male and female, out of white clay found upon the borders of a lake.

The ‘creation of humans from clay’ stories are common throughout the world, including places like Australia and the Pacific Islands which were not in contact with Islam or any of the other Abrahamic faiths until recent times.

Asia

Thus the Karens of Burma say that God "created man, and of what did he form him? He created man at first from the earth, and finished the work of creation. He created woman, and of what did he form her? He took a rib from the man and created the woman."

The aborigines of Minahassa, in the north of Celebes, say that two beings called Wailan Wangko and Wangi (created humans from earth). Said Wailan Wangko to Wangi, "Return and take earth and make two images, a man and a woman."

The Dyaks of Sakarran in British Borneo say that the first man was made by two large birds. At first they tried to make men out of trees, but in vain. Then they hewed them out of rocks, but the figures could not speak. Then they moulded a man out of damp earth and infused into his veins the red gum of the kumpang-tree. After that they called to him and he answered ; they cut him and blood flowed from his wounds, so they gave him the name of Tannah Kumpok or "moulded earth.

The supreme god of the Island of Nias, Luo Zaho, took a handful of earth as large as an egg, and fashioned out of it a figure like one of those figures of ancestors which the people of Nias construct. Having made it, he put it in the scales and weighed it; he weighed also the wind, and having weighed it, he put it on the lips of the figure which he had made ; so the figure spoke like a man or like a child, and God gave him the name of Sihai.

The Bila-an, a wild tribe of Mindanao, one of the Philippine Islands, relate the creation of man … (by) a certain being named Melu. He fashioned them accordingly in his own likeness out of the leavings of the scurf whereof he had moulded the earth, and these two were the first human beings.

The Bagobos, a pagan tribe of South-Eastern Mindanao, say that in the beginning a certain Diwata made the sea and the land, and planted trees of many sorts. Then he took two lumps of earth, shaped them like human figures, and spat on them; so they became man and woman.

The Kumis, who inhabit portions of Arakan and the Chittagong hill tracts in eastern India, told Captain Lewin the following story of the creation of man. God made the world and the trees and the creeping things first, and after that he made one man and one woman, forming their bodies of clay.

According to the Korkus, an aboriginal tribe of the Central Provinces of India: Thereupon the god (Mahadeo aka Shiva) repaired to the spot, and taking a handful of the red earth he fashioned out of it two images, in the likeness of a man and a woman.

A like tale is told, with a curious variation, by the Mundas, a primitive aboriginal tribe of Chota Nagpur. They say that the Sun-god, by name Singbonga, first fashioned two clay figures, one meant to represent a man and the other a woman.

(According to) the Santals of Bengal… Some say ' she (Malin Budhi) made them (humans) of a kind of froth which proceeded from a supernatural being who dwelt at the bottom of the sea, but others say she made them of a stiff clay.

Australia

Thus the Australian blacks in the neighborhood of Melbourne said that Pund-jel, the Creator, cut three large sheets of bark with his big knife. On one of these he placed some clay and worked it up with his knife into a proper consistence. He then laid a portion of the clay on one of the other pieces of bark and shaped it into a human form ; first he made the feet, then the legs, then the trunk, the arms, and the head. Thus he made a clay man on each of the two pieces of bark; and being well pleased with his handiwork, he danced round them for joy. Next he took stringy bark from the eucalyptus tree, made hair of it, and stuck it on the heads of his clay men. Then he looked at them again, was pleased with his work, and again danced round them for joy. He then lay down on them, blew his breath hard into their mouths, their noses, and their navels ; and presently they stirred, spoke, and rose up as full-grown men.

Pacific Islands

The Maoris of New Zealand say that a certain god, variously named Tu, Tiki, and Tane, took red riverside clay, kneaded it with his own blood into a likeness or image of himself, with eyes, legs, arms, and all complete, in fact, an exact copy of the deity ; and having perfected the model, he animated it by breathing into its mouth and nostrils, whereupon the clay effigy at once came to life and sneezed. "Of all these things," said a Maori, in relating the story of man's creation, "the most important is the fact that the clay sneezed, forasmuch as that sign of the power of the gods remains with us even to this day in order that we may be reminded of the great work Tu accomplished on the altar of the Kauhanga-nui, and hence it is that when men sneeze the words of Tu are repeated by those who are present"; for they say, "Sneeze, O spirit of life." 1 So like himself was the man whom the Maori Creator Tiki fashioned that he called him Tiki-ahua, that is, Tiki's likeness.

A very generally received tradition in Tahiti was that the first human pair was made by Taaroa, the chief god. They say that after he had formed the world he created man out of red earth, which was also the food of mankind until bread-fruit was produced. Further, some say that one day Taaroa called for the man by name, and when he came he made him fall asleep. As he slept, the Creator took out one of his bones (ivi) and made of it a woman, whom he gave to the man to be his wife, and the pair became the progenitors of mankind.

In Nui, or Netherland Island, one of the Ellice Islands, they say that the god Aulialia made models of a man and a woman out of earth, and when he raised them up they came to life. He called the man Tepapa and the woman Tetata. The Pelew Islanders relate that a brother and sister made men out of clay kneaded with the blood of various animals, and that the characters of these first men and of their descendants were determined by the characters of the animals whose blood had been mingled with the primordial clay.

According to a Melanesian legend, told in Mota, one of the Banks' Islands, the hero Qat moulded men of clay, the red clay from the marshy riverside at Vanua Lava.

The inhabitants of Noo-hoo-roa, in the Kei Islands, say that their ancestors were fashioned out of clay by the supreme god, Dooadlera, who breathed life into the clay figures.

The Marindineeze, a tribe who occupy the dreary, monotonous treeless flats on the southern coast of Dutch New Guinea, not far from the border of the British territory: They say that one day a crane or stork (dik) was busy picking fish out of the sea. He threw them on the beach, where the clay covered and killed them. So the fish were no longer anything but shapeless lumps of clay. They were cold and warmed themselves at a fire of bamboos. Every time that a little bamboo burst with a pop in the heat, the lumps of clay assumed more and more the shape of human beings.

Europe

The Cheremiss of Russia, a Finnish people, tell a story of the creation of man which recalls episodes in the Toradjan and Indian legends of the same event. They say that God moulded man's body of clay and then went up to heaven to fetch the soul, with which to animate it.

The Americas

…the Eskimo of Point Barrow, in Alaska, tell of a time when there was no man in the land, till a certain spirit named á sê lu, who resided at Point Barrow, made a clay man, set him up on the shore to dry, breathed into him, and gave him life. Other Eskimo of Alaska relate how the Raven made the first woman out of clay, to be a companion to the first man ; he fastened water-grass to the back of the head to be hair, flapped his wings over the clay figure, and it arose, a beautiful young woman. The Acagchemem Indians of California said that a powerful being called Chinigchinich created man out of clay which he found on the banks of a lake ; male and female created he them, and the Indians of the present day are the descendants of the clay man and woman.

The Maidu Indians of California the first man and woman were created by a mysterious personage named Earth-Initiate, who descended from the sky by a rope made of feathers. His body shone like the sun, but his face was hidden and never seen. One afternoon he took dark red earth, mixed it with water, and fashioned two figures, one of them a man and the other a woman.

The Diegueño Indians or, as they call themselves, the Kawakipais, who occupy the extreme south-western corner of the State of California, have a myth to explain how the world in its present form and the human race were created…. Tcaipakomat took a lump of light-colored clay, split it partly up, and made a man of it.

The Hopi or Moqui Indians of Arizon… Thereupon the eastern goddess took clay and moulded out of it first a woman and afterwards a man ; and the clay man and woman were brought to life just as the birds and beasts had been so before them.

The Pima Indians, another tribe of Arizona, allege that the Creator took clay into his hands, and mixing it with the sweat of his own body, kneaded the whole into a lump. Then he blew upon the lump till it began to live and move and became a man and a woman. A priest of the Natchez Indians in Louisiana told Du Pratz " that God had kneaded some clay, such as that which potters use, and had made it into a little man ; and that after examining it, and finding it well formed, he blew upon his work, and forthwith that little man had life, grew, acted, walked, and found himself a man perfectly well shaped."

The Michoacans of Mexico said that the great god Tucapacha first made man and woman out of clay.

The Lengua Indians of Paraguay believe that the Creator, in the shape of a beetle, inhabited a hole in the earth, and that he formed man and woman out of the clay which he threw up from his subterranean abode.

Conclusion

This is not a "scientific miracle of the Qur'an" because it is apparent that folkloric tales about the creation of humans from clay/earth/mud is very common throughout the world, and many of these tales pre-date the existence of Islam.

It is also scientifically inaccurate because the Islamic faith claims that human beings were created from clay, contrary to the scientific hypothesis that clay merely 'match-makes' RNA and membrane vesicles - and therefore does not form a building block.

This page is featured in the core article, Islam and Science which serves as a starting point for anyone wishing to learn more about this topic

See Also

• Creation - A hub page that leads to other articles related to Creation
• Harun Yahya - A hub page that leads to other articles related to Harun Yahya