Islamic mythology

Islamic mythology is the body of traditional narratives associated with Islam from a mythographical perspective.

Islam incorporates many Biblical events and heroes into its own mythology. Stories about Musa (Moses) and Ibrahim (Abraham) form parts of Islam's scriptures. The Qur'an retells in detail the Jewish tale of Joseph, who was sold to an Egyptian, and the Christian tale of Mary, the mother of Jesus. In both cases, it adds original details and an Islamic interpretation: for instance, in the Islamic version, Jesus speaks while he is still an infant, and he is a miraculously-conceived human prophet, not the incarnation of God.

According to the Qur'an, the skies and the earth were joined together as one "unit of creation", after which they were "cloven asunder". After the parting of both, they simultaneously came into their present shape after going through a phase when they were smoke-like. Some parts of the Qur'an state that the process of creation took 6 days, Other parts provide detail about creation. 2 days to create the Earth, 2 days to create the mountains, to bless the Earth and to measure its sustenance, total 4 days, and then 2 more days to create the heavens and the stars. In the Quran, the word "day" is used loosely to mean era, for example Surah 70 verse 4: "The angels and spirit will ascend to Him during a day the extent of which is fifty thousand years".

The Qur'an states that God created the world and the cosmos, made all the creatures that walk, swim, crawl, and fly on the face of the earth from water. He made the angels, and the sun, moon and the stars to dwell in the universe. He poured down the rain in torrents, and broke up the soil to bring forth the corn, the grapes and other vegetation; the olive and the palm, the fruit trees and the grass.

God molded clay, earth, sand, and water into a model of a man. He breathed life and power into it, and it immediately sprang to life. And this first man was called Adam. God took Adam to live in a Paradise. God taught Adam the names of all the creatures, and then commanded all the angels to bow down before Adam. All of them bowed but Iblis, a jinn, refused to obey.

God placed Adam and Eve in a beautiful garden in Paradise, telling them that they could eat whatever they wanted except the fruit of a forbidden tree. Iblis tempted them to disobey God, and eat the fruit. When Adam and Eve had disobeyed God, God cast them out of Paradise. Muslim scholars are divided whether the Paradise, from which Adam and Eve were expelled, is the paradise in the heavens awarded to the righteous at the day of judgement or was it a paradise on earth.

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