ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses biblical influences from Critias, Plato's mythical tale of Atlantis that was the immediate sequel to Timaeus. Critias described the earliest civilized world, its descent into corruption and violence, and the necessity to punish the wicked rulers of Atlantis by earthquake and flood. The chapter argues that the Garden of Eden lacks a viable Ancient Near Eastern literary antecedent, but closely resembles the mythical paradise of Atlantis, where the god Poseidon dwelled among the humans in his domain. Genesis 6 also appears to draw on Critias, with its stories of marriages between terrestrial gods and human women, of the heroic demigods that were their offspring, and of the diminution of the divine element and rise of human violence through time, ending in judgment and punishment by God. Among all the flood stories of the Ancient Near Eastern and Greek worlds, only in Plato's Critias is human wickedness the reason for God sending a flood upon the earth. This chapter also traces further influence of Critias in Genesis, Exodus and Deuteronomy, although the influence of both Timaeus and Critias is most strongly and systematically felt in the Primordial History of Genesis 1–11.
