World, Underworld, Overworld, Dreamworld

Book excerpt: Ancient cultures were faced with two immense problems. Why is there something rather than nothing and why is the universe ordered rather than chaotic? To answer these questions, they invented cosmologies, which were also the basis of their religious beliefs. A person's cosmological and religious beliefs are always interdependent. The ordered universe of the ancients was divided into four: 1) the World (that we inhabit), 2) the Overworld (the sky and heavens that the gods inhabit), 3) the Underworld (that the dead inhabit), and 4) Dreamworld (the mysterious zone between sleep and death that connects the living, dead and the gods). This is the incredible story of these four worlds and how they have influenced the development of all human thought, right up to the present day.