This essay attempts to critically compare and contrast two JSTOR papers, searching the words ‘Cosmology’ and ‘Culture’. The two papers chosen are Joanne Conman, ‘It’s about Time: Ancient Egyptian Cosmology’, Studien zur Altägyptischen Kultur, Bd. 31, (2003), pp.33-71 and Y. Tzvi Langermann, ‘Arabic Cosmology’, Early Science and Medicine, Vol.2, No. 2, Medieval Cosmologies (1997), pp. 185-213. Both papers are articles for the public who share an interest in academic writing. Before looking into the differences and similarities of the papers, a definition of the terms ‘Cosmology’ and ‘Culture’ must be established. According to Hetherington, Cosmology is 'the science, theory or study of the universe as an orderly system, and of the laws that govern it; in particular, a branch of astronomy that deals with the structure and evolution of the universe'.  When culturally applying cosmologies, it is important to comprehend that every culture is specific to ‘a people’. In fact, ‘culture’ is said to be very complex to define as one single term in the English language.  Eagleton proposed that there are several meanings that contribute to define culture; as a civilisation – a grand narrative of human self-development, a utopian critique, a way of life, artistic creation. In order to successfully compare and contrast the two differing cosmologies, a brief analysis of three main topics will be discussed as follows; the structuring of the heavens, the mathematical astronomy and their cultures.
Initially, Conman reiterates throughout her introduction that Egyptian cosmology is similar to the Babylonian model according to Leonard Lesko.  Unlike the Babylonians, there is little evidence that the Egyptians were as systematically observational.  However, like the Babylonians recorded the moons behaviour, the Egyptians had many texts which emphasised the importance of the sun and its purpose. Conman uses a reference from a pyramid texts which say that the “the sun descends in order to rise again”.  This suggests that the Egyptians had a concept of a sunrise and a sunset. Meaning the sun followed a recurring journey on a set path, hence the sky dome is constantly mobile. The apparent path that the sun took was referred to as the msqt sqdw – the ecliptic.  The Egyptians were very spiritual and many of their actions and findings had relation to their religion. In fact, their relationship with the sky was “intense, experiential and a matter of national survival as well as religious imperative”.  Many agricultural activities, rituals or events would specifically happen on days that involved astronomical phenomena. It’s important to note that Egyptians were very mythological when describing what occurred in the “heavens”. “Ancient Egyptians understood the universe as sacred, not mechanical”, meaning that occurrences in the heavenly sky were due to the Ancient gods of Egypt.   On the contrary, Langermann explains that  Arabs were scientifically thought driven when exploring the heavens. Unlike the Egyptians who saw the cosmos as a dome, the works of the early Arabs suggests that the heavens were three dimensional.  The planets are in a specific arrangement and follow an orbital motion. These orbs are both “deferent and epicyclic” and revolve along with the stars that they contain, according to al-tartib al-mawjud.  The word tartib in Arabic means order or arrangement. Mawjud means “there is” or “there exists”. Arab astronomers and philosophers based a lot of their work on Hellenistic thought. Langermann claims that the Islamic world referenced philosophers such as Ptolemy and Aristotle and sought to expand on it. A lot of astronomical literature is based on the “translation, elaboration and exploration of philosophy”.  Within the astronomical literature are described motions of the heavenly bodies in the universe. The spherical bodies, known as planets, were three dimensional and referred to as alfak, which translates into “orbs”.  The explanation behind the structure of the heavens of the Ancient Egyptians was very different to how the Arabs perceived it. Ancient Egyptians were heavily mythological whereas Arabs elaborated on Hellenistic philosophy of cosmology and developed it in their own terms based on their own findings. 
The Egyptians were in fact very symbolic in nature and their cosmological thoughts did not shy away from this. However as little mathematical astronomy that they had, they still had a system of division in the sky. These divisions were understood as “times connected with certain regions of the sky”.  Egyptians modelled the sky done from west to east and associated the west with day (sun) and the east with night (moon). Since direction is dependent on time, if it was dark outside, the Egyptians would know that they were in the east side of the sky. The sky was also divided into constellations.  The Egyptians observed these stars that would rise in the eastern horizon which they referred to as the msqt region, which essentially as stated before in the first paragraph, is the ecliptic – in this case, the range of the ecliptic on the eastern horizon.  These stars were collectively known as decan stars. Once a year a decan star will rise at 10-day intervals and 12 intervals during the night.  The decan star will rise before the sun sets (heliacal rising) and rise after the sun sets (acronychal rising). The decan stars also contributed to the Egyptians which part and hour, as direction is equivalent to time, the sky was in. Thus, as a further elaboration, there is not in particular any hard mathematics that the Egyptians used. The same cannot necessarily be said for the Arabs. Arab philosophers and individuals who studied the universe, used mathematical findings and physics to develop innovations which they introduced into the Ptolemaic models.  This was done by converting circular motion into rectilinear motion; a geometrical construct know as the “Tusi couple”. Essentially, an image can be created, by imagining two circles with a smaller one inside the larger one, having half of its diameter and moving in rotation with respect to its circumference; thus, any point along the circumference of the smaller circle will “oscillate along the diameter of the larger” circle.  The main trend that follows in Arabic cosmology is the idea that the bodies, including the Earth, were thought of as orbital and geometrical, whereas the Egyptians depended on constellations by which they divided the sky into different regions.
Thus far, most of this essay has focused on the cosmological thinking of the Ancient Egyptians and Arabs. However, since the essay includes two search terms, Culture must not be over looked. In fact, culture has a somewhat of an influence on a civilisation’s thoughts concerning cosmology. The Traditional Cosmology Society, defined cosmology as a way in which humans adjust their culture and practices with respect to their cosmos. The Greek word cosmos means order and refers to evaluations of our surroundings.  Since the Egyptians were very symbolic and governed their life around their religion, it is not surprising that roles of their divine gods would implement how the heavens functioned. The study of the heavenly sky had religious intent: “the motions of the stars were the movements of the gods and goddesses”, making them “observers of divine drama”.  Since direction was equivalent to time it meant that the rising of an individual star correlated with a sacred ritual etc. Clearly, a human in Ancient Egypt had a personal relationship with the cosmos that could be regarded as spiritual. On the contrary, the Arabs were a people of knowledge who wanted to seek more by taking a philosophical and scientific approach when exploring the universe. The issue with this was that they were not any scholars during the medieval Arab-speaking world that identified as ‘cosmologists’.  In fact, there is no specific word in the Arabic language that can be related to cosmology. They were rather known as philosophers who questioned the structure of the heavens. It was the combination of astronomy that led onto the innovations that eventually were introduced to Ptolemaic models of the cosmos. So, unlike the Ancient Egyptians, the Arabs had a rather scientific curiosity rather than religious endeavour. Arab scholars continuously strived to refine their knowledge of astronomical ideologies. During the ninth century A.D. there was a “great revival of mathematics and astronomy” particularly in Iraq and Syria.  By approaching the study of the universe in a scientific way, Arab scholars were able to discover new astronomical phenomena. 
This essay has compared and contrasted the two papers by introducing three main themes. Evidently the Ancient Egyptians focused their structuring of the heavens on a basis of divinity and mythology, whereas the Arabs approached it in a geometrical and scientific matter. Although the approach of the Ancient Egyptians differed to the Arabs, it is undeniable that both cultures desired to understand their personal cosmos and the reasoning behind why certain motions in the sky occur. According to Freya Mathews, “cosmology is not a cultural epiphenomenon; once it has taken hold of the communal imagination it can on the one hand serve the community, riding it through periods of material, or on the other hand disserve it, undermining its morale even when material conditions improve and permit expansion”.