Before the advent of
monotheism, the ancient Greeks developed the
theological model of Emanationism, a school of thought positing that our Universe, our physical experience of existence with all of the phenomena it contains, emanated wholesale from a single divine being,
without that entity having any concern for the nature of the emanation, possibly with our Universe being so insignificant a byproduct of its existence that no
notice of it was taken at all.
The primary early proponent of Emanationism was the philosopher
Plotinus, who imagined an intelligent entity of pure mathematical form, eternally contemplating the infinite purity of mathematics. So great was this entity that waves of its
essence or
thought flowed from it, with the occasional intersections of the ripples of these waves causing a 'breakage' of sorts, a shattering of the pure forms and the formation therefrom of a crude world of matter (although matter still governed by mathematics). This idea was likely inspired by the observation of sometimes-
chaotic interference patterns from the intersection of waves in still water.
Plato had earlier proposed that the organization of our Universe was not the work of a Creator, but instead of a
Demiurge, a lower level of entity which simply worked with the energy produced by a creative higher being -- though that higher being might not have any care for what was created. Plotinus extended this line of thought to the supposition that such a Demiurge may have organized our Universe from the debris of the breakage emanated from an uncaring and unobserving Creator, and that the Demiurge itself might be a byproduct of such a breakage.
Elements of emanationism have been incorporated into some early strains of
Christianity (though not in mainstream Christian thought, which has always relied upon the notions that the Creator was at all levels interested and involved in its Creation). Emanationism is, as well, precursive to the theological model of
Deism, and to the later models of
Pandeism and
Panentheism, though both of the latter models invoke the considered and intentional action of a Creator at some point, if not at all points.