Myth is often used negatively, along with words like ’superstition’, ‘fairytale’, or ‘legend’. But I don’t use it like that. If it is superstition, I call it superstition. But myth implies a greater being as a narrative of meaning.
It seems these days that myth and truth can’t be in the same sentence, unless it’s ‘Myth is not the truth’.
I don’t think so.
This might be my lecturer speaking through me – or it might be that I am now so influenced by him that this aspect of his opinion has become my own – but myth tells you a lot more about something than history. History is not ‘living’ like myth is. Myth changes lives. History, as fascinating as it is for me, is dead. What’s crazy about myth is that it blurs the line between the ‘false’ and the ‘unreal’ with the ‘historical’ and the ‘true’. And it is very hard to entertain the subtleties that arise even in a simple artist’s portrayal of, say, the Buddha’s Enlightenment.
How much truth do you find in that picture? Is it historical? If it’s not, what is the truth conveyed by the Buddha being surrounded by hundreds of supernatural beings?
Raymond,
Where’s the picture of which you speak and on which you want us to comment?
You’re right about myth, though . . . cosmic commentary, drawing timeless lessons from the timebound facts of history . . .