Stephen Gerringer
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More definitions of myth. Note the variety of both parallel and sometimes seemingly contradictory descriptions. Rather than viewing any one definition as correct and the others wrong, all provide a piece of the mosaic.
“In common parlance, a myth is an ‘old wives’ tale,’ a generally accepted belief unsubstantiated by fact.”
– David Adams Leeming, The World of Myth (p. 3)
“Mythology is the study of whatever religious or heroic legends are so foreign to a student’s experience that he cannot believe them to be true. . . . Myth has two main functions. The first is to answer the sort of awkward questions that children ask, such as: ‘Who made the world? How will it end? Who was the first man? Where do souls go after death?’. . . . The second function of myth is to justify an existing social system and account for traditional rites and customs.”
– Robert Graves, “Introduction,” New Larousse Encyclopedia of Mythology (p. v)
“Myths are things that never happened but always are.”
– Sallustius, 4th cent. A.D. (quoted in Carl Sagan’s Dragons of Eden)
“The Myth, in a primitive society, that is in its original living form, is not just a tale. It is a reality. These stories are of an original, greater, more important reality through which the present life, fate, and mankind are governed. This knowledge provides man with motives for rituals and moral acts.”
– Veronica Ions, The World’s Mythology (p. 6)
“By knowing the myth, one knows the ‘origin’ of things and hence can control and manipulate them at will.”
– W. Taylor Stevenson, History as Myth (p. 17)
“Greek mythology is largely made up of stories about gods and goddesses, but it must not be read as a kind of Greek Bible, an account of the Greek religion. According to the most modern idea, a real myth has nothing to do with religion. It is an explanation of something in nature: how, for instance, anything and everything came into existence; men animals, this or that tree or flower . . . Myths are early science, the result of men’s first trying to explain what they saw around them. But there are many so-called myths that explain nothing at all. These tales are pure entertainment, the sort of thing people would tell one another on a long winter’s evening. . . . But religion is here, too.”
– Edith Hamilton, Mythology (p. 19)
“Myth purports to offer an adequate explanation for everything–for the elements and laws of nature, for social structure, ethics and the dynamics of the individual psyche.”
– Norman Austin, Meaning and Being in Myth (p. 2)
“Myth is a traditional tale with secondary, partial reference to something of collective importance”
– Walter Burkert, Structure and History in Greek Mythology and Ritual (p. 23).
“A mythology is a system of affect-symbols, signs evoking and directing psychic energies. It is more like an affective art work than a scientific proposition.”
– Joseph Campbell (interview)
“We still like to make up stories, just as our ancestors did, which use personification to explain the great forces of our existence. Such stories, which explain how the world began or where the sun goes when it sets, we call myths. Mythology is a natural product of the symbolizing mind; poets, when not making up myths of their own, are still commanding ancient ones.”
– John Frederick Nims, Western Wind: An Introduction to Poetry (p. 41-42)
“Mythology is the womb of mankind’s initiation to life and death.”
– Joseph Campbell, “Bios and Mythos” in Flight of the Wold Gander
“Myths concern us not only for the part they play in all primitive, illiterate, tribal, or non-urban cultures . . .; not only for the grip that versions of ancient Greek myths have gained through the centuries on the literary culture of the Western nations; but also because of man’s endearing insistence on carrying quasi-mythical modes of thought, expression, and communication into a supposedly scientific age.”
– G. S. Kirk, Myth: Its Meaning and Functions (p. 2)
More definitions of myth. Note the variety of both parallel and sometimes seemingly contradictory descriptions. Rather than viewing any one definition as correct and the others wrong, all provide a piece of the mosaic.
“In common parlance, a myth is an ‘old wives’ tale,’ a generally accepted belief unsubstantiated by fact.”
– David Adams Leeming, The World of Myth (p. 3)
“Mythology is the study of whatever religious or heroic legends are so foreign to a student’s experience that he cannot believe them to be true. . . . Myth has two main functions. The first is to answer the sort of awkward questions that children ask, such as: ‘Who made the world? How will it end? Who was the first man? Where do souls go after death?’. . . . The second function of myth is to justify an existing social system and account for traditional rites and customs.”
– Robert Graves, “Introduction,” New Larousse Encyclopedia of Mythology (p. v)
“Myths are things that never happened but always are.”
– Sallustius, 4th cent. A.D. (quoted in Carl Sagan’s Dragons of Eden)
“The Myth, in a primitive society, that is in its original living form, is not just a tale. It is a reality. These stories are of an original, greater, more important reality through which the present life, fate, and mankind are governed. This knowledge provides man with motives for rituals and moral acts.”
– Veronica Ions, The World’s Mythology (p. 6)
“By knowing the myth, one knows the ‘origin’ of things and hence can control and manipulate them at will.”
– W. Taylor Stevenson, History as Myth (p. 17)
“Greek mythology is largely made up of stories about gods and goddesses, but it must not be read as a kind of Greek Bible, an account of the Greek religion. According to the most modern idea, a real myth has nothing to do with religion. It is an explanation of something in nature: how, for instance, anything and everything came into existence; men animals, this or that tree or flower . . . Myths are early science, the result of men’s first trying to explain what they saw around them. But there are many so-called myths that explain nothing at all. These tales are pure entertainment, the sort of thing people would tell one another on a long winter’s evening. . . . But religion is here, too.”
– Edith Hamilton, Mythology (p. 19)
“Myth purports to offer an adequate explanation for everything–for the elements and laws of nature, for social structure, ethics and the dynamics of the individual psyche.”
– Norman Austin, Meaning and Being in Myth (p. 2)
“Myth is a traditional tale with secondary, partial reference to something of collective importance”
– Walter Burkert, Structure and History in Greek Mythology and Ritual (p. 23).
“A mythology is a system of affect-symbols, signs evoking and directing psychic energies. It is more like an affective art work than a scientific proposition.”
– Joseph Campbell (interview)
“We still like to make up stories, just as our ancestors did, which use personification to explain the great forces of our existence. Such stories, which explain how the world began or where the sun goes when it sets, we call myths. Mythology is a natural product of the symbolizing mind; poets, when not making up myths of their own, are still commanding ancient ones.”
– John Frederick Nims, Western Wind: An Introduction to Poetry (p. 41-42)
“Mythology is the womb of mankind’s initiation to life and death.”
– Joseph Campbell, “Bios and Mythos” in Flight of the Wold Gander
“Myths concern us not only for the part they play in all primitive, illiterate, tribal, or non-urban cultures . . .; not only for the grip that versions of ancient Greek myths have gained through the centuries on the literary culture of the Western nations; but also because of man’s endearing insistence on carrying quasi-mythical modes of thought, expression, and communication into a supposedly scientific age.”
– G. S. Kirk, Myth: Its Meaning and Functions (p. 2)
James,
We definitely mythologize money, as if it has some sort o value independent of human constructs.
I am intrigued with the concept of gift economies.
In 2012, I was invited, along with JCF President Robert Walter, to deliver presentations at the Voyage of Aloha conference in Hawaii. We had shipped over hundreds of dollars worth of Campbell titles (not cheap to send) to make available for attendees to purchase – but we sold only a couple, and did not relish the thought of packing the books up and paying to ship them all back to the mainland.
Then we heard a presentation on the final morning on gift economies. One example was a local chain of donut shops on the islands that, in indigenous neighborhoods, charged whatever people could afford! Some financially challenged customers paid only a few cents for donuts, ice cream, or coffee, while others actually paid more than the retail value – and the company was actually making a profit!
That triggered a sudden inspiration; I texted Bob, who was seated across the hall, and learned he had the same thought at the very same moment. I then announced to the crowd just before the morning break that JCF, as a result of that presentation, had decided to embrace the gift economy for the last hours of this conference – so all the books in our booth in the lobby were now available for whatever anyone wanted to pay – a function of the value they placed on the books, coupled with what they could or could not afford. We had the retail prices listed – but if someone could only afford to pay $10 instead of $25 for the hardbound revised edition of the Hero With A Thousand Faces – or $1, or zero dollars – that was alright, because we trusted that some who could afford to pay more than the listed retail price would be happy to do so.
The results were astounding. It took only fifteen minutes to completely clear our inventory! Several attendees paid a bit less than retail for a couple of books, and a handful did take a book for free (though none took more than one for free, and they were careful about choosing the title – didn’t want to abuse the opportunity), but many paid full retail plus a dollar or two more, and a few paid double! We not only broke even, but also didn’t have to ship books back to California.
Ironically most people paid full price or more (the same full price that we hadn’t been able to sell any books at the previous two days: the opportunity of helping those less fortunate proved the difference). I wish we had implemented that experiment at the beginning of the conference, though we might have needed to bring more books.
Definitely a learning experience that prompted me to re-think the value we place on money. There are several works that explore this concept, but one that might particularly appeal to Campbellophiles is Lewis Hyde’s The Gift: How the Creative Spirit Transforms the World.
(Hyde is the author of one of my favorite post-Campbell works, entitled Trickster Makes This World: Mischief, Myth and Art )
Seems posting any links currently requires moderator authorization, so the appearance of some posts might be delayed until I get to them.
What we would really appreciate, though, are links that don’t take forum readers away from COHO, but open in a new window. So, for example, if sharing a link to an NPR story on Jung’s Red Book, instead of simply posting the URL, as follows
“Check our this NPR story here
https://www.npr.org/2009/11/11/120129676/the-red-book-a-window-into-jungs-dreams ”We would prefer instead that you highlight the words you want to link, then click on the link icon in the menu bar at the top of the post you are composing (looks like a paper clip on the diagonal), enter the URL in the field that opens, click on the gear icon at the right of the field, and check the box that says “Open in a new tab” – so the result looks like so:
Check out this NPR story
Please note the difference. Clicking on the first link – the raw internet address – takes readers away from COHO; they have to navigate back by clicking on the back arrow to return. But clicking on the second link opens up a new window without taking users away from COHO: readers can close the second window when through, or use that as a point of departure to visit other sites, without losing the forums.
The only time one should be copying and pasting an address directly into one’s post is if including a YouTube clip, as that will ensure the video clip plays on this this page.
Thank you in advance for following that format.
Hello Nandu,
I’d like to focus, if you don’t mind, on your second area of disagreement with Joseph Campbell (no rush getting back to me on this – I suspect this is the beginning of a long, leisurely conversation. Once you do reply, I might try splitting our exchange off from the original thread, so it doesn’t get lost amid the thickets of the earlier discussion of European projections onto the history of Hinduism).
You describe that difference as follows:
2. Mysticism: It seems to me that both Joe and Jung were mystics to a certain extent. Over the years, I have become more and more of a hardcore rationalist. I am an atheist for all practical purposes now; and I don’t believe that there is any “mystery” out there not accessible to science.
However, I am a writer – and I do believe that both myth and art proceed from the same source. So on this level, I can still connect with Joe, and deal with all his theories as concepts which are useful for me to connect with my inner muse. You can call me a “spiritual atheist”.
I don’t seem to recall Jung having a problem with being described as a mystic – and I have no trouble embracing that label myself. Campbell, however, has a different perspective:
I’m not a mystic, in that I don’t practice any austerities, and I’ve never had a mystical experience. So I’m not a mystic. I’m a scholar, and that’s all.
I remember when Alan Watts one time asked me, “Joe, what yoga do you practice?” I said, “I underline sentences.” And that’s all I’m doing. My discipline is taking heavy notes and correlating everything I read with everything else I’ve read. I have nine drawers full of notes, and I have four more packed down in the cellar that I can’t get another piece of paper in. For 40 years I’ve taken notes on these materials that seemed to me to be opening the picture to my mind.” (Interview with Jeffrey Mishlove)
Maybe it would help if you shared your understanding of what a mystic is, which seems different than Joseph Campbell’s understanding (that’s not to determine which is correct, but to ensure our vocabulary doesn’t trip us up and have us thinking we disagree where our perspectives actually overlap, and vice versa).
Campbell’s definition would appear to be that a mystic is someone who has had a mystical experience – an actual experience of the transcendent which can not be put into words, as opposed to using words as metaphors for the transcendent (which is done by mystics and non-mystics alike).
I would agree with that definition, as far as it goes, which is in sync with my own subjective experience. You mention that you are now an atheist and believe there are no mysteries out there which are not accessible to science; that may be, but I’m not clear as to why either of those beliefs would preclude and/or negate a mystical perspective. One doesn’t need to believe in deity to be a mystic (multiple schools of Buddhist thought attest to that), nor disbelieve in science (theoretical physicists and Nobel winners Erwin Schrödinger and Wolfgang Paul are just two scientists of many who come to mind); heck, the wave-particle paradox is a scientifically confirmed example of what lies beyond and remains inaccessible to human experience and conception.
Campbell’s understanding of mysticism appeals to me. I have experienced what cannot be put into what words, experiences that I can’t “describe” to anyone who has not had such themselves, but can only “talk around.” There is no way I can rationally explain or convey these subjective experiences, which some might describe as existing only in my head – crazy talk, if you will.
That might explain some of the confusion re the congruence you see between mysticism and a belief in God. Some mystics do describe experiencing “God” – but that’s essentially a shorthand term to describe a mystical experience that is beyond words; however, it is difficult for the bulk of people, who have never had such an experience and likely never will, to avoid injecting personifications and projections of the “God” their culture/society/church/family subscribes to onto that term.
In one of my junior high literature classes nearly two decades ago, I had an inspiration I thought might help to illustrate for students this inadequacy of language to describe an experience of what is beyond human experience.
Fortunately for me, Stephanie Gutierrez was in this class; Stephanie was gifted with the voice of an angel – just two weeks before, during an official flag-raising ceremony honoring the victims of the recent 9/11 attacks, she sang the national anthem in front of the whole school – which was all the more poignant because Steph had been blind since birth.
So, having cleared this with Stephanie ahead of time, I asked the class to raise their hands if they believed the color red actually exists. Naturally all students raised their hands. Then I challenged Steph’s classmates to describe the color red to her in such a way that she would “get” it – and watched with fiendish delight as they struggled to describe the indescribable.
One student said that red is hot, like red-hot coals – but I pointed out that red can be cool, like an apple or strawberry you take out of the fridge to eat. Some said red means “stop,” like a red light or stop sign – but Steph pointed out that what means “stop” for her at a main intersection is a specific sound that’ s made when the light changes from green to red, so would that noise be the same as red?
Some spoke of red as anger, others claimed it meant danger, and some said love or sex (red roses, red valentines, passion), and so on
. . . but, ultimately, the best they could do was hand Stephanie a collection of metaphors.
I pointed out that Stephanie has no point of reference for any of these metaphors. She knows that sighted people claim to experience something they call the color red: they believe in and will respond to that something, but that to her is no proof there really is such a thing. What is real, and what she must deal with, is that people believe and act as if there were a color red, so she certainly takes that into account – but when it comes to the objective existence of the color red, she is, at best, an agnostic.
Similarly those who have never experienced a mystical state, whether Campbell, you, or billions of others – it does not necessarily follow there is no such thing, any more than Stephanie’s experience is proof the color red does not exist.
But pardon my digression. Back to your differences with Campbell: the fact that you and Joe might define your terms differently does not necessarily mean you that are at odds in what you believe (as you pointed out, you think of Joe as a mystic “to a certain extent”); the difference seems to that, though he never had such an experience himself, he might have been more open to mystical experiences reported by others.
So I’m curious: what do you mean by mysticism? Can you narrow down where, exactly, you and Joseph Campbell actually disagree?
Happy Day Captsunshine,
I too was trying to think of any solstice celebrations in India – seems Hindu doesn’t have any specific solstice rite. I wonder if for a major portion of your subcontinent, located on the equator, perhaps the demarcation between increasing and decreasing daylight didn’t really stand out . . .
Marianne,
So glad you are feeling better after your dance with the Covid devil. Thanks for letting me know you can’t see the tree. Still trying to work out the sharing of images. I notice since this requires the URL of where the image lives on the internet that some photos I posted months ago I can no longer see – but I am curious why you can’t see the picture I just posted. I’ll investigate, and hope we learn enough to make the posting process easier .
That does seem to be one area where Facebook and other social media are more user friendly, allowing people to instantly upload photos from their phone.We would need to build a much more muscular discussion platform to achieve that . . .
No worries, Shaheda – you didn’t post to the quote database, but you and Robert did wander down an interesting off-ramp into your own conversation in a thread I created here in COHO called “Things Joseph Campbell Never Said” – which I designed to cache sayings mis-attributed to Joe. Of course, part of the problem of a public forum is that any thread tends to take some intriguing twists and turns following off-topic tangents, which is part of the fun – but I’d like to keep that thread focused on the misquotes.
However, I didn’t want to lose this dialogue between the two of you either, which merits its own thread. Hence the admin operation of “splitting” the discussion (first time I’ve done that on this message board – happy to see it works; I’m likely to do the same with Nandu’s discussion of where he disagrees with Campbell, separating his disagreements over Campbell’s view of India from his characterization of Campbell as a mystic, allowing for two separate discussions). We can think of it as switching a train onto a side-track to let another train pass.
I do appreciate the train theme, which is very much part of the American mythos. Trains opened up the United States to settlement, accelerating the spread of the population from coast to coast, supplying towns founded in otherwise remote parts of the country, and powering trade.
My wife, Des, loves trains – and then my mom was a Harvey Girl in La Junta, Colorado (Fred Harvey established a chain of Harvey House restaurants at train stations in the 1880s designed to provide a hearty, wholesome meal to the passengers of a train in the barely 30 minutes they had at a train stop; Harvey Houses were staffed by young single women who lived on site in a special dormitory and followed strict rules of grooming, dress, and behavior). Harvey Girls were the subject of a popular Judy Garland musical of the same name – released a few years after my mom’s time wearing the apron; along with Pullman Porters, sleeping cars, and upper and lower berths, the Harvey House and their corps of waitresses are part of the romance of rail travel in the Old West.
I have traveled by train across the southwest, and Des and I enjoyed a wonderful trip with our own little room many Christmases ago on Amtrak’s Coast Starlight, traveling from the Bay Area up to Seattle past Mt. Shasta and through the beautiful snow clad mountains of northern California and Oregon on into Washington – much more leisurely and pleasant than the hassle of airport travel. We also have enjoyed more than our share of small touristy trains from days gone by, going places cars never go – whether just up the road from us in the Sierra Nevada foothills, along the Verde River Canyon in Arizona (saw a number of bald eagles on that trip), or, our favorite, the Leadville, Colorado and Southern Railroad in the Rockies.
What made that last trip so stellar is where we sat on the return: a local friend pulled a few strings for us, and we rode more than an hour on the outside platform at the front of the locomotive (which you can see in the photo below – alas, we don’t have a good one of us there), at over 10,000 feet elevation – quite a rush!
And then I’ve hopped one freight, in Shelby, Montana, back in my hitchhiking days. Turns out you get very dirty traveling as a hobo – I much preferred hitchhiking.
Though freight trains still play a major role in interstate shipping, seems travel by train, at least in the Western United States, is relative rare, thanks to our interstate freeway system – Americans like the independence of driving, so the car remains supreme.
Hope you both don’t mind, but the stream of consciousness has wandered far afield from a collection of “things Joseph Campbell never said.” Intriguing as the side discussion is, it defeats the purpose of creating a collection of misquotes that people can use as a source if they have to wade through several unrelated posts – so I split the thread following Robert’s explanation of the associational patterns that sometimes make for cryptic posts, and created a new one focused on the fun conversation you’re having.
What a wonderfully detailed memory, Shaheda!
Thanks, Robert, for that stream of associations – definitely resonates.
I tend to think of this not so much as a Christmas tree, but homage / recreation of Yggsdrasil, the World Tree of Norse mythology (in touch with my forebears), though elements of every mythology appear in these branches. Rather than a Christmas star, topping the tree is a peacock feather, to watch over my home – the peacock, with its hundred eyes sacred to Hera, sister-wife to Zeus, and patroness of marriage and the domestic landscape.
Felix Culpa – o happy fault! – certainly has the sense and feel of a Zen koan; that paradox which opens a little crack in “reality” to the stillness on which all that exists, all that is in motion, rests.
That so many layers are embedded in one image – 1132 – dropped like little splashes of color throughout Joyce’s work of art, working on the reader’s psyche whether one knows or not … what an epiphany! Can’t help but feel Joe’s enthusiasm.
Thanks for sharing that memory, Toby!
What a sweet idea, James. Alas, I’ve been stuck in the netherworld of cyberspace (forgive me for mixing my metaphors), in limbo between an archaic, dying MacBook at its last gasp, and a brand new laptop with all the bells and whistles, trying to prep and load and transfer files and info and apps and such from old to new, right as so many end-of-the-year tasks raise their head and demand attention (and that’s not not even counting the holiday vortex we all tend to fall into).
So I have nothing profound or inspirational to share. However, this is what I did this weekend:
Raising and decorating a Christmas Tree is a ritual so many share this time of year, even those who aren’t particularly religious, or particularly Christian. But I grew up in a rigid Christian cult that viewed Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Easter, and Halloween, as pagan in origins (true enough) and hence satanic (lots of shadow projection there!). So our family never celebrated Christmas during my childhood; I couldn’t participate in Christmas activities (or Valentine’s, Easter, etc.) at school, which included coloring Santa Clauses, cutting Christmas Trees out of construction paper, singing Christmas carols, drinking Christmas punch and eating Christmas cookies – and the last day of school before the holiday vacation I always had to leave early while the rest of the class enjoyed a Christmas party. And, or course, we couldn’t accept Christmas presents; relatives who forgot and sent gifts anyway had them returned.
It took a few years after leaving home before I got the hang of Christmas. It had always seemed no big deal to me – can’t miss what you’ve never had – but I found I enjoyed the happy music, the good cheer, the pretty lights, the excitement and joy of children, the fun of giving gifts, and all sorts of things I missed out on as a kid.
So when it comes to decorating the tree I tend to overcompensate for my childhood.
I really celebrate the Solstice – Yule (from the Old English geol, derived from *quelo-, an Indo-European root related to “wheel,” or “turn” – the turning point for the wheel of the year (which, from the position of the tomb at Newgrange and so many other ancient sites, of course including Stonehenge, that are aligned with the rising sun on the solstice, is the oldest, longest lasting ritual, celebrated by humankind for at least 5,000 years). Names and details differ among the many iterations, depending on one’s culture, of the ancient myth of the birth / rebirth of the Sun God (or Son of God) – that time when the Sun’s light begins to wax again.
On the Solstice – this year on December 21 – I engage in reflection and perform a few simple, yet poignant personal rituals. This is the moment when the sun stands still (Solstice – from Sol, “the Sun,” and stit – “make stand”); then, on the 25th, is more for participation in the joyful collective ritual celebrating new birth (this is generally the first day after the solstice that the change in the sun and the growth of the light is visible to the naked eye, which is why so many solar gods are born on December 25, including the Christ Child).
Tends to place one’s self in perspective, part of a mythic tradition celebrated by all humanity across millennia – and then to realize the cosmic cycle we all participate in, whether we want to or not, with the change of season and the eternal return of the light.
Decorating a solstice tree with lights and sparkling spheres and little tableaus tucked away deep within the boughs of the tree, pays homage to and participates in that stream stretching back into the distant past and on past the horizon into the future, and spreading out in this moment to encompass so many billions around the globe, whatever their professed faith, celebrating our unity – peace on earth and good will to all.
May you have a wild, wyrd, wonderful Winter Solstice, James
Shaheda,
I apologize to you and Norland for being out of the loop; I’ve been dealing with technological issues that, ultimately, required purchasing a new computer (I’m typing this on my old one, which is on fumes – might be knocked offline for another day or so as I figure out how to migrate data from the old machine to the new).
Thank you for your appreciation (though I can’t take complete credit for the email “reminder” – that’s a function of the forums plug-in: I have been enjoying yours, Nandu’s, and Captsunshine’s comments in the thread on The Ripening Outcast, which began back in July as a discussion dedicated to an earlier MythBlast essay by Dr. Téllez – it is satisfying to see that conversation still in play well over four months later – so I thought I’d let alert participants in a post that Norland had a published a new MythBlast essay; the email was an automatic notification of a new comment in that conversation).
Unfortunately, I’m sorry to report that Joseph Campbell did not say, “Where there is crime, there is life, and where there is life, there is crime.” If you can track down a source, we’ll glad change that position, but as it stands, it doesn’t sound like something Joe would say (“crime” is a legal construct – mammals, birds, reptiles, fish, mollusks, etc. are not bound by human law and so cannot commit crimes).
What you may have heard could have been closer to “Where there is killing, there is life, and where there is life, there is killing” – a very different emphasis. Though I don’t find a source for this statement either, that phrasing seems much more in sync with points Campbell did make.
Just reminder in case you missed it. Norland Têllez’s most recent essay, “In the Stillness of Love’s Madness,” is this week’s entry in our MythBlast series. He and I have been discussing it here, focusing at the moment on the relationship between death and myth. Come say hi and weigh in with a comment or question.
