Myths are common in human civilizations, and their origins can be traced back to prehistory. We don’t know how they came to be, and that air of mystery no doubt contributes to their power.
Myths are rich in symbolic language, which allows historians to learn about how ancient civilizations perceived the world and their place in it.
Myths in antiquity undoubtedly contributed to a sense of community by forging a shared heritage and identity. They could have acted as society’s glue, offering shared values and a collective story that helped to reinforce societal relationships.
Mythology provides essential insights into the societies that developed them, reflecting the prevailing societal norms, fears, hopes, values, and beliefs at the time. Myths, while not historical facts, sometimes contain kernels of historical truth. They usually refer to genuine events, places, or individuals, providing us with a view of how those events appeared to the general public at the time.
Carl Jung on mythology
Carl Jung saw mythology as a representation of the “collective unconscious.” He proposed that these myths were more than just stories but also reflections of universal and archetypal symbols and patterns that exist in our unconscious brains.
Jung’s theories were founded on the idea that psychological phenomena do not arise purely from personal experiences. He proposed that, in addition to our personal unconscious, which is made up of forgotten or suppressed personal experiences, there is a deeper level he called the communal unconscious. This level contains archetypes, which are primordial pictures or symbols shared by all people, acquired from our ancestors’ shared experiences and reproduced in other cultures’ myths, religions, and fairy tales.
Archetypes and the collective unconscious, according to Jung, are expressed through dreams, symbols, and myths. These serve as a form of universal “language” that cuts beyond cultural and temporal divides.
Understanding this language and integrating these unconscious archetypes into waking consciousness (a process he called individuation) was, he believed, a critical step toward human progress and self-realization.
Mythology is art
I have always found Sir James Frazer’s description of “Diana of the Wood” and the Nemi cult to be an exquisite passage; it takes me to that place and time and exposes a hint of mystery that begs me to explore further.
Frazer himself declares the myth described in this passage “unhistorical,” but that’s to be expected of mythology.
“The real value of such tales is that they serve to illustrate the nature of the worship by providing a standard with which to compare it; and further, that they bear witness indirectly to its venerable age by showing that the true origin was lost in the mists of a fabulous antiquity. In the latter respect these Nemi legends are probably more to be trusted than the apparently historical tradition…”
-Sir James George Frazer, The Golden Bough (1922)
The arts and mythology share many purposes and effects on society and individuals. They share experiences, ideas, emotions, and worldviews through storytelling, often across languages and cultures.
Like myths, art uses symbols to convey deeper meanings and interpret complicated concepts, emotions, and experiences. Both art and mythology can trigger deep emotions, providing catharsis and letting us address and process our emotions safely and distantly, helping us understand and manage them.
Mythology and art transcend the mundane. They open our minds to new realms and inspire us to study the metaphysical and spiritual. Both allow us to express the human experience across cultures, ages, and individuals. They offer amusement, knowledge, thought, and insight through exploring deeper truths and global topics.
And we’re done.
At its most basic level, this post is about introducing a lesser-known myth—a work of art—to a new audience who may have never heard of Sir James Frazer and The Golden Bough. But also, I hope that those who might think of mythology as something irrelevant to the modern age might consider seeing these ancient stories in a new light.
Mythology represents what was once a religion for ancient people. The position of this blog is that what we now consider “religion” is the same. Exactly the same.
What if we looked at our religions as mythologies? If we evaluated our religious texts less as dogma and more as art, what might they reveal to us? Might they, as Jung believed myths provided, help us toward human progress and self-realization? We might realize, finally, that we’ve been missing the point of our ancient spiritual texts all along: that they were never intended as the basis of institutions that gather wealth and control the masses, nor as the basis for discrimination and war, but simply as something that might help us reflect and grow.
