Are We Mything the Point?

So much of interfaith dialogue and scholarly study is done using western paradigms. The challenge is that often, when eastern religions are put into the mix, things just don’t translate easily. As someone who lectures often on Hindu Dharma, I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve been challenged by a question that I just couldn’t answer well because it was asked by someone who assumed that all traditions followed a similar model  to the Abrahamic ones.

Case in point: Mythology.

Different Things to Different Folks

In many circles, this is kind of a “dirty” word. That is, to call a scripture of someone else’s religion “mythology” is often meant as term of derision. This is because much of the time when we say something is a myth we mean that it never happened. It’s a fairy tale, a pipe dream, a falsehood, etc. I maintain that to deign a story as mythological is high praise indeed. A myth, defined in its highest sense is a story that may or may not have happened, although sometimes there is some foundational account that may have been “ornamented” with some otherworldly aspects that appeal to our sense of wonder.

Joseph Campbell is perhaps the best known mythologist of the 20^th century. At this point, I do not see anyone surpassing him in the ability to explain to the curious masses the value of exploring myth. In his book The Power of Myth he describes the importance of the sacred story this way: “Mythology is not a lie; mythology is poetry, it is metaphorical. It has been well said that mythology is the penultimate truth—penultimate because the ultimate cannot be put into words.” And elsewhere: “Myth is much more important and true than history. History is just journalism and you know how reliable that is.”

Yet for many religionists, the idea that some of their holy texts contain narratives that defy our understanding of how the world works didn’t happen as historically as say, the moon landing, is offensive.

In the World of Hinduism

In the 40+ years that I have been immersed in Sanatana Dharma I have understood that devotees are in no way directed to believe in the stories of gods and goddess as historic fact. Honestly, if there was such a directive I never would have embraced this way of life and practice. Above most of what I find beautiful and compelling about Hinduism is its explicit encouragement to explore beliefs and ideas without any mandate to accept any dogma. To those who criticize us by saying, “you just believe what you want to believe,” I say no. We believe what we are able to believe.

However, in recent years I’ve noticed a resistance by Hindus to avoid using the word myth to describe the celestial tales that are part and parcel of the religion. This is mainly driven by the frustration felt when other faiths charge that ours is a religion that’s just “a bunch of myths.”  Well, as important as our mythology is to us, if you took it all away you’d still be left with a profound history, theology, philosophy, practice and science. So, no. It’s not all mythology. And many of these critics still maintain that much of the supernatural in their own scriptures is verifiable history.

Taking Ownership

To my Hindu comrades I say, let us embrace our tradition of myth and call it exactly what it is. But let us make sure that we define for ourselves and not have others do it for us.  Let’s face it. We will be taken to task by them anyway. We must tell the naysayers that while certain stories might not have happened as history, they have had a profound impact on how we understand our relationship with Divinity and how we are define ourselves and both human and sacred. Perhaps we can quote 4^th century Roman philosopher Selustius who said, “A myth is something that never was but always is.”