Today, science is developing rapidly, economy is active, ideals are drifting away, and fairy tales are even more out of reach. However, why do film and television themes and literary creation constantly produce and interpret old and new fairy tales?
Will myth still exist? What else do we need myths for?
This is an article about myth and philosophy, ***255 1, and it takes 7 minutes to read the whole article.
1 Myth is a science of the ancients.
Ancient science and education were not popular and could not explain the phenomenon of natural change. Moreover, people should not only live, but also understand the meaning of living, otherwise life will be full of tension and fear, and culture will not be stable and developed, so myths should be used.
In the early days of mankind, the phenomena of all things in the universe were explained by stories of gods, so mythology was also the science of the ancients.
"God" and "power" have the same root in ancient Greek. People think that things that exist are full of power. Without power, people can't know their existence, so power can make obvious differences.
So from the beginning of nature, wind, rain, thunder and lightning, the sun, the moon, the mountains and rivers all make people feel powerful. Therefore, ancient myths are closely related to natural phenomena, and many natural phenomena are even regarded as gods.
Myth is a national dream and an unconscious fiction.
Myth is a story about God and a dream of a nation. This is an unconscious fiction and cannot be deliberately created. It was first passed on by word of mouth, so there was no author, but there were various versions and expressions.
Myth can be compared with fairy tales. Children need to read fairy tales. Fairy tales have authors, but myths don't.
Fairy tales are not true or false, but they are effective.
Fairy tales or myths provide a prototype structure. Without truth and falsehood, they always produce effects, so every generation can read them.
The author of fairy tales knows children's psychology very well. These stories all happened a long time ago. Why are fairy tales not written in which year or period? There is a simple reason. If there is time, it will become history, and there will be questions of truth and falsehood.
Although fairy tales lack the beginning time, all the characters in the story will have good and evil retribution, and the ending is often: the prince and princess live happily ever after. Children have no ability to face the real world. If you tell them that good and evil are not reported, there may be no fairness and justice in the world, which will make them lose their courage to survive. Fairy tales make them believe that there are reliable laws in the world, and good and evil will eventually be rewarded, so that they can sleep soundly and soundly.
Myth expresses a special vitality.
Myth constitutes a living society. It is not based on people, but on life. Everything has life and is connected with each other, which makes people feel relatively safe, know what they can't do, which gods they can't offend, and know what rituals to use to ease their emotions.
Myths are spoken, and rituals are made. The ceremony is made up of a series of actions. Based on myth, the process is reinterpreted, with the purpose of letting people return to the original point and gain the real power of life.
These four points constitute the basic features of all human myths.
No matter how the myths of the East and the West are expressed, they are inseparable from these four characteristics:
First, everything can communicate. There is no gap between nature and human beings, and they are a whole. Mountains, seas, trees and rocks can communicate with people and form a living community.
Second, everything has life. Life can be transformed into each other, people can become trees, trees can become monkeys, and monkeys can become stars in the sky. Unlike after the development of science, there is a strict distinction between living things and non-living things.
Third, emotion is dominant. It is not rational thinking, and we can't ask the rationality of what happened, so many characters act according to their own personalities.
Fourth, dramatic character. Myth, like drama, is also the material of movies. The United States has Avatar, and China has Monster Hunt. If we think rationally, these are just absurd stories. Why are they all creating box office miracles? It is because the mythical theme is born with a dramatic character, and this dramatic tension is full of vitality and fascinating.
Why are we more keen on fairy tales than ever?
The more science develops, the more absurd fairy tales become. Why are people keen on movies and literary creation of all kinds of fairy tales when they know that myths are not credible? It can be seen that myth still has its special features.
First, myth can grasp the truth.
History has facts, but there is no truth. History is written by people and cannot be viewed as a whole. Fifteen Years of Wanli written by Mr. Huang Renyu is a very thick book, but it is only a small page of China's two thousand-year history. The essence of history is the development of time, which is a fleeting fragmentation event. Historians have different value judgments. People will reinterpret history according to the needs of the times, thus establishing the legitimacy of rule, whether at home or abroad.
Although myth is fiction, it has mastered the truth. Myth provides prototype, which is the earliest form. Once it appears, it will never change. It wants eternity.
Second, build a prototype.
People living in the world will face all kinds of broken situations such as birth, adulthood, marriage and death. These four existing faults all need prototypes. For example, many ethnic groups attach great importance to bar mitzvah, and these prototypes are provided by myths.
Myths tell stories, which let us go back to the specific situation when we first carried out a certain ceremony, that is, to the original truth, so that what we are doing can be fully affirmed, thus realizing that life is stable. For example, fairy tales say that heaven and earth get married, so the combination of men and women gains legitimacy through the wedding ceremony.
Third, bring meaning and structure to the world.
Whether for the ancients or now, the world is full of uncertainty. How can human beings live with peace of mind in such a place that will be destroyed at any time?
Myth provides the principle and structure of explanation, saying that the world is designed rationally and people can live in it with peace of mind.
If a person does not believe that there is another world after death, life will be full of pressure, because there is nothing after death, why struggle to live? It is said that there have been many disputes over the former residences of celebrities in recent years, and the news of "the dispute over the hometown of top ten celebrities" has appeared. People are scrambling to publicize the clues that the ancients lived in a certain place to prove whether the place where they lived is a place of interest or not. It can be seen that it is not easy for people to find the meaning of life in history. Religious belief keeps many myths, which just responds to people's needs in this respect.
Fourth, myths explain natural phenomena, social division of labor and human desires.
The power of nature is far greater than that of human beings, and the knowledge of the ancients is not developed enough. Without myths to explain natural phenomena, it is inevitable to live in anxiety and fear every day. Only when there are myths that can explain natural phenomena can people feel more at ease. Thunder, for example, represents Raytheon's anger, but as long as he doesn't do bad things, he doesn't need to be afraid, because only those who do bad things will be struck by lightning. After this explanation, people are less worried when it thunders. Myth is similar to ancient science.
Myth also explains the social division of labor.
Human society needs cooperation, and division of labor is needed before cooperation. There is a myth behind every profession. It was all kinds of immortals or heroes who invented this industry at the beginning, so people who are engaged in this industry in the future must worship him regularly.
The story of the founder can also encourage people in the same industry to stick to their principles and ideals and believe that they have made contributions to society. For example, the "teacher" industry is based on Confucius, so when Confucius is respected by everyone, it will also make many people think that the teacher industry is worthy of respect. Another example is that we often see in movies made in Hong Kong that police and gangsters should pay tribute to Guan Gong, and China people should also pay tribute to Guan Gong when doing business. Therefore, every industry will have myths to illustrate its intrinsic value.
Myth can also explain people's desires.
In addition to reason, there are untested desires and emotions. Some people say that the ratio between reason and emotion is 1: 25. If there is 1 rationality, there will be 25 emotional impulses. The British philosopher Hume (171-1776) also believed that reason serves emotion. When you like someone, you can find many reasons to praise him. When I hate him, I will find out all kinds of shortcomings to prove my legitimacy.
Dante (1265- 132 1) described the seven deadly sins of Catholic thought in The Divine Comedy, such as pride, gluttony, lust, greed, laziness, anger and jealousy. If these desires are not explained by myths, people think they are gentlemen, but when they are tested, they have dark impulses and will feel panic.
In ancient Greek mythology, it is described that God has also committed all kinds of human sins, so that people can know themselves and thus relieve their inner pressure. So is the myth of China. The immortals in Journey to the West also make mistakes. The little ones are lax in discipline, and the big ones are demons. Even the jade emperor's eldest son is public power and used privately. Comparatively speaking, human heroes may be more noble than gods because they have ideals.
If all myths disappear, how can we humans be real?
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