Gilgamesh was probably some illiterate brutish thug that raped women and smelled terrible. Noah was probably some religious nut babbling on about the end of the world when he happened to stumble into the middle of a local flood. King Arthur was also probably another plunderer on horseback that killed and maimed for profit. Joan of Arc would be sedated and locked up in today’s world.
Does it really help us to know these things? Do we profit somehow in knowing that George Washington never chopped down a cherry tree or that the Washington family never even had cherry trees and that Washington lied all the time.
I understand the need of historians to get the facts straight. Everyone wants to do their job right. But i question the thought process that decides that myths are not important to future generations.
Myths are the way we make sense of the world around us. Or so said Joseph Campbell. Where do these myths come from? They derive over time from faulty history, from details glossed over, from dates misremembered, and from wish-fulfillment. Myths are symbols and humans desperately need these to make the world work for them.
Cold dry facts are just that. They neither breathe or live in the mind, nor do they serve any purpose but to record. Statistics, time lines, records. We might as well use accountants to tote up the numbers and write-up a ledger.
Myths inspire, they drive on unborn generations to think what is possible to achieve and to strive to better that achievement.
What myths will our modern age inspire?
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