What is Mythology

Greek mythology.

 The Greek Myths being a corpus of tales ex- pressed in different kinds of literature and visual arts, the tales of particular indi- viduals as Odysseus, Oidipous, Helene, Medeia and so forth. Understood in this sense, the definition of 'myth' is clear and simple, a group of identify able tales, which by corollary we consider as historically and otherwise 'untrue.' But while we can readily determine whether a tale was part of the corpus of Greek myths' or not, we have great difficulty in answering the question, what kind of phenomena 'myths' are, and in giving one single definition(Synnøve, 20).

     Forms of mythology successively, of Oriental mythology, Occidental mythology, and what 1 propose to call creative mythology, as representing the re- maining natural divisions of this subject. For under the rubric "Oriental" can be readily comprised all the traditions of that broad and various, yet essentially unified, major province represented by the philosophical myths and mythological philosophies of India, Southeast Asia, China, and Japan-to which can be joined the earlier yet closely related mythological cosmologies of archaic Mesopotamia and Egypt, as well as the later, remoter, yet essentially comparable systems of pre-Columbian Middle America and Peru. And under the rubric "Occidental" the progressively, ethically oriented mythologies of Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam naturally fall, in relationship and counterplay to the Greco- Roman pantheons and the Celto-Germanic. And finally, as "creative mythology," will be considered that most important mythological tradition of the modern world, which can be said to have had its origin with the Greeks, to have come of age in the Renaissance, and to be flourishing today in continuous, healthy growth, in the works of those artists, poets, and philosophers of 4 the West for whom the wonder of the world itself as it is now being analyzed by science- is the ultimate revelation(Grant, 7).

The whole of Greek mythology will never be deciphered and translated. But can this be urged as an objection? There are many Greek words of which we cannot find a satisfactory etymology, even by the help of Sanskrit. Are we therefore to say that the whole Greek language has no etymological organization? If we find a rational principle in the formation of but a small portion of Greek words, we are justified in inferring that the same principle which manifests itself in part governed the organic growth of the whole; and though we cannot explain the etymological origin of all words, we should never say that language had no etymological origin, or that etymology "treats of a past which was never present." That the later Greeks, such as Homer and Hesiod, ignored thelogos of their muthoi .

     I fully admit, but they equally 5 ignored the real origin to etymon of their words. What applies to etymology, therefore, applies with equal force to mythology. It has been proved by comparative philology. that there is nothing irregular in language, and what was formerly considered as irregular in declension and conjugation is now recognized as the most regular and primitive formation of grammar. The same, we hope, may be accomplished in mythology, and instead of deriving it, as heretofore, "ab in genii humane imbecilities. et a dictions gestate," it will obtain its truer solution, ab in genii humane sapient et a dictions abundant." Mythology is only a dialect, an ancient form of language. Mythology, though chiefly concerned with nature, and here again mostly with those manifestations which bear the character of law, order, power, and wisdom impressed on them, was applicable to all things. Nothing is excluded from mythological expression; neither morals nor philosophy, neither history nor religion, have escaped the spell of that ancient sibyl. But mythology is neither philosophy, nor history, nor religion, nor ethics. It is, if we may use a scholastic expression, a quale, not a quid - something formal, not something substantial, and, like poetry, sculpture, and painting, applicable to nearly all that the ancient world could admire or adore (Müller, 143,144)

Bibliography

•   Müller, Friedrich Max. "Comparative mythology." Myths and Mythologies. Routledge, 2016. 136-145
• Grant, Michael, and John Hazel. Who's who in Classical Mythology. Routledge, 2004.
• Des Bouvrie, Synnøve. "The definition of myth. Symbolical phenomena in ancient culture." (2002).