Myths, Mysteries, & Symbols
Our previous considerations quite naturally lead us to examine another related question, the relationship of the symbol to what is called 'myth'. On this subject it first should be pointed out that we have occasionally spoken of a certain degeneration of symbolism that has given birth to 'mythology', taking this last word in its usual sense. This is in fact accurate when applied to 'classical' antiquity but it is perhaps invalid when applicd outside this period of the Greek and Latin civilizations. Thus, since the term can only provoke troublesome ambiguities and unjustified comparisons, it is best to avoid it altogether; but if correct usage imposes this restriction, we should nevertheless say that, in itself and in its original meaning, the word 'myth' has nothing to do with a degeneration that was moreover of relatively late origin and duc only to a more or less complete misunderstanding of what remained of an earlier tradition. It is fitting to add that if we can speak of 'myths' in connection with this tradition (on condition that its true meaning be reinstated and everything 'pejorative' attached to it in current usage be ruled out), in any case there was at that time no 'mythology' as moderns understand the term, for this amounts to no more than a study undertaken 'from the outside' and hence implies a misunderstanding raised, one might say, to the second power.
Nor is the distinction somctimes made between 'myths' and 'symbols' based on reality. While some people consider a myth to be a narrative having a meaning other than that which is directly and literally expressed by the words composing it, for others a symbol
would essentially be a figurative representation of certain ideas by a geometric diagram or by some design or other; the symbol would then be a graphic mode of expression and myth a verbal mode. But from what we have explained earlier regarding the meaning of the word 'symbol', this is an altogether unacceptable restriction, for every image taken to represent an idea, that is, to express or suggest it in any way and to any degree, is by that very fact a sign or, what amounts to the same thing, a symbol of that idea; and it hardly matters whether a visual image or any other is involved, for this introduces no essential difference and changes absolutely nothing as to the principle of symbolism itself. In every case, symbolism is based on a relationship of analogy or correspondence between the idea to be expressed and the image, graphic, verbal, or any other, by which it is expressed. From this quite gencral point of view words themselves, as we have already stated, are not and cannot be anything but symbols. Instead of talking about an idea and an image, as we have just done, one could even speak still more generally of a correspondence between any two realities of different orders, a correspondence based on the nature of both at once; under these conditions a reality of a certain order can be represented by a reality of another order, the latter then being a symbol of the former.
With this principle of symbolism in mind, we see that it is evidently susceptible of a great variety of modalities; myth is simply a particular case, one of these modes; one could say that symbol is the genus and myth is one of its species. In other words, a symbolic narrative can be envisioned just as well, and by the same right, as a symbolic design, or, by the same right, as many other things that have the same character or play the same role; myths are symbolic recitals, as also are 'parables', which are essentially the same thing. [1] It does not seem to us that this point should present any difficulty
once we have understood the general and fundamental notions of symbolism.
Having established this much, we will clarify now the proper meaning of the word 'myth' itself, which can lead us to certain not unimportant remarks relating to the character and function of symbolism taken in its most specific sense, which not only differs from the ordinary sense, but even opposes it in certain respects. The word 'myth' is commonly regarded as a synonym for 'fable', taking this simply as any fiction, and usually a fiction clothed in more or less poetic dress. This is the result of the degeneration we spoke about at the beginning, and the Greeks, from whose language this term is borrowed, certainly share in the responsibility for what is really a profound alteration and deviation from the original meaning. Indeed, early on in all Greek forms of art, individual fantasy was given free rein, so that the arts, instead of remaining properly hieratic and symbolic, as among the Egyptians and the peoples of the East, soon took an altogether different direction, aiming less at instructing than at pleasing, and resulting for the most part in works almost devoid of any real and profound meaning (except for the elements that still subsisted, even if only unconsciously, from the previous tradition), in which we no longer find any trace of the eminently 'exact' science that true symbolism is. In short, this was the beginning of what can be called profane art, and it coincides noticeably with the beginning of that equally profane thought which, due to the exercise of the same individual fantasy in another domain, was to become known under the name of 'philosophy'. This fantasizing was cxercised especially on pre-existing myths. Poets, who from this point on were no longer sacred writers as at the beginning, nor retrained any 'supra-human' inspiration, so obscured and denatured these myths by developing them at the whim of their imagination and surrounding them with supcrfluous ornamentation that it becomes very difficult to uncover their meaning and to extract their essential elements, except perhaps by comparing them with similar symbols found clsewhere which have not suffered the same distortion. Thus, at least for most people, myth finally became nothing more than a misconstrued symbol, which it
remains for us moderns. But this is only an abuse and, we could say, a 'profanation' in the proper sense of the word; what we need to see is that before its deformation myth was essentially a symbolic recital, as we said above, and that this was its unique purpose; and from this point of view myth is not entirely synonymous with fable, for this last word (in Latin fabula, from fari, 'to speak') etymologically designates any recital whatsoever without specifying its intention or character, and even here the idea of a 'fiction' became attached to it only later. Thus these two terms, myth and fable, which have come to be seen as equivalent, are derived from roots that in fact have altogether opposite meanings, for whereas the root - of 'fable' designates the spoken word, that of 'myth' on the contrary, strange as it may seem at first glance since a recital is involved, designates silence.
In fact, the Greek word muthos, 'myth', comes from the root mu (found also in the Latin mutus, 'mute'), which represents a closed mouth and hence silence. [2] This is the meaning of the verb muein, 'to shut the mouth', 'to be silent' (which by extension also comes to mean 'to shut the eyes', both actually and figuratively). An examination of some of the derivatives of this verb is especially instructive. Thus from muo (infinitive muein) are immediately derived two other verbs with only slight differences in form, muao and mueo; the first has the same meanings as muo, and we must join to this another derivative, mullo, again meaning 'to shut the lips', and so to murmur without opening the mouth. [3] As for mueo-and this is most important-it signifies 'to initiate' (into the 'mysteries', a word derived from the same root, as we shall soon see, specifically
through the intermediary of mueo and mustes) and hence both 'to instruct' (though at first to instruct without spoken words, as was indeed the case in the mysteries) and 'to consecrate'; we might even have said 'to consecrate' first, if consecration meant, as it normally ought, the transmission of a spiritual influence, or the rite by which the latter is regularly transmitted. Later, in Christian ecclesiastical language, this same word came to mean the conferring of ordination, which is also very much a 'consecration' in this sense, although in an order differing from the initiatic order.
But, some will say, if the word 'myth' has such an origin, how could it designate a certain kind of narrative? It is because here the idea of 'silence' must be related to things that by their very nature are inexpressible, at least directly and in ordinary language, for one of the general functions of symbolism is effectively to suggest the inexpressible, to give a presentiment of it, or better said, to render it 'accessible' by virtue of the transpositions it makes possible from one order to another-from an inferior order to a superior one, from what can be grasped immediately to what can be grasped only with much greater difficulty-such being precisely the primary goal of myths. Besides, even in the 'classical' period, Plato still appealed to myths in order to expound concepts that went beyond the range of his habitual dialectical means; and these myths, which he certainly did not 'invent' but only 'adapted' (for they bear the unmistakable mark of a traditional teaching, something also evident in certain procedures he employs for the interpretation of words that compare to the nirukta in Hindu tradition), [4] are far from being merely the more or less negligible literary ornaments that commentators and modern 'critics' all too often see in them simply because it is so much easier thus to brush them aside without further inspection than to provide even an approximate explanation. On the contrary, they represent all that is most profound in Plato's thought, all that is most free from individual contingencies, and which, because of this very profundity, he cannot express in any other way than by symbols. With Plato, dialectic often includes a certain amount of 'playfulness', which is quite in keeping with the Greek mentality, but
when he abandons this for myth one may be sure that this playfulness has come to an end and that what is now at issuc has as it were a 'sacred' character.
In myth, then, what is said is something other than what is meant; and let us note in passing that this is also the etymological meaning of 'allegory' (from allo agoreuein, literally 'to say something clse'), which provides us another example of the deviations of meaning in current usage, for at present this word in fact designates only a conventional and literary representation with a merely moral or psychological intention, one that most often falls under the category of what is commonly called 'personified abstractions', and this, it hardly needs saying, could not be further from true symbolism. But coming back to myth, although it does not say what it means, it does suggest it by that analogical correspondence which is the very basis and essence of all symbolism, so that we could say one keeps silent in the very act of speaking, and that it is from this that myth draws its name. [5]
It remains to draw attention to the kinship of the words 'myth' and 'mystery', both deriving from the same root, the Greek word musterion, 'mystery', which is also directly related to the idea of 'silence'; and this can be interpreted in several different but related ways, each with its own raison d'être from a certain point of view. Let us note first of all that according to the derivation (from mueo) indicated above, the principal meaning of the word refers to initiation, and indeed, what were called 'mysteries' in Greek antiquity should be so understood. On the other hand, and this shows the truly peculiar destiny of certain words, the word 'mystical', closely related to the words just mentioned, applies etymologically to
everything concerning the mysteries; mustikos is in fact the adjectival form of mustes, 'initiated', and was therefore originally equivalent to 'initiatic' and designated everything related to initiation, to its doctrine and even to its goal (though in this ancient sense it was never applied to persons); now among moderns the same word 'mystical', alone among the terms derived from this common root, has come to designate solely something which, as we saw, has absolutely nothing to do with initiation, and is in certain respects even opposed to it.
Let us now return to the different meanings of the word 'mystery'. In its most immediate sense-in our opinion the crudest or at least the most outward - mystery is what we should not speak of, what we should keep silent about, what we are forbidden to disclose to the outside world. This is how it is ordinarily understood even when the ancient mysteries are in question, and in its present use the word hardly retains any other meaning than this. Nevertheless, even taking into account questions of opportuneness that must certainly have played a role from time to time but which were never anything but purely contingent, this prohibition against revealing rites and teachings must above all be seen as having a symbolic value, something we have already explained above in connection with the true nature of the initiatic secret. As we said, what was called the 'discipline of the secret' (which was just as obligatory in the primitive Christian church as in the ancient mysteries, something the religious adversaries of esoterism would do well to remember) seems to us to have been far from a mere precaution against hostility, as real and often dangerous as this hostility may have been due to the incomprehension of the profane world. We see other reasons of a much more profound order, reasons indicated by the other meanings of the word 'mystery'. We might also add that the close similarity between the words 'sacred' (sacratum) and 'secret' (secretum) is not simply coincidence; both involve something 'put aside' (secernere, 'to place apart', from which is derived the participle secretum), 'reserved', separated from the profane realm; similarly, a consecrated place is called templum, of which the root tem (found in the Greek temno, 'to cut', 'to cut off from', 'to separate', from which temenos, 'a sacred enclosure', is derived) also expresses the same
idea; and 'contemplation', derived from the same root, is again related to this idea by its strictly 'inward' character. [6]
The second meaning of the word 'mystery', which is already less outward, designates what must be received in silence, [7] what it is unsuitable to speak of; from this point of view all traditional doctrines, including religious dogmas, which constitute a particular case, may be called mysteries (the use of the word being then extended to domains other than the initiatic, though they too are domains in which a 'non-human' influence is exerted) because they are truths that by their essentially supra-individual and supra-rational nature are above all discussion. [8] Now, to link this meaning to the first, one might say that to lavish mysteries, so understood, indiscriminately on the profane is inevitably to expose them to discussion, a profane method par excellence, with all the resultant drawbacks, a method perfectly described by the word 'profanation', a term previously applied to something else but which here must be taken in both its most literal and most complete sense. The destructive work of modern 'criticism' with respect to all traditions is too eloquent an example of what we mean to require further emphasis. [9]
Finally, there is a third meaning, the most profound of all, according to which the mystery is strictly inexpressible, something one can only contemplate in silence (and here it is fitting to recall what was just said about the origin of the word contemplation); and since the inexpressible is also incommunicable, the prohibition against revealing the sacred teaching symbolizes, from this new
point of view, the impossibility of expressing by spoken words the real mystery for which this teaching is only, so to speak, a garment that both reveals and veils it. [10] Obviously, a teaching that concerns the inexpressible can only suggest it with the help of appropriate images, which then become supports for contemplation; from what we have explained, this amounts to saying that such a teaching necessarily acquires a symbolic form. This was always and among all peoples one of the essential characteristics of initiation into the mysteries, whatever name may have been given it, and we can therefore say that symbols, and particularly myths when the teaching is conveyed by words, truly constitute, according to their primary purpose, the very language of initiation.