The obvious linguistic dimension of myth is not exempt from philosophical problems. The
first approximation to the relation between language and myth would make us
think that the latter is a species of the former, for there are communicative
forms, like a political constitution, or a mathematical reasoning, that,
in principle, do not create scenarios with categories of traditional myths.
However, if we examine a political constitution in more detail, we can see
scenarios that in a direct or derived manner make reference to mythological settings.
Thus, for instance, in the Constitution
of Athens,[1]
underlying the comments of Aristotle concerning the administrative proceedings of
democracy itself and the laws, we find concepts such as
those of Diké, justice, or Eunomía, order, that appear in Hesiod’s poem
as the consorts of Zeus,[2] addressing
to a specific mythological world. In fact, the poems of Solon that appear in the Aristotelian text are loaded with mythic concepts in order
to make intelligible, after the idea of purpose, the
democratic actions which are described in them, using Athens’ Lebenswelt as
a final referent. The Athenian case
can be extended to other constitutions, for the concepts used in them belong to
the world of the community’s life,
inevitably linked to some mythology. And
with mathematics, as a communicative linguistic form founded on
Ancient traditions, something similar occurs. Pythagoreans identified numbers with gods, like Platonists, who did
not only share with them the sacred character of numbers, but
also used the myths of Greek tradition as symbols to deal, intuitively, with philosophical
matters. Nonetheless, the religious treatment of mathematics is far from being a characteristic of the Ancient world. With
the emergence of modern science, Galileo, and a
long list of mathematicians, considered that mathematics was the language of God,[3] and
in the midst of the 20th Century, Platonist authors such as Kurt
Gödel believed that a mathematical logic procedure provided a proof for God’s existence,[4] what
is equivalent to believe in the congruence of the concept of God (of the Leibnizian Judeo-Christian
tradition) with the concept of the logical
system. The very same idea of the need for a logico-ontological proof
implies that the concept of a supreme
being is not something that can be intuitively attained, for it needs the
help of a transcendental category, like
the ones appearing in myths. As we
saw above, the categorical transcendental structure of mythological scenarios
is not enough to define myths, but it
is interesting to observe that it neither would be the provisional definition of myth that we have adopted after its
communicative functionality, since there are processes of identity formation which do not conform to the traditional
ideas of what myths might be: a political constitution is no less a
founder of the group’s identity than an archaic myth could be. And something
similar could be said about mathematics, for its degree of development in
different cultures has determined the economic life of the human group, something
which at the same time determines the identity of the group itself, that is, it is also a communicative
process from which foundational identity actions are derived. Then, it seems that it is not so
simple to separate communicative linguistic forms that we do not consider
mythical from the ones which we openly recognize as such.
This is a fragment of Chapter 2.1, of Volume I of Mythopoetics.
[1] By Aristotle or one of his
students. See the translation of F.G. Kenyon in The Complete Works of Aristotle. Vol. II. Ed. Cit. p.p.2341-2383.
[2] See Hesiod. Theogony. V.902. Translated
by Hugh G. Evelyn-Whyte. Harvard University Press and William Heinemann.
Cambridge (Mass.) and London. 1982. p.144.
[3] See Galileo. Opere.
4.171. Fragment in Morris Kline Mathematical Thought: from ancient to modern
times. Oxford University Press. Vol. 1 New York and Oxford. 1990. p.p
328-329.
[4] See the proof in Kurt Gödel, Ontological Proof. Collected
Works. Vol.3. Edited by Solomon Feferman; John W. Dawson, Jr. ; Warren Goldfarb;
Charles Parsons; Robert N. Solovay. Oxford University Press. New
York. 1995 .p.403. The proof of God’s existence uses the concepts of modal logic applied to
Leibniz’s argument. Leibniz bases his proof
on the concept of an Ens perfectissimum,
whose qualities are all perfections, or simple positive qualities that cannot
be limited. Since they are not limited by any quality, if they are possible,
must be actual.
