When Myth Is the Message
This personal reflection is part of a series called The Big Ideas, in which writers respond to a single question: What is history? You can read more by visiting The Big Ideas series page.
We in the modern world tend to understand the word 'myth' as a synonym for 'falsehood.' But that is not how our ancestors understood it. Indeed, the ancient mind did not draw the same line between myth and fact that we do.
Whether we are speaking of Zeus forcing his father to vomit up his siblings or Jesus being born in a manger, these tales were never meant to be read as factual reports. They were meant to fire the imagination, to illuminate hidden truths and, most of all, to bring about transformation. The power of myth lies in its capacity to move a listener from one state of being to another — from confusion to clarity, from despair to hope, from disorientation to meaning.
Myths are the packaging for truth. They are the language of religion.
Scripture deals in what might be called 'sacred history,' a narrative realm that blends fact and fiction to convey timeless truths. The authors and transmitters of these sacred texts were not seeking facts; they were seeking meaning.
Our modern conception of history — the critical analysis of observable and verifiable past events — is only a handful of centuries old. It arose alongside the Enlightenment and the scientific method in the 1600s, and while immensely valuable, it is not the lens through which sacred texts were written.
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