On Rehabilitation of Myth and Extension of Limits of the Rationality in Philosophical Thought of 19th – 20th Century

Abstract

The article aims to create a thorough alternative to educative and positivist views regarding the historical and anthropological position of the myth. The purpose of the article is to present how a new way of addressing the myth was introduced in the history of the philosophical thought of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, which views the myth as an integral part of human rationality. The author suggests that the rehabilitation of myth is a part of a general inclusive approach which continues in the philosophy of modern times and involves a substantial expansion of the limits of what can be considered as rational. The study is based on the ideas of such influential thinkers and researchers of the myth as Friedrich Schelling, Max Muller, Ernst Cassirer, Susanne Langer, and Hans Blumenberg. The article demonstrates the importance of a linguistic turn in the study of myth, conducted by M. Muller, and it is shown that his idea of myth as “a disease of language” is strongly connected to the rethinking of the essence and purpose of the philosophy initiated by Ludwig Wittgenstein and the representatives of the Vienna Circle. The author asserts that the supplementation of a linguistic dimension by anthropological approach, suggested by E. Cassirer and his follower S. Langer, as well as a consideration of myth as a selfsufficient symbolic form, leads to the rejection of the contradiction between mythological and rational thinking and facilitates the understanding of the close connection between myth and language. Despite the fact that E. Cassirer developed his philosophy of symbolic forms and remained in general within the tradition of transcendental idealism, while S. Langer, on the contrary, rejected idealism, they both reached similar conclusions in the view of myth. Based on the work of H. Blumenberg and other researchers, is the author presents that the rehabilitation of myth and its incorporation into rational limits are closely linked to the rehabilitation of metaphor as another form of non-discursive expression. It is shown that the recognition of myth as inevitable part of world perception contributes to a deeper understanding of the nature of human thinking. Article received 05.02.2019