The Origin and Functioning of Myth: Linguistic Conditions

The article identifies two approaches to determining the linguistic conditions of the emergence and functioning of the myth. The first approach assumes that the myth is a manifestation of unconscious (M. Müller) or conscious (E. Cassirer, R. Barthes) distortion of language. Within this approach it is impossible to escape from myth because the presentation of the facts of the world in language is inescapable, which is always imperfect. These distortions are meant for political influence, as according to the proponents of the conscious mythologizing of language. Philosophy is tasked with resisting such distortions and, consequently, myth creation in general. This approach seems simplified, because the myth is identified here with the linguistic form of its distribution, reduced to the analysis of distortions of language presentation. At the same time, the psychological and epistemological preconditions of the myth, its unique status in the life of communities are lost. Conditions for the development of the second approach arise through the critique of classical rationality by several influential thinkers who undermined the belief in the exclusive ability of discursive language to present the truth (F. Nietzsche, L. Wittgenstein, M. Heidegger). The second approach assumes that the myth emerges and continues to exist due to the inability of the logos to present some important aspects of reality, especially its existential dimension (P. Tillich, H. Blumenberg, L. Hatab, K. Morgan). In this case, myth and logos become alternative and at the same time closely connected linguistic ways of presenting the truth. Logos (the language of science) presents primarily abstract causal connections of essences. At the same time, mythical narratives are better than science at presenting the mysteries of origin and existence, creating a hierarchy of values for communities.