On the philosophy’s “threshold”:
from Myth to Logos
Mythology is a
system of legends,
in which is stated
the understanding
of the emergence
and structure of
the world and
man as its
inherent element.
Myth is the first form
of cultural activity of
man.
Cosmogonic myths
are about the origin
of the universe.
Cosmological myths
are about the
structure of the
universe
Hesiod
This way, the myth had the
function to explain how the world
was created and pass this
information from generation to
generation. As to say, the myth is a
kind of collective memory of a
people or a nation.
Myth fulfilled also the function
to keep and preserve the
ancient order of the society, as
far as the knowledge goes from
ancestors, thus gives that
knowledge something sacral
and inviolable.
Myth arranged the order of the
society in consequence of the
reproduction of the inherited
customs and, this way, this process
can repeat for a very long time,
without any changes. The myth
made the world “closed” and
cyclic.
Myth affected the feeling of the man
and did not affect his judgment.
Consequentially, there was no need to
find a rational explication to the
phaenomena of the nature.
Myth affected the feeling of the man
and did not affect his judgment.
Consequentially, there was no need
to find a rational explication to the
phaenomena of the nature. The myth
had the main aim to create
archetypes and “behavioral” pattern
for the man.
On the contrary, the philosophy
found its origin not in the
mythological samples, but in the
creation of ideas and conceptions.
The philosophy is a process coming
from the human for the human
and not from the supernatural.
Philosophy arose in new social and
political conditions of the Greek city –
state (πόλις) (VI- V century) , where
developed a new political form such as
democracy. As you can easily
understand, the most important
consequence of the democracy was
freedom. The power was in the hand
of the Ecclesiae (the popular
assembly), where every citizen had the
right to defend his ideas, opinions, and
so on. The orator became an
important figure in Athens and the
power of the word took the place of
the authority. Thus, the
argumentation, the discussion, the
dispute were the centre of the
intellectual life of that time. The man
of the city state had the desire to
know and change his knowledge,
no more being satisfied with the explication of
the myth.
The philosophy helped the process of
development of the man towards the real
knowledge. Knowledge is the opposite of the
ignorance, as far as knowledge is our
conception, which corresponds to reality.
Knowledge destroys the illusions and the false
meaning in order to create a new, true
conception of the world. On this ground we can
see how the Logos (λόγος) came on.
Originally this word meaning "a ground", "a
plea", "an opinion", "an expectation", "word",
"speech", "account", "to reason“. For the first
time Logos was a word used by Heraclitus and
he thought that it was an Universal law:
“Nothing happens by accident, but logos and
necessity”. Plato said that logos had three
different significances: thinking expressed in
words; the enumeration of the characteristic of
a thing; the determination of a special feature
of a thing, which differs it from all the other
things. The Logos is the “right word” also.
By the way, the Logos is an universal principle
which will play a great role in the European
philosophy , particularly in the Hegel’s theory,
and in our cultural history also, if we consider
that Logos was used in the Bible, where it is
identified with Jesus Cristh. This way, we can
easily understand, that the Logos found the
ontological way of the European philosophical
world. More than this, the philosophy gave the
birth to the search for the ultimate principles
and beginning of the world.