People Have Told Myths

Chapter one of The Power of Myth articulates the purpose of myths in our world today. Moyers begins with the simple question, “Why myth?” Campbell responds that mythology “catches you” and provides clues to the questions that concern mankind.

Mythology serves to create an explanation for why the world is the way it is. All religions have mythology in them and myths help people understand history. Myth can mean so many different things to different people. Some myths are total fiction, while others may have a hint of truth in them. But most myths are more of a symbolic and metaphoric truth, rather than a literal truth, because most of the time myths cannot be proven and people are not trying to prove that they are true. Myths become true to the people who believe in them and they use them as a sort of lens through which they see the world. They use myths to create explanations for themselves as to why the world is the way it is and they use them to help cope with the difficulties of life. Myths are a natural outgrowth of our imagination and our passions.

A myth is a symbolic way of expressing truths and beliefs that are accepted by society. Myths, which are reading literature that is imaginative, teach truths that may not always have a basis for historical fact. Myths, which communicate ideas in story form, are creative stories that explain and teach religious truths of sin and consequence.

6. Imagine trying to explain some difficult concept to young children: why you were born, why life involves struggle, why women and not men bear children, or what happens to a person after death. Would your explanations qualify as myths? Explain why or why not.

A simple definition of a myth is a story handed down through history, often through oral tradition, that explains or gives value to the unknown. Myths are composed of stories or explanations. Myths are not always false sometimes they have some truth to them. They come to being by people making an assumption about a person based on their race.

Hearing, seeing and visualizing the future and our present is frustrating. Believing in what is called “reality” and “society” based off decisions that weren’t made by us, but by the past to protect the outcome of what should happen later. People search for clues to help stabilize and move forward in life in myths and many other sources. Myths are traditional stories that deal with a historical explanation of some natural or social event, usually associating with supernatural appearances. The ancient Greeks told their cosmos through teachings and tales concerning their gods and heroes, and the importance of the culture and ritual practices to show their natural state. The myth of the Amazons and the great story of Hercules explain the

What is a myth?, A myth is a traditional story about Greek gods and goddess they are famous throughout the ancient world and are usually pretty long. The Greeks used these myths to describe everyday events in the world take Hades, for example, there had to be someplace to go after death and they imagined the underworld and then they thought if there is an underworld we need someone to rule it. The Greeks even stories to explain the night the day and even the seasons.

You need myths to find your truth. You have elaborate myths to compare to everyday experiences and to other myths. “Myths give a meaning to life (Campbell, 5). Mythology is a collection of stories based on one’s knowledge and stories of experience. Myths are clues to life meaning. They are clues to “spiritual potentialities” or your potential to develop spiritually and finding your inner self. For example, marriage creates a transformation in us spiritually because it transforms our perspective of ourselves and our ability to sacrifice.

This newspaper article connects to the topic of myths. A myth involves several elements but the most important is the battle of good versus evil; this is a theme that is present in all myths. The purpose of a myth is the ability to project the underlying psychological truths, of the human race at the time. The truths found back then are often relevant to today’s society whether or not these truths are present in society. Myths address problematic issues or events in the society at the time. The hero is faced with a difficult task to fulfill in order to protect their people.

Humans as single beings want to find the meaning behind things. It gives us structure and a ‘backbone’ to go off of and create something from our experiences. This event can be about birth, death or even nature, which in turn, gives us a way to invent stories and put our lives in a setting beyond just living. There is a definite meaning behind myth and its evidence is in every story we read, whether it be a children’s story, a myth, or even a fairytale, it helps us find meaning in our life and cope with life events. Karen Armstrong puts this idea into words in her book, explaining how we created stories from our imagination, enabling us to make sense of our lives despite our hardships and to look beyond what we only want to see.

By reading myths, people can see that the creation myths illustrate the cultural beliefs of a society, when these myths were created by people, their thoughts and cultures determined what would happen in the stories, if they where scared of something, this would be many times the bad thing in the myth, representing the evil or something that people would be scared. Other factor that appear on the myths that are based in the cultural beliefs of that time are the gods, they represent everything that was important in that time, war, plantation, reproduction, etc. Concluding my idea, myths represent almost all the cultural beliefs that a society haves, and we can learn a lot of their culture by simply reading their

When students hear the word "myth," they succumb to the popular belief that mythology is necessarily something that is false. This is a good place to start a discussion about truth, inviting students to consider that there are other kinds of truth besides scientific truth (which is what gave a bad name to mythology in the first place). Consider this definition of myth: "The dramatic representation of culturally important truths in narrative form." Such a definition highlights the fact that myths represent or dramatize shared visions of the world for the people who hold them. Myths articulate the fundamental truths about the shape of the universe and the nature of

Myths are stories that are not true in a historical sense, but they can still explain human nature. Firstly, myths explain the danger of curiosity. For example, Pandora’s Box is an extremely popular myth that shows the potential danger of being too curious. In the myth, Zeus created a beautiful woman named Pandora and though her creation was successful, he gave her one major flaw; curiosity. Because of her curiosity, she opened a box that was not supposed to be opened and released all the evils into the world.

The exact origins of myths are unknown and have been changed or altered because myths were passed on orally before the invention of writing (Barnett 6). As stated by Barnett, “They developed and changed in the telling according to the customs, tastes, and needs of the tellers” (6).

In prehistoric cultures myths are stories which are passed down from the generation to generation, stories that have been told in the earlier centuries, and have been very popular in the world for a very long time. It helps people know further about the culture and what their family from diverse cohorts had to go through. A myth is sporadically based on a true occasion but, usually, it is just a story that has been made up to allow people to learn something significant or meaningful.