Mythic Method: L'7
Choice of Name: Because images are so central, names like imagic and imaginative were considered, and poetic also seemed possible. Mythic was chosen because ancient myths are the purest example of this use of language.
Essence
This is the language of transcendence. As in a dream, things, words, events, indeed anything, are used to provide guidance about the nature of an underlying or overarching Absolute Reality. The images commonly indicate what is required to align with this reality.
The thought processes here do not follow logically or conventionally from one step to the next, and may at times be engulfing and overwhelming. The result embodies a deep primal power and, because it may touch profound spiritual depths, can seem mysterious or mystical.
Features
Mythic communication is:
- magical—because it may be associated with the impossible happening;
- spiritual—because it engages with the soul or cosmos rather than the personal ego-self;
- counter-intuitive—without relevance to past experiences or personal views;
- imperative—because it touches and conveys a supreme power.
Examples
Sefer Yetzirah
The original book, of which there are several versions, is in Hebrew. It reads like solemn blank verse. Authorship is unknown, but attribution is made to the Patriarch Abraham (which =1800 BCE). Earliest commentaries are from the 10th century CE. The book is thought to contain secrets for creating a golem, a living creature from inanimate matter, through use of letters-words and meditative techniques. (It could be argued that THEE is a golem.)
See what you make of a few extracts.
Ch. 1:1 With 32 mystical paths of Wisdom engraved Yah the Lord of Hosts the God of Israel the living God King of the universe El Shaddai Merciful and Gracious High and Exalted Dwelling in eternity Whose name is Holy—he is lofty and holy—
And He created His universe with three books, with text, with number and with communication.
Ch. 2:1 Twenty-two foundation letters Three Mothers Seven Doubles
and Twelve Elementals
The Three Mothers are Alef Mem Shin
Their foundation is a pan of merit a pan of liability and the tongue of decree deciding between them, Mem hums, Shin hisses, and Alef is the Breath of air deciding between them.
Ch. 3:7 He made the letter Alef king over Breath and He bound a crown to it.
And He combined them one with another.
And with them He formed Air in the Universe, The temperate in the Year, And the chest in the Soul. The male with AlefMemShin. And the female with AlefShinMem.
The above is taken from a translation by Aryeh Kaplan (Weiser Books, 1997) who provides an extensive introduction and modern-day commentary without which the text would be largely meaningless for almost everyone.
Greek Heroes: Perseus
Read a summary of the Perseus story in Wikipedia
.
Notice the many strange phenomena: oracles that come true despite the efforts to prevent them; frequent interactions of gods and mortals including sex—Perseus is son of Zeus and a woman; magical aids including a special polished shield, a cap of darkness, and winged sandals to fly; non-divine non-human old women who share a single eye between them; the winged horse (Pegasus) and its brother, a warrior (Chrysaor = 'golden sword'), who spring from Medusa's neck following her decapitation; fatal consequences of boasting about beauty; slaying of a monster to win a wife (Andromeda).
Perseus was viewed as a historical figure by the Greeks. Herodotus made him an ancestor of the Persians and the great hero Hercules. Perseus and Andromeda were put up in the sky as constellations.
Wilber's Theory of Consciousness
Ken Wilber has integrated a range of concepts and philosophies in his Integral Theory of consciousness. He calls it a theory of everything. In his A Brief History of Everything, the exposition is primarily conceptual e.g. the basic moral intuition is: protect and promote the greatest depth for the greatest span. Sounds like jargon? Sure, but jargon is perfectly normal in conceptual accounts. To help explain the concepts, Gestalt use of language is also employed at times with dramatic metaphors. However, Wilber ends some key chapters with a burst of Mythic language clearly introduced to entrance and possibly seduce or mystify the reader. Note use of image, arcane capitalization, repetition, and unorthodox spelling in the following paragraphs.
End of Ch.2: "The whole game is undone, this nightmare of evolution, and you are exactly where you were prior to the beginning of the whole show. With a sudden shock of the utterly obvious, you recognize your own Original Face, the face you had prior to the Big Bang, the face of utter Emptiness that smiles as all creation and sings as the entire Kosmos—and it is all undone in that primal glance, and all that is left is the smile, and the reflection of the moon on a quiet pond, late on a crystal clear night."
End of Ch.13: "Abide as Emptiness, embrace all Form. The liberation is in the Emptiness, never in the Form, but Emptiness embraces all forms as a mirror embraces all its objects. So the Forms continue to arise, and, as the sound of one hand clapping, you are all those Forms. You are the display. You and the universe are One Taste. Your Original Face is the purest Emptiness, and therefore every time you look in the mirror, you see only the entire Kosmos."
End of the book to capture the "integral vision": "And there, hidden in the secret cave of the Heart, where Emptiness embraces all Form as the lost and found Beloved, where Eternity joyously sings the praises of noble Time, where Shiva uncontrollably swoons for luminescent Shakti, where Ascending and Descending erotically embrace in the sound of one hand clapping—there forever in the universe of One Taste, the Kosmos recognizes its own true nature, self-seen in a tacit recognition that leaves not even a single soul to tell the amazing tale. And remember? There in the Heart, where the couple finally unite, the entire game is undone, this nightmare...". [continues by repeating the paragraph from the end of Ch. 2 above.]
Criticisms: Fair and Unfair
The break from everyday reality is at its zenith and accounts here are viewed as mysterious at best, and unbelievable or delusional at the extreme. Commitment to the communication may lead to charges of superstition or infantile credulity. Sometimes the communication is perfunctory and reflects blind orthodoxy, in which case it will not serve its function.
The distinctive features of the seven methods for using language (PH'5) have now been presented with examples. The next section elaborates the properties further and considers the dualities, and then the TET is developed.
Originally posted: 5-Jan-2013. Last amended: 10-Feb-2023.
