Mythen, Scheppingsmythen

(1) Mircea Eliade “Aspects du mythe” Gallimard 1963; “We have seen that there are several possibilities to go back, but the most important are: 1. the prompt and direct reintegration of the first situation [either Chaos or the pre-cosmogonic state, or the moment of creation] , and 2. the gradual return to the ‘origin’, going back in Time, from the present moment to the ‘absolute beginning’ In the first case, it is a question of, a dizzying, even instantaneous, abolition of the Cosmos [or of the human being as a result of a certain temporal duration] and the restoration of the original situation [‘Chaos’ or – at the anthropological level – the ‘seed’, the ‘embryo’]. The resemblance is evident between the structure of this method and that of the mythic-ritual scenarios of precipitated regression to ‘Chaos’ and the reiteration of cosmogony. / In the second case, that of the gradual return to origin, we are dealing with a meticulous and exhaustive recollection of personal and historical events. Certainly, in this case also the ultimate goal is to ‘burn’ these memories, to abolish them in a way by reliving them and by detaching from them. But it does not act to erase them instantly in order to reach the original moment as quickly as possible. On the contrary, the important thing is to remember even the most insignificant details of existence [present or previous], because it is only thanks to this memory that one manages to ‘burn’ his past, to master it, to ‘prevent intervening in the present. /

 (2) Passim: We can see the difference with the first type, whose model is the instantaneous abolition of the World and its re-creation. Here, memory plays the capital role. One gets rid of the work of Time by remembrance, by anamnesis. The main thing is to remember all the events that we have witnessed in time. This technique is therefore linked to the Archaic conception that we have discussed at length, with the importance of knowing the origin and the history of a thing, in order to be able to master it. Certainly, the going back in time imposes an experience dependent on personal memory, while the knowledge of the origin is reduced to the apprehension of an exemplary primordial history, of a myth. But the structures are homologable. It is always a question of remembering, what happened in the beginning, and since then. / We touch here on a capital problem not only for the intelligence of myth, but above all for the subsequent development of mythical thought. Knowledge of the origin and the exemplary history of things grant a spell of magical mastery over things. But this knowledge also opens the way for systematic speculation on the origin and structures of the World. We will come back to this problem. However, we must now specify that memory is considered the connaissance par excellence. The one who is able to remember himself has a magic-religious force even more precious than the one who knows the origin of things.”