Myth And The Existential Quest

The Faustus myth, before being identified as a myth, was the folktale of a man named Faustus who lived in Germany. Underneath the popularity of this myth lies the basic human instinct to trespass the limits of traditional knowledge in pursuit of self-definition, authentic knowledge and power. This search and transgression also involve the desire to exercise the right of making free authentic choices. Faustus represents universal issues that are relevant for all human beings, which explains the reason why he has acquired mythic stature. Indeed, a most persistent myth has evolved, the appeal of which has led one writer after the other to reshape it. After his story became popular, he reappeared, even in contemporary culture, in different art forms such as literature, both high-brow and popular, including comics, the ballet and the opera. The real historical Faustus came onto the scene as a scholar and persistently reappeared in literature assuming different identities which, however, shared basically the same qualities. This book demonstrates and offers different perspectives to versions of the Faustus myth in literature: Christopher Marlowe’s The Tragical History of the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus, Goethe’s Faust and John Fowles’ The Magus. The Faustus Myth is a cycle which starts and ends in tragic circumstances in Christopher Marlowe’s Renaissance Faustus, in salvation in Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s Faust, and in meaninglessness, ambiguous collapses in John Fowles’ existentialist Nicholas Urfe.

The task given to the authors of the essays in this collection-3 scholars from 3 different continents-was to examine the phenomenon of intelligence. Human and animal intelligence is known to us. Extra-terrestrial intelligence and artificial intelligence are now serious topics for debate and discussion.

Ripinsky-Naxon explores the core and essence of shamanism by looking at its ritual, mythology, symbolism, and the dynamics of its cultural process. In dealing with the basic elements of shamanism, the author discusses the shamanistic experience and enlightenment, the inner personal crisis, and the many aspects entailed in the role of the shaman.

This book will attempt to achieve a constructive and positive correla tion between mythic-symbolic language and philosophical anthropolo gy. It is intended as a reflection on the philosophical accomplishment of Paul Ricoeur. The term mythic-symbolic language in this context means the language of the multivalent symbol given in the myth with its psychological and poetic counterparts. The term symbol is not con ceived as an abstract sign as it is used in symbolic logic, but rather as a concrete phenomenon - religious, psychological, and poetic. The task inherent in this correlation is monumental when one considers the dual dilemma of problematic and possibility which is at its heart. The prob lematic arises out of the apparent difficulty presented by the so-called challenge of modernity which seems to require the elimination of my thic-symbolic language as an intelligible mode of communication. Mythic-symbolic language is sometimes eliminated because in a world molded by abstract conceptualizations of science, such a language is thought to be unintelligible. The claim is that its "primitive" explana tions have been transcended by our modernity. Others believe that the problem of mythic-symbolic language is the problem of the myth. If the mythic forms of language could be eliminated, the truth of such language could be preserved through its translation into an intelligible mode of discourse. The problematic is heightened further by the relation of consider ations of language to philosophical anthropology. Any consideration of language involves a related view of the nature of man.

Walsh explores the role that myth has played in the interpretation of the Bible. He sees myth as an empowering, structuring story used either for good or ill and either consciously or unconsciously controlling our world views. Walsh looks for both the empowerment and the marginalization effected by myth as he follows the word through its myriad meanings ('Grasping Proteus'), its use in various disciplines ('Procrustean Mythographers'), its distinctive uses in biblical interpretation ('Mything the Bible'), and, finally, the mythic character of interpretation itself ('The Myth of Interpretation'). The concluding chapter, 'Behind the Mythic Curve', muses on the difficulty of knowing the myths by which we live and reflects hopefully on the possibility of play among the myriad myths in a postmodern, pluralist world.

This overview of McCarthy’s published work to date, including: the short stories he published as a student, his novels, stage play and TV film script, locates him as a icocolastic writer, engaged in deconstructing America’s vision of itself as a nation with an exceptionalist role in the world. Introductory chapters outline his personal background and the influences on his early years in Tennessee whilst each of his works is dealt with in a separate chapter listed in chronological order of publication.

First published in 1998, this collection of ten essays transforms our understanding of both the role of philosophical anthropology in modern world philosophy and the origins of tribal knowledge in their relation to contemporary assessments of cognition and consciousness. Ethnographic data from geographically distant cultures - such as the Maori of New Zealand, the Fore of New Guinea, the Sea Nomads of the Andaman, the Cowlitz of North America, the Maya, Australian Aborigines, Siberian Shamans - are carefully crafted toward an empirical basis for discussing a variety of phenomena traditional labelled in Western thought as transcendent or metaphysical. This anthology is a valuable source of information relevant for any theories of knowledge and a solid challenge for reductionist models of consciousness. The essays enhance our recognition and appreciation of fundamental similarities as well as differences in world views and cultural perspectives related to knowledge claims. This anthology illustrates unplumbed depths of human consciousness, reveals experiential understandings beyond linguistic thought, and stands aside from the view that behaviour and intelligence can be understood by deterministic principles. This volume of essays should be read with stereoscopic vision: one lens focusing on the rich ethnographic material of folk societies, the other focusing on the wider awareness of how we come to know what we know. It features specialists in philosophy, ethnology and comparative sociology, comparative religion, cross-cultural psychology, physical anthropology, environmental and marine scientists, Indian affairs, anthropology, comparative literature, shamanism and theoretical biology. These contributors explore issues including individuality in relational cultures, Maori epistemology, shamanistic knowledge and cosmology and images of conduct, character and personhood in the Native American tradition.