Timeless Tales E-Book

Maher Asaad Baker

• Herausgeber: tredition
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 68

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Beschreibung

In the human veins there is effluence of the stream of the stories which carries heal of the myths and the legends for as long as the world existed. In "Timeless Tales", we go through this vast area of these interesting stories in an effort to evaluate their body and soul and determine the impact of society, psychology today and in arts and contemporary literature. As for our voyage, it starts with the Greco-Egyptian lore that has no beginning and end and is heralded by the frozen civilized bleakness of the North. We get into the worlds of gods and heroes and meet with such representations within ourselves and our lives. Through the twists and turns of the stories, profound messages are revealed regarding such things as confusion and structure, pain and ecstasy, annihilation and resurrection. This book is more than the straightforward analysis of mythology; it is an attempt to awaken the world to the value of stories and finite; it is a call to face the questions that have been asked since the dawn of time and to live fully in the face of mystery.

Leseprobe

Maher Asaad Baker

Timeless Tales

© 2024 Maher Asaad Baker

ISBN Softcover: 978-3-384-32073-5

ISBN Hardback: 978-3-384-32074-2

ISBN E-Book: 978-3-384-32075-9

ISBN Large print: 978-3-384-32076-6

This work, including its parts, is protected by copyright. The author is responsible for the contents. Any exploitation is prohibited.

Cover image designed by Freepik

Contents

Introduction

Mythological Foundations

Significance

Contemporary Cultural Reinterpretation

Illustrative Examples

Contemporary Mythology

Glossary and Timeline

Mythological glossary

Ancient Mythologies Timeline

Disclaimer

About the Author

Introduction

Folk and historical myths have always been considered significant in the history of the world and they should concern today’s inhabitants of the Earth.

It is thus clear that folktales have been in circulation for decades, and have equally entertained and terrified people at different epochs. For the greater part these mythological and epic stories with characters like gods, heroes and magical creatures were not mere repetitions of the thing in the ancient world. In the contemporary society, myths and legends are not perceived as significant with people relying on science. Even though as characters, they remain figments of the author’s imagination, they are able to inform the reader on aspects such as human behaviour, morality, faith, and creativity.

As for the definition of the concept the myth and legends point to the traditional stories that are shot with the help of actors, with reference to the setting, and other aspects of the modern culture.

Myths are said to be traditional or epic stories that pertain to the historical past of a community or the events behind the existence of the phenomena in the natural world. Nearly all of them operate characteristics from super normal beings, persons, and other elements seen in religion and culture all over the globe. Myths are the popularised stories which are embedded in a chronological period considered before history or beginning of man. Some of them concern the beginnings of traditions and culture, faith and some of the characteristics of the environment.

There is a very thin line between deriving legends and myths but legends are concerned with the extraordinary skills of humans. Essentially, they are the types of narratives that history acknowledges but which do not hold steady ground, or else amorphous reiterations. As it has been noted earlier, legends have a nature of popularizing history events and turning such evident facts into stories that speak of heroes with unique abilities and outstanding performances. Other legends are mythological or completely invented but a search for the place has been made and a time is given.

Folk tales and myths have been practiced for thousands of years and are attributed to the preliterate communication where one generation passes the stories to the next generation of man. Myths that are defined as traditional stories that belonged to a certain society and introduced that society, explained how and why something began, why people started to do such things, how people died and what happened next, and who people were and what they were like in relation to the gods, were used to recount the beginning of the world and the beginning of man, the traditions of a certain culture and its rituals, and the occurrence and consequences of death. In the advanced manifestations of culture and literacy the myths and legends were written down in epics. For an instance, Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, Virgil’s Aeneid, Epic of Gilgamesh, Norse, and the Hindu Vedas are regarded as epics that consist of myths of a given culture.

Myths and legends served several vital functions in ancient cultures:Many of the myths and legends played several important roles in ancient societies as follows:

- Explain Natural Phenomena: The myths were probably giving descriptions on natural phenomena that early societies perhaps could not probe into scientifically for instance, sunrise, seasons, weather, geographical features and life and death. It provided people with solace since it was believed that unjustified outcomes in nature’s behavioral evidences were the manifestation of gods; thus, people were relatively less hopeless while watching the destruction.

- Validate Cultural Practices: These mythologies were hence employed by various cultures to explain why they practiced what they implemented, their behavior and even the social setup they put in place. Myths came in to explain or complete what science and knowledge did not provide answers to ; for instance why people went through a rite of passage, why is the world controlled by men and not women? The has however, brought about a feeling of belonging as well as an assigned responsibility to the people.

- Provide Moral Guidance: Often the myths show the consequences of such sins as pride, behaving evil and performing evil actions and disobedience to Gods while virtues are more often punished: courage, generosity , willingness to die for others and the like ; it showed the ancients how Gods conceived people should act or should not act.

- Explain the Unknown: They provided accounts of how and why things happened and responded to questions which even in the modern world give hard=time to respond to, the questions that are; what happens when one dies, the formation of the universe, creation of people and other questions for which there were no answers. Most cultures have myths relating to afterlife and creation despite the difference in the type of cultures. Thus, these stories offered people a shield against the unknown and, consequently, gave them security and tranquility.

- Transmit Tradition and History: Because early people did not have an opportunity to write, they passed the knowledge necessary for the successful survival of the next generation in the form of stories and myths. Here, the ancients were in a position to impart the said information from one generation to the other without the help of writing but with the help of narratives.

- Provide Entertainment: Folk had received myths and legends from poets and bards who enacted the tales, emotions and all, before there was television and books. We understand that fairy tales were even more developed and the listeners were entertained in the same way, today’s movies entertain by the camp fire. The other roles of the myths were perhaps more important, but fun was definitely not one of them.

Therefore, observing these shows individuals might get the impression that myths, legends have no role to play in today’s society. Today’s people in general can in no way regard such stories as real stories about the sky and the earth. However, mythology still plays an influential role in the modern world in the following ways: Thus, mythology cannot be considered to be unimportant in the contemporary world in the following aspects:

1. It is also required to enlighten the students concerning previous beliefs and culture.

The myths are essential for the modern society because they enable people to understand how the ancient civilizations treated life and the world that people could be confined to before scientific methods where brought into the picture. About the techniques that the early people used in their thinking, the values that they employed and the whole process of their belief system myths offer an understanding. They depict the cultural similarities and differences over time and between different societies that are relevant even up to date. Realizing that such notions, using at least one example, are inherited from ancestors makes people describe their similarity.

2. Informatively impacting Modern Sociology and Psychology

Both Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell were philosophers and thinkers and they both tried to study myths of all societies and cultures and concluded that all the symbols and all the archetypes are derived from the collective-unconsciousness. It may be concluded here that it is possible to explain certain patterns like such the hero’s journey and keep thinking that they are embedded universally as, in fact, they often originate in the subconscious level. Thus, myths continue the tradition of indicating that the Africans of the present age have the same soul issues, questions, and search for identity and meaning as the ancestors, although they, perhaps, inhabit different material environments. Particularly, myths are the most striking an influential type of narrative because they give one an understanding of the essential constituents about one being and make one consider the holding principle in the given society.

3. Appreciating Literature and Art