A Myth’s Reflection

Strong myths are created by gifted artists striving to describe essential personal truths.

If done well, those essential truths described in the myth will be recognized by others whose experiences are similar. Each one who looks upon the myth sees a nearly exact rendering of their own experience causing them to be drawn close to the myth maker and to others who recognize the truth but it also deludes each one into thinking that the image the myth shows them is the exact same image the myth shows to each of the others. In other words, the myth comes to be seen as the truth itself.

And so, myth, the imperfect but powerful vessel into which human experience is poured comes to be seen, not as a general proposition or template encompassing the many imperfect truths, but as truth itself. That which should be a focal point for an outpouring of human expression for the purpose of drawing people together into a common experience and a common understanding becomes, instead, attempt to draw from the myth as if it is the source of the power. The problem with this is that the myth is a description or a rendering of many shared multi-faceted understandings having a common essence. The truth is only understood best by seeing many of the the facets; the myth is the guide to see the underlying essence or commonality of those facets. It is important as a guide but it has fewer dimensions and less complexity and less ambiguity than the truth it describes. The power drawn from it, then, is much less; if the flow is drawn from the myth to empower individuals it of necessity is a limited and puny power. If the flow, instead, is one that goes in the direction to the myth from the many human expressions, voicing similar experiences or similar truth, then the power is unlimited and magnified and vital.

Setting aside for the moment the question of whether Jesus is God or if the Christian God even exists, the fact is that there is no way to prove either and that each person’s understanding of Jesus and God is, and cannot be anything but, a personal, individual understanding that each believes to be perfectly described in the Bible, not knowing that each other person, whose experience and understanding are different, also think the Bible is the perfect description of their own experience. In other words the Bible’s description of God and of Jesus is a perfect myth example. It is a focal point. It is a means by which many individuals can draw close and attempt to find the commonalities in their experiences and rejoice in the similarities. It can be a powerful force in each of their lives. Similarly, if each stops pouring their own expressions of truth out and stops refining the myth and stops attempting to relate to it in their own words and stops finding the commonalities they have with others as they also express their experiences, and instead, decides that the myth is the truth itself, then they will be trading a vibrant, vital and powerful experience for an impotent, diluted and puny power.

It seems to me that not many Christians approach their faith this way. There should be no fear that the myth will become irrelevant or shifting sand. The power of great myths is that they so ably describe vital truths of human experience and are, therefore, lasting. The truth of human experience may be due to God’s influence and due to the divinity and resurrection of Jesus or it may be due to human drives and essences alone but, in either case, the myth is strong and vital and descriptive of true experience that is commonly held. A strong myth such as this is a wonderful stone against which each individual can press against and test their own experiences to see how closely the grooves and cracks and pores of their own lives mesh against those of the stone.

Prayer exemplifies the direction and degree of the flow that should be toward, not from, the focal point myth. Those of the conservative Christian faith view the Bible myth as the actual truth and pour nothing into it and do not test themselves against it. There is no room for a dialog with other believers as to how each interprets the Bible so that they may find the common ground of the Bible closest to the truth. To enter such a faith, to test one’s experience against a mere interpretation of the Bible, is seen as an admission of the inerrancy of the Bible. There is no room to consider that the inerrant truth imperfectly described in Biblical words is really outside of the Bible. So, conservative Christians expect the power to flow from the Bible to them and their prayer takes the form of examining the Bible myth and seeking the truth there and expecting the answers to their prayers to be found there and flow to them.

For others, the Christ story and the creation story are the best attempts of an artist rendering the truth from the artist’s own experience. It is the closest to truth that words can come but it is not the truth itself. The truth is in the comparison of each person’s experience held up to the Bible myth and tested against the myth to find the commonalities of experiences with others and with the myth maker. Their prayer is an outpouring of all they find within themselves that resonates with the myth and a delight in how well the myth describes their own experience. Their prayer is a communion also with others who relate as they do. The prayer and the fellowship is vital and vibrant and powerful. In this way the atheist can pray with the theist.

Said another way, let’s say that God exists and that Jesus is God and has been resurrected and lives in a spiritual realm where he influences our lives and waits to judge and reward the dead and resurrected. Words alone, whether divinely inspired or not, are an imperfect representation of the truth. Words can only be an imperfect reflection of the truth. The Bible’s words, though, give us something to bump up against, something to test our experience against, something by which we say, “This that I am reading I relate to. This that I am reading resonates with an experience in my life. I know what this means when it says, for instance, perfect love casts our all fear. I may understand it in some ways differently than you but those words tie us together. There is something in those words that we each relate to and we know that there is something we have both experienced in common that is true.” This is the power of myth. It is a superb artist’s expression that is so good that it stands the test of time and we know that it speaks of something true and common to all. If I, as an atheist, resonate with those same truths and those same experiences, the only difference in your communion and mine is that I attribute that experience to our common humanity, alone, while you attribute it to a God who inspired the artist to write the words to direct you to those truths. We nonetheless have found a commonality, a communion, a touchstone and focal point that draw us together.

I personally believe that the more Christians stop looking to the Bible and church doctrine as the truth itself and instead look to the Bible’s teachings and doctrine as focal touchstone that enables and requests a pouring forth of each one’s own experience and encourages each one to enter a dialogue with others as to how each interprets the myth in their own experience, the more vital and powerful the religion will be. It’s as if, not being able to look on the glory of God directly, the artist stood God at his back shining his image through the artist to write the myth. When we each look upon the reflection of that myth, each from a slightly different perspective, we can compare how each of our perspectives differs and discover the commonality that is the truth. Some of us may think that truth is God, some of us may think that truth comes only from ourselves but we all have something upon which we can have a dialogue and test our experiences. The only ones with whom we cannot have this conversation are those who insist that the artist’s words are themselves the truth and that the truth they see must be the only truth that others must see.