THE RATIONAL CONCEPT IN EXPLAINING THE WORLD STRUCTURE IN ANCIENT CHINESE AND ANCIENT GREECE MYTHOLOGY
Abstract
Humanity has a long history of exploring the mysteries of the universe and the world, and myths were the first interpretations of the origins of the world and natural phenomena by primitive ancestors. Ancient Chinese and ancient Greek mythology both arose during childhood in human development, and myths from this stage reflect the poetic understanding of the structure of the world by the first people of ancient societies. The myth of the world's origin mainly includes the beginning of the universe and the origin of all things. Famous Ancient Chinese myth about Pan Gu and Ancient Greek myth about Chaos contain the understanding of the world’s beginning from Eastern and Western civilizations. The study argues that differences between both myths are mostly structural. Analyzing the differences in the archetypes of thought and the characteristics of the concept of rationality as well as discussing similarities of those myths, it is proved that both creation myths greatly influenced the culture of the opposite parts of the World. They formed similar understanding of the world development as the moving from chaos to order and at the same time creating linear (West) and curvilinear (East) types of thinking, as well as heroic (West) and harmonious (East) understanding of the man-nature opposition.
Full text article
References
Chen Jianxian. Myth Interpretation: An Exploration of the Method of Parenthetical Analysis. Wuhan: Hubei Education Press, 1997. 297 p.
Engels, Friedrich. Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical German Philosophy. In: Marx Engels, Selected Works, vol. 4. Beijing: People's Publishing House, 1972. 1050 p.
Hesiod. Theogony. From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia, 1953. p. 170, 1022 lines.
Herodotus. History. Translated by Wang Jiajun. Beijing: The Commercial Press, 1959. 886 p.
Zhang, J. F. “The Seven Signs of Yunji.” In: Ancient Study, vol. 56, chap. 1: Qi Dharma of the Various Schools, with the order of the theory of vitality. Available at: http://book.sbkk8.com/gudai/daojiaoshuji/yunjiqiqian/103966.html
Li Fang, Li Mu, Xu Xuan. Taiping Yulan. Beijing: China Book Bureau, 1960. 626 p.
Liu An. Huai Nan Zi. Translated by Chen Guangzhong. Beijing: China Book Bureau, 2014. 614 p.
Lévi-Strauss, Claude. Structural Anthropology. Translated by Xie Weiyang and Yu Mengxuan. Shanghai: Shanghai Translation Press, 1995. 412 p.
Lévi-Strauss, Claude. Mythologiques: Le cru et le cuit. Translated by Zhou Changzhong. Beijing: People's University of China Press, 2007. 505 p.
Marx, Karl; Engels, Friedrich. Selected Works of Marx and Engels. Edited by the Bureau of Compilation of the Works of Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Stalin. Beijing: People's Publishing House, 1972. 803 p.
Pu, Andai. Chinese Narrative. Beijing: Peking University Press, 1996. 219 p.
Tao Yang; Zhong Xiu. Chinese Creation Myths. Shanghai: Shanghai People's Publishing House, 1989. 251 p.
Wang Hong; Zhao Zheng (trans. into English); Chen Cheng (trans. into Modern Chinese). The Classic of Mountains and Seas: The Classic of Areas Within the Seas. Hunan: Hunan People’s Publishing House, 2010. 355 p.
Ouyang, X. Collection of Arts and Literature, vol. 1, citing “San Wu Li Ji.” In: Siku Quanshu Chinese Encyclopedia, sub-ministerial books. Beijing: Commercial Press. 604 p.
Ye Shuxian. Mythological-Archetypal Criticism. Xi'an: Shanxi Normal University Press, 1987. 495 p.
Yu Jianzhang; Ye Shuxian. Symbols: Language and Art. Shanghai: Shanghai People's Publishing House, 1988. 326 p.
Authors
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Licensed under the Creative
Commons Attribution International License
(CC BY 4.0).
Copyright © by author(s).