Understanding Myths and Rituals in Religious History

The truth of myths is as follows:

• Myths aim to provide a horizon of meaning for building a valid existence. They may offer scientific or historically verifiable truths. For example, the vocation of Mohammed is not only meaningful but also a verifiable historical narrative.
• In the history of religions, myths express sacred truths. Their value depends on how this truth affects those who proclaim or hear it. From this perspective, myths are not formally different from legends or stories. The differences lie in their structure and influence.

Differences Between Myths, Legends, and Stories

Most Important Rituals

• Spells: Their purpose is to avert dangers.
• Rites of Passage: These ensure the future success of important life moments.
• Sacrifice: Individuals offer themselves to the deity through gifts, establishing greater communion and communication with the divine through participation in the sacred offering.
• Atonement: This involves the sacrifice of victims and expresses the qualitative distance between humans and God.
• Communion: Achieved through a communal meal where participants eat the sacrificed offering, entering the realm of the divine. Every rite is a sacred act, and its meaning is explained by the associated myth.

Different Images of God

Primitive Peoples

• Belief in a supreme being.

Polytheism

• Religions that believe in multiple gods. Their thinking is explained in mythologies, which can be divided into three categories: theogony, cosmogony, and anthropogony.

Pantheism

• Reduces the existing multiplicity to a single principle. God is identified with the universe.

Buddhism

• A religion largely silent on God, renouncing religious representation. Some consider it an atheistic philosophy.

Monotheism

• Belief in one God, without image or form, unlike anything created. The only acceptable representation is God's name.