Epics in Imprints-1.pdf - Vivekananda Kendra Prakashan

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EDITORIAL
Let myth interrogate itself ‘Why is myth?’ and the answer is: ‘God’s need to love man.’ This
love lived by man is mythology.
There is a cry in the West that we have lost our myth. Jung says it definitely that the
West has lost its myth and that the anguish of the unconscious can be remedied only when
it is rediscovered. Before the West came to lose its myth, partly or fully, the West treated the
question in a slovenly manner. Since the coming on the scene of science and the increase of
the prestige of reason and precision, the West thought that prestige attaches itself to a religion
which is historical. Linked to this is the attachment to a historical Christ. Since the West
arranged things in the above way, it has been complaining of increasing secularization.
Secularization does not come from outside, but from our inside, from our attitude to religion
and what we want it to be. If we want it to be historical, then naturally we clip its wings by
which it would have climbed to mythical heights. Before the search to make Christianity
historical started, civilization was a part of religion. But now religion has become a part of
civilization.”
Within India the Epics and the Puranas have produced a vast treasure of folk arts,
dances, tales and fables. That is why the rural people, mountain tribes, and the forestdwellers
have absorbed the classical tales, kept them stored in their heart until the classical
angularities are rounded off and re-expressed the tales in spontaneous outbursts as if they
have newly created these characters and events. The art forms are in direct contact with life
in its most vital and raw essence. This is true of every classical tale of the Epics/Puranas.
Maybe, one region prefers one story and another region is partial to some other story. But
there is a full parallel folk literature comparable in intensity of emotion, volume and
relationship to ritual to the classical traditions. But the Christian tradition, claimed variously
as 500 to 2000 years old in India, has made little or no impact on the ‘spontaneous’ literature
of India, on its folk tales, folk arts, rituals, songs, puzzles, and proverbs. This is a proof that
India’s common man considers Christian mythology and tradition as an artificial superimposition
unrelated to life in its essence. Of course, there are a few folk Christian tales and
songs, “odams” ‘dramas’ and ballads, but their quantity and quality do no justice to the
number of years Christianity has been current in India.
Leon Uris in his ‘Armageddon’ describes how during the second world war,
Germany had to fall back to its pre-Christian local legends to rally her people around. A
Nagaland elder wrote a letter to an Arunachali tribal Chief how Christians have taken
away their culture without giving the Nagas new dances, folk songs or legends.
The point is that the onslaught of Westernisation and religious conversion alienates
the people from their cultural capital of which mythologies, legends, beliefs, healing processes,
pilgrim centres, heroes and heroines and art form are the most important components. In
India, the Epics and the Puranas have a great role to play in preserving and conserving
them. Guha and Sabari relate with Rama with ease. So does Sri Krishna with a shopkeeper
woman.