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     There is obvious similarity in the experience of self
and the experience of myth.  (The experience of self is not
mere consciousness, but the reflection, the summation of the
memories that I have of myself.)  Experience of self and myth
are similar in that both are separate from, in contradiction
to a public reality.  Both self and myth are experienced in
opposition to a public reality.  The experience of self makes
one suspicious of the interpreted world.  The experience of
self makes one sensitive to myth.  The characteristic of myth
is its incongruity with the objective world.  Thus myth may
be understood as the objectivation of subjectivity.  In the
religious situation, arguably, the myth enhances, deepens,
amplifies the experience of self.

     Characteristic of the notion of self is its
subjectivity.  I alone am the observer.  My self is seen, is
known, is understood by no one other than me.  By definition,
the notion of self is not objective, and cannot be public.
As soon as objects, artefacts, clothes, letters, furniture,
documents become involved, they no longer have anything to do
with the self to which they point.  They transform self into
an object, into a person.  Self is never objective. It cannot
be demonstrated.  When self is described, as in
autobiography, it becomes an object, and is better
denominated at a person, i.e. a mask of the self.  The person
represents a self, but cannot communicate the original
subjective quality of self.

     The reality of self contrasts sharply with the reality
of of myself as an historical person.  As an historical
person I am an object of history, along with all the other
historical objects.  or for that matter with any other
historical object.  For the nature of the historical person
(object) is that it is the object of common knowledge.
History is the product of the communal mind.  History is
public.  History is what two or more individuals may agree
upon to have happened.  History is corroborated by ruins, by
monuments, by documents, by acheological artifacts all of
which recapitulate the opportunity and perpetuate the
occasion for communal judgment.  Thus documents, especially,
vitiate time and create a perpetual (psychologic) present.
eine ewige Gegenwart.

     Both history and myth present themselves, appear,
erscheinen, avail themselves of narrative. Both history and
myth are clothed in words, sentences, stories, language.  But
the narrative of history is amenable to documentation, to
confirmation by artifacts. (When there are no documents, no
ruins, no artifacts, then history tends to degenerates to or
rises to myth.)  The story, the history which is undocumented
and (or) which is contrary to experience is myth. That which
is outside of experience for which documentation is
discovered then ceases to be myth and becomes history. What
would happen for example, if skeletal remains of centaurs or
mermaids or other mythological animals were discovered?

     When and how does history become myth, and when and how
does myth become history?  There is a constant interplay
between myth and history, which we deny.  The Trojan war is a
prominent example of the mixture (fusion) of myth and
history.

     All history has a propensity to turn into myth; and to
the extent that we "believe" (rely on) the existence all myth
has a kernel of historical "truth".

     Myth will be turned into pseudo-history by the historian
(theologian) who asserts its "truth."

     Myth is the modification, permutation, which history
undergoes in the human mind.  The self, therefore, is by
definition, pure myth.

     Mythical animals, flying saucers, aliens from space, sea
monsters, Lochness monster.

     Myth is the degradation of history to subjectivity.
History is the degradation (or enhancement, promotion) of
myth.

     The difference between myth and history, is that myth is
either understood skeptically as untrue, or it is accepted on
faith (in which case it turns out to be religion); whereas
history has its own integral (built-in) evidence of
credibility, of "truth".  "Self" is an inherently mythical
construct, because it is inaccessible to demonstration,
because it is inherently private, it cannot be tested for
truth.  Where truth is validation in the marketplace of
experience, observations and ideas.

=================
9. Und da er solches gesagt, ward er aufgehoben zusehends, und eine
Wolke nahm ihn auf vor ihren Augen weg.

10. Und als sie ihm nachsahen gen Himmel fahren, siehe, da stunden bei
ihnen zween Maenner in weissen Kleidern,

11. welche auch sagten: Ihr Maenner von Galilaea, was stehet ihr und
sehet gen Himmel? Dieser JEsus, welcher von euch ist aufgenommen gen
Himmel, wird kommen, wie ihr ihn gesehen habt gen Himmel fahren.

12. Da wandten sie um gen Jerusalem von dem Berge, der da heisset der
Oelberg, welcher nahe ist bei Jerusalem und liegt einen Sabbatweg davon.
                            Apostelgeschichte 1
==================

     The preceding is clearly mythical; yet the mythical
event is presented in a social context; and even more
important, the myth has been quasi universally accepted as
truth.

     The question: how is history distinguished from myth
remains unanswered.  History is distinguished from myth only
in the social interpretation.  The distinction is essentially
an act of literary criticism; it is the judgment (evaluation)
of an objective, public, social account.  If the account is
persuasive to a society it is accepted as historically valid.
History is a social phenomenon.  If the account is not
persuasive, it is stigmatized as myth.  The individual who
distinguishes myth from history in private is applying social
criteria which he has internalized.

     The experience and understanding of myth, as a socially
unacceptable account, is prototypical for the expereience of
self, which is likewise socially inaccessible, and therefore
unacceptable.  It is the experience of self as a socially
inaccessible and therefore socially unreal which validates
myth, and which makes myth a suitable vehicle for religious,
i.e. essentially subjective experience.

     It is because my apprehension of self is unavoidably
independent of society that myth is subjectively persuasive.
My experience of self vouchsafes a reality for the absurd,
accords reality even to that which does not have social
recognition.  The persuasiveness of myth is independent of
social endorsement.  That is the meaning of credo quia
absurdum est.  The self is unavoidably incongruous and
absurd.

     The denomination of the subjective experience with a
noun creates a pseudo-objectivity, which is reflected in the
awkwardness of language, of the name the Self, even more
awkward in German, das Ich, the I.

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Copyright 2006, Ernst Jochen Meyer
