ロゴスとミュートス (特集 : 「始源の思索」)

Abstract

W. Nestle in his influential book Vom Mythos zum Logos (1940) writes, "Mythos und Logos--damit bezeichen wir die zwei Pole, zwischen denen das menschliche Geistesleben schwingt. Mythisches Vorstellen und logisches Denken sind Gegenstӓtze." (S. 1) This view still has a following, and many scholars believe that Greek thought underwent a development from a mythic to a rational view of the world. But this "from myth to reason" thesis cannot be supported by any early Greek literature, in which, unlike our common idea, logos and mythos have never been used contrastively. Regarding Homer and Hesiod, their use of mythos overwhelming logos with respect of number, logos does not have the meaning of "rational". On the contrary, it is observed that they use it in the negative meaning, like "with logos heart is bewildered". The fact that it reaches the point where logos positively has the meaning of "rational" is the achievement of the philosophers. With consciousness of limited characteristic of human recognition, logos, left from the human storyteller, was objectified and came to have a more abstract notion. With the early Greek philosophers, probably the position of logos and mythos was reversed. But, even in that case, they did not arrive at this new idea of logos by denying mythos. This survey of early Greek literature and philosophy leads to the conclusion, that there are two ways before Plato in which we can tell the truth. With mythos we tell the truth which is transmitted by way of the memory. This type of truth is what is memorable or to be memorized (aletheia in Greek), and it appears in the conversation which intends to report to others what they see or hear. With logos we can recognize and tell the truth which lies behind the appearance. This type of truth is a permanent cohesive principle which presents a systematic interpretation of our manifold world. The two systems which tell truths had coexisted without denying or expelling each other. Xenophanes, for example, criticized traditional myths, but it is for the contents of the myth, not for the form of myth, that he reproached poets. Therefore the claim "philosophy ceases to be myth in order to become philosophy" is wrong, which we show from the linguistic consideration of Greek words mythos and logos.