Since Jean Paul Gustav Ricoeur’s passing away in 2005, there has been a significant international resurgence of interest in his work. Coming to grips with the sheer extent of Ricoeur’s publications on a variety of subjects can leave one thoroughly perplexed. This is also true when investigating his views on myth and demythologisation. Numerous of his publications expound from various perspectives his insights on myth and its interpretation. This investigation proposes to bring together Ricoeur’s extensive contributions on myth, its interpretation and demythologisation in order to present them in condensed form. This will pave the way for a future follow-up study to compare Ricoeur’s perspectives to Bultmann’s demythologisation program and consider combining their contributions for theological hermeneutics.
Since his passing away in 2005, there has been a significant international resurgence of interest in Jean Paul Gustav Ricoeur’s work, as is attested by a cascade of articles and books, Ricoeur study groups and well-attended international Ricoeur conferences, as well as an online Journal for Ricoeur Studies (Stiver
Theological hermeneutics and Ricoeur’s life and work fused in a natural way. Ricoeur (1913–2005), raised by French Huguenot grandparents, by age 17 was already confronting an inner conflict between faith and reason, as the strong appeal of philosophy threatened his religious faith. Roland Dalbiez, his philosophy teacher, urged him to confront his fears, thus setting Ricoeur on the road to becoming one of the most influential philosophers of the twentieth century with a teaching and writing career of almost seventy years. Ricoeur’s work included significant intersections of varied areas of philosophy, as well as religion, literature, psychoanalysis and sociology, prompting the apt description of his career as ‘a hermeneutical life’ (Stiver
Both Bultmann and Ricoeur were renowned hermeneutical exponents of the twentieth century and Ricoeur took a keen interest in Bultmann’s demythologisation program. The concept of myth and the necessity for demythologising were important to them both, as Ricoeur (
At first glance, demythologisation is a purely negative enterprise. It consists in becoming conscious of the mythic clothing around the proclamation that ‘the [reign] of God has drawn near in a decisive fashion in Jesus Christ’. In this way, we become attentive to the fact that his ‘coming’ is expressed in a mythological representation of the universe, with a top and a bottom, a heaven and an earth, and celestial beings from up there to down here and returning from down here to up there. To abandon this mythical wrapping is quite simply to discover the distance that separates our culture and its conceptual apparatus from the culture in which the good news is expressed … Demythologisation, far from being opposed to kerygmatic interpretation, is its very first application. It marks the return to the original situation, namely that the Gospel is not a new Scripture to be commented on but is effaced before something else because it speaks of someone who is the true word of God. Demythologisation then is only the inverse side of the grasp of the kerygma. (p. 57–58)
Like Bultmann, he advocates the necessity of demythologising and views the ancient mythological worldview as a false scandal which hides the true scandal of the cross (see also Bultmann
In his 1973 essay, translated into German for
Bultmann’s hermeneutic has developed from a theological base, appropriating Heidegger’s existential philosophy, while using the
Myth is not understood by Ricoeur as simply a false story nor as an explanation in the modern sense of the word (Pellauer
To understand myth as myth is to understand what the myth, with its time, its space, its events, its characters, its drama, adds to the revelatory function of the primary symbols. (p. 162)
He explains the threefold function of myth as embracing humanity in one ideal history, narrating a movement from beginning to end; thus imparting orientation, character and tension to our experience; and lastly trying to get at the enigma of human existence, namely the discord between the fundamental reality of man as innocent, and the actual modality of man as defiled, sinful and guilty (Ricoeur
Earlier in his career, Ricoeur used myth in the context of symbols. This coincides with his initial phenomenological approach developing into an ontology of the self, following the publication of
In
Regarding the relationship between symbol and myth, one should take note of Ricoeur’s observation that ‘symbol gives rise to thought’. This phrase, borrowed from Kant, is used repeatedly in
Ricoeur and Kearny (
Ricoeur views myth as part of the hidden imaginary nucleus that determines and rules the distribution of transparent functions and institutions such as the politics, economics and law of any culture. As such, Ricoeur (
Beyond the self-understanding of a society there is an opaque kernel which cannot be reduced to empirical norms or laws …, it cannot … be explained by some transparent model because it is constitutive of a culture even before it can be expressed and reflected in specific representations or ideas… By analysing itself in terms of such a foundational nucleus, a society comes to a true understanding of itself. (Ricoeur in Ricoeur & Kearny
Contrasting his view with Levi-Strauss’s approach to societies without history, Ricoeur emphasised that societies have a specific historical component. The development of societies is both synchronic and diachronic, meaning that the distribution of power functions contains a historical dimension. Societies thus have simultaneous institutions (synchronism) and a process of historical transformation (diachronism). Any hermeneutic is characterised by a panchronic approach, including both synchronic and diachronic aspects. It is important to understand that the foundational myths of societies also have this twofold characteristic: they represent a simultaneous system of symbols which can be structurally analysed, but they also have a history that keeps the myths alive through processes of interpretation and re-interpretation. Thus, myths are, like the societies they ground, both structural and historical (Ricoeur in Ricoeur & Kearny
In much the same way as Berger and Lückmann (
Myth can also serve as an alienation of this symbolic structure for social dynamics when myth becomes reified and is misconstrued as an actual materialistic explanation of the world. In this regard, it is important to note that Ricoeur views the literal interpretation of myth as a misinterpretation, because myth is essentially symbolic.
It is only in terms of such misinterpretations that we may legitimately speak of demythologisation: not concerning its symbolic content but concerning the hardening of its structures which cannot stand the shock of the logos. (Ricoeur in Ricoeur & Kearny
To his mind, Bultmann confused the two concepts of myth because he ignored the complexity of myth. Bultmann’s demythologising of the three-storied worldview is in Ricoeur’s view a literal interpretation of myth and thus a misinterpretation. Ricoeur is of the opinion that Bultmann does not realise that there is a symbolic as well as pseudo symbolic or literal dimension to myth, and that demythologising is only valid in relation to this second dimension (Ricoeur in Ricoeur & Kearny
On the universality of myths, Ricoeur sees foundational myths not as universal but as tailored for a specific community, just like languages. Just as languages are translatable, so are myths, giving them a horizon of universality that allows them to be understood by other cultures. In this way, the horizons of myths exceed the political and geographical boundaries of their communities and the territorial limitations set by politics, emigrating and developing in new cultural frameworks (Ricoeur in Ricoeur & Kearny
Ricoeur hopes for a ‘recreation of language’
Ricoeur uses myth in different ways that overlap in meaning but can be clearly differentiated. In the context of narrative analysis, he endorses Aristotle’s five narrative pillars, of which
Still within the context of narrative and poetics, Ricoeur’s understanding of myth relates to Aristotle’s views on
A very important correlation which Ricoeur notes is that between metaphor,
Narrative is never able to totalise time completely as it always works with beginnings and endings. Even historical consciousness is always starting over because it is in essence a temporal form of understanding and self-understanding. The sense of being in time remains problematic, more like a mystery than like a problem we can solve. It is as if we were inside a gigantic windowless room that we have never been outside of, of which we have no idea that there is an outside, or if we do have such idea, the very effort to think of it as ‘outside’ inevitably must lead us back to myth or some kind of poetic language to express this (Ricoeur
Deconstruction is used in the Heideggerian nuance of the fundamental task of thought, namely to deconstruct cultural constructs, thus posing the question of false consciousness (Ricoeur
… the act of dispute, exactly proportional to the expression of false consciousness. The problem of false consciousness is the object, the correlative of the act of suspicion. Out of it is born the quality doubt, a type of doubt which is totally new and different from Cartesian doubt. (p. 206)
Demystification departs from a doubtful consciousness as critique of culture and moves towards a new method of deciphering appearances as masked consciousness in order to unmask hidden relations which connects ideology to the phenomena of domination (Ricoeur
… to know the moment when what man says is equal to what man does, and when his work is truly equal to his being. And in this kind of equation between being human, doing, praxis, and speaking, there is no longer ideology. (p. 208)
If we are always equally far from the folly of the Cross, if it is no more believable today than it was for ancient man, what has become irreversible is our cultural estrangement from a cultural vehicle which is, for us, to a great extent mythological. In this regard the work of Bultmann is perfectly legitimate, to dissociate the true scandal from the false scandal. To demythologise is to dissolve the false scandal in order to have the true scandal, the original scandal, revealed to all. (p. 211)
… the dissolution of myth as explanation is the necessary way to the restoration of myth as symbol. Thus the time of restoration is not a different time from that of criticism; we are in every way children of criticism, and we seek to go beyond criticism by means of criticism, by a criticism that is no longer reductive but restorative … [D]emythologisation is the irreversible gain of truthfulness, intellectual honesty, objectivity. (p. 350)
Ricoeur illustrates his point arguing that the creation stories of the Bible are ‘incorrect’ as historical accounts, but only after digesting this shocking realisation can they by reinterpreted as powerful symbols of creation. Ricoeur stresses that rehabilitation of symbol occurs only after critical thought realised a certain disengagement, which has dissolved the symbols’ apparent function of explaining the cosmos. Only then emerges symbol’s deeper function of transforming and interpreting human existence, resulting in the second naïveté. Ricoeur (
… the being which posits itself in the Cogito has still to discover that the very act by which it abstracts itself from the whole does not cease to share in the being that challenges it in every symbol. (p. 356)
Another process Ricoeur identifies, which he calls ‘symbolic signification’, to my mind, also results in demythologising, or at least demystification. Ricoeur (
… not two significations, one literal and the other symbolic, but rather a single movement, which transfers… [a participant] … from one level to the other and which assimilates him to the second signification by means of, or through the literal one concluding that symbol assimilates rather than apprehends a resemblance. (pp. 355–356)
In this case, symbol is again restored by shedding literal meaning when some things are assimilated to others resulting in us being assimilated to what is signified.
Thus, it is only through rigorous critical examination that symbols regain their meaning-making power, which empowers them to be experienced again and again. This is not an easy process. It is a slow cognitive pilgrimage through the dessert of criticism, not always resulting in the
Ricoeur’s hermeneutic of suspicion reaches a turning point with his application of destruction, which he views as a positive aspect, because it is a destruction of what destroys the radical question conveyed by the mythological language of another time. This destructive force is the assurances of modern man, which must be destroyed to arrive at a recollection of meaning. Ricoeur describes destruction as ‘… another kind of suspicion, but a suspicion with respect to ourselves, with respect to those who suspect what is suspected’ (Ricoeur
Destruction is necessitated by the forgetting of the initial question in the ancient language as a result of cultural distance. It is therefore a struggle against our own alienation in relation to the existential challenge the question once presented. Destruction in the sense of recollection of meaning is a turning point because it is the true task of hermeneutics. Our alienation from the initial question is the product of secularisation’s two pronged onslaught. Firstly, the extension of rationality to all levels of reality causes universal objectification and leads to an expulsion of the cosmic sacred, the psychic sacred out of our consideration and our language. The once mysterious is reduced to the problematic (see also Lowe
Destruction calls into question the process of secularisation and the presuppositions of modern man and his culture, in order to restore the interval of interrogation in which the existential question of the by-gone era can again have meaning (Ricoeur
Ricoeur proposes a certain pre-understanding consisting of three directions for the struggle against secularisation. Firstly, he suggests a philosophic anthropology, which he approaches with a phenomenological and existential style. For example, a critique of science should not criticise the results of science, but should understand how scientific understanding influences how people comprehend their existence in the world (Ricoeur
Secondly, the question of humanity as a whole should be re-established, namely explaining the forces at work in humanity. This question has already been articulated from various angles, for instance evil and salvation was interpreted differently by the Church Fathers and Karl Marx. Immanuel Kant on the other hand, suggested ‘having, power and worth’ as man’s great motivations, which qualifies man’s being (Ricoeur
Thirdly, the level of language should be explored with a view to restore and recreate a language that is convenient to describe existing as an individual in this world, and to pursue an historical quest in a humanity that seeks to become whole. Language should be understood not as one function among others, but as the semantic aspect of all functions, for instance of having, power and worth. Ricoeur concurs with Humboldt that ‘man is language’ and proposes that it is precisely in this ‘being-language’ that we should be fundamentally questioned, which should result in the language of the existential and the historic. This language should be ‘… appropriate to the kind of imagination which expresses most characteristic existential possibilities’ (Ricoeur
With this stated pre-understanding, Ricoeur moves further along the road of restoration of meaning, suggesting the next two stages should be the task of validation (justification) and the task of arbitration. By validation he means the justification of modern people still using symbolic language. Symbolism should be shown to be an appropriate language, correct, pertinent and adequate because by its double meaning it releases signification and explores existential possibilities. By means of symbols’ oneiric, cosmic and poetic functions symbols generate a semantic structure: an immediate material or physical sense which intends an existential sense. The power of double meaning operates in such a way that we do not dispose of this language, but it disposes of us (Ricoeur
Arbitration suggests that there is a profound unity between destroying and interpreting. Throughout the process of cultural and ideological destruction, there is an intense listening act taking place, trying to hear a more original and primal word. This interpretation act is the driving force of hermeneutics. In this context of the semantics of symbol, Ricoeur explains that the explicative function of myth is secondary and the symbolic function of myth is primary. That is why Ricoeur subordinates the problem of myth entirely to the problem of symbol. In this way, it becomes possible to distinguish the false rationality of myth and its symbolic expression. Therefore, demythologisation works on the level of myth’s false rationality in its pretext to explain. Having eliminated myth’s explicative function, we must also liberate the symbolic function, which Ricoeur calls ‘saving the myth’. The Adam myth of Paradise lost, for instance, has the existential function of permitting us to read human history through the hero of culpability, resembling the hero of tragedy (Ricoeur
The compilation of Ricoeur’s insights on the definitions and functions of myth and the spectrum of interpretative possibilities he proposed, supplied from various perspectives, ranging from phenomenology to symbolism and narrative analysis, places his understanding and application of demythologisation in a useful frame of reference. From this synopsis, a future comparison and possible merger of Bultmann’s demythologisation program can be made in a meaningful way.
Possible suggestions for comparison between Ricoeur and Bultmann’s perspectives from this study are:
definitions of myth
myth as comprehensive frame of reference (mythical worldviews)
literal or materialistic interpretation of myth as alienation
symbolic interpretations of myth
existential interpretations of myth
development of existential language for translating mythical language and worldview
myth as symbol
the relation between myth, symbol and ritual
mythology as symbolic structure for social dynamics
myth as narrative in terms of narrative analysis: existential possibilities.
Aspects from Ricoeur’s contributions to be considered for a possible broadening of Bultmann’s approach to demythologisation:
wider scope of definition for myth
accommodating symbolic language and viewing myth as symbol
placing demythologisation within the broader framework of deconstruction alongside demystification and destruction
the role of myth in narrative and narrative analysis of myth
social relevance of existentially interpreted mythology.
Such comparisons and possible merger could be meaningfully facilitated from the vantage point of the sociology of knowledge with its extensive terminology and comprehensive frame of reference, especially through the work of Berger and Luckmann (
The author declares that he has no financial or personal relationships which may have inappropriately influenced him in writing this article.
Ricoeur’s ‘Preface to Bultmann’ was first published in the French publication of Bultmann’s book
Kearny uses this citation from Ricoeur in
In answer to Kearny’s question as to the meaning of Ricoeur’s statement in