Editing Religion and mythology (section)

==Religious views==
Most religions contain a body of traditional sacred stories that are believed to express profound truth. Some religious organizations and practitioners believe that some or all of their traditional stories are not only sacred and "true" but also historically accurate and [[revelation|divinely revealed]] and that calling such stories "myths" disrespects their special status. Other religious organizations and practitioners have no problem with categorizing their sacred stories as myths.{{Citation needed|date=April 2024}}

===Opposition to categorizing all sacred stories as myths===
====Modern-day opposition====
Some religious believers take offense when what they consider to be historical aspects of their faith are labeled as "myth". Such believers distinguish between religious fables or myths, on one hand, and those sacred narratives which are described by their tradition as being history or revelation, on the other. For instance, [[Priesthood (Catholic Church)|Catholic priest]] Father [[John Hardon|John A. Hardon]] insists that "Christianity is not mythology. What we believe in is not religious fantasies, no matter how pious."<ref>Hardon</ref> Evangelical Christian theologian [[Carl F. H. Henry]] insisted that "Judeo-Christian revelation has nothing in common with the category of myth".<ref>Carl F. H. Henry, quoted by Mohler</ref>

====The roots of the popular meaning of "myth"====
Especially within Christianity, objection to the word "myth" rests on a historical basis. By the time of Christ, the Greco-Roman world had started to use the term "myth" (Greek ''muthos'') to mean "fable, fiction, lie"; as a result, the early Christian theologians used "myth" in this sense.<ref>Eliade, ''Myth and Reality'', 1968, p. 162.</ref> Thus, the derogatory meaning of the word "myth" is the traditional Christian meaning, and the expression "Christian mythology", as used in academic discourse,<ref name=grassie>{{cite journal |last1=Grassie |first1=William |date=March 1998 |title=Science as Epic? Can the modern evolutionary cosmology be a mythic story for our time? |journal=Science & Spirit |volume=9 |issue=1 |quote=The word 'myth' is popularly understood to mean idle fancy, fiction, or falsehood; but there is another meaning of the word in academic discourse. A myth, in this latter sense of the word, is a story that serves to define the fundamental worldview of a culture .... Using the original Greek term ''mythos'' is perhaps a better way to distinguish this more positive and all-encompassing definition of the word.}}</ref> may offend Christians for this reason.

In addition, this early Christian use of the term "myth" passed into popular usage.<ref>Eliade, ''Myths, Dreams and Mysteries'', 1967, p. 23.</ref> Thus, when essential [[sacred mysteries]] and teachings are described as ''myth'', in modern English, the word often still implies that it is "idle fancy, fiction, or falsehood".<ref name=grassie/> This description could be taken as a direct attack on [[religious belief]], quite contrary to the meaning ostensibly intended by the academic use of the term. Further, in academic writing, though "myth" usually means a fundamental worldview story, even there it is occasionally ambiguous or clearly denotes "falsehood", as in the "[[Christ myth theory]]". The original term "[[mythos]]" (which has no pejorative connotation in English) may be a better word to distinguish the positive definition from the negative.<ref name=grassie/>

===Non-opposition to categorizing sacred stories as myths===
Modern day clergy and practitioners within some religious movements have no problem classifying the religion's sacred stories as "myths". They see the sacred texts as indeed containing religious truths, divinely inspired but delivered in the language of mankind. Some examples follow.

====Christianity====
[[J.R.R. Tolkien]]'s love of myths and devout [[Catholic Church|Catholic]] faith came together in his assertion that [[mythology]] is the divine echo of "the Truth".<ref>Wood</ref> Tolkien wrote that myths held "fundamental things".<ref>Menion, 2003/2004 citing essays by Tolkien using the words "fundamental things".</ref> He expressed these beliefs in his poem ''[[Mythopoeia]]'' circa 1931, which describes myth-making as an act of "sub-creation" within God's primary creation.<ref>Tolkien, ''Mythopoeia'', circa 1931.</ref> The poem in part says creation is "myth-woven and elf-patterned":

{{Blockquote|<poem>... There is no [[firmament]],
only a void, unless a jewelled tent
myth-woven and [[elf]]-patterned; and no earth,
unless the mother's womb whence all have birth.</poem>|JRR Tolkien}}

Tolkien's opinion was adopted by another [[Christianity|Christian]] writer, [[C. S. Lewis]], in their conversations: "Tolkien explained to Lewis that the story of Christ was the true myth at the very heart of history and at the very root of reality."<ref>Pearce</ref> [[C. S. Lewis]] freely called the Christ story a "true myth", and he believed that even pagan myths express spiritual truths. In his opinion, the difference between the Christ story and pagan myths is that the Christ story is historically as well as spiritually true. Lewis writes,<ref>letter to Arthur Greeves, quoted by Brown</ref>
<blockquote>The story of Christ is simply a true myth: a myth working on us in the same way as the others, but with this tremendous difference that it really happened: and one must be content to accept it in the same way, remembering that it is God's myth where the others are men's myths: i. e. the Pagan stories are God expressing Himself through the minds of poets, using such images as He found there, while Christianity is God expressing Himself through what we call real things.</blockquote>

Another Christian writer, the Catholic priest Father [[Andrew Greeley]], freely applies the term "myth" to Christianity. In his book ''Myths of Religion'', he defends this terminology:<ref>Greeley, ''Myths of Religion''; quoted in Bierlein 1994, pp. 304-5.</ref>
<blockquote>Many Christians have objected to my use of this word [myth] even when I define it specifically. They are terrified by a word which may even have a slight suggestion of fantasy. However, my usage is the one that is common among historians of religion, literary critics, and social scientists. It is a valuable and helpful usage; there is no other word which conveys what these scholarly traditions mean when they refer to myth. The Christian would be well advised to get over his fear of the word and appreciate how important a tool it can be for understanding the content of his faith.</blockquote>

At a "Consultation on the Relationship Between the Wesleyan Tradition
and the Natural Sciences" in Kansas City, Missouri, on October 19, 1991, Dennis Bratcher presented a discussion of the adaptation of Near Eastern mythical thought by the Israelites.<ref name="Bratcher">Bratcher</ref> Bratcher argued that the Old Testament absorbed Near Eastern pagan mythology (although he drew a sharp distinction between the literally-interpreted myths of the Near Eastern pagans and the "mythopoetic" use of imagery from pagan myths by the Hebrews). During this presentation, he gave the following disclaimer:<ref name="Bratcher"/>
<blockquote>the term "myth" as used here does not mean "false" or "fiction". Even in my old and yellowed Webster's, "fiction" is the ''third'' meaning of the word. In its primary and more technical meaning "myth" refers to a story or group of stories that serve to explain how a particular society views their world.</blockquote>

====Judaism====
Some [[Judaism|Jewish]] scholars, including [[Dov Noy]], a professor of folklore at Hebrew University and founder of the Israel Folktale Archives, and [[Howard Schwartz (writer and editor)|Howard Schwartz]], Jewish anthologist and English professor at the University of Missouri – St. Louis, have discussed traditional Jewish stories as "mythology".<ref>Schram</ref>

Schwartz authored the book ''Tree of Souls: The Mythology of Judaism''. It consists of myths and belief statements excerpted from—and, in some cases, synthesized from a number of excerpts from—both Biblical and non-Biblical Jewish texts. According to Schwartz, the Jewish people continue to elaborate on, and compose additions to, their traditional mythology.<ref>Schwartz, p. lxxv</ref> In the book's introduction, Schwartz states that the word "myth", as used in the book, "is not offered to mean something that is not true, as in the current popular usage".<ref name="Schwartz, p. lxxviii"/>

====Neopaganism====
[[Neopaganism|Neopagans]] frequently refer to their sacred stories as "myths". [[Asatru]], a modern-day revival of Germanic Paganism, holds "that the [[Eddas]], Myths and [[saga|Norse Sagas]] are the divinely inspired wisdom of [its] religion".<ref>"About Us"</ref> [[Wicca]], another Neopagan movement, also applies the term "mythology" to its stories.<ref>"The Wheel of the Year / the Sabbats"; "What is Wicca?"; "Workshops and Talks"</ref>