Myth, Metaphysics and Mysticism

Myth, metaphysics and mysticism-what do they have in common? The union of finite and the infinite, of the defined and the undefinable.

Myth is a symbolic but concrete presentation of the union of the finite and the Infinite. Usually a story, it may also appear as a ceremony or icon, as a building, costume or dance--or even as landscape. Both concealing and revealing, it is immediately available to the imagination. Metaphysics explains theories about the union of the finite and the Infinite by using concepts and arguments, or by providing phenomenological descriptions followed by reasoning that leads to ontological insight. Many philosophical traditions in both East and West believe that the crucial insight into the basic relation has to come of itself and cannot be captured in concepts and exhaustively explained, although the way to such insight can be prepared. Mysticism then grasps the reality directly a lived experience, without any mediating story or explanation.

The Hindus say we should first listen, then we should think, and then we should realize. Receiving the myths is listening, doing metaphysics is thinking, living as mystics is realizing.

Dr. Beatrice Bruteau from Radical Optimism, Practical Spirituality in an Uncertain World