Chapter 7 in Myth and Reality

Chapter VII in Eliade's Myth and Reality opens with the tale of Matsyendranath and Gorakhnath.For the sake of convenience, let's refer to them as Mat and Gor. The story begins as Mat(a yogi) abandons his own body to wander in spirit form. It is during this vulnerable time that Mat's spirit enters a dead king's corpse and thus reanimates it. According to the poem Goraksha-vijaya the women of the "dead" king's country then hold Mat prisoner. Hearing of his master's plight, Gor enters the realm of death(yama), searches through the book of fates and erases his master's name from the list of those dead. Gor then retruns to the land of the living in the guise of a dancing girl, he enters the court of Mat's kingdom and dances for him, singing songs that slowly bring Mat's spirit back to its proper state. Mat comes to see that the "way of the flesh" will lead to only death, his end would have been brought about by his forgetting his pure and immortal nature. The tale concludes with Mat rejecting the sins of the flesh and returning to his disciple Gor.

The purpose of the tale of Matsyendranath and Gorakhnath in chapter 7 is to introduce the place memory inhabits in myth. "Indian literature uses images of binding, chaining, and captivity interchangeably with those of forgetting, unknowing and sleep to signify human condition..."-page 116 of Myth and Reality. Indian symbolism takes this a step farther to explain that "Forgetting" is equivalent, on one hand, to "sleep" and, on the other, to loss of the self, that is, disorientation, blindness..." Simply said, sleep brings about ignorance, while wakefulness ushers in knowledge and truth. In respect to myth, memory (wakefulness) also brings about the truth. The relationship between myth and memory is perhaps better explained from the Greek's point of view.

"When a poet is possessed by the Muses, he draws directly from Mnemosyne's store of knowledge, that is, especially the knowledge of "origins" of "beginnings", of genealogies."-page 120. Drawing on this quote, it becomes clear where the power lies in memory. Drawing upon the Muses ultimately links the artist to the very start of time, which holds the greatest of powers. Memory, then, links those who are aware of it to the origin as well.

Forgetting is then akin to death. Cut off from the memories of the origin, from the power of the beginning, only the destruction of the body and mind is able to follow, as one cannot renew oneself with the memories of the origin. The fountain of Lethe in Greek mythology is found in the underworld, where the dead are housed. For those who are dead have lost their right to memory. Life stems from memory then, which the living are able to retain

Lethe undergoes somewhat of a revision in respect to reincarnation; where Lethe erases the celestial memory in order for the soul to be reborn. Plato elaborates on the matter to state that only those souls who gorge on "forgetfulness and vice" will be reincarnated. Plato's Theory of Ideas further explain to role of memory and reincarnation(I'll leave you all to read it, as you should, being that you are required to read it.)

Platonic anamnesis applies to modern society as well, myth acts as a reminder that everything a man has done or will do, has already been done before, in illo tempore. To Gnostics, the ability to remember the "primordial drama" is akin to salvation from sin. In remembering they are able to avoid the pitfalls of ignorance that lead to sin.

History, too, takes a page from myth in respect to memory. "What is of interest to our investigation is not the meaning that history may have but historiography itself-in other words, the endeavor to preserve the memory of contemorary events and the desire to know the past of humanity as accurately as possible."-page 135. For history to be succesful, it must, like the myth, employ the use of memory to continue onward. To deprive ourselves of historical memory is to risk repeating the errors of the past. See a pattern yet? Mythological memory relates to the power of the origin, while historical memory relates to the importance of past events, events that mark the continuation of life. Life for both myth and everyday life relates to memory, precise memory. Myth therefore lives in our every memory, we evoke the power of the origin by simply creating and retaining memory.

For a far better, more concise look at chapter 7, I'll direct you all to Kari's blog. She has the ability to pack information into a shorter amount of space with far better results. I'm still drinking from Lethe, so bear with me.