The Hero and the Sea: Patterns of Chaos in Ancient Myth (Student Notebooks)

209 Pages·2002·0.82 MB·English

by  Donald H. Mills

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The Hero
and
the Sea
Patterns of Chaos
in Ancient Myth
by Donald H. Mills
Bolchazy-Carducci Publishers, Inc.
Wauconda, Illinois USA
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General Editor
Laurie Haight Keenan
Contributing Editor
D. Scott VanHorn
Cover Design
Adam Phillip Velez
Cover Illustration
Katsushika Hokusai
“The Hollow of the Deep Sea Wave off Kanagawa.”
The Minneapolis Institute of Arts. Bequest of Richard P. Gale.
The Hero and the Sea:
Patterns of Chaos in Ancient Myth
Donald H. Mills
© copyright 2002 Bolchazy-CarducciPublishers,Inc.
All rights reserved
Published by
Bolchazy-Carducci Publishers, Inc.
1000 Brown Street
Wauconda, IL60084 USA
www.bolchazy.com
Printed in the United States of America
2003
by United Graphics
ISBN 0-86516-508-4
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Mills, Donald H., 1940-
The hero and the sea : patterns of chaos in ancient myth / Donald H.
Mills.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-86516-508-4 (pbk.)
1. Epic poetry--History and criticism. 2. Poetry, Ancient--History
and criticism. 3. Bible. O.T. Genesis--Criticism, interpretation, etc.
4. Bible. O.T. Exodus--Criticism, interpretation, etc. 5. Heroes in
literature. 6. Sea in literature. 7. Heroes in the Bible. 8. Sea in
the Bible. I. Title.
PN1307 .M55 2002
809.1'3209352--dc21 2002153910
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Foreword
Professor Mills here presents a work about a major mythic
archetype, or mythologem, the struggle of the hero against the
forces of chaos, especially watery ones, as incarnate in the stories
of Gilgamesh, Achilles, Odysseus, and Jacob. But he extends the
theme of watery chaos to examine heroic confrontations with
chaos of many kinds. Detailed considerations of the four paradig-
matic hero stories lie at the heart of the book.
Mills’s study, virtually an extended essay, is initially framed
by Eliade’s well-known conception of myth as cosmic in its con-
cerns and by the division of space (and time) into sacred and pro-
fane. The approach is grounded in an intelligent application of
ritual theory, dominated by van Gennep’s notion of liminality,
later adopted and modified by Victor Turner. The study is marked
by structural oppositions, principally between chaos and order.
Since the author’s approach is also functional (no surprise given
the above), myth becomes a high stakes game: at issue are noth-
ing less than the quest for a coherent view of the cosmos, and the
viability and survival of myth-based communities.
In an unusual and moving Epilogue, Mills argues strongly for
a correspondence between attempts to understand the universe
through the modern science of chaotics and those that occupied
the ancient mythmakers in the patterns they sought to discern
and express in their concrete stories. The ancient patterns, there-
fore, are not really ancient, they are timeless and universal.
Modern students of chaos sometimes use the same metaphor
(water as chaos) as the ancient mythmakers, and they have,
almost religiously, the very same aim: to seek and establish pat-
terns of order within the seemingly random and chaotic.
At the outset, Mills clearly defines his essential working
terms. The argument is always carefully expressed, easy to follow;
the writing is seamless and unfailingly elegant. This seems a work
produced by Mills’s having taught the selected texts for many
years, and from his having thought deeply about them with a the-
sis in mind. The learning is profound, but lightly worn: annota-
tions and bibliography are fresh, but not overwhelming. This
notwithstanding, experts can learn from this book, but so also
under this design can undergraduates and the general public.
JAMESG. KEENAN
Loyola University Chicago
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Preface
A number of ancient Near Eastern myths recount a hero’s bat-
tle with a water demon or water divinity. These divinities often
come to symbolize primordial or pre-cosmic chaos, and the hero’s
victory over his watery adversary is emblematic of a cosmic cre-
ation or re-creation. This study investigates how myths of heroic
battle with chaotic adversaries inform and condition several
ancient heroic narratives. In particular, it examines the ways in
which this mythic pattern functions in response to the cultural
needs, religious concerns, and worldview of its audience. The
Babylonian hero Gilgamesh, the Greek heroes Achilles and
Odysseus, and the Old Testament patriarch Jacob all encounter the
chaotic in their respective struggles with watery adversaries.
It is the thesis of this study that these mythic narratives give
vivid expression to the terrifying experience of the chaotic while
providing the conceptual framework by which ancient poets could
ritualize, in ways meaningful to their respective communities, the
hero’s movement from chaos to victory. Because myth and ritual
each serve to make intelligible social organization and to clarify a
multitude of problematic human relationships, the riddle of the
chaotic lies behind every ancient mythmaker’s struggle to express a
sense of order in a world where chaos often seems to reign.
The last chapter explores points of contact between the ancient
mythic patterns and the discoveries of modern scholars engaged in
the theoretical study of chaos and chaotics.
There is, of course, much that could be written about the mul-
ticultural dimensions of the ancient Mediterranean civilizations
and the interconnections of their world views, but I believe that The
Hero and the Sea is unique in that it expands the realm of inquiry
by using the methodological insights of literary scholars, compara-
tive religionists, anthropologists and psychologists to explore
ancient conceptions of chaos. For these ancient narratives of hero-
ic struggle uniquely transcend time and culture to speak to the uni-
versal human condition. Thus, they give expression to all those
hopes, aspirations, and fears that have defined, for ancient no less
than modern thinkers, what it means to be human in a chaotic
world.
I would like to express appreciation to the Department of
Languages, Literatures, and Linguistics at Syracuse University for
help with the some of the productions costs of this volume. I owe
also a great debt of gratitude to those who have read the manu-
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script in whole or in part: Jim Bresnahan, Jeff Carnes, Laurie
Winship, and the peer reader at Bolchazy-Carducci. Their efforts
are deeply appreciated.
Finally, this book is dedicated to the memory of my parents,
Naomi and Irvin Mills.
D.H.M.
Acknowledgements
The Greek font, Milan Greek, used in the quotations from the
Iliad and the Odyssey, was developed by Ralph Hancock after a
similar typeface used in an edition of Isocrates published in Milan
in 1493.
The cover illustration is the wood cut titled “The Hollow of the
Deep Sea Wave off Kanagawa” by Katsushika Hokusai
(1760–1849), Japanese painter and wood engraver, born in Edo
(now Tokyo). He is regarded one of the best representatives of the
Ukiyo-e, or “pictures of the floating world” (everyday life), school of
printmaking.
Used by permission of the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, a
bequest of Richard P. Gale.
Contents

Foreword.........................................................................................iii

Preface...............................................................................................v

I. Mythic Patterns.........................................................................1
Notes to Chapter I...............................................................17
II. Gilgamesh and the Heroic Confrontation with Death..........21
Notes to Chapter II.............................................................49
III. Achilles and the Scamander....................................................55
Notes to Chapter III...........................................................90
IV. Odysseus and Poseidon...........................................................95
Notes to Chapter IV..........................................................129
V. Old Testament Patterns: Creation, Flood, Exodus..............135
Notes to Chapter V............................................................157
Epilogue: Chaos and Cosmology, the Modern View...................161
Notes to Epilogue..............................................................182
Bibliography..................................................................................185
Index.............................................................................................195

(cid:177)
Chapter I
Mythic Patterns

Many ancient Near Eastern myths tell of a hero’s battle with a
water demon or water divinity. Such divinities often symbolize
primordial or pre-cosmic chaos, and the hero’s victory over his
watery adversary is symbolic of a cosmic creation or re-creation.1
There is, however, despite the consistency of its basic structure, a
great deal of variety in the development, function, and meaning of
this mythic pattern. This study investigates how myths of heroic
battle with chaotic adversaries inform and condition several
ancient heroic narratives. In particular, it examines the ways in
which this mythic pattern functions in response to the cultural
needs, religious concerns, and worldview of its audience.2 By
considering the commonalities of a mythic idea in different
cultures and literary traditions, one can identify both conver-
gences and differences, and gain thereby a fuller understanding of
the unique interplay of differing mythic traditions in ancient Near
Eastern and Greek thought.3
Although this study does not adhere to a specific methodol-
ogy, nevertheless, in my attempts to understand this mythic
pattern, I have found the writings of several structuralist and
comparative theorists helpful, especially Arnold van Gennep’s Les
Rites de Passage4 and Mircea Eliade’s concept of sacred space,5
both of which involve a number of useful cross-cultural and
comparative observations.
The Nature of Myth
I understand myth as a traditional story that speaks to issues
of great social and religious concern to mythmakers and their
audiences. Both van Gennep and Eliade base their work on the
perception that traditional societies uniformly posit a firm and