The Comparison between Chinese Myth and Greek Myth1

1、中国神话与希腊神话的对比the comparison between chinese myth and greek mythcontents(times new roman三号加粗居中)i. introduction.1ii. the similarities between chinese myth and greek myth.1a. the general content of myth of creation of the world.1b. the myth of the flood and fire.1c. the origin of animal and plant2d. the

2、 myth of reforming nature and resisting despotic heroes.2iii. the differences between chinese myth and greek myth.2a. the system of gods.2b. the image of gods.3c. the nature of gods.3d. ethnical and moral principles.6iv. reasons for the similarities and differences between chinese myth and greek myt

3、h.9a. forces of ethnics and powers co-exist.9b. extent philosophical elements.10c. dominating factors.10v. conclusion.11works cited.12abstract: mythology is a story about gods or ancient heroes of deification and is an innocent explanation and a beautiful yeaning about ancient people in the natural

4、and social livelihood. chinese myth and greek myth reflect the living and cognitive process of the earlier period. chinese nation and ancient greek have their own unique, far-reaching influence myth. the generalities of the reason decide the similarities of basic content. but comparatively, there ar

5、e great differences in the nature of god, moral principles and the system of god. its because the different influences of geographical environment, nationalities fusion and traditional ideological culture. this paper, through the contrastive analysis of the differences between chinese myth and greek

6、 myth, is trying to explore the culture value in them between these two nations. key words: chinese myth；greek myth；similarities and differences；reason；culture value (不多于五个关键词, 用分号隔开)摘要：神话是关于神仙或神化的古代英雄的故事，是古代人们对自然现象和社会生活的一种天真的解释和美丽的向往。中国神话和希腊神话都产生于人类的初始阶段，反映了早期人类生活和认识的过程。中华民族和古希腊民族各有自己独特的、影响深远的神话故事。

7、二者关于创世纪神话的基本内容相同，神的形象都历经了演变过程，而在此基础上，两个民族神话中神的性格、伦理道德准则、神系的组成等方面存在着较大的差异，这是由于各自产生的地理环境不同，以及“历史化”进程中所受的影响如民族融合的影响、传统思想文化的影响等不同所造成的。此论文通过对比分析中国神话与希腊神话的异同，尝试探索两国神话的文化价值。关键词：中国神话；希腊神话；异同；成因；文化价值(不多第 12 页 共 12 页the comparison between chinese myth and greek mythi. introductionmythology is a story about go

8、ds or ancient heroes of deification and is an innocent explanation and a beautiful yeaning about ancient people in the natural and social livelihood. chinese myth and greek myth reflect the living and cognitive process of the earlier period. chinese nation and ancient greek have their own unique, fa

9、r-reaching influence myth. the generalities of the reason decide the similarities of basic content. but comparatively, there are great differences in the nature of gods, moral principles and the system of gods. its because the different influences of geographical environment, nationalities fusion an

10、d traditional ideological culture. this paper, through the contrastive analysis of the differences between chinese myth and greek myth, is trying to explore the culture value in them between these two nations. the origin of the mythology is from a greek word “mythos + logos”, “mythos” means “word” o

11、r “verbal language”, “logos” means “story”. it reflects nature and society of ancient people and it is an original understanding of human beings about origin of world, natural phenomenon and social livelihood. so there are relationship between chinese myth and greek myth. ii. the similarities betwee

12、n chinese myth and greek myth（一级标题前a. the general content of myth of creation of the worldboth chinese myth and greek myth were created at the very beginning of human beings and reflected the ancient peoples life and the procedure of cognition. they are the synthetic forms of the theories by which a

13、ncient people recognized the world and human beings. they awe for nature and desire for conquering nature make chinese myth and greek myth share same characteristics. before earth and sea and heaven were created, all things were gathered in one confused and shapeless mass called chaos. “in chaos sle

14、pt the seed of all things” (thomas 4). and the source of human, in chinese myth, nv wa makes mortal man out of clay. “in greek myth, prometheus used some mud and clay to create humans, athena gives them soul” (thomas 31). he creates the original human beings.b. the myth of flood and firein greek myt

15、h, zeus wants to punish the sin of human and to destroy the resident of the earth. he lets the flood to swallow the earth. in a moment, everything is destroyed by rush of water. in chinese myth, gong gong crashes the mt buzhou in rage. it leads to great flood disaster.the fire is the symbol of human

16、 civilization. from human find the fire to use the fire, we made great efforts. in greek myth, prometheus steals the fire from the heavens. prometheus lit a torch from the chariot and put the fire in a hollow stalk that he concealed under his cloak. then he stole away without being seen by any of th

17、e gods, and brought his fire to earth. because of this, prometheus is fastened to the cliff and suffering pain that his liver is eaten by two eagles. and zeus tortures him for 3000 years. in chinese myth, the man sui goes to a faraway place and has gone through all kinds of hardships and difficultie

18、s to study the way of making fire and teaches people to master this method. c. the origin of animal and plantin the natural world, animal and plant are the most intimate friends of the human beings. the most metamorphosis of the animal and plant are with human nature in chinese myth and greek myth.

19、and it is taken as the metamorphosis of the human beings or the gods. in greek myth, the beautiful goddess, daphne changes into a laurel tree to avoid chasing by apollo. a handsome man changes into the narcissus because of he loves the reflection of his own face in the water. arachne turns into a sp

20、ider by the goddess for she dares to challenge the goddess. in chinese myth, the story about wild goose and so on point out that man changes into the animal or plant under the certain situation.d. the myth of reforming nature and resisting despotic heroes for instance, “in chinese myth, nv wa mendin

21、g the sky, the myth of kua fu, jingweis struggles and yi arrowing down nine suns” (yi 13). “in greek myth, the twelve exploits of heracles, theseus gets into the maze and kills the beast, jason goes through all the difficult and hardship to get the gold sheep wool and so on” (hamilton 4). all those

22、heroes risk their lives for the collective benefits. it reflects not only ancient people hope to ease their labor and increase the capability of conquering nature, but also myths of these two countries possess a common point. iii. the differences between chinese myth and greek myth a. the system of

23、godsin greek myth, “gods are plentiful and systematic, just like a complete world of human beings” (switch 16). the concept of heaven and earth of greek myths about the creation is different to that of china. in greek myth, the gods all possess the capabilities of supermen, and have fairly low moral

24、 standards, even lower than that of worldly people. this shows that what underlies the fundamental consciousness in greek myth is the worship of powers as opposed to meaning and nature of the powers. in contrast to greek creation myths, chinese creation myths are filled with ethical and moral virtue

25、s. chinese gods are “rare”, staying high above in the heaven and not systematic. the gods in them have higher moral standards for everything they do. at the end of the creation myths, the process of toricalization began to appear in the development of mythical system. the process took place so early

26、 that systematic creation myths did not take shape before it was replaced by the utilization of legends about emperor and heroes. “greek myth, as the spoken literature in the early period of human society, represents abundant themes of human nature, presenting the passionate side of greek spirit” (g

27、reen 4).b. the image of godsthe birth of both chinese and greek has had a primitive period of blood-related marriage, a totem, which considered a certain animal to have a close relation with a family group and formed a ruling circle of deities with sacred gods as the core. the greek myth forms a sys

28、tem with zeus as the core while the chinese myth takes a still and dispersed shape because its sacred gods. there are many similarities and differences between chinese myth and greek myth. they both take heroes as their praising objects. however, the greek gods are the combination of gods and mens b

29、ody, with male gods occupying the top position. the chinese gods are the combination of gods and animals body, with female gods occupying the top position. this article starts with both eastern and western mythologies, focuses on a simple comparison of the image of gods between chinese and greek myt

30、hs. through the comparisons of the soil and the characteristics of the mythical allusion and so on, this passage points out the origin of the myths of ancient. china and greece have close relationship with the low productivity of that time, but because of the influence on the different environments,

31、 chinese myth has the color of human life with big river valley and greek myth has contacts with marine life.c. the nature of godsfrom the comparison between the differences of the mythical nature, from the two cultures we see ancient myths are not only the source of chinese culture, but also the or

32、igin and reflection of chinese national culture spirit. the myths reflect the struggling spirit the innovation spirit and the unceasing spirit of the chinese nation ancient myths are not only the precious artistic works, but also a rich spiritual wealth. revenge has been a special phenomenon popular

33、 all through human social practice. revenge themes have the most colorful and lively embodiment in greek myth. according to motives and main bodies of these revenge conducts, together with the value of juristic ethics reflected, we could divide the theme into three patterns, that is, consanguinity r

34、evenge, honor revenge and love revenge. the greek myth is wonderful, pure, and optimistic. it has no rubs and worries of life, and has no sermon on virtue praise and vice punishment. “so it demonstrates the romantic ancient greece persons value orientation, which is more important than moral, the gr

35、eek myth praises and admires the mans original desire nature, for example the glorification of the eroticism and the human body, so it manifests the ancient greece persons philosophy idea that the human nature and the human rights are” (gustav 5). it is held in this article that the myths of differe

36、nt nations undergo their own growth course and boast distinctive spirits and values in the light of those social, historical, psychological distinctions. in greek myth, gods are characterized by the strong romantic and ideal inclination, while the chinas myth features the incarnated saints who are m

37、ostly prone to be ethical, historical and moralizing. myth and legends always go ahead with the human being s slow steps through ages, just like the soul of the national culture itself which continuously wandered. the ancient chinese myth and legends describe the primitive ancestors struggles agains

38、t nature and bad social powers. faced with all kinds of dangers, such as misery, hardship, misfortune, fright and death, primitive ancestors are gradually and rationally aware of natures alien and super-powers, fighting against bad living conditions bravely. best known in the world for its magnifice

39、nce and clear genealogy, greek myth and legend embody the historical development and mixture of different myths and legends from various areas, races and nations in the world. these myths and legends were originally independent and different from one another, but finally resolved themselves into an

40、identical and unbroken pedigree of greek gods and a systematic legend of heroes through constant cultural exchange and blending and long years of transformation. myth is an important way to understand the history of the early spirit of mankind .exploring the spiritual world of the ancients from the

41、angle of ancient chinese myth has great realistic significance. it not only helps us to grasp the composition and direction of the national culture from the aspect of primitive culture gene, but also to further understand the more subtle sense of self-regulatory mechanism .meanwhile, the research on

42、 myth provides us a reference to understand and interpret other myth. pangu mythology as chinese genesis myth is its outstanding feature of humanism in comparison with the genesis myth of other notions. chinas genesis myth, historicized revision, it originality, nationality serving as reasonable mol

43、ecules still run through the body of the later culture. the fountain of humanism in the chinese culture starts from no where but the humanism embodies in the genesis mythology of china. myth, as a literary style of human childhood, is full of signs because the narration was going on in a state of ps

44、ychological unconsciousness. it reveals the initial state of human culture and intellectual activities. greek myth, a residence of esthetics, interprets the philosophical understanding and esthetic cognition of the origin and the form of the universe. greek myth, in its religious connotation, expres

45、ses the extreme concern of ancient greek. ancient greek philosophers had tried to explain the world at the angle of life, but at last it turned out that they either talked about the universe and nature without the society and life or talked about the society and life without universe and nature. how

46、ever, the ancient greek myth, which is pregnant with ancient greek philosophy and which embodies the pursuits of individual value and dignity, mixed fanciful world and world outlook together. the core of free will in ancient greek myths is the defiance of gods and heroes to their fates, which concre

47、tely presents the struggle against the external while the other against the internal. the former involves the process from defiance to the nature till to tyranny through a series of myths and epics with a might of knowledge, where the earliest western democracy came forth; the latter presents a kind

48、 of will which shows itself perfectly in heroic tragedy wherein there is rational contemplation. ancient greek myth has artistic charm and unique feature. it not only has abundant content and lively scenario but has integrated narration and vivid personality. to be the headwaters of western literatu

49、re, many motifs are derived from it. the motif of incest, the motif of revenge and the motif of deserted wife are the best models. these reflect deep-seated and cultural mentality by different aspects and profiles. the comprehension of human about the ultimate meaning of life is expressed also in th

50、em. hellenism is the origin of european culture, and greek myth, which plays an imperial role in the western history, even in the whole human history, is regarded as the greatest achievement of hellenism. “greek myth has a profound influence on the aspects of literature, language, philosophy, religi

51、on, arts and so on” (swear 6). as an english learner, we should know something about the related english culture. greece is characterized by a civilization of long standing. greece has already created pretty rich and varied myths about the sea. and it is the mythologies that make the greek culture m

52、ore brilliant. medea is an ancient greek tragedy which has never been away from the world stage. some people say that euripides is the very first writer who discovered women in greek literature. the reason for this is that in the said play, the playwright made his changes to fairy tales and legends,

53、 and through the tragedy of medea, he became a pioneer to submit acutely women issues to the social agenda. since the time the book medea by euripides came out of the press, the person medea was a peculiar female image in the literary world of ancient greece. even up to today, she is still a female

54、of much controversy. she has been aimed at either with sympathy or with criticism by ethic-rooted critics of one generation after another. but no critics can deny the tragic coloring on her. the ethical spirit of a nation is the spiritual pursuit of the nation in knowing itself, perfecting itself an

55、d pursuing happiness and value of life. it is completely preserved in the literary works of the nation. there exist very important ethical thinking and ethical conception in ancient greek mythology in addition to its aesthetic value. the various gods and heroes show strong inner force in affirming t

56、hemselves, pursuing freedom, demonstrating human nature and pursuing happiness, which represents the whole man. the mythology is a hot issue in literature research nowadays. “at the century of science, reasonableness and logic, the mythology with the non-reasonableness has the special magic on the l

57、iterature stage” (armstrong 7).d. ethnical and moral principles as is known to chinese scholars, there is no unified or comprehensive mythic system in china, because ancient chinese culture belongs to the first civilization, which is spontaneous. it has rarely inherited or absorbed any elements from

58、 other civilizations. ancient china, situated in the far east separately, obtained little advanced heterogeneous culture from other nations. the process of mythic historicalization and ethicalization is too early and too profoundly to shape. as a result the current pure mythic materials became fragmentary and incomplete, even self-contradictory. historicalized systematic myths are