Monday, September 20, 2010

Mythopoeia

"The language of modernity has emphasized the factual, and in doing so, theological imagination has greatly suffered. Indeed, modernity's language can be understood as anti-mythopoeic because modernity disconnects itself from ancient and patristic thought. In the quest for knowledge, truth has come to be defined as something that has been proven to be factual. Contrarily, the ancients used imagination and story to convey truth and meaning. The Church Fathers, with their many interpretive lenses of Holy Scripture, used theological imagination to express biblical truth, for their language oftentimes stirs the entire makeup of the reader: mind, soul and spirit. Modernity's loss of theological imagination, therefore, is an attempt to present facts that appease the cognitive dimension of the mind rather than the holistic makeup of the human being. In recapturing the essence of mythopoeia, theological imagination can once again emerge, conveying truth and meaning to the complete ontological makeup of humanity."


~Scott Seely, "Aslan's Song: The Mythopoeic Dimensions of the Narnian Creation Account" (Ambridge, PA: Trinity School for Ministry, 2010), 5.

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