“What is necessary is that there should be a turn in humanity felt by some or many towards the vision of this change, a feeling of its imperative need, the sense of its possibility, the will to make it possible in themselves and to find the way.”
Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine. The complete works of Sri Aurobindo Ch. XXVIII p1097
PROLOGUE
This work, the decoding of Greek myths, does not claim to be free from error, nor to have discovered all the keys needed to understand the myths. Often, intuition has opened ways leading to a wider understanding, progressing through a spiral approach which obliges one to return repeatedly to previous hypotheses.
It would be impossible to interpret the multiple versions of all the myths and their many characters; that would take dozens of volumes. Therefore this work endeavours only to bring forward the main structure and meaning of the most important myths. The decoding method given in the first chapter allows the reader to deepen the study at his own pace.
A substantial part of the interpretation rests on decoding the symbolism of proper names. It is thus evident that working three thousand years after these accounts were recorded, one must proceed with caution. Details of the decoding of these proper names are given in an annex at the end of this work.
In the course of this study we will see that the different variables and lines of genealogical descent were introduced to remove ambiguity, cut out disagreement between the different schools of initiation, enrich the knowledge of the path, or to ward off a progressive loss of meaning. Often, the most significant variable, and the only one that has been retained, is the one that is most coherent with the corresponding stage on the spiritual path.
Within the framework of this work, the stories cannot always be told in their entirety. The lists of characters that describe a totality of “conditions” necessary for certain spiritual experiences have been particularly abridged. Certain details are mentioned only in the interpretation which follows the narration of the myths. In a more general way, preference is always given to the version which seems to be the closest to the original oral version, even if it was transcribed much later on.
This first volume mainly provides the necessary bases for the decoding process. The following volumes set out theoretical teachings and descriptions of experiences that mark the path, in accordance with the two great directions discussed later: a progression through the mind and the path of purification/liberation.
During the decoding process, it became apparent that the knowledge hidden in the myths was rapidly lost, probably already partly so at the time of the great tragedians. Although sometimes the only surviving sources, the texts of Aeschylus and Euripides are to be considered with caution for primitive myths were often distorted. To substantiate their dramaturgy these authors not only lowered the stakes of the great myths to the level of our human understanding but also added variations that have little relation to the deeper meaning of these stories. For the sake of play, out of a need for secrecy or to give their theatrical works the value of moral edification, certain stories would be presented as the opposite of what the initiates were supposed to understand through them. Aeschylus for instance glorified the defenders of Thebes because it was a criminal offence to turn against one’s own city. But the seeker must understand that it is the attackers who are in the right, for the myth is about the purification of the energy centres in the body.
It would probably be more fitting to use a word such as “traveller” or “aspirant” instead of “seeker”, as this is not so much a mental quest as an aspiration of the entire being for another way of being, for another kind of humanity. In this study, however, we have kept the term established by tradition.
The texts of historians or mythographers must likewise pass under the scrutiny of intuition and experience. The Library of Apollodorus, dating from the 1st or 2nd century AD, generally remains the most complete and reliable source for numerous myths.
Let us also note that of the two great forerunners, Hesiod was more theoretical, and Homer more pragmatic. Attributed to Hesiod, the Catalogue of Women is a collection of fragments to which we have given major importance. It is an epic poem dating from the 7th century BC, also known as Ehoiai.
This study barely takes Latin mythology into account. At its beginnings in fact, the Roman world rejected the occult forms of the sacred, and it was only later, in view of establishing the divine rights of emperors, that they took on the mythological traditions of conquered territories, in particular those of Greece. Virgil is among the most celebrated of Latin poets. He associated the Aeneid with Greek mythology in a way that suggests that he was hardly aware of its general meaning. By the symbolic precision of the accounts in his Metamorphoses, which contains Greek myths almost exclusively, Ovid appears to have been even better initiated into their meaning.
Two contemporary works which have provided us with valuable assistance should also be noted: that of Timothy Gantz, Early Greek Myths, and for the different genealogical lineages that of Carlos Parada, Genealogical Guide to Greek Mythology.
With regard to the spelling of proper names, this work uses the version that seems the most appropriate: either the form made known by the Latin or French tragedians (for instance Ulysses, whose exact name is Odysseus in Homer’s text, or Pollux, initially known as Poludeukes), or the name in English form, or the transliterated form. The last two are closest to the Greek form, which facilitates an interpretation based on character structure.
Finally, it must be noted that in this work the word “god” is reserved for the mythological gods, that is to say, forces that work for the development of human consciousness. Whichever name is given to the Absolute, and for the sake of avoiding the inevitable associations that come with the word God, it seems preferable to use other terms such as Reality, Real, One, Divine, Truth and Supreme. In fact, his Absolute must not be associated with the God of religions, for it cannot be limited to a single truth or a God outside his creation that is a concept stemming from an omnipresent duality. In this work, the word Absolute refers to a state of being, a perfection that humanity has tended towards throughout the ages. The idea is brought forward that each c