Are myths and legends applicable to today?

Recently I've been working on two urban fantasy novels set in the same world, one using the plot of the Volsung legend and another dealing with the story of Kullervo. While doing research for the second one, I started thinking about the question of whether myths and legends are applicable to real life. For example, was the Volsung legend meant to be, at least partly, a tale about the effects of greed? Could you use myths to "explain" aspects of real life, like school shootings?

Here's the article I found analysing the Kullervo story in light of school shootings, which set me thinking. I love thinking about stuff like this, it ties in with the retellings of legends and folktales I'm doing.

Tale of Kullervo:

An Ancient Finnish Myth and Its Relevance to the Modern Day

David Yuen, Yahoo! Contributor Network Dec 11, 2007

All across the world, many cultures have developed their own myths and folktales, either to explain the natural of order of things or to provide a creative medium to pass wisdom from one generation to the next. Many of the more popular ones include the typical Greek and Roman myths of gods and heroes engaged in the complex dance of drama and entwined fate. Such stories may usually include cautionary lessons sometimes regarding the dangers of arrogance, greed, or even misplaced love. But one lesser known, more obscure myth—one that tackles far deeper issues than the usual ones most common to everyone, comes from the snowy land of Finland. This myth, or folktale, is part of a larger epic poem known as the Kalevala, which is considered to be the Finnish national epic compiled in the 19th century by Finn Elias Lonnrot from ancient oral poetry. This myth is the Tale of Kullervo.

At the beginning of the myth, two brothers are born and separated, Kalervo and Untamo (Untamoinen in the translated text). They both grow up to be men and they settle into two different lands. But one day, Untamo lays his fish nets into the waters of Kalervo and Kalervo, seeing this, steals Untamo's net along with any fish that Untamo caught with it. And from there, a cycle of vengeance begins, culminating to the ultimate destruction of Kalervo's tribe by Untamo and the virgin birth of Kullervo by Untamala (Kalervo's daughter), who survives only by submitting to Untamo.

From here the story shifts to Kullervo (Kullerwoinen in the translated text) who, at only three months old, is heard making vows of vengeance against Untamo and his tribe. Untamo, hearing this, tries three times to kill Kullervo, but in all three times Kullervo survives due to his inborn magical abilities. Finally, Untamo gives up and decides to put Kullervo, who's now a young youth, to work. He assigns him to multiple tasks (cutting down trees, threshing grain, etc.), but Kullervo, because he's overpowered with magic, unintentionally fails at every task. As a result, he ends up being sold as a slave to a blacksmith named Ilmarinen after Untamo declares:

"Kullerwoinen as a workman Is a miserable failure; Whatsoever work he touches Is but ruined by his witchcraft; I shall carry him to Ehstland, In Karyala I shall sell him To the blacksmith, Ilmarinen, There to swing the heavy hammer."

Under the ownership of Ilmarinen, Kullervo gets assigned the task of being a shepherd. But during his stay, Ilmarinen's wife is cruel to Kullervo and, during a round of shepherding, Kullervo shatters his family's heirloom knife, while cutting a piece of bread for dinner that the blacksmith's wife maliciously baked a rock into. From there, Kullervo snaps and with his powerful magic turns the wife's herd of cows into wolves and bears, which then maul and kill her. Afterwards, Kullervo flees. But during his flight, he encounters an old woman who informs him that his original tribe is still alive and living in the Northland. Kullervo then goes to his family and discovers them all, but for his sister, which his mother informs him went missing and is feared to be dead.

Though this would be a very joyous time for Kullervo, who's now a young man, the joy of the time isn't that long lasting, as Kullervo unintentionally fails again at all the tasks that his father, Kalervo, gives him during his stay. In frustration, Kalervo finally assigns Kullervo the task of collecting tributes for the tribe, which he is successful at doing. But on his way back from the task, Kullervo seduces a wandering girl and ends up sleeping with her. Then, on the following day, Kullervo discovers, to his horror, that the girl he slept with was his long lost sister who, upon realizing what she's done, commits suicide right in front of him. Kullervo, completely ashamed, returns home and informs his family of this.

After confessing to his family, Kullervo intends to kill himself, despite his mother's pleas not to, and ultimately determines to take out Untamo's tribe in one last act of vengeance. As Kullervo, himself, proclaims:

"I can never hide from sorrow, Cannot flee from my misconduct; To the jaws of death I hasten, To the open courts of Kalma, To the hunting-grounds of Pohya, To the battle-fields of heroes. Untamoinen still is living, Unmolested roams the wicked, Unavenged my father's grievance, Unavenged my mother's tortures, Unavenged the wrongs I suffer!"

One by one, his family tries to persuade him not to go down this path, but he refuses to relent and, as a result, they end up disowning him, except for his mother, who continues to love him even though she knows that what he's doing is wrong.

Kullervo, battle ready, departs for his mission of vengeance and during his journey, he discovers that every member of his family has died, one after the other. With his heart hardened, he barely stops to mourn for any of them. But once he discovers that his mother has died, the only one who has ever shown him any true love, Kullervo mourns. However, the fire of vengeance is heavy on his heart and Kullervo still chooses not to turn back to attend his mother's funeral. He pushes on with his mission. Before confronting Untamo's tribe, he requests a broadsword from Ukko, the chief god of the Finnish pantheon, and, armed with Ukko's sword, he slays all of Untamo's people and burns their villages to the ground.

But this victory is hollow for Kullervo. For when he returns back home he finds his homestead deserted with all of his family dead. With reality setting in, Kullervo weeps for days before finally crying out to his mother, who then awakens from her grave. Still bound to the love of her son, she tells Kullervo to go to the forest where wood-nymphs would take care of him and shelter him. Kullervo, upon the words of his mother, goes there, but during his trip he discovers the corpse of his long lost sister. With this being more than Kullervo could take, he asks his sword if it would accept his life. The sword, being a mere weapon of destruction, bursts into song, saying that it would gladly do so, since it is what it is and doesn't care if it takes the life of the righteous or guilty.

"Why should I not drink thy life-blood, Blood of guilty Kullerwoinen, Since I feast upon the worthy, Drink the life-blood of the righteous?"

With that Kullervo, plunges the sword into his heart killing himself. The tale ends with the minstrel, Väinämöinen, the central character of the Kalevala epic, speaking the tale's moral which is that a child should never be raised in wickedness and foolishness lest he or she would grow up to be as misguided as Kullervo.

The Tale of Kullervo is a very unique tale in the fact that it's one of the only folktales in the world to address the detrimental consequences of child abuse and neglect. Though this obscure tale comes from a fairly primitive background, its subject matter and conveyance of that subject matter is extremely sophisticated for what it is and very relevant, even in the modern day. In fact, the fundamental essence of the tale and its characters echo painfully keen when spoken in light of the tragic events of Columbine and Virginia Tech. In both incidences, we have adolescents who, despite their incredible potential, experience abuse in their youth (whether from bullying or neglect) and who, in turn, make terrible choices when dealing with the resulting pain. In both cases, vengeance comes at a high cost to both them and others around them. And, by the time all is said and done, their tale ends with them, ultimately, turning their weapon of destruction upon themselves, just as Kullervo did with Ukko's sword.

Overall, what the perpetrators of Columbine (Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold) did was inexcusable and terrible. Moreover, it was their ultimate decision to deal with their pain the wrong way that led to the atrocity. The same goes for Seung-Hui Cho of the Virginia Tech massacre. But just as Kullervo's ultimate fate could have possibly been averted with enough love and understanding, such could be the same with those mentioned.

In an age of computers, Internet, and genetic research, the issues that haunted society in the past still haunt the modern age. Though man, through the ages, has achieved many accomplishments, the need for responsible parenting and the need to be sensitive to one another still remain essential, yet unfulfilled with each passing generation. Ultimately, the words of the minstrel from Kullervo's tale continue to ring true today as it did countless centuries ago:

"O, ye many unborn nations, Never evil nurse your children, Never give them out to strangers, Never trust them to the foolish! If the child is not well nurtured, Is not rocked and led uprightly, Though he grow to years of manhood, Bear a strong and shapely body, He will never know discretion, Never eat the bread of honor, Never drink the cup of wisdom."

The Yahoo page for this article

So, can myths and legends be applicable to the 21st century? Can you use them to explain stuff like school shootings? I'm a bit skeptical about how the author links this story to shootings, probably because I don't think abuse is THE explanation for stuff like that.

edited 8th Apr '13 6:24:12 AM by MorwenEdhelwen

The road goes ever on. -Tolkien

Yes, though they may not always mean to be. When studying the Kabbalist Sephirot rabbis predicted priests who swore to be celibate would end up molesting children because God reveals himself to humans in ten ways and without balancing Yesod (the founding Sephira, how God reveals himself through the joy of the reproductive process) with Malkuth (the Sephira of practical worldly things) and or Tifereth (compassion, spirituality, ect).

Just rambling by dark ages Rabbis who barely knew their own language, had an unhealthy hatred of the Church and likely did not even know what a bacteria was right? Then this happened, during the time of "Happy Days".

Modified Ura-nage, Torture Rack

Well, sure, but the problem is that Western society is pretty much dominated by myths of war between good and evil. Bad guys are supposed to be completely bad, with few if any redeeming features. Popular culture treats mass murderers and serial killers as if they were devils, or werewolves. Hannibal is simply Satan in human form. Our myths leave little if any place for a misguided villain. Plus, we don't really believe in magical people anymore, we believe in destiny, calling, and possession by forces beyond human ken (that science cannot explain!). So a myth like that one seems unlikely to resonate with a large number of people. That isn't to say that there isnt a community of more literate people somewhere who might see a deeper meaning in it (I wonder where you might find a community like that?).

"We learn from history that we do not learn from history."

@Marquis: What story are you referring to when you say "that one"?

edited 8th Apr '13 7:39:58 PM by MorwenEdhelwen

The road goes ever on. -Tolkien

I know the Anti-Villain is less common the the evil villain, but still...

If anything, morality seems to be mostly depicted as Black and Gray, because nihilism is "edgy" and "cool".

edited 8th Apr '13 4:34:23 PM by Peryton

@Peryton: I don't know what you mean. Could you please explain? With most of the myths and legends I know, the characters aren't black or white eg. Sigurd in the Volsung legends is brave, honourable and heroic but also proud and impulsive. Gudrun is kind and loyal but also slightly greedy, envious, and bloodthirsty. Brynhild is beautiful, noble, vengeful and tragic.

edited 8th Apr '13 7:49:56 PM by MorwenEdhelwen

The road goes ever on. -Tolkien

@De Marquis: That's radically, radically wrong. Jewish, Greek, Roman, Norse, and Christian mythology is filled with flawed heroes. It'd be hard to find a lot of "white" morality. A couple of Biblical characters, maybe...Galahad...some (but not many) of the Greek heroes (Perseus springs to mind, but that's mostly because his story's not very fleshed out)...there are more flawed heroes then not.

Except for 4/1/2011. That day lingers in my memory like...metaphor here...I should go.

Such as Sigurd.

The road goes ever on. -Tolkien

The whole 'black and white morality' thing is why I think the bible is one of very few works of myth that are not relevant today.

'All he needs is for somebody to throw handgrenades at him for the rest of his life...'

@Thread Title: It depends on what you mean by applicable. The stories of the past can give useful insights into human nature, culture and history for certain; so long as they're looked at in the context of when, where, why and by whom they were written. In works derived from a time without (say) institutional education or science, fact and fiction can go hand-in-hand.

edited 9th Apr '13 4:22:10 AM by Snipehamster

@Snipehamster: I meant whether myths and legends can tell us something about today.

Also, do these lines refer to what I think they do? (shaken baby syndrome)

From Eino Friberg's translation of The Kalevala.

Shaken baby syndrome can cause quite serious problems, including emotional ones, and I've heard (from people who know about this stuff) and read that excessive rocking can cause shaken baby syndrome. Plus, very young babies don't have much hair, so if "his hair was flying" or tossing about, this obviously wasn't your ordinary fast rocking. Verlyn Flieger, the Tolkien scholar, did an analysis of Tolkien's retelling of this story, and noted under the line "for ill cradle rocking":

edited 9th Apr '13 5:03:48 AM by MorwenEdhelwen

The road goes ever on. -Tolkien

@Morwen: I was referring to the Finnish myth that shared with us. I'm not saying that the Finnish myth cant help us understand people who do evil things, I'm just saying that I'm not sure how many people are open to that yet.

@Peryton: I realize that a lot of fiction has a wide variety of different types of villains. What I was trying to say, probably poorly, is that the specific mythic and legendary models popular culture currently uses to explain evil actions consist almost entirely of the black and white variety. "Grey Morality" hasn't extended into, say, newscast depictions of real life mass murderers.

Again, that doesn't mean that it shouldn't, just that it hasn't.

@Ultrayellow: Similarly, I wasn't implying that mythology from around the world doesn't have flawed characters, including villains. Obviously it does (although I would say that flawed heroes are a lot more common than flawed villains). Offhand, I cant think of a single complex antagonist from mythology or legend, although I'm sure that I could if I really thought about it. (I'm focusing on villains because the OP seemed to emphasize bad stuff).

I mean, look at the popularity of Dracula vs. Frankenstein (the original character I mean, not the dumbed down version from the movies). Dracula is evil, Frankenstein is complicated (and very similar to Kullervo). Which one do you see used more often in popular media?

People generally don't mind grey areas in their fiction, but SFAICS, they are much less tolerant of it in non-fictional accounts of actual tragedies.

"We learn from history that we do not learn from history."

You won't actually find much "black and white morality" in the Bible. Many of the "heroes", from Moses to Jacob to Samson to David, are definitely not flawless and morally perfect; and some of the adversaries — like Saul, for example, but even Jezebel — have a tragic greatness of sorts.

This is no mere Values Dissonance: the ancient Hebrews were perfectly aware, for example, that Jacob was a cheat and a liar and Solomon was a horndog.

And let's not get started on the more philosophical books: whoever wrote the Ecclesiastes was about as far from black and white morality as it is possible to be.

Perhaps you could make a case for "black and white morality" in the New Testament; but really, it's just a matter of the NT narrative being focused on a Marty Stu (whether justified or not, it's a matter for a different thread)

edited 9th Apr '13 9:29:57 AM by Carciofus

But they seem to know where they are going, the ones who walk away from Omelas.

There is the way that Christianity pegs good and evil as objective rather than subjective quantities (ie "like God" and "not like God" respectively). This doesn't leave much wiggle room when social sensibilities shift, as they are wont to do, and leaves people clinging to outdated concepts of morality.

Can we please avoid the usual "Christianity is good/evil and true/false" discussion, and just consider the Bible as a literary work for the purposes of this thread?

The whole idea that good and evil are subjective (without commenting on its validity) is a modern one. You won't find it in the Iliad any more than in the Bible. Yes, in the Iliad there are sympathetic characters on both factions; but that's not to say that the Iliad operates under the assumption that correct behaviour is a matter of subjectivity. For example, in the Iliad Paris is presented as a lecherous, lazy coward, far less worthy than his brother Hector. Behold, an "objective" value judgement.

Now, the Bible is very different from the Iliad in a number of aspects, since it is the product of a wholly different culture; but the presence or absence of "black and white morality" is not a difference between the two works.

edited 9th Apr '13 10:26:30 AM by Carciofus

But they seem to know where they are going, the ones who walk away from Omelas.

Hmm...So moral ambiguity in stories is modern? >_>

edited 9th Apr '13 10:33:14 AM by CassidyTheDevil

No. You can find plenty of moral ambiguity in the Iliad, as well as in the Bible and in plenty of other works.

Moral relativism, on the other hand, is essentially a modern philosophical position, and it would have been as alien to the ancient Greeks as to the ancient Hebrews.

EDIT: Thinking about it, the Sophists seem to have worked under some sort of moral relativism. But it's difficult to say if that was the case — most of the sources which we have about them are unsympathetic ones — and they were far more recent that the Iliad, of course.

edited 9th Apr '13 10:42:00 AM by Carciofus

But they seem to know where they are going, the ones who walk away from Omelas.

Yeah, I know...But I don't see how exactly else you'd fit moral subjectivism into a story. I mean, obviously you could use it to interpret stories differently.

Well, for example, consider Discworld. "There are no good people, only bad people on different sides". There are some very moral characters, of course; but their morality seems to be mostly a personal position — Vimes is an useful tool for the Patrician, not the other way around.

EDIT: In effect, it seems to me (if we can talk about modern "myths and legends" in this thread too) that if Philip Pullman is the secular humanist answer to CS Lewis, Terry Pratchett is the secular humanist answer to JRR Tolkien — someone whose worldbuiling, while not a deliberate allegory of one's beliefs, conveys very effectively their main thrust.

By the way, this relates to another point which is related to the OP: myths and legends are still relevant today, because we are still creating and elaborating them. It is a typically human activity, and it's not going to stop any time soon.

edited 9th Apr '13 11:15:53 AM by Carciofus

But they seem to know where they are going, the ones who walk away from Omelas.

Some of God's prophets had worse morals than the pagans they denounced. Jonah is a standout example as his entire section draws attention to the fact God is not just for Israel. I think that will always be relevant so long as the world has religion. Right and wrong are the only things that separate human beings from animals according to proverbs (who knows, some may still find that archaic but it is a pretty humbling statement to me).

It is black and white as far as "God good, against God bad" but despite God being good he still allows things against him and at one point boasts about creating evil by defining what is good as casually as he creates shadow by letting there be light. God ultimately gives almost every soul the same rest after death too. The righteous will apparently get paradise eventually and a particularly nasty group of sinners will get dunked in a river of fire for an aeon (or maybe eternity but I do not think of revelation as anything more than a prolonged flowery metaphor for the Roman empire anyway) but it is pretty much the same in Norse Mythology (warriors get Folkvang and Valhalla, oath breakers get Nastrond, everyone else gets Hel)

I am not really convinced that the other myths are any more or less relevant. Even when the message was probably intended to be otherwise I think there value. Aisha, despite being venerated and respected as a الصحابة‎ Sahabah is a great example of why men should not take child brides for example. Joshua demonstrates how powerful and destructive the "US vs THEM" rhetoric can be. Able really should not have told off Cain just because God did not find his sacrifice acceptable.

Modified Ura-nage, Torture Rack

Yes, can we not get into a religious debate please?

edited 9th Apr '13 9:11:29 PM by MorwenEdhelwen

The road goes ever on. -Tolkien

Morwen:

Oh, certainly. My point was that we should be careful to avoid confirmation bias, misinterpretation and so on. Myths can tell us many things, but not all of those things are true.

Bit like politics, really. Or, you know... the news.

@Snipehamster: Like the fact in this one, there's the implication that child abuse=evil.

@De Marquis: Frankenstein is the scientist.

edited 10th Apr '13 6:57:43 PM by MorwenEdhelwen

The road goes ever on. -Tolkien

The monster is a morally ambiguous antagonist. Frankenstein himself is a morally ambiguous protagonist. It's pretty nuanced.

I agree with you, though. An English class I took once studied Dracula and Frankenstein at about the same time. I was the only one who preferred Frankenstein.

The Bible has plenty of flawed villains. Pilate and Judas, for instance, are both incredibly sympathetic in their own ways.

All in all, I think the greatest value of myths and legends is that by looking at fundamental questions through different cultural lenses, we gain a better understanding of our subject. The Greeks, for instance, had a very different way of seeing life than the Hebrews. And if you study both (as most Westerners do) you hopefully (it's hard in practice) get a more sophisticated understanding of life than either of them did.

Except for 4/1/2011. That day lingers in my memory like...metaphor here...I should go.