Warning. This post is bound to offend, irritate, or piss off certain readers, especially those who take the Bible, the Quran, or whatever other holy books they believe in seriously or literally. So if you are such a person, you may wish to exit this post now.
I’ve always enjoyed reading and studying mythology and the stories of heroic and legendary characters. But as entertaining as they may be, I’ve never, as a very pragmatic individual, put much credence into these tales. That’s because they are, plain and simple, folklore.
Folklore is essentially traditional beliefs, customs, and stories of a community, passed down through the generations, first by word of mouth and later by the written/printed word.
Like folklore, fables are generally short tales designed to teach a moral lesson, often with animals as characters.
A legend is a type of folklore, but it typically features human actions, rather than animals, and is perceived to have taken place within human history. It’s typically a non-historical or unverifiable story handed down by tradition from earlier times that is often popularly accepted as historical.
And that brings us to myths, which are stories concerning the early history of a people or explaining some natural or social phenomenon, and typically involving supernatural beings or events.
Perhaps it’s because of my aforementioned pragmatism, my logic, and my reason, that I can’t quite grasp how so many people in the 21st century truly believe as real the folklore, myths, fables, and legends contained in their holy books and are willing to fight and maybe even die to defend their own versions of these myths and legends as being the only ones to be believed.
Wouldn’t the world be a better place if people just appreciated their myths, fables, and legends for the folklore that they are. Believe whatever you want, but don’t use your myths as a weapon against those whose myths may be different from yours.
This irreligious rant was written for yesterday’s Fandango’s One-Word Challenge, “legend.” Sorry, I’m a day late, but my tour guide duties continue to keep me away from my blog.
This, That, and the Other 
very true and well said, the irrational belief in holy fairies really gets my goat. They make ask you to disprove their belief and of course you can’t so Rumour is fact. I’d say your leader Mr Trump might call it fake beliefs!
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All of Trump’s beliefs are fake beliefs.
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How long are you guiding?
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Through Wednesday.
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Not long now then. We haven’t got a time frame.
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Yes
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🙂
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You should hear the threats I get from people when I criticise their myths, Oh! Sorry religion.
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Oh no, you should never criticize anyone’s myths (religion). They will defend them with their lives.
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Where are you taking Heather and John today?
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North across the Golden Gate Bridge to Muir Woods, Mount Tamalpais, and Stinson Beach. Gonna be gone almost all day.
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I’m one of the believers (in Christ, the Bible and the Book of Mormon ((please no throwing tomatoes at that last one)). I was talking to a person the other day who has been a lot more devout than I ever was, and he shocked me when he said “I don’t believe in pushing my point of view on anyone else. Everyone is free to believe what they want.” Now that has been my point of view my entire life..but this other person? I hadn’t a clue. Some of the ‘devout’ in the trees don’t shove their own myths (an atheist friend of mine calls “God” – the Mythical Being) on their fellow (wo)men. Too bad the rest of them give the few of us bad names..
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Yes, it is too bad that those who wish to impose their myths on everyone else can’t or won’t stop.
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Yep. 🙂
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This is not a battle worth fighting. Belief is illogical. That’s why it is “faith” and not “fact.” You can’t “prove” god nor can you UN-prove god. Something ineffable and infinite is essentially outside the realm of proof. Give it up. Unless you just like fighting with for the fun of it.
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You’re right. I should give it up…and I would if others would stop trying to force their religious beliefs down my throat through their legislative initiatives.
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You can’t convince me that religion is nothing more than a social gathering, often times with more gossip and back stabbing than in the work place. I have nothing against faith and spirituality, but a church is just a social setting.
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No arguments from me on that.
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