Mystery and thought: Between demythization, interpretation, and revelation

Abstract

The thematic and problematic binomial science/myth occupies an important place within the first historical formulation of the demythologising project and in the historical-exegetical, philosophical and theological debates that were provoked by this project. This contribution aims to revisit the theme from an essentially theoretical perspective. It begins by proposing an interpretation of scientific research and its technological outcomes in terms of a special expression of human existential engagement within the physical-naturalistic and socio-cultural scenarios within which the human adventure unfolds. An understanding of myth is then developed as one of the itineraries through which human beings attempt to confront the mystery that unfolds when the question of the global sense of the human condition is radically posed. Finally, various modes of approaching myth are analysed, such as the demythologising and the phenomenological-hermeneutical. A quick reflection on the theme of revelation concludes the discourse.