History Vs Mythology

I have always wondered why the mythology of civilizations of a period all seem similar in their characters and the lives of those characters.

Greek god Zeus reminds me of Hindu god Indra, both had heroic human sons, Perseus and Arjuna respectively who at one point fought with their fathers and received divine weapons from them too.

At times I do wonder whether this is actually history of a time so ancient and wondrous that future races being unable to imagine them pushed them into the realm of mythology.

After watching the movie ‘Elysium’ I even have a theory now. Consider this.

There was a time when a section of the human race was so evolved that some had acquired extraordinary mental and technological capabilities, so magnificent that they did not deem fit to live among the more ordinary mortals. So they built for themselves a city away from earth, called it ‘Heaven’. They had technology good enough to make life indefinitely long seeming immortal to the ones below. They thus turned into gods.

Being gods who depended still on some resources from earth, like sand, stone and water from the oceans, they decided to declare themselves rulers of the Earth. The council of Heaven controlled the resources, like Lord Varuna controlled the water supply, Lord Vayudev controlled air supply thus becoming wind god. This was the history of the times when gods lived above.

Of course this whole theory will sound ridiculous to those who believe that we are at the pinnacle of evolution. But they forget that life is cyclical. Even the life of universe is cyclical. So why could not have been living a race far superior to ours? Why could mythology not be just the history of forgotten times?

The Hindu epic Ramayana describes Ravana’s flying machine and city of gold. When the story was told up until 1900 it could be obviously seen as an imaginary tale as machines obviously cannot fly. But tell this same story now and the child who hears it would not have to imagine some weird box with wings, she would instead remember the flight she took once and ask what is so special about that.

What changed? Not the story, but our own technological prowess. So I believe there will come a time when all machines would be controlled by mind and tiny arrows could contain the destructive power of an atomic bomb and at this time mythology would once again become history.

Why do we need that? To humanize gods so the lessons taught can seem relevant to us. Today we just hear the stories but don’t care much for the lessons therein since we wonder how the troubles of imaginary goods and demons mean anything to us.