Why speak? E-Book

Luisa Aurora Viviana Rodal

• Herausgeber: Editorial Autores de Argentina
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 345

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Beschreibung

This philosophical work is a research about the meaning and importance of language. The author investigates the different comprehensions about language through various civilizations and philosophies. She proposes to understand it as a technique for survival, allowing culture and democracy. She notes that, even if it may be used for manipulation and exploitation, it is the best tool for freedom.

Leseprobe

LUISA AURORA VIVIANA RODAL

Why speak?

Treatise on Language

Rodal, Luisa Aurora VivianaWhy speak? : Treatise on Language / Luisa Aurora Viviana Rodal. - 1a ed. - Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires : Autores de Argentina, 2023.

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ISBN 978-987-87-4365-3

1. Ensayo Filosófico. I. Título.CDD 410.1

EDITORIAL AUTORES DE [email protected]

Table of contents

Preliminary Words of David Gardiner

Prologue

Introduction

1. Speech, Mythology and Religion

2. The word in Plato and Aristotle

3. Language in Augustin and Thomas

4. The meaning of language in Leibniz and Rousseau

5. Locke and the question of language

6. Wilhem von Humboldt and the power of language

7. Russell and the Analytic Philosophy, Kripke, Wittgenstein

8. Charles Sandlers Peirce and Victoria Welby, Semiotics.

9. Saussure and Linguistics.

10. Ogden and Richards, language and meaning

11. Leonard Bloomflied and Behaviourism

12. Noam Chomsky and Universal Grammar

13. Fodor and the Language of Mind.

14. Steven Pinker and Language as Instinct

15. Austin and the Acts of Speech, Montague and Grammar

16. Walter Benjamin and Giorgio Agamben, Transcendence and Language

17.Heidegger, Being and Language

18. Paul RIcoeur and Hermeneutics of Linguistics

19. Derrida, Deconstruction and Writing

20. Gadamer and language as conversation

21. Emile Benveniste and Stylistics

22. Jacques Lacan and the psychoanalyst word

23. Karl Otto Apel and the responsibility in dialogical language

24. Jurgen Habermas, the Ethics of Language and the Manipulated or Distorted Communication

25.Conclusion. Language as Technique or Tool for Survival and Culture. Virtue and Value of Language

Notes

“Speak only if improves silence”

Mahatma Gandhi

“I read old books I would rather learn from those who built civilisation than those who tore it down”

I dedicate this book to John Stephen Gregor who has been my constant interlocutor and who has inspired not only the chapter on silence but also economically supported the publication of this essay

I truly thank the wise and patient guide and critique of David Gardiner.

Preliminary Words of David Gardiner

It has been a pleasure and privilege, over the last few months, to observe the research for, and then the subsequent writing of this excellent book. I think the book will add significantly to our knowledge of the origins , functions and development of language over the centuries. It breaks new ground in examining different forms of language in different cultures, and also provides a deep insight into the work of philosophers, linguists and other thinkers who have made contributions to this fascinating area of scholarship.

Prologue

Why there is language? Why speak? Which necessity grants it its existence? What is language by itself (and not simply in itself)?

I do not inquire, nor search for its essence (something hidden and perhaps derivative). I ask why does not exist only the mere silence (not the silence as absence of sound, but the nothingness of a special noise that directs the attention towards a significative content).

Language, associated to the transcendent divine in all religions because of its lack or absence of bodily or expressed materiality, is especially sensual (sensible audition inasmuch as sound and relative to music) and, on the other hand, mental, referred to signification. Without sound or communicative sensibility, there is no language, since this is so much as it appears as speech (or written, graphism that remits to speech).

Language is, because of what has been said, relational , involving the nexus with the mind and the sonorous sensibility. And also, it is the force generating of the social relation, as it is communication. Because of all this, that there is language when there is speech.

Language is related not only to semantics (through the intention of the signification), but also to a legal structure depicted by grammar and syntax. And, at last, it is the medium that allows the communitarian organization, describing its modes through the instrumental expressivity.

In few words, language is a relational instrument that makes possible, in its turn, the social relation.

In an universe of uncertainties (uncertainties perhaps because the universe might be, truly, hazardous, or because human wisdom is determinately limited). Language helps the necessity to reach the best probabilities concerning that worries human being through the sharing or participation of knowledge (communication) for the survival of humanity (inhabitant of an existence for which culture is the grounding point). Language may be understood, hence, as the instrument, or technique that he human developed for aits own culture, producer of a medium allowing survival in face of the natural calamities and helper of life through the political order, as also of the community of knowledge.

I propose to understand language (that which is language by itself) as an effective technique for the survival of the human being ( be it considered as species, or individual, or social entity). In this sense it has been comprehended, used and has been present in the mythical civilizations as in those which privilege rationality.

The instinct of life, expressed in the hope ( and many times incarnated in faith or personified in leaders) discovers in language a mode of affirming and sustaining itself. Rationality, in its part, creates new symbolic languages to encode science.

Yet, it may be added to the problem referred to that which determines language, the question of its reference to silence. Human being (as I understand it) is free to choose silence. But its history directed hum to language as a technique. Perhaps the answer might be that it showed itself as the most apt and successful tool, inasmuch as it generates culture and society. there are some that choose silence as a way of life (for example, several monastic orders).

In spite of what has been said, I may observe that without language there is no humanity. And I do not wish to state with hits that it is a privilege of the human. Better, the way in which human being has used tis technique originated not only surprising civilizations, but also assured the survival of the life unique to humanity, tradition (essential anchor of the social and individual becoming) and the innovation in knowledge (included art and poetry).

Why speak? The question could be answered in different ways. I mainly understand that one of the motives of the speech techniques (and also of writing, later technique but still grounded on speech) is awoken by the material, social, cognoscitive and affective needs of human being. Through the stream of language all human ideation is expressed and it serves for human species survival and the possibility of its cultural creations.

Evidence of the decisive and crucial importance of language for the existence of human being as person and as social individual is the preoccupation, manifested since early epochs for its clarity and correction (as it can be seen in Aristotle´s Organon, the interest in grammar to interpret the Vedas, or even in the pictorial work of the caves, which point out the importance of a right technique to communicate knowledge, as also to express affections). This question reaches a full expression with the work of Locke, in a period when science increases its efforts to liberate itself from the dogmas of faith.

The participation and communication of knowledge (and also of other human intentions, as poetic creation or politics, among other issues) directs the critical attention of humanity to the problems of the necessary clearness, signification and sense of language.

Exactly because of what has been said, I shall try to reflect on what determines and stablished language. I want to argue for the importance of speech (and, consequently for writing). I ask about the fact of language to answer this question: Why speak?

Introduction

“Learn more to be silent, just as how you learned to speak”, Imam Ali

Bertrand Russell says: “Without language, or some pre-linguistic analogue, our knowledge of the environment is confined to what our senses have shown us; but by the help of speech we are able to know what others can relate and to relate what is no longer sensibly present but only remembered” (1). Russell synthetizes what I intended to say in the Prologue

The question of language was specially thematized during the XX and XXI centuries, not only through a philosophical, linguistical, anthropological and sociological considerations, but specially by Psychology and Psychiatry. The first work of Sigmund Freud, which originated the psychoanalytic theory, was the treatise on aphasia (On the Interpretation of Aphasias,1891). This work criticized the location mechanistic theories (it confronted the belief that aphasia or the lack of speech was located in certain brain areas). Freud criticized the positions which linked aphasia to neuroscience, considering them as irrelevant. This point of view grounded an important founding for later theories. Freud originates with this change in the consideration of language problems a fundamental basis for the development of psychoanalysis. He suggested that speech is spontaneous in nature and postulates that that it emanates from the individual desire to link up with others through language. This allowed him the discovery that the difficulties in speech in an individual would instantly disappear if the patient would begin to speak about the event which induced to the language disorder. Freud proposes thus to overcome the theories that associated the problem to severe brain damages through the relation between language, body, concept, mind. From the theories centred in the mind which receives bodily impressions he inclines himself to the comprehensive study of speech by the overcoming of the event which produced the disorder. The Freudian alternative moves the attention from the posture that states absences in critical parts for the normal functioning of language towards the supposition of interpretations associated with psychoanalysis. Considering that the theories up to his epoch were mistaken, erroneous, unproved, he proposes a cure through psychoanalysis. It is surprising that, nevertheless, Freud lacked of linguistic theories which in his time were flourishing, and that Lacan, later, will profit (2)

I mentioned the work of Freud because it is not only remarkable how the issue of language concerned even the Psychiatry of the XX century, but also since it is the fact that the first essay inaugurating a new discipline, Psychoanalysis, was born precisely out of the lack of speech and its problems.

I think, relating the phrase of Russell with the treatise on Aphasia, that precisely the linguistic communicative problems diminish the capacity to share knowledge and the ability of using a technique, which founds and creates the proper and characteristic medium of humanity.

The language technique is so decisive for survival and the development of humanity that its lack drives and generates the apparition of alternative instruments to supply its absence. Scientifics and physicians to MIT and Massachusetts General Hospital have produced a quantitative method to identify these deficiencies. Their discoveries have showed that patients with grammar problems use a richer and more complex vocabulary to compensate syntactic lacks and vice versa (3). Mutism (be it selective or total) is treated today through different therapies, and those who suffer deaf-mutism use other signal ways as gestures, written words or computers as a mode of communication. There are 2.4 million of deaf-muted in the world that overcome isolation and the impossibility of expression through other languages or sign systems different from speech (4). With this I wish to attend to the special situation of speech and word as belonging to the language technique that has shown to be the more appropriate for communication through centuries, and that accompanied humans as instrument to share, build and realize their ideas. Ant what is noteworthy is that the instrument itself generated a cultural universe, being one of its interests the study of the speech itself and the linguistics.

Through the sound, the sensibility, we form a map of reality; we elaborate a culture that allows human being to move and to trust in the surrounding medium, granting it a signification (scientific, affective, politic and others). This allows the continuity of humanity in history and the implication of the individual in society. Thus, the technique of language shows the centrality of its use.

In Spanish, there is a verb (which can only be traduced to English with a verbal phrase, “shut up”): “callar”. It is remarkable that this verb has no corresponding noun. It indicates the action of silencing. “Callar” would be the opposite to “speak, and it involves a willingness to silence. It is silence as an abstention of speaking. This is the silence proper to language, since there iare another kinds of silence: the silence referred to noise or unarticulated sound (which produces disappointment and its decibels may be superior to the normal ones), and the silence referred to the simple sound (auditive sensation produced through the vibration of an object, felt by the ear and transformed in nervous impulses sent to the brain) (5).

Precisely, the silence of speech and word is related to the silence of “callarse” (as in music silence is relative to notes). It is not the silence implied in noise or simple sound. The silence of language is understood by means of the absence of significative sound, speech and word. In language, the signification includes sonority and silence that allows articulate it, in a similar way as in musical pieces. We live in a world of sounds, and language does not lack the musicality of intonation.

Speech is this: sound that calls the attention regarding relevant situations to be shared or communicated. The significative sonority orients those who communicate themselves regarding ideas, which compose an habitable world (in all the possible human senses: effectivity, science, legality, politics, among others).

As it can be seen, the question of silence does not appear as something accessory to language. It is intrinsic to speech, as the spacing to writing. The rationality of the discourse implies it in order to accentuate, suggest, express ignorance (argumentum ex silentio), disapprobation or doubt, intensification of phrases (with rhetorical aims), mark of prosodic units limits, as also to allow the freedom to silence or even to show a danger. Nevertheless, all what has been said does not exhaust the relation between silence and language. An important and surprising facet of silence is shown in its religious use.

Ritually, silence is used in the mode of prolonged intervals, and certain religious disciplines practice silence during periods or all along the whole life as an ascesis for spiritual elevation (Carmelites, trappists): Metaphorically understood as indication of interior stillness it leads to the contact with the divine reality and the true self. Speech would cease as also the unrest of the material noise.

Of special importance is the silence in Pseudo Dionysius. In his Mystical Theology, when explaining the two modes of access to the divine, he exposes the affirmative and negative ways. The first one states the reality of God through affirmative descriptive propositions. The second one odes it negating all theological name and representation. The cause of this last attitude is that “When entering in the darkness which exceed al intelligence, we shall not only be frugal in words, but also we shall be completely without words and not thinking in anything” (6); “when one tries to ascend from things below towards the highest, inasmuch as one rises, one begins to lack words, and when one has ended the ascension one shall be totally without words and shall united completely with the ineffable” (7). Since “There is no words for it, no name, no knowledge” (8), silence is what is proper to the divine, that “cannot be named, nor understood; absolutely nothing can be negated or affirmed of it” (9). That is to say that because of its own transcendence, it is impossible and inadequate to speak about the divine. The access to the divine is the entrance to obscurity, which is not the absence of light but its superabundance (11). So, the negative way of elevation towards the divine is apophatic and cancels speech. Therefore, Dionysius says: “Let thy speech be better than silence, or be silent” ( 12).

This position will acquire a notable place in Christianity, allowing also to elaborate a dogmatic that affirms the beyond of faith in pure belief. Saint Augustin distinguishes, hence, the merely exterior silence from the interior one that is apart from the turbulence of noise and makes possible the spiritual transformation, speaking of “keeping silence for the love of God” (13). The rule of Saint Benedict invokes the silence that prepares the heart to listen in the middle of a noisy world and allows the faithful to enter in the heart of God, who loves silence; it adds that there is a strong silence which is not quietism but the permanence in God, and that neither is the silence of death at the tomb but the one of resurrected Christ (14). According to Angelus SIlesius, the prayer does not require word, song, gesture, nor sound and it mus be silent since God is unnameable (15).

There is a parallel vision of silence in Buddhism, though not centred in the triune and one God and the tranquillity but rather on the quietness of voidness (Zen Buddhism) (16).

The mysticism encouraged by the Quietism of XVII and XVIII centuries (Madame Guyon, for example) meant the retirement of the noisy world for a state of happiness or blessing of the contemplation of the divine (17).

Heidegger takes this significative comprehension of silence proposing it as central ground of language (18). Even if it is possible to relate the Heideggerian silence (specially the one of poetry and creation) with the comprehension of Wittgenstein (who considers that the limits of language are also the limits of the world, and because of this, of what one cannot speak, one must be silent), I believe that it is not appropriate considering that the two visions of the theme postulate similar positions. Heidegger speaks from Da Sein and the Ereignis (existentialism), Wittgenstein from the theory of word games and the importance of the context in the comprehension fo language.

Besides all this, one may speak of a “silence fallacy”, that is to say, assuming that the one who is silent agrees. Silence must be understood not only in accordance to its nominal sense but also related to the context in which it appears.

And, one could go further, remembering the divine name YAWEH, unpronounceable but written and readable. The Torah prohibits the use in vain of God, but Karainism avoids the use of hi name absolutely. Posteriorly, theologians weaved a grammatical history that explained the lost of the original pronunciation of the word (19).

I could, in addition, remember the willing silence of Ulises before the illusions of the mermaids. This is a particular kind of silence: voluntary and regarding the discourse of other. Opposed to the silence of “callar” or omitting the speech, the silence searched by Ulysses is achieved blocking the possibility of the sensation of the voice, with the aim to avert a deceitful seduction (that implied a danger for his life and freedom). Daily life shows this case en a variety of cases and diverse objectives (being the resistance to listen one of its cases).

To speak is to express with a word or proposition (phrase) (spoken or written) certain signification. In this all etymologies and lexicons coincide (10). To say or to speak is the fabulous power of human beings, already personified in the classic mythology by Hermes, the divine messenger. And one speaks or says something to communicate or participate something.

Knowledge is power affirms Francis Bacon ( “Scientia potential est”) (21), in the same wway as stated in the Book of Proverbs (24:5). And if this power is communicated, it increases in number as also in the possibilities of its progress or perfection, through the discussion, reflection and critique. Because of this, language, in so far as it is communication, is involved in the power of wisdom and knowledge itself.

In other words, human being is not simply impressed by the image of the world through sensations. Even Home recognizes the task of reason in the elaboration of ideas. The human mind does not reflect in the way of a mirror simply through mental images the surroundings and what concerns him. He makes it through language too. That language is necessary to thinking is another question, because it is still discussed whether one thinks linguistically or not. But, it is proper to humans forging ideas from sensibility with the help of the language technique. Therefore, some authors saw in language an interpretation of the world that surrounds the human being, situated in certain culture. Indeed, the human being would not be capable of managing himself in the world (including society) were it not for his ability to interpret and communicate his knowledge, speaking thus about a world in which otherwise he could not survive. Human beings produce its environment creating culture with the technique of language.

I think it is important to quote Bertrand Russell stating: “Knowledge means the assertion of a true form of words# (22).

So, as I observed, language and speech are techniques for power, which enable the human being to survive and to produce culture through communication.

There are various theories regarding the origin of language. I shall mention them since it is an important question the one about the effective historical beginning of it. It is noteworthy, nevertheless, the affirmation of Georges Yule: “We simply don´t know how language have originated”. Though “some type of spoken language developed between 100.000 or 50.000 years ago, well before written language”. Without the possibility of concrete evidence, it is impossible to know when language was originated, though the biblical tradition adjudicates the power of naming to Adam (23).

Mythologies link speech to the divinity. And, even during the Illuminism, the relation between language and God was not forgotten. Towards the end of the XIX century (and onwards)the reference to the divine is lost and the inquisition is about language itself. The theory of evolution influenced on the elaboration of explications about its origin.

The continuist theories point out that it evolved from pre-linguistic systems of ancestral primates and the discontinuist ones state that is a human characteristic. There are some that believe it is an innate faculty and some assign it to a cultural system (depending of social transformation).

The symbology, the DNA, and th fossils may induce to formulate hypothesis regarding the beginning of language.

According to Charles Darwin: “I cannot doubt that language owes its origin to the imitation and modification, aided by signs, and gestures of various natural sounds, the voices other animals and man´s own instinct” (The Descent of Man) (24). I think that, since it is a technique for survival, language arises from the stimuli of the environment (natural sounds, gestures imitated and modified, due to its utility and facility to communicate necessities and urgent knowledges, since sound signs transmit in a practical way relevant contents), stimuli that include individuals, nature and society. Humanity discovered an ingenious mechanism that, uniting sound and idea, allowed to express urgent messages in a hostile habitat and which even in the technological world permits the codification of scientific data, as well as the expression of artistic forms, contents that in the present time have an elevate grade of abstraction and elaboration.

The contemporary theories about the origin of language believe that the onomatopoeic ones (Bow.bow, Pooh.pooh, Ding.dig, Yo-he-ho) are peripherical, naïve, irrelevant analysis because they believe in a mechanistic way that language evolved linking sounds and meanings (25).

The most important hypothesis today include the theory of the relation mother and child (Fitch), a reciprocal altruism (Ib Ulbaek), the murmuring for coupling (Dunbar), the ritual speech (Rappaport), the hypothesis of Romulus and Remus based in language recursiveness, (Vyshedking), gestural theory, the calling of ancestors, the use of tools the hands being busy for gestures, the dance as inductor of word and the noise of instruments suggesting words, the relation with the baby and interaction (Falk), the grammatical theory based in the understanding starting from metaphor, the mental theory (Baaron Cohen) (26).

A research proposes that the Ardipithecus Ramidus (hominid dated in 4.5 million of years) shows the first evidence of an anatomic change with a vocal capacity, lacking the hindrances for speech proper to chimpanzee. The archaic Homo Sapiens used a pre linguistic system (Steven Miller proposed the word “Hmmmm” for this mode of speech) may have had a gestural, facial, acoustic language. Homo Sapiens (Ethiopia, 200.000 years ago) used pigments for pictograms (Biombo cavern). SO, in the evolution, the pharynx descends, the vocal tract is reconfigured (John Ohala) (26), Quentin Atkinson proposes to think that language was created in Africa 80000 and 160000 year ago, in the epoch of symbolic culture.

It is noteworthy that the mythologies do not credit to man the invention of language, but it depends on divine power.

With the development of the thought of Chomsky and the Universal Grammar (influenced by Humboldt and Descartes), the glottochronology, the neurolinguistics, psycholinguistics and the creation of institutes dedicated to the origin of language in 1990, new theories have emerged (28). It is important to remember that Noam Chomsky and Fodor propose an innate linguistic structure to human beings, activated through experience and learning.

One of the central questions of language is its relation to ethics and mutual trust. Since it is relational, because it communicates. The trust not only about what is referred by the sign but also the sincerity of the interlocutors is elemental. Confucius says in the Analects,13,3:

“When the words are not the correct ones, what is said does not sound reasonable: when that is said does not sound reasonable, the affairs will not end satisfactorily; when the affaris do not end satisfactorily, rituals and music shall not flourish; when rituals and music do not flourish, the punishment will not be in accordance with the crimes, the common of the people will not know where to put a hand and the foot; thus, when the lord names something, or when he says something, it must be certain that it may be practicable. The question about the lord is that it be not casual regarding speech”.

Toda, Habermas and Apel insist int the implicit relation between speech and ethics. Not only because the necessity of expressing clearly the mental contents, but also due to the social moral nexus that involves speech (which, as I observed, implies the instinct of life, or at least the intention of individual and social survival), the technique of language demands an accurate expression. Because of all this, communication presupposes or is related to morality and involves information as also commandments and questionings or questions. In Russell´s words: “communication does not consist only in giving information, commands and questions must be included” (29).

Perhaps the affirmation of DIederick A. Stapel and Gun R. Semin might be more clear to explicate my concern to understand language as an instrument to ably address before the urgencies of the surrounding world. They say: “Language is a tool that directs the attention to specific aspects of the physical , psychological and social environment” (30). When, and how appeared this efficient technique is difficult to establish. And perhaps it is something innate to the mind (as Chomsky says), but the fact is that this tool developed itself giving place not only to oratory, rhetoric, logic, science, history, poetry, politics but also to the progress of the achievements in formal and mathematical languages (indispensable to computation and artificial intelligence).

With what I have said, I wished to offer a panorama about the theme that I shall try to explicate argumentatively. I considered important to remember that primitive comprehensions and the thinkers or philosophers who have reflected on language, so I did it in a chronological way. I shall begin with the most antique ideas on the subject and then I shall explain the modes in which the problem is understood today. I shall conclude explaining my own position on language, that I have briefly advanced in this introduction.

Let me please close the Introduction recalling that, when the Greeks tried to define the human being, they made it through the terms “zoon logon echon”, which in its original sense it did not mean simply “rational animal or living being” but “animal gifted with language” (31). Karl Popper clarifies in a contemporary perspective, this characterization when he affirms; ”You must not illusion yourself so much communication; it is what we have in common with animals. What matters in human language are propositions. In them, the peculiar capacity of man for the exposition of the truth about the real world is leaned on”. One must consider that language is referential and relational; it attends to the necessities of human expression that is committed in society making of its survival the flourishing of culture through the simple technique of language.

1. Speech, Mythology and Religion

Bronislaw Malinowski, whose mentor was Sir James Frazer, believed that magic existed even in modern times (and, as I shall review in this work, there still are thinkers about language with this kind of comprehension). Primitive man associated it with the practice of fire, basketry, the production of stone instruments, cooking, danger in hunting, war and love (34). I think that the magical and mythical mentality (related to religion, which privileges faith as a mode of behaving in the world), supplied or allowed a peculiar form of practical orientation (then replaced by rationality with the thinkers of Miletus, Greece). The magical culture (mythical or religious) facilitates a system through which each human being efficiently understands the environment, often threatening, and thus, it orders it in a thoughtful way.

Before the objectivity or distance of rationality, the mythical universe seems to be dominated by a sympathetic attitude and hidden forces may influence the reality, imparted through contagion (and not through a rational and voluntary action) (35). Malinowski says: “The sympathetic rite… very prominent in magic functions… Its main purpose consists in the generation and transference of magical force… in the atmosphere of the supernatural”(36). This thinker states something more interesting even, that specially rests with the theme of language: the mythology is included especially in the realization of enchantments, spells, and incantations, that must be repeated with absolute fidelity to the traditional origin, in which the power of the prototype is invoked. This supernatural character of magic is also expressed in the figure of the sorcerer (so, the speaker or producer of the magical word) because of its abnormal character and because of the taboos that surround the realization of the ritual (37).

The magical speech, the charm of language, is realized with a gestural accompaniment, always with the belief that the hidden force will act practically with a goal in reality, without a nexus with the natural rationality (38). And all this is possible because “the function of myth is neither explanatory nor symbolic” (39); that is to say, there is no intention of explicating but of making possible an extraordinary event(40). As Malinowski says, the myth is note merely a part of an attractive fiction (41), or a phantastic narrative. The mythical mind affirms a primal reality that is nourished through the intuitions and searches of the community, supplying it with moral values (42) as the transcendent numinous.

To what has been said, Malinowski adds a suggesting observation: magic and religion are connected with the biological necessities of human beings, they surge from their imagination and thought, and they officiate a functional character for society and the individual (43). They are basically rooted in man and are satisfied by a culture that allows them (44). And no other thing do I intend to say when I sustain that language is a technique for survival, that collaborates for the existence of a properly human world. Therefore, the primitive man relates his existence and speech to the mythical ideation. Magic fabulates the comprehension of language as something intimately linked to the divinity and thus fulfils with a social and individual function. The technique of language, in the mythical mind, associates itself ti the supernatural and explains itself through the divine power and government.

I made these observations because what I shall immediately expose are not simple stories, tales and histories, but they imply a special form of thinking, not usual in our technological era. Myths were explicative references of divine kind, statements magically true; the fabulation of the narrative held reality and even the daily existence of individuals and community. It granted certainty and authority, help and knowledge (or wisdom). The relevance of the data of magical histories and the spells were a sure assistance and weaved the image of reality. They proportionate referentiality to the mode of life of primitive man. The function of magical tales was to guarantee refuge to comprehend the natural or human events. Its protective mantle allowed to maintain not only daily life but also the one of empires, illuminated wars and feats, as also to protect the power of some initiated (among them, the scribes, who were generally associated with trade).

If the speech remits to the referent, the narration of the myth organizes this mentioned entity inside a hierarchy or interpretation, which gives reference to the referentiality itself. The orientation that supplied the configurations of language in the mythical world was associated to the divinity that organized the universe. The intimidating or menacing environment (natural or social) could be thought in such a way that, through the word, it acquired a significant relevance for the understanding and domestication of the universe. The technique of speech and writing facilitated, in the mythical mentality, a guide for inhabiting the world.

Egypt personified in Thoth, heart and tongue of Ra, the god of writing, magic, wisdom, language and moon. This god was the one who fabricated the languages and invented writing. Yet, as it is related in the story of Set and Horus (representatives of the battle between good and evil), Thoth is the mediator. And thus was later language thought in Western culture, conceiving word and proposition as mediations of thought.

Thoth was the scribe, the god of wisdom, son of Ra, who could create himself using the power of magical languages. He is the generator of magic and the messenger of the gods, their counsellor and mediator in the disputes, as also the guardian of divine records. He is a lunar deity, associated to Semas, goddess of writing and wisdom, scribe of the divinity. He gave to Set the magical words to resurrect his lover Osiris and conceive his son Horus.

It is credited to Thoth the sacred Book of the Dead, collection of spells and rituals. He was attributed the words that pleased Ra as well as the creation of heavens and earth.

Being Thoth the beginning of creation and all areas of the intelligence, he ruled over religion, law, mathematics, science, philosophy, medicine, writing. Since he originated the written word and he gave it to the humans through his consort Seshar, he could be compared with the myth of Prometheus and the fire.

Thoth is the interpreter, who formulates the sense not only of the divine but of the whole universe (45).

In India, the word vac, officiates a similar character. Raimundo Pannikar observes that “In the beginning there was the word (vac) state some Vedic texts. But the word is not the beginning, it is beside him. Without this unique mythical element the Upanishads cannot be understood”(46).

Salvation is realized not only by the mind but also through the word and, because of this, the vocalization is essential part of the cult (Tantrism).

Pannikar remarks that the first category of hindu spirituality is the word (47), that must be understood as thought essence and must also be really pronounced. The sound pf the audible and physical prayer, transmitted and conferred by whom has been authorized for it, is the force of the mantra. Even more, it is not sufficient the sole vocalization since it is required that the spatial visualization too for its total penetation (48).

For this, Pannikar points out, the mantra is “an instrument of the mind, a medium for the realization of the sacred action, the natural accompaniment of ritual. The mantras and the brahamana compose the Veda (49). In this sense, the Veda is not a book. The mantric recitation is owned by them and a only theoretical study of it has no sense for Hinduism. This is explained by the reason that the text implies the praxis.

Properly said, the mantra is a verse or even a simple word, with or without meaning, repeated recitatively in loud voice, that must be interiorized. The mantra is, hence, a sound with a supra – intellectual content and originally sacred, and, therefore, salvific. Because of this, speech rescues and saves. Its efficacy requires adequate or correct conditions and dispositions.

Because of all this, the mantra entails a sacramental character. Thus, the mystical sound fulfils a soteriological function. And, even more, its ritual repetition produces the identification with the object (divine) (50).

Pannikar comments that the religious salvific truth is not the knowledge of a proposition, doctrine or dogma, but its personal assimilation, its complete realization (that necessarily implies the effectivity of language). And this is possible because the mantra is understood as a reality, as a mystical manifestation, as an audible echo of the transcendent, ass the effectuation f the mantric power. The seed of the divinity (bija) must be present for the effectuation of the mantric power. It is inoculated with the imposition of the mantra by the guru. That is to say that nobody may give to oneself a mantra, since it belongs to the path of initiation. Now, each aspect of the divinity has its bija, which empowers the mantra in an efficacious mode so that the initiated may identify himself with the divinity, to whom he recites or invokes (52). This germen of the divine in man is nourished through the mantra, which, on the other hand, allows the famous reductions of the sacred texts of Hinduism ( in such a way that millions of verses (stoka) are condensed in a few ones and these in an unique mantra of only one monosyllabic sound).

The spirituality of the mantra permits the liberation of the soul. In other words, the word effects the liberation. Its sound dynamic is completed with the yantra, mantric diagram of the whole reality which is generally geometrical. The yantra is the representation of the cosmos and the bridge through which man visually enters into the true and real universe. These practices direct the homogenization with the divine, the salvation. The most known yantra in Occident is the mandala (54).

The Hindu god of the word is precisely Vac (that in Sanskrit means “speak”, “voice”, “express”)(55). Vac is a Vedic goddess, the personified form of speech. She penetrates the inspired poets and visionaries, and gives expression and energy to whom she loves. She is invoked as the “Mother of Vedas”, and is the consort of Prajapati, incarnation of the mind; she is also associated to Vision (Kashyapa), the mother of emotions and friend of musicians (56).

She is usually identified with Saravasti or Bharati, goddess of speech, and the Veda represents her as created by Prajapati. In other stories, she is the mother itself of the Vedas and wife of Indra (57).

In the early Rig Veda (books 2 to 7) she is related to the sacrificial voice of the priests, and she is personified in the books 8 and 10. In the Rig Vedam10, 125m5 y 8,100, Vac speaks in first person, saying: “I verily myself announce and utter the Word that Gods and men alike welcome” (58).

There is a intimate relation between speech, sacrifice and ceremony and this is clearly expressed in the book 10, 711, 4 : “like men cleansing corn flour in a cribble, the wise in spirit have created language” (59.

In the figure of Vac, the goddess represents language as speech. As Sarawasti, she is the divinity of wisdom, knowledge, music, aesthetics. As Bharati, she refers to eloquence.

Sarawasti means elegant, flowing, and many times it is traduced as speech. She is attributed the invention of Sanskrit, she is the patron of arts and sciences and wife of Brahma. The children are initiated into writing during her celebrations or festivals and some believe that humanity was originated from her marriage with Brahma. She gives to Ganesha (the divine scribe divine patron of writers) the gifts of the pen and inks (60). In particular, Ganesha was the deity of intellectuals, bankers and scribes; his name signifies “Lord of the People” and as the rat and the elephant, he removes the obstacles (61).

Sarawasti is personified as a beautiful woman, dressed with niveous garments, decorated with the lotus that means light, knowledge and truth, holding the book of Vedas, a rosary (symbolizing meditation, interior reflection and spirituality). This symbology serves to express the vision of the true nature of things through speech. Sarawasti is, due to this, the celestial Queen that allows the friendly communication through the gift of language, connecting human beings. In the figure of Vac, she symbolizes the sacred word (62)