John J. Bonaduce PhD., Mythobiogenesis: The Cellular Origin of Myth, Religion, and Ritual
Dr John J. Bonaduce has his doctorate in mythological studies with an emphasis in depth psychology. His specific expertise lies in his work on “mythobiogenesis” a term and theory he coined during his doctoral studies. John is currently a regular contributor to the Joseph Campbell Foundation through his writing as well as a lecturer, presenting at both academic and religious conferences.
Mythobiogenesis seeks the origin of myth, religion, and ritual not only in the vastness of human history, but in the confining nucleus of a human cell. This place of origin is we designate the “trysting place,” the secret rendezvous of mind and body. Data in support of the existence of such a trysting place abound. These data exist in the forms of our most transcendent myths, our most sacred scriptures, and even in our most cherished bedtime stories.
Such is the production line of psyche and soma. It is a fruitful collaboration: Psyche (which is the totality of human consciousness) and soma (that is the human body as defined by its elements) are partners in a seamless division of labor. The human psyche donates lavishly from her store of culturally-conditioned imagery ranging from pretty portraits to terrifying monstrosities.
But the story structure is lifted straight from the human body. Larger-scale cellular processes, like the struggle of male gametes to survive in their advance toward an egg, also make fine story templates, structurally complete with beginning, middle, and end. Mythobiogenesis posits a powerful interpenetration of mind and body in an intimate collaboration of psyche and soma. Biological events too small for the unaided eye are translated into the greatest of epics and the most compelling of our rituals. The results include the sacrament at Mass last week and the fairy tales we tell our children.
Imputing mythological and psychological correspondences to intrauterine events has not been considered radical for some time; we have a whole school of prenatal psychology as a consequence. What may be considered radical is takingthe next step: the premise that ritual and myth can arise from a biological proces antecedent to the brain, to neural function, and to standard definitions of sentience, arising from units of life as small as a cell and still smaller.
Deluge myths originate, John proposes, in the perilous journey of a fertilized egg to a site of implantation in the uterus. While millions of sperm cells die in the failed attempt to reach the egg, the ovum itself is on a journey fraught with danger. By virtue of mythobiogenesis the transcendent myths are generated with remarkable narratives of arks, rafts, and canoes in search of safe berth in theaftermath of a world flood.
Mythology borrows its words and pictures from the world via the senses, but its story structure is abstracted from microscopic events taking place within the cell cycle in the human body. Put another way, mythology conflates very small events (an ovum passing through a woman’s upper fallopian tube) with very large events (the sun setting in the Egyptian west and passing through the body of the goddess Nut). Put another way, if we observe cell division with a microscope we may be simultaneously witnessing the story outline of the Iliad—or at least chapter XVIII of the Iliad.
The human cell, is the place where proteins and stories come from.
