Mircea Eliade - Cosmos and History. The Myth of the Eternal Return

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Cosmos and History. The Myth of the Eternal Return

By Mircea Eliade

The manuscript that was began in May, 1945, was headed Cosmos and History. It was only later that author changed its title to Archetypes and Repetition. But finally, at the suggestion of the French publisher, he made Archetypes and Repetition the subtitle, and the book was published in 1949 as The Myth of the Eternal Return (Le Mythe de reternel retour). This has sometimes given rise to misunderstandings. For one thing, the archaic ideology of ritual repetition, which was the central subject of my study, does not always imply the "myth of the eternal return." And then too, such a title could lead the reader to suppose that the book was principally concerned with the celebrated Greek myth or with its modern reinterpretation by Nietzsche, which is by no means the case.
The essential theme of investigation bears on the image of himself formed by the man of the archaic societies and on the place that he assumes in the Cosmos.The chief difference between the man of the archaic and traditional societies and the man of the modern societies with their strong imprint of Judaeo-Christianity lies in the fact that the former feels himself indissolubly connected with the Cosmos and the cosmic rhythms, whereas the latter insists that he is connected only with History.
This essay appeared in French in 1949 as Le Mythe de Veternel retour: archetypes et repetition (Paris, Librairie Gallimard). English translations have revised and enlarged the text and have included in the footnotes references to certain studies published within the last few years.

This founding work of the history of religions, first published in English in 1954