Eternal Return (Eliade) - Human Creativity

Human Creativity

To some, the theory of the eternal return may suggest that traditional societies are stagnant and unimaginative, afraid to try anything new. However, Eliade argues that the eternal return does not lead to "a total cultural immobility". If it did, traditional societies would never have changed or evolved, and "ethnology knows of no single people that has not changed in the course of time". The mere fact that traditional societies have colonized new lands and invented new technologies proves that the eternal return hasn't suppressed their sense of initiative.

Far from suppressing creativity, Eliade argues, the eternal return promotes it:

"There is no reason to hesitate before setting out on a sea voyage, because the mythical Hero has already made in the fabulous Time. All that is needed is to follow his example. Similarly, there is no reason to fear settling an unknown, wild territory, because one knows what to do. One has merely to repeat the cosmogonic ritual, whereupon the unknown territory (= 'Chaos') is transformed into 'Cosmos'."

According to Eliade, traditional man's creative possibilities are endless because "the possibilities for applying the mythical model are endless".