Etymology And Magic Yaskas Nirukta Flatos Cratylus And Riddle Of Semanticetymologies

Author(s): Johannes Bronkhorst
Publisher: Johannes Bronkhorst

Page 19

182
Johannes Bronkhorst
Etymology and Magic
183
excite in the mind. And this origin I believe occurs not merely in the primal language, but also in languages that have grown up later in part from the primal language and in part from the new usage of men dispersed over the globe. (Aarsleff, 1969: 88). 52
each other, and to higher forces with which they share features. Cosmic sympathy is possible because the world is a living organism.
Neoplatonic ideas played a major role in the natural magic that exerted much influence in Renaissance Europe (Walker, 1958; Yates, 1964: cf. Hadot, 1982). This magic - as Thomas M. Greene points out (1997: 262) -- requires the assumption that there is an inherent correspondence if not an identity between sign and its object, that there is a natural language and a natural semiotics. It comes as no surprise that sixteenth century critics of magic emphasize the conventional nature of language, which is the exact opposite of the position maintained by the upholders of magic (ibid. p. 255 f.). The same period has an interest in etymology. For Petrus Ramus etymology "means that one looked in it to discover, not the original meanings of words, but the intrinsic properties of letters, syllables, and, finally, whole words" (Foucault, 1966: 35). The situation is similar "in the Neoplatonic and cabalistic exegesis of texts and analyses of language, such as one finds in Pico or Fabio Paolini. You have a significant while, a lexi... which can be analysed into still significant parts, words (or propositions: then you go a stage further and try to find elements of the significance of the whole in single letters.... where in fact they do not exist." (Walker. 1958: 118). The interest in etymologies initially centered on Hebrew, the first language, but then extended to other languages as well (Maillard, 1991; Dubois, 1970: 80 f.). Even Leibniz, though critical of the idea of an original 'Ursprache', as the mystic Böhme called it came to accept a modified form of the Platonic doctrine of the nature of language: 'For languages have a certain natural origin, from the agreement of sounds with the dispositions of the mind (or 'affects"), which the appearances of things
The importance of similarities in "magical" acts was already noted by anthropologists in the last century. We shall here consider some of the ways in which these anthropologists and their successors have tried to make sense of this observation, with the ultimate aim of discovering to what extent their theories can help us to explain etymologies.
Sir Edward Tylor (1865: 124: 1891: 115 f.), followed by Sir James Frazer, ascribed the frequent presence of similarities in acts of magic to a confusion between thought associations and objective connections, to the mistake of taking "ideal connections for real connections". Frazer (1922: 14), in particular, distinguished two principles of thought on which magic is based; he called them the Law of Similarity and the Law of Contact or Contagion. These two give rise to Ho moeopathic or Imitative Magic and Contagious Magic respectively. 54 Frazer explained these principles as "misapplications of the association of ideas" (p. 15). In spite of this, these two principles constituted, for Frazer, a faith, as is clear from the following citation (p. 63-64): "Wherever sympathetic magic occurs in its pure unadulterated form,
Closely similar ideas are found in ancient China (Needham, 1956: 253 f.). Needham points at the connection with Frazer's law of similarity' (p. 280) and with the correlations accepted in Renaissance Europe (p. 296 f.). It is not necessary to believe that these ideas in different parts of the world must be explained by mutual influence, as Needham (p. 297.) tends to think. Rather, it appears that the idea that Similar things act on similar things is a rather obvious rationalization of the presumed effectiveness of certain magical and related facts
53 For a recent survey, see Cunningham, 1999
5* The discussion of magic was introduced in the second edition of The Golden Beagh, which came out in 1900: see Ackerman, 1987: 166 1. Ackerman, referring to EE Evans-Pritchard, calls this analysis of magic "Frazer's single most important contribution to the anthropology of religion".
p. Vickers, 1984: 95: "The occult tradition does not recognize the distinction hetween words and things and between literal and metaphorical language Words are treated as if they are equivalent to things and can be substituted for them." The term pra c htge' has been used Gerl. 1982) to describe the changed
languapehu.cn Locado Bruni 137-144) an Franco Patrici(15291547