THE CONCEPT OF NATURE AND LIFE IN CONGRUITY WITH NATURE IN THE AXIOSPHERE OF THE TRADITIONAL CULTURE

OF THE MARI PEOPLE

 

 

Galina E. Shkalina¹, Raisia A. Kudryavtseva², Tatyana N. Belyaeva³* & Vitaly I. Shabykov⁴

¹Prof, Mari State University, RUSSIA, galina_shkalina@mail.ru

²Prof, Mari State University, RUSSIA, kudsebs@rambler.ru

³Asst. Prof., Mari State University, RUSSIA, sokolova_beljaeva@mail.ru

⁴Senior Scientific Researcher, Mari Research Institute of Language, Literature and History named after V. M. Vasilyev, RUSSIA, sebs9-kud@yandex.ru

*Corresponding author

 

Abstract

The article is devoted to the analysis of the system of value relations and attitude of the Mari people toward nature, society, man. Such an axiosphere is untranslatable into the language of scientific concepts, and is expressed by symbols in a mythological, religious, artistic form. The concept of nature gives to Mari traditional culture structural isomorphism. Mari came to understanding of the natural order not through rational observation and logical thinking, but through mystery. Such form of knowledge today must be viewed as a tradition of sacred wisdom, which governs human life. It is such knowledge, from which theology, philosophy, and science emerged.

All nations have an innate respect for nature, expressed in the sign-symbolic form of their traditional culture.

In the sacred texts of Mari people, there is the idea of harmony between Man and the World. The harmony of the world is based on the circulation, consecrated and supported by higher beings – deities. In such environment nature itself is perfectly and culturally organized space, ideal abode with an eternal source of life energy. The man in such structure of the Universe does not play a passive role. He is energetically involved in activities to ensure his successful existence.

The age-old tradition of the Mari people has an analogue of Tao. It is the concept of Yu. It connects the man and the world in whole, removes limitations, one-dimensionality of human consciousness, which the logical form of thinking is.

The derivatives of Yu are юж (air), Юмо (God), юзо (magician), юлаш / юмылташ (to pray), Югорно (prophetic way).

The practice of prayers in the Mari sacred groves in the XXI century is the ongoing search of the highest truth, justice on this sinful earth.

The artistic treatise of the Mari ethnoethics is the poetic work of Anatoly Spiridonov «Yugorno. The song about the prophetic way»

The worldview basics of the traditional culture of the Mari people are, first of all, natural conformity, ecocentrism. In the Mari ethnoethics it sounds like that: «There is no nature – there is no man either. As I refer to nature today, so tomorrow I will live, as well as my family, my people, my country».

There is a need of reformatting of such sacral knowledge to the conditions of the modern cultural paradigm, what will allow to reduce the consumer attitude of modern man to the ecosphere. In an era of global crisis such approach is a lifeline for mankind, because the essence of this crisis is worldview.

Keywords: axiosphere, tradition, culture of the Mari people, the concept of nature, ethnoethics, structural isomorphism.