MYTHOLOGY AND PHILIPPINE STUDIES

By F. Landa Jocano
The value of myths and legends to students of Filipino society and culture cannot be
overemphasized. These narratives are basic to our social tradition; they constitute part of our social
heritage. Yet the study of Filipino mythology has not apparently attracted the attention of many
educators and students.  Only few, so far, have shown interest in it. Undoubtedly, this aspect of our
literature is the most neglected field of study. Many colleges and universities do not carry a course
on it in their curriculum; instead, they have Greek and Roman mythologies as major offerings. While
it is true that liberal education must be internationally oriented, it must not be so detached from the
local culture as to lose its meaning and perspective. A balance has to be maintained or students
become dislocated in the end. After all they are the ones who will eventually come to grip with and
make adjustments to the realities of the community where they will live.

Whether or not this poor treatment which our own mythology receives is due to the neglect on the
part of our educators is hard to judge. Perhaps because we often hear these stories, we rarely
pause to consider them important in understanding the nature of Filipino culture and society. Also
these oral narratives have become so familiar to us that we often regard them as products of vain
imaginings intended to amuse or to frighten a child. If ever we study myths, we view them in terms of
what they look like on paper and not in terms-of what they actually serve in life.

Many of us fail to realize that myths fulfill one of the most important functions in society-serving as a
means by which people can logically present fundamental concepts of life and systematically
express the sentiments which they attach to those concepts. Let us examine briefly how myths
supply Filipino institutions (i.e. , family and kindred groups, social; political, and religious) with a
retrospective pattern of moral values that makes possible the understanding of the continuity of
certain customs and traditions.

Anyone who reads old accounts about the Philippines during the arrival of the Spaniards will
certainly note that our forefathers believed in many divinities. These deities inhabited the
surrounding world of our ancestors and maintained continued social and ritual interactions with
them. Aside from these relationships, these supernatural beings were believed to have control over
all phenomena basic to man’s survival-e.g. weather, diseases, success of crops, and so forth-such
that every phase of the daily activity had to follow the wishes of these controlling powers. The
farmer, the hunter, or the wayfarer venturing into the fields, hills, and forests should first seek the
permission of the spirits living in the vicinity or else he would meet with misfortunes on his way.

In like manner a traveler trodding a new path should first ask the permission of the environmental
divinities so that he would arrive safely at his destination. For good harvest hunting fishing building a
house, or for any other matter, appropriate sacrifices should be offered to the “soul spirits” of the
departed relatives who were considered intercessors with the higher divinities. The offerings should
be made during the performance of these proper ceremonies. These diverse ways of establishing
relations with the spirit world clearly illustrate how the myths of our ancient fathers, as well as our
own today, have favored the growth of traditional beliefs and practices. These also point out to the
fact that myths cannot be separated from any social institution as long as human beings are a part of
group life.

The nature of human society is such that it requires continuous motivation of human behavior in a
culturally constituted behavioral environment, in which traditional meanings of values play a vital role
in the organization of needs and goals and in the redirection of immediate experiences. Thus we
always find myths and legends identified with the convictions of the group. It is through the
elaboration of these folk narratives that ethical and religious views of life assume definite form and
character among the people. In like manner, it is from these stories that interpretations of natural
phenomena germinate and give rise, unconsciously under the tender care of those who conceived
them, to the luxuriant foliage of arts and letters.

Viewed from this perspective, Myths and legends have a far-more-reaching significance than we
suppose these have by merely studying the printed text. Perhaps this maybe explicitly stated in
terms of how myths play a vital role in the social life of ancient and contemporary Filipinos. It must
be realized that myths touch the deepest of human emotions-man’s fears, sentiments, passions, and
hopes, as these affect his social activity . They were the first hand tools which man used (and are
still using) to justify and validate the social order of his society and to explain his environment, long
before any systematic knowledge of natural phenomena became known to him. Their influence has
contributed directly to the creation of that great unseen world of ideas and ideals. It was through
these narratives that our forefathers defined their world, expressed their feelings, explained their
success, and made their judgments. In other words, myths form the fabric of meaning in terms of
which our ancestors interpreted their experiences and guided their actions; the source of their
realization of how everything they learned had precedents in the past.

Moreover, many of the deified personalities in Filipino mythology were spirits of the departed
members of the community. By tracing descent from these divinities, the individual was drawn closer
to other members of the group to whom he considered himself related because of common
ancestors. In this way, myths of origin endowed our forefathers with a retrospective pattern of
historical truth – a living faith which reinforced group solidarity, maintained social order, and made
interpersonal relationships easier. The constant repetition of the adventures of culture heroes,
moreover, established in the minds of our ancient fathers an effect similar to that which we feel in the
study of our contemporary historical heroes. It created in their minds a soil fertile for implanting
nobler sentiments necessary to bolster the morale of society and to regulate individual conduct in
conformity with the social order of group life. The empirical evidence for this historical assertion lies
in the persistence and continuity of Filipino myths and legends among numerous contemporary
lowland and mountain groups. The stories recorded by Miguel Lopez de Loarca (1583) and Jose
Maria Pavon (1838-39), to cite only two documents, are still currently narrated by the old folk in
Western Bisayas.

Thus studied, myths inevitably lead us to a fuller reconstruction of the social context of our
prehistoric lifeways and to a better understanding of the details of the historical tradition that form the
base of our contemporary culture and society. For one thing, as an eminent anthropologist puts it in
wider context, “myths are ways in which the institutions and expectations of the society are
emphasized and made dramatic and persuasive in narrative form. Myths show that what a people
has to enjoy or endure is right and true – true to the sentiments the people hold.” It is clear then that
one cannot hope to understand the Filipinos, as a people, if their tales, myths, legends, and songs,
which are part of the matrix of their tradition are disregarded; these native lore give them a sense of
being Filipinos.

1916 is around the earliest recorded. Wrote about. Melu the largest. Who set on the clouds.
Over looking the sea. His feet in the sea. Talked to tulu tulu the great turtle. He had decided to
make man in his image. He did this by taking a small part of his skin. From that he shaped
mam. Set him on the back of the great turtle to live. There man learned to fish, hunt prosper. To
live the ideal life. Then Melu made woman from a small skin from his back. He set them
amongst men. Soon they caused strife & fights. The division of people. Who for that reason
spread across the back of the great turtle. For this woman must forever suffer. Till peace is
brought back to all.