The semi-fantastic form of knowing (Myth and religion)

Abstract

With this installment we continue the translation of La filosofia di G.B. Vico (1911) by Benedetto Croce. We now present the 5º chapter of the monograph, entitled: La forma semifantastica del conoscere. (Il mito e la religione). Croce maintains that within the New Science three orders of research are intertwined: philosophical, historical and empirical. In the previous 4º chapter the Author has dealt “The fantastic way of knowing. (Poetry and Language)” (Cuadernos sobre Vico, n. 36, 2022). This continuation deals with the Crocean interpretation of the Vichian interpretation of the myth (Croce dissociates myth and poetry and aesthetics); and postulates a concept of religion from the perspective of “human science” (Croce interprets a dualistic conception of religion in Vico: the ‘imanent’ conception, anthropological and historical, and the ‘trascendent’ conception, theological revealed).