The function of ritual and myth is to make possible, and then to facilitate, the jump — by analogy. Forms and conceptions that the mind and its sense… - Joseph Campbell

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The function of ritual and myth is to make possible, and then to facilitate, the jump — by analogy. Forms and conceptions that the mind and its senses can comprehend are presented and arranged in such a way as to suggest a truth or openness beyond. And then, the conditions for meditation having been provided, the individual is left alone. Myth is but the penultimate; the ultimate is openness — that void, or being, beyond the categories — into which the mind must plunge alone and be dissolved. Therefore, God and the gods are only convenient means — themselves of the nature of the world of names and forms, though eloquent of, and ultimately conducive to, the ineffable. They are mere symbols to move and awaken the mind, and to call it past themselves.