Narrative

A Brief History of Story

Ruth Sawyer traces the beginnings of storytelling back to prehistoric times, and through her work, we can speculate that an early hunter may have given us a first narrative in the form of an impromptu chant exulting in his act of bravery and accomplishment. Gradually these chants may have developed into prose narratives, and the focus on the storytellers' actions may have broadened to include family, tribe, and others—until the third-person narrative came into being. Over time, the quest for understanding beyond immediate, concrete experience may have developed: wonderings about patterns in nature and whether there is a force beyond what one can see that shapes the world. Stories were created to explain these forces, and the ancient myths came to be.

In early cultures the storytellers were teachers: bards, troubadours, minstrels, seanachies, and ollahms. It was the storytellers' work to pass down the epics, myths, sagas, and legends that expressed the history, wisdom, and values of their societies. Following the invention of the printing press, print became the dominant medium for storytelling, and today we see stories told across the airwaves, through film, and through electronic media. Yet the power and appeal of story is in no way diminished. Indeed, despite modernism's attempt to devalue narrative as a way of knowing, the human need for story may be stronger than ever.

Story in Spiritual Traditions

The Hebrew Bible begins with a story—two stories, actually, from two different oral traditions—about how the world came to be. What follows is story after story: of how God caused humankind to multiply and spread over the face of the earth, of God's interactions with the matriarchs and patriarchs of the Hebrew people, including fictional stories such as the stories of Job and Jonah. These stories, interspersed with commands and regulations for living, were passed down from generation to generation, reflecting and shaping the Hebrew people's sense of their own identity and their understanding of God.

The first four books of the Christian Testament are stories of the life of Jesus of Nazareth. In them we learn that Jesus himself was a storyteller. He told stories to answer people's questions about how to relate to God and to fellow human beings. When Jesus came to the core of his message, the proclamation of the Kingdom of God, the best way Jesus knew to describe the Kingdom was through story: “The Kingdom of God is like a merchant who…” the Kingdom of God is like a householder who….”

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