Joseph Campbell's work The Hero with a Thousand Faces is an interesting dive into comparative mythology. It was of keen interest in gaining a basic understanding of the metanarratives offered by many of the cultures and religions of the world.
During the reading four thoughts came to mind. I will start with the most favorable.
1. Story telling principles that resonate in our souls
Campbell did a wonderful job of deriving the key pieces of many mythologies. These mythologies share many story points because they try to answer the same questions of the human condition. Because Campbell was able to outline and categorize them he gives us the framework for putting together and telling stories that will naturally resonate with us.
2. Overemphasis on human psychology over human condition
It was surprising to see him cite dream psychology and Freudian ideas in conjunction with the mythologies he was trying to synopsize. Rather than strengthen his ideas they weakened them as they placed the mythology at the needs of human psychology rather than the strivings to answer the questions of the human condition.
His thesis was "Mythology is psychology misread as biography, history, and cosmology." For my money, this is far too humanist and neglects the work of looking into the mysteries each mythology is trying to plumb.
3. Not a fair representation of Christianity so I doubted his representation of all religions and mythologies
At the beginning of the read I thought I was being treated with a thorough and fair treatment of the world's various mythologies. However, once he cited the "stories and beliefs" of Christianity it became clear that it was woefully inadequate. In order to fit Christianity into his framework he had to quote outlier doctrine, late apocryphal writings, or modern sermons.
Once I realized he did not give Christianity a fair representation, I was no longer confident the stories of Islam, Hinduism or various South American religions were being faithfully transmitted.
4. No treatment of the fact that some "mythologies" submit their stories as historical fact and should be evaluated under their assumptions
Due to his emphasis on psychology, Campbell completely dismisses out of hand that some religions and cultures proclaim their "mythologies" as factual stories. This is an unfair treatment and should be discouraged.
While I agree with Campbell, that many of the world's stories agree, I disagree on the reason behind the agreement. The human race shares not just it's psychology but it's spirituality. We all possess a soul that longs for the eternal and in our most honest days we crave for answers to our broken condition. The similarities of our mythologies show us that we know we need rescue but sometimes are more willing to cling to our fictional creations rather than the realities they echo.