EVRENSELCİ DİKOTOMİ BAĞLAMINDA ARI HAAN DESTANI
THE ARI HAAN EPIC IN THE CONTEXT OF THE UNIVERSAL DICHOTOMY

Summary/Abstract: Turks are one of the nations that build unique wisdom, the supreme work of collective contemplation. The fact that wisdom is a kind of worldview in one regard relates it to cosmogony. Turkish thought perceives the world as a whole and considers all beings that make up the universe as its components. Besides, in Turkish thought, the world consists of a combination of the earth and the sky. Although these two have opposite natures, they form a unity by harmonizing with each other. These two are equivalent to each other, neither of them is superior to the other. This system, which is formed by the earth and the sky, is known as the universalist dichotomy, the two universal principles or the two-principle system. The universalist dichotomy, which is the most fundamental part of Turkish thought, shows its effect in every aspect of Turkish life in a way to create harmony and unity in contrasts. This also includes narratives. The symbols in the plot of Turkish mythological narratives contain two universal principles in the depths of the apparent subject. The existence of two principles comes to light only when the symbols are analyzed, and it is seen the basis of the narratives is based on this system. In this study, the symbols in the Arı Haan Epic, which belongs to Tuva Turks and contains archaic features, have been analysed and associated with each other, and the Epic has been examined in the context of the universal dichotomy. The analyses have demonstrated that the Arı Haan epic, which was detected to belong to an archaic period when the concept of underground was not yet included in Turkish cosmogony, is also an epic that contains the dichotomy in its deeper layers through symbols. The totality of the meanings revealed by the analysis of symbols clearly reflects the existence of two universal principles.

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