A ritual is a set of actions, often thought to have symbolic value, the performance of
which is usually prescribed by a religion or by the traditions of a community.[1][2]
A ritual may be performed at regular intervals, or on specific occasions, or at the discretion of individuals or communities.
It may be performed by a single individual, by a group, or by the entire community; in arbitrary places, or in places especially
reserved for it; either in public, in private, or before specific people. A ritual may be restricted to a certain subset of the
community, and may enable or underscore the passage between religious or social states.
The purposes of rituals are varied; they include compliance with religious obligations or ideals, satisfaction of spiritual or
emotional needs of the practitioners, strengthening of social bonds, demonstration of respect or submission, stating one's
affiliation, obtaining social acceptance or approval for some event — or, sometimes, just for the pleasure of the ritual
itself.
Rituals of various kinds are a feature of almost all known human societies, past or present. They include not only the various
worship rites and sacraments of organized religions and cults, but also the rites of passage of certain societies, oaths of allegiance,
coronations, and presidential inaugurations, marriages and funerals, school "rush" traditions
and graduations, club meetings, sports events, Halloween parties and veteran parades, Christmas shopping, and more. Many activities that are ostensibly performed for concrete purposes, such as
jury trials, execution of criminals, and
scientific symposia, are loaded with purely symbolic actions prescribed by regulations or
tradition, and thus partly ritualistic in nature. Even common actions like hand-shaking and
saying hello are rituals.
In any case, an essential feature of a ritual is that the actions and their symbolism are not arbitrarily chosen by the
performers, nor dictated by logic or necessity, but either are prescribed and imposed upon the performers by some external source
or are inherited unconsciously from social traditions.
Ritual actions
Due to their symbolic nature, there are hardly any limits to the kind of actions that may be incorporated in a ritual. The
rites of past and present societies have typically involved special gestures and words, recitation of fixed texts, performance of
special music, songs or dances,
processions, manipulation of certain objects, use of special dresses, consumption of special food,
drink, or drugs, and much more. Religious rituals have
also included animal sacrifice, human
sacrifice, ritual suicide, and ritual murder.
Purposes
Ritual serves diverse purposes including, but not limited to:
- Worship
- Ritual purification with the aim of removing uncleanliness, which may be real or
symbolic.
- Atonement
- Dedication
- Education
Religious
In religion, a ritual can comprise the prescribed outward forms of performing, the cultus or cult of a particular observation within a religion or
religious denomination. Although ritual is often used in context with
worship performed in a church, the actual relationship between any religion's doctrine and its
ritual(s) can vary considerably from organized religion to non-institutionalized spirituality, such as ayahuasca shamanism as practiced by the Urarina of the upper Amazon. Rituals often have a close connection with
reverence, thus a ritual in many cases expresses reverence for a deity or idealized state of
humanity.
However, despite these understandings of ritual, the significance of ritual as a force for creating and maintaining religions
has been largely under-studied. The possibilities allowed by ritual's distinctive combination of traditional meaning with
instrumental or partially instrumental actions has been underestimated by many religious studies scholars who instead account for
the formation of religious groups in terms of "expression" of mental beliefs (or other mentalistic accounts) rather than in terms
of social bodily actions that become symbolic over time.
Sociology
Rituals have formed a part of human culture for tens of thousands of years. The earliest
known evidence of burial rituals dates from around 20,000 years ago. (Older skeletons show no
signs of deliberate 'burial', and as such lack clear evidence of having been ritually treated.)
Alongside the personal dimensions of worship and reverence, rituals can have a more basic social function in expressing, fixing and reinforcing the shared values and beliefs of a society. This
function can be exploited for political ends, though it lies at the heart of most sociological understandings of religious
ritual.
Rituals can aid in creating a firm sense of group identity. Humans have used rituals to create social bonds and even to
nourish interpersonal relationships.
Archaeology
Any artifact found in an archaeological assemblage that is not immediately recognised as a tool or decoration is sometimes
assumed to be or initially described as a ritual object. For example, the Red Deer skulls with antlers as found at
Star Carr or explanations of the Beaker culture.
Anthropology
Anthropologists have found rituals performed across the globe, in every conceivable culture. In its most basic elements ritual
is one of many cultural universals, yet cross-cultural variation in form, content and
social function is often great. Of particular interest to anthropologists has been the role of ritual in structuring life crises,
human development, religious enactment and entertainment. Among anthropologists, and other ethnographers, who have contributed to
ritual theory are Victor Turner, Ronald Grimes, Mary
Douglas, and the Biogenetic Structuralists.
Fraternal
Nearly all fraternities and sororities have rituals incorporated into
their structure, from elaborate and sometimes "secret" initation rites, to the formalized structure of convening a meeting. Thus,
numerous aspects of ritual and ritualistic proceedings are engrained into the workings of the societies.
Psychology
In psychology, the term ritual refers to a repetitive, systematic behavioral process enacted in order to neutralize or
prevent anxiety and is a symptom of obsessive-compulsive disorder
(OCD).
Further reading
Bell, Catherine. (1997) Ritual: Perspectives and Dimensions. New York: Oxford University Press.
Bloch, Maurice. (1992) Prey into Hunter: The Politics of Religious Experience. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
D'Aquili, Eugene G., Charles D. Laughlin and John McManus. (1979) The Spectrum of Ritual: A Biogenetic Structural
Analysis. New York: Columbia University Press.
Douglas, Mary. (1966) Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and Taboo". London: Routledge.
Erikson, Erik. (1977) Toys and Reasons: Stages in the Ritualization of
Experience. New York: Norton.
Gennep, Arnold van. (1960) The Rites of Passage. Chicago: Chicago University
Press.
Grimes, Ronald L. (1994) The Beginnings of Ritual Studies. Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press.
Malinowski, Bronislaw. (1948) Magic, Science and Religion. Boston: Beacon
Press.
Rappaport, Roy A. (1999) Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Smith, Jonathan Z. (1987) To Take Place: Toward Theory in Ritual. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.
Staal, Frits (1990) "Ritual and Mantras: Rules Without Meaning". New York: Peter Lang
Publishing, Inc.
Turner, Victor W. (1969) The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure.
Chicago: Aldine Publishing Company.
See also
References
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