A ritual is a sequence of activities involving gestures , words, actions, or revered objects. Rituals may be prescribed by the traditions of a community , including a religious community. Rituals are characterized, but not defined, by formalism, traditionalism, invariance, rule-governance, sacral symbolism, and performance.
110-463: Rituals are a feature of all known human societies. They include not only the worship rites and sacraments of organized religions and cults , but also rites of passage , atonement and purification rites , oaths of allegiance , dedication ceremonies, coronations and presidential inaugurations , marriages, funerals and more. Even common actions like hand-shaking and saying " hello " may be termed as rituals . The field of ritual studies has seen
220-621: A homeostatic mechanism to regulate and stabilize social institutions by adjusting social interactions , maintaining a group ethos , and restoring harmony after disputes. Although the functionalist model was soon superseded, later "neofunctional" theorists adopted its approach by examining the ways that ritual regulated larger ecological systems. Roy Rappaport , for example, examined the way gift exchanges of pigs between tribal groups in Papua New Guinea maintained environmental balance between humans, available food (with pigs sharing
330-625: A magic circle which practitioners believe will contain energy and form a sacred space, or will provide them a form of magical protection. Prayer is one of the duties and worships of Mazdayasna , which is performed in order to always pay attention to the religious commandments and to give thanks to Ahura Mazda (God). In modern society and sociology , some writers have commented on the ways that people no longer simply worship recognised deities, but also (or instead) worship consumer brands, sports teams, and other people ( celebrities ). Sociology therefore extends this argument to suggest outside of
440-412: A "battle against fakelore". Dorson complained that popularizers had sentimentalized folklore, stereotyping the people who created it as quaint and whimsical – whereas the real thing was often "repetitive, clumsy, meaningless and obscene". He contrasted the genuine Paul Bunyan tales, which had been so full of technical logging terms that outsiders would find parts of them difficult to understand, with
550-416: A British Functionalist, extended Turner's theory of ritual structure and anti-structure with her own contrasting set of terms "grid" and "group" in the book Natural Symbols . Drawing on Levi-Strauss' Structuralist approach, she saw ritual as symbolic communication that constrained social behaviour. Grid is a scale referring to the degree to which a symbolic system is a shared frame of reference. Group refers to
660-468: A biblical source for this idea. In Sikhism , worship takes place after the Guru Granth Sahib , which is the work of the 10 Sikh Gurus all in one. Sikhs worship God and only one God, known as "One Creator", "The Wonderful Teacher" ( Waheguru ), or "Destroyer of Darkness". Wiccan worship commonly takes place during a full moon or a new moon. Such rituals are called an Esbat and may involve
770-443: A complete mind and body experience. By stopping one's everyday activities and focusing on something simple, the mind can open and expand enough to reach a spiritual level. By practicing the step of vipasyana, one does not achieve the final stage of awareness, but rather approaches one step closer. Mindful meditation teaches one to stop reacting quickly to thoughts and external objects that present themselves, but rather to peacefully hold
880-535: A cultural order on nature. Mircea Eliade states that the calendrical rituals of many religious traditions recall and commemorate the basic beliefs of a community, and their yearly celebration establishes a link between past and present, as if the original events are happening over again: "Thus the gods did; thus men do." This genre of ritual encompasses forms of sacrifice and offering meant to praise, please or placate divine powers. According to early anthropologist Edward Tylor, such sacrifices are gifts given in hope of
990-418: A diverse range of rituals such as pilgrimages and Yom Kippur . Beginning with Max Gluckman's concept of "rituals of rebellion", Victor Turner argued that many types of ritual also served as "social dramas" through which structural social tensions could be expressed, and temporarily resolved. Drawing on Van Gennep's model of initiation rites, Turner viewed these social dramas as a dynamic process through which
1100-427: A fixed period since an important event. Calendrical rituals give social meaning to the passage of time, creating repetitive weekly, monthly or yearly cycles. Some rites are oriented towards a culturally defined moment of change in the climatic cycle, such as solar terms or the changing of seasons, or they may mark the inauguration of an activity such as planting, harvesting, or moving from winter to summer pasture during
1210-721: A formal stage of life such as a fraternity . Arnold van Gennep stated that rites of passage are marked by three stages: Anthropologist Victor Turner defines rites of affliction actions that seek to mitigate spirits or supernatural forces that inflict humans with bad luck, illness, gynecological troubles, physical injuries, and other such misfortunes. These rites may include forms of spirit divination (consulting oracles ) to establish causes—and rituals that heal, purify, exorcise, and protect. The misfortune experienced may include individual health, but also broader climate-related issues such as drought or plagues of insects. Healing rites performed by shamans frequently identify social disorder as
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#17327721836011320-451: A four-volume analysis of myth) but was influential to later scholars of ritual such as Mary Douglas and Edmund Leach . Victor Turner combined Arnold van Gennep 's model of the structure of initiation rites, and Gluckman's functionalist emphasis on the ritualization of social conflict to maintain social equilibrium, with a more structural model of symbols in ritual. Running counter to this emphasis on structured symbolic oppositions within
1430-417: A hiatus in his knowledge or in his powers of practical control, and yet has to continue in his pursuit.". Radcliffe-Brown in contrast, saw ritual as an expression of common interest symbolically representing a community, and that anxiety was felt only if the ritual was not performed. George C. Homans sought to resolve these opposing theories by differentiating between "primary anxieties" felt by people who lack
1540-444: A human response. National flags, for example, may be considered more than signs representing a country. The flag stands for larger symbols such as freedom, democracy, free enterprise or national superiority. Anthropologist Sherry Ortner writes that the flag does not encourage reflection on the logical relations among these ideas, nor on the logical consequences of them as they are played out in social actuality, over time and history. On
1650-411: A legitimate communal authority that can constrain the possible outcomes. Historically, war in most societies has been bound by highly ritualized constraints that limit the legitimate means by which war was waged. Activities appealing to supernatural beings are easily considered rituals, although the appeal may be quite indirect, expressing only a generalized belief in the existence of the sacred demanding
1760-646: A limited and rigidly organized set of expressions which anthropologists call a "restricted code" (in opposition to a more open "elaborated code"). Maurice Bloch argues that ritual obliges participants to use this formal oratorical style, which is limited in intonation, syntax, vocabulary, loudness, and fixity of order. In adopting this style, ritual leaders' speech becomes more style than content. Because this formal speech limits what can be said, it induces "acceptance, compliance, or at least forbearance with regard to any overt challenge". Bloch argues that this form of ritual communication makes rebellion impossible and revolution
1870-410: A means of resolving social passion, arguing instead that it simply displayed them. Whereas Victor Turner saw in ritual the potential to release people from the binding structures of their lives into a liberating anti-structure or communitas, Maurice Bloch argued that ritual produced conformity. Maurice Bloch argued that ritual communication is unusual in that it uses a special, restricted vocabulary,
1980-410: A number of conflicting definitions of the term. One given by Kyriakidis is that a ritual is an outsider's or " etic " category for a set activity (or set of actions) that, to the outsider, seems irrational, non-contiguous, or illogical. The term can be used also by the insider or " emic " performer as an acknowledgement that this activity can be seen as such by the uninitiated onlooker. In psychology ,
2090-412: A religion worship is a process whereby society worships itself, as a form of self-valorization and self-preservation. Invented traditions Invented traditions are cultural practices that are presented or perceived as traditional, arising from people starting in the distant past, but which are relatively recent and often consciously invented by historical actors. The concept was highlighted in
2200-411: A return. Catherine Bell , however, points out that sacrifice covers a range of practices from those that are manipulative and "magical" to those of pure devotion. Hindu puja , for example, appear to have no other purpose than to please the deity. According to Marcel Mauss , sacrifice is distinguished from other forms of offering by being consecrated, and hence sanctified. As a consequence, the offering
2310-420: A ritual was his exploration of the liminal phase of rites of passage, a phase in which "anti-structure" appears. In this phase, opposed states such as birth and death may be encompassed by a single act, object or phrase. The dynamic nature of symbols experienced in ritual provides a compelling personal experience; ritual is a "mechanism that periodically converts the obligatory into the desirable". Mary Douglas ,
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#17327721836012420-469: A shared "poetics"). These rituals may fall along the spectrum of formality, with some less, others more formal and restrictive. Csordas argues that innovations may be introduced in less formalized rituals. As these innovations become more accepted and standardized, they are slowly adopted in more formal rituals. In this way, even the most formal of rituals are potential avenues for creative expression. In his historical analysis of articles on ritual and rite in
2530-439: A similar way to how the liturgical term "cult" is traditionally used) was not synonymous with adoration, but could be used to introduce either adoration or veneration. Hence Catholic sources will sometimes use the term "worship" not to indicate adoration, but only the worship of veneration given to Mary and the saints. Orthodox Judaism and orthodox Sunni Islam hold that for all practical purposes veneration should be considered
2640-399: A small number of permissible illustrations, and a restrictive grammar. As a result, ritual utterances become very predictable, and the speaker is made anonymous in that they have little choice in what to say. The restrictive syntax reduces the ability of the speaker to make propositional arguments, and they are left, instead, with utterances that cannot be contradicted such as "I do thee wed" in
2750-594: A spectrum: "Actions fall into place on a continuous scale. At one extreme we have actions which are entirely profane, entirely functional, technique pure and simple; at the other we have actions which are entirely sacred, strictly aesthetic, technically non-functional. Between these two extremes we have the great majority of social actions which partake partly of the one sphere and partly of the other. From this point of view technique and ritual, profane and sacred, do not denote types of action but aspects of almost any kind of action." The functionalist model viewed ritual as
2860-424: A symbolic activity, it is no longer confined to religion, but is distinguished from technical action. The shift in definitions from script to behavior, which is likened to a text, is matched by a semantic distinction between ritual as an outward sign (i.e., public symbol) and inward meaning . Worship Worship is an act of religious devotion usually directed towards a deity or god. For many, worship
2970-467: A technical distinction between two different concepts: The external acts of veneration resemble those of worship, but differ in their object and intent. Protestant Christians, who reject the veneration of saints, question whether Catholics always maintain such a distinction in actual devotional practice, especially at the level of folk religion . According to Mark Miravalle the English word "worship"
3080-559: A temple. Meditation ( samādhi ) is a central form of worship in Buddhism. This practice is focused on the third step of the Eightfold Path that ultimately leads to self awakening, also known as enlightenment. Meditation promotes self-awareness and exploration of the mind and spirit. Traditionally, Buddhist meditation had combined samatha (the act of stopping and calming oneself) and vipasyana (seeing clearly within) to create
3190-457: A wedding. These kinds of utterances, known as performatives , prevent speakers from making political arguments through logical argument, and are typical of what Weber called traditional authority instead. Bloch's model of ritual language denies the possibility of creativity. Thomas Csordas, in contrast, analyzes how ritual language can be used to innovate. Csordas looks at groups of rituals that share performative elements ("genres" of ritual with
3300-463: Is also often questionable. Pseudo-folklore or fakelore is lore (or activities, documents, etc) falsely presented as if it were genuinely traditional. The term can refer to new stories or songs made up, or to folklore that is reworked and modified for modern tastes. The element of misrepresentation is central; artists who draw on traditional stories in their work are not producing fakelore unless they claim that their creations are real folklore. Over
3410-503: Is an example of the way in which a traditional symbol has been used to manipulate the minds of people who had nothing to do with its creation." Others have argued that professionally created art and folklore are constantly influencing each other and that this mutual influence should be studied rather than condemned. For example, Jon Olson, a professor of anthropology, reported that while growing up he heard Paul Bunyan stories that had originated as lumber company advertising. Dorson had seen
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3520-484: Is based on silence and inward listening to the Spirit, from which any participant may share a message. In unprogrammed meetings for worship, someone speaks when that person feels that God/Spirit/the universe has given them a message for others. Programmed worship includes many elements similar to Protestant services. Many programmed meetings also include a time during the service for silent, expectant waiting and messages from
3630-518: Is because the woman has come too closely in touch with the 'man's side' in her marriage that her dead matrikin have impaired her fertility." To correct the balance of matrilinial descent and marriage, the Isoma ritual dramatically placates the deceased spirits by requiring the woman to reside with her mother's kin. Shamanic and other ritual may effect a psychotherapeutic cure, leading anthropologists such as Jane Atkinson to theorize how. Atkinson argues that
3740-432: Is bodily discipline, as in monastic prayer and meditation meant to mold dispositions and moods. This bodily discipline is frequently performed in unison, by groups. Rituals tend to be governed by rules, a feature somewhat like formalism. Rules impose norms on the chaos of behavior, either defining the outer limits of what is acceptable or choreographing each move. Individuals are held to communally approved customs that evoke
3850-527: Is equivocal, in that it has been used (in Catholic writing, at any rate) to denote both adoration/ latria and veneration/ dulia , and in some cases even as a synonym for veneration as distinct from adoration: As St. Thomas Aquinas explains, adoration, which is known as latria in classical theology, is the worship and homage that is rightly offered to God alone. It is the manifestation of submission, and acknowledgement of dependence, appropriately shown towards
3960-687: Is it possible or useful to attempt to discriminate the 'genuine' antiques from the fakes?" Another also praised the high quality of the articles but had qualifications. "Such distinctions" (between invented and authentic traditions) "resolve themselves ultimately into one between the genuine and the spurious, a distinction that may be untenable because all traditions (like all symbolic phenomena) are humanly created ('spurious') rather than naturally given ('genuine')." Pointing out that "invention entails assemblage, supplementation, and rearrangement of cultural practices so that in effect traditions can be preserved, invented, and reconstructed", Guy Beiner proposed that
4070-621: Is not about an emotion, it is more about a recognition of a God. An act of worship may be performed individually, in an informal or formal group, or by a designated leader . Such acts may involve honoring . The word is derived from the Old English weorþscipe , meaning to venerate "worship, honour shown to an object or deity , which has been etymologised as " worthiness or worth-ship" —to give, at its simplest, worth to something. Worship in Buddhism may take innumerable forms given
4180-569: Is not their central feature. For example, having water to drink during or after ritual is common, but does not make thar ritual a water ritual unless the drinking of water is a central activity such as in the Church of All Worlds waterkin rite. According to anthropologist Clifford Geertz , political rituals actually construct power; that is, in his analysis of the Balinese state , he argued that rituals are not an ornament of political power, but that
4290-544: Is offered the following description of the creation of man: "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul". As a result at the moment of death each of the two elements needs to be returned to its source, the body returns to earth, while the soul to the heavenly creator, by means of the funerary ritual. Calendrical and commemorative rites are ritual events marking particular times of year, or
4400-584: Is probably a central one in Hinduism. A direct translation from the Sanskrit to English is problematic. Worship takes a multitude of forms depending on community groups, geography and language. There is a flavour of loving and being in love with whatever object or focus of devotion. Worship is not confined to any place of worship, it also incorporates personal reflection, art forms and group. People usually perform worship to achieve some specific end or to integrate
4510-674: Is seeing believing, doing is believing." The theatricality of ritual may overlap with performance art . For simplicity's sake, the range of diverse rituals can be divided into categories with common characteristics, generally falling into one three major categories: However, rituals can fall in more than one category or genre, and may be grouped in a variety of other ways. For example, the anthropologist Victor Turner writes: Rituals may be seasonal, ... or they may be contingent, held in response to an individual or collective crisis. ... Other classes of rituals include divinatory rituals; ceremonies performed by political authorities to ensure
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4620-411: Is somehow generated." Symbolic anthropologists like Geertz analyzed rituals as language-like codes to be interpreted independently as cultural systems. Geertz rejected Functionalist arguments that ritual describes social order, arguing instead that ritual actively shapes that social order and imposes meaning on disordered experience. He also differed from Gluckman and Turner's emphasis on ritual action as
4730-500: Is the case with the Bosnian syncretic holidays and festivals that transgress religious boundaries. Nineteenth century " armchair anthropologists " were concerned with the basic question of how religion originated in human history. In the twentieth century their conjectural histories were replaced with new concerns around the question of what these beliefs and practices did for societies, regardless of their origin. In this view, religion
4840-420: Is usually destroyed in the ritual to transfer it to the deities. Rites of feasting and fasting are those through which a community publicly expresses an adherence to basic, shared religious values, rather than to the overt presence of deities as is found in rites of affliction where feasting or fasting may also take place. It encompasses a range of performances such as communal fasting during Ramadan by Muslims;
4950-627: Is viewed in the same light. He observed, for example, how the first-fruits festival ( incwala ) of the South African Bantu kingdom of Swaziland symbolically inverted the normal social order, so that the king was publicly insulted, women asserted their domination over men, and the established authority of elders over the young was turned upside down. Claude Lévi-Strauss , the French anthropologist, regarded all social and cultural organization as symbolic systems of communication shaped by
5060-494: The Encyclopædia Britannica , Talal Asad notes that from 1771 to 1852, the brief articles on ritual define it as a "book directing the order and manner to be observed in performing divine service" (i.e., as a script). There are no articles on the subject thereafter until 1910, when a new, lengthy article appeared that redefines ritual as "...a type of routine behaviour that symbolizes or expresses something". As
5170-581: The antam sanskar in Sikhism. These rituals often reflect deep spiritual beliefs and provide a structured way for communities to grieve and honor the deceased. In Tibetan Buddhism, for example, the rituals described in the Bardo Thodol guide the soul through the stages of death, aiming for spiritual liberation or enlightenment. In Islam, the Janazah prayer is an essential communal act that underscores
5280-743: The Legend of the Rainbow Warriors – a belief that a "new tribe" will inherit the ways of the Native Americans and save the planet – as an example of fakelore. One reviewer ( Peter Burke ) noted that the " 'invention of tradition' is a splendidly subversive phrase", but it "hides serious ambiguities". Hobsbawm "contrasts invented traditions with what he calls 'the strength and adaptability of genuine traditions'. But where does his 'adaptability', or his colleague Ranger's 'flexibility' end, and invention begin? Given that all traditions change,
5390-665: The Muslim ritual ablution or Wudu before prayer; baptism in Christianity , a custom and sacrament that represents both purification and initiation into the religious community (the Christian Church ); and Amrit Sanskar in Sikhism , a rite of passage ( sanskar ) that similarly represents purification and initiation into the religious community (the khalsa ). Rites that use water are not considered water rites if it
5500-462: The agricultural cycle . They may be fixed by the solar or lunar calendar ; those fixed by the solar calendar fall on the same day (of the Gregorian, Solar calendar) each year (such as New Year's Day on the first of January) while those calculated by the lunar calendar fall on different dates (of the Gregorian, Solar calendar) each year (such as Chinese lunar New Year ). Calendrical rites impose
5610-419: The intricate calendar of Hindu Balinese rituals served to regulate the vast irrigation systems of Bali, ensuring the optimum distribution of water over the system while limiting disputes. While most Functionalists sought to link ritual to the maintenance of social order, South African functionalist anthropologist Max Gluckman coined the phrase "rituals of rebellion" to describe a type of ritual in which
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#17327721836015720-540: The slaughter of pigs in New Guinea; Carnival festivities; or penitential processions in Catholicism. Victor Turner described this "cultural performance" of basic values a "social drama". Such dramas allow the social stresses that are inherent in a particular culture to be expressed and worked out symbolically in a ritual catharsis; as the social tensions continue to persist outside the ritual, pressure mounts for
5830-470: The 'nation', with its associated phenomena: nationalism, the nation-state, national symbols, histories, and the rest." Hobsbawm and Ranger remark on the "curious but understandable paradox: modern nations and all their impedimenta generally claim to be the opposite of novel, namely rooted in remotest antiquity, and the opposite of constructed, namely human communities so 'natural' as to require no definition other than self-assertion." The concept of authenticity
5940-695: The 1600s to mean "the prescribed order of performing religious services" or more particularly a book of these prescriptions. There are hardly any limits to the kind of actions that may be incorporated into 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. Catherine Bell argues that rituals can be characterized by formalism, traditionalism, invariance, rule-governance, sacral symbolism and performance. Ritual uses
6050-418: The 1983 book The Invention of Tradition , edited by Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger . Hobsbawm's introduction argues that many "traditions" which "appear or claim to be old are often quite recent in origin and sometimes invented." This "invention" is distinguished from "starting" or "initiating" a tradition that does not then claim to be old. The phenomenon is particularly clear in the modern development of
6160-890: The Catholic Church but part of the popular spiritual practices of Catholics. They do not become part of liturgical worship, even if conducted in a Catholic church, in a group, in presence of a priest. Anglican devotions is private prayers and practices used by Anglican Christians to promote spiritual growth and communion with God . Among members of the Anglican Communion , private devotional habits vary widely, depending on personal preference and on affiliation with low-church or high-church parishes . The New Testament uses various words translatable as "worship". The word proskuneo - "to worship" - means to bow down to Gods or kings. Roman Catholicism , Anglicanism , Oriental Orthodoxy , and Eastern Orthodoxy make
6270-582: The Magarac story has truly made a substantive transformation from 'fake-' into 'folklore ' ", but noted his importance as a local cultural icon. Other American folk heroes that have been called fakelore include Old Stormalong , Febold Feboldson , Big Mose , Tony Beaver , Bowleg Bill , Whiskey Jack , Annie Christmas , Cordwood Pete , Antonine Barada , and Kemp Morgan . Marshall Fishwick describes these largely literary figures as imitations of Paul Bunyan . Additionally, scholar Michael I. Niman describes
6380-621: The Muslim world, the word worship (in the literal context of worshipping ) is forbidden to be used if it refers to an object or action and not exclusively to Allah. Worship of God in Judaism is called Avodat Hashem . During the period when the Temple stood, the rites conducted there were considered the most important act of Jewish worship. However, the most common form of worship was and remains that of prayer . Other forms of worship include
6490-511: The Qur'an translation on Q51:56 , Thus, the innermost purpose of the creation of all rational beings is their cognition of the existence of Allah and, hence, their conscious willingness to conform their own existence to whatever they may perceive of His will and plan: and it is this twofold concept of cognition and willingness that gives the deepest meaning to what the Quran describes as "worship". As
6600-530: The South Pacific. In such religio-political movements, Islanders would use ritual imitations of western practices (such as the building of landing strips) as a means of summoning cargo (manufactured goods) from the ancestors. Leaders of these groups characterized the present state (often imposed by colonial capitalist regimes) as a dismantling of the old social order, which they sought to restore. Rituals may also attain political significance after conflict, as
6710-475: The Triple Gem. Most Buddhists use ritual in pursuit of their spiritual aspirations. In Buddhism, puja (Sanskrit & Pali: pūjā) are expressions of "honour, worship and devotional attention." Acts of puja include bowing, making offerings and chanting. These devotional acts are generally performed daily at home (either in the morning or evening or both) as well as during communal festivals and Uposatha days at
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#17327721836016820-463: The accepted social order was symbolically turned on its head. Gluckman argued that the ritual was an expression of underlying social tensions (an idea taken up by Victor Turner ), and that it functioned as an institutional pressure valve, relieving those tensions through these cyclical performances. The rites ultimately functioned to reinforce social order, insofar as they allowed those tensions to be expressed without leading to actual rebellion. Carnival
6930-471: The appropriate honor and recognition that created persons deserve based achievement in excellence. We must make a further clarification regarding the use of the term "worship" in relation to the categories of adoration and veneration. Historically, schools of theology have used the term "worship" as a general term which included both adoration and veneration. They would distinguish between "worship of adoration" and "worship of veneration." The word "worship" (in
7040-561: The body, the mind and the spirit in order to help the performer evolve into a higher being. In Islam , worship refers to ritualistic devotion as well as actions done in accordance to Islamic law which is ordained by and pleasing to God . Worship included in the Five Pillars of Islam , primarily that of salat , which is the practice of ritual prayer five times daily. According to Muhammad Asad , on his notes in The Message of
7150-541: The case of those churches practicing seventh-day Sabbatarianism ). The church service is the gathering together of Christians to be taught the "Word of God" (the Holy Bible ) and encouraged in their faith . Technically, the "church" in "church service" refers to the gathering of the faithful rather than to the building in which the event takes place. In Christianity, worship is reverent honor and homage paid to God . The New Testament uses various words to express
7260-558: The cause, and make the restoration of social relationships the cure. Turner uses the example of the Isoma ritual among the Ndembu of northwestern Zambia to illustrate. The Isoma rite of affliction is used to cure a childless woman of infertility. Infertility is the result of a "structural tension between matrilineal descent and virilocal marriage" (i.e., the tension a woman feels between her mother's family, to whom she owes allegiance, and her husband's family among whom she must live). "It
7370-428: The commercialized versions, which sounded more like children's books. The original Paul Bunyan had been shrewd and sometimes ignoble; one story told how he cheated his men out of their pay. Mass culture provided a sanitized Bunyan with a "spirit of gargantuan whimsy [that] reflects no actual mood of lumberjacks". Daniel G. Hoffman said that Bunyan, a folk hero , had been turned into a mouthpiece for capitalists: "This
7480-600: The community renewed itself through the ritual creation of communitas during the "liminal phase". Turner analyzed the ritual events in 4 stages: breach in relations, crisis, redressive actions, and acts of reintegration. Like Gluckman, he argued these rituals maintain social order while facilitating disordered inversions, thereby moving people to a new status, just as in an initiation rite. Arguments, melodies, formulas, maps and pictures are not idealities to be stared at but texts to be read; so are rituals, palaces, technologies, and social formations. Clifford Geertz also expanded on
7590-575: The concept of worship. The word proskuneo - "to worship" - means to bow down (to Gods or to kings). Mass is the central act of divine worship in the Catholic Church . The Congregation for Divine Worship at the Vatican publishes a Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy . Roman Catholic devotions are "external practices of piety" which are not part of the official liturgy of
7700-677: The conduct of prescribed rituals, such as the Passover Seder and waving the Four Species , with proper intent , as well as various types of Jewish meditation . Jewish sources also express the notion that one can perform any appropriate mundane activity as the worship of God. Examples would include returning a lost article and working to support oneself and one's family. The Code of Jewish Law ( Orach Chayim , Chapter 231) cites Proverbs (3:6), "in all your ways, know him" ( Hebrew : בכל דרכיך דעהו ( b'chol d'rachecha dei'eihu )), as
7810-399: The contrary, the flag encourages a sort of all-or-nothing allegiance to the whole package, best summed [by] 'Our flag, love it or leave.' Particular objects become sacral symbols through a process of consecration which effectively creates the sacred by setting it apart from the profane . Boy Scouts and the armed forces in any country teach the official ways of folding, saluting and raising
7920-491: The cultural context in which it was created. The term was first used in the early 1960s by German scholars, who were primarily interested in the use of folklore by the tourism industry . However, professional art based on folklore, TV commercials with fairy tale characters, and even academic studies of folklore are all forms of folklorism. The term fakelore is often used by those who seek to expose or debunk modern reworkings of folklore, including Dorson himself, who spoke of
8030-456: The degree people are tied into a tightly knit community. When graphed on two intersecting axes, four quadrants are possible: strong group/strong grid, strong group/weak grid, weak group/weak grid, weak group/strong grid. Douglas argued that societies with strong group or strong grid were marked by more ritual activity than those weak in either group or grid. (see also, section below ) In his analysis of rites of passage , Victor Turner argued that
8140-516: The doctrine of skillful means . Worship is evident in Buddhism in such forms as: guru yoga , mandala , thanka , yantra yoga , the discipline of the fighting monks of Shaolin , panchamrita , mantra recitation, tea ceremony, ganacakra , amongst others. Buddhist Devotion is an important part of the practice of most Buddhists. According to a spokesman of the Sasana Council of Burma, devotion to Buddhist spiritual practices inspires devotion to
8250-454: The effect of print sources on orally transmitted Paul Bunyan stories as a form of cross-contamination that "hopelessly muddied the lore". For Olson, however, "the point is that I personally was exposed to Paul Bunyan in the genre of a living oral tradition, not of lumberjacks (of which there are precious few remaining), but of the present people of the area." What was fakelore had become folklore again. Responding to his opponents' argument that
8360-529: The effectiveness of a shamanic ritual for an individual may depend upon a wider audiences acknowledging the shaman's power, which may lead to the shaman placing greater emphasis on engaging the audience than in the healing of the patient. Many cultures have rites associated with death and mourning, such as the last rites and wake in Christianity, shemira in Judaism, the antyesti in Hinduism, and
8470-528: The excellence of an uncreated divine person and to his absolute Lordship. It is the worship of the Creator that God alone deserves. Although we see in English a broader usage of the word "adoration" which may not refer to a form of worship exclusive to God—for example, when a husband says that he "adores his wife"—in general it can be maintained that adoration is the best English denotation for the worship of latria. Veneration, known as dulia in classical theology,
8580-512: The festival. A water rite is a rite or ceremonial custom that uses water as its central feature. Typically, a person is immersed or bathed as a symbol of religious indoctrination or ritual purification . Examples include the Mikveh in Judaism , a custom of purification; misogi in Shinto , a custom of spiritual and bodily purification involving bathing in a sacred waterfall, river, or lake;
8690-413: The flag, thus emphasizing that the flag should never be treated as just a piece of cloth. The performance of ritual creates a theatrical -like frame around the activities, symbols and events that shape participant's experience and cognitive ordering of the world, simplifying the chaos of life and imposing a more or less coherent system of categories of meaning onto it. As Barbara Myerhoff put it, "not only
8800-425: The form of uncodified or codified conventions practiced by political officials that cement respect for the arrangements of an institution or role against the individual temporarily assuming it, as can be seen in the many rituals still observed within the procedure of parliamentary bodies. Ritual can be used as a form of resistance, as for example, in the various Cargo Cults that developed against colonial powers in
8910-412: The function (purpose) of the institution or custom in preserving or maintaining society as a whole. They thus disagreed about the relationship of anxiety to ritual. Malinowski argued that ritual was a non-technical means of addressing anxiety about activities where dangerous elements were beyond technical control: "magic is to be expected and generally to be found whenever man comes to an unbridgeable gap,
9020-579: The health and fertility of human beings, animals, and crops in their territories; initiation into priesthoods devoted to certain deities, into religious associations, or into secret societies; and those accompanying the daily offering of food and libations to deities or ancestral spirits or both. A rite of passage is a ritual event that marks a person's transition from one status to another, including adoption , baptism , coming of age , graduation , inauguration , engagement , and marriage . Rites of passage may also include initiation into groups not tied to
9130-536: The historical trend. An example is the American Thanksgiving dinner, which may not be formal, yet is ostensibly based on an event from the early Puritan settlement of America. Historians Eric Hobsbawm and Terrence Ranger have argued that many of these are invented traditions , such as the rituals of the British monarchy, which invoke "thousand year-old tradition" but whose actual form originate in
9240-403: The honor and reverence appropriately due to the excellence of a created person. Excellence exhibited by created beings likewise deserves recognition and honor. We see a general example of veneration in events like the awarding of academic awards for excellence in school, or the awarding of olympic medals for excellence in sports. There is nothing contrary to the proper adoration of God when we offer
9350-464: The inherent structure of the human brain. He therefore argued that the symbol systems are not reflections of social structure as the Functionalists believed, but are imposed on social relations to organize them. Lévi-Strauss thus viewed myth and ritual as complementary symbol systems, one verbal, one non-verbal. Lévi-Strauss was not concerned to develop a theory of ritual (although he did produce
9460-470: The last decades the term has generally fallen out of favor in folklore studies because it places an emphasis on origin instead of practice to determine authenticity. The term fakelore was coined in 1950 by American folklorist Richard M. Dorson in his article "Folklore and Fake Lore" published in The American Mercury . Dorson's examples included the fictional cowboy Pecos Bill , who
9570-413: The late nineteenth century, to some extent reviving earlier forms, in this case medieval, that had been discontinued in the meantime. Thus, the appeal to history is important rather than accurate historical transmission. Catherine Bell states that ritual is also invariant, implying careful choreography. This is less an appeal to traditionalism than a striving for timeless repetition. The key to invariance
9680-611: The liminal phase - that period 'betwixt and between' - was marked by "two models of human interrelatedness, juxtaposed and alternating": structure and anti-structure (or communitas ). While the ritual clearly articulated the cultural ideals of a society through ritual symbolism, the unrestrained festivities of the liminal period served to break down social barriers and to join the group into an undifferentiated unity with "no status, property, insignia, secular clothing, rank, kinship position, nothing to demarcate themselves from their fellows". These periods of symbolic inversion have been studied in
9790-408: The nation and of nationalism , creating a national identity promoting national unity, and legitimising certain institutions or cultural practices. A set of practices, typically ritualistic or symbolic, aims to instill values and behavioral norms through repetition, such as saluting the flag before class. These practices attempt to create a bridge between an uncertain present and an idealized image of
9900-468: The next verse shows, this spiritual call does not arise from any supposed "need" on the part of the Creator, who is self-sufficient and infinite in His power, but is designed as an instrument for the inner development of the worshipper, who, by the act of his conscious self-surrender to the all-pervading Creative Will, may hope to come closer to an understanding of that Will and, thus closer to Allah Himself. In
10010-429: The only feasible alternative. Ritual tends to support traditional forms of social hierarchy and authority, and maintains the assumptions on which the authority is based from challenge. Rituals appeal to tradition and are generally continued to repeat historical precedent, religious rite, mores , or ceremony accurately. Traditionalism varies from formalism in that the ritual may not be formal yet still makes an appeal to
10120-471: The participants. During the silence, people may stand up and Minister, this is where people start talking about what they have been thinking about. It is Quaker practice to only minister once. Worship in Hinduism involves invoking higher forces to assist in spiritual and material progress and is simultaneously both a science and an art. A sense of bhakti or devotional love is generally invoked. This term
10230-841: The past—an image often as much a creation as the tradition associated with it. Though these "invented traditions" appear to be genuine, rooted in historical images and symbols (whether real or imagined), they are actually of relatively recent origin and deliberately constructed. British historian Eric Hobsbawm, along with Terence Ranger, explored this phenomenon in their edited collection The Invention of Tradition (1983). Hobsbawm argues that invented traditions serve three main purposes: they foster social cohesion, legitimize institutions and authority structures, and solidify value systems and beliefs. The concept has been applied to cultural phenomena such as neo-Druidism in Britain, tartanry in Scotland,
10340-430: The power of political actors depends upon their ability to create rituals and the cosmic framework within which the social hierarchy headed by the king is perceived as natural and sacred. As a "dramaturgy of power" comprehensive ritual systems may create a cosmological order that sets a ruler apart as a divine being , as in "the divine right" of European kings, or the divine Japanese Emperor. Political rituals also emerge in
10450-412: The ritual's cyclical performance. In Carnival, for example, the practice of masking allows people to be what they are not, and acts as a general social leveller, erasing otherwise tense social hierarchies in a festival that emphasizes play outside the bounds of normal social limits. Yet outside carnival, social tensions of race, class and gender persist, hence requiring the repeated periodic release found in
10560-661: The same as prayer; Orthodox Judaism (arguably with the exception of some Chasidic practices), orthodox Sunni Islam, and most kinds of Protestantism forbid veneration of saints or of angels , classifying these actions as akin to idolatry . Similarly, Jehovah's Witnesses assert that many actions classified as patriotic by Protestant groups, such as saluting a flag , count as equivalent to worship and are therefore considered idolatrous as well. Quakers (the Religious Society of Friends) have both unprogrammed and programmed Meetings for Worship. Unprogrammed worship
10670-478: The same foodstuffs as humans) and resource base. Rappaport concluded that ritual, "...helps to maintain an undegraded environment, limits fighting to frequencies which do not endanger the existence of regional population, adjusts man-land ratios, facilitates trade, distributes local surpluses of pig throughout the regional population in the form of pork, and assures people of high quality protein when they are most in need of it". Similarly, J. Stephen Lansing traced how
10780-399: The stories about him that are known today. According to Dorson, advertisers and popularizers turned Bunyan into a "pseudo folk hero of twentieth-century mass culture" who bore little resemblance to the original. Folklorismus also refers to the invention or adaptation of folklore. Unlike fakelore, however, folklorismus is not necessarily misleading; it includes any use of a tradition outside
10890-520: The symbolic approach to ritual that began with Victor Turner. Geertz argued that religious symbol systems provided both a "model of" reality (showing how to interpret the world as is) as well as a "model for" reality (clarifying its ideal state). The role of ritual, according to Geertz, is to bring these two aspects – the "model of" and the "model for" – together: "it is in ritual – that is consecrated behaviour – that this conviction that religious conceptions are veridical and that religious directives are sound
11000-607: The techniques to secure results, and "secondary (or displaced) anxiety" felt by those who have not performed the rites meant to allay primary anxiety correctly. Homans argued that purification rituals may then be conducted to dispel secondary anxiety. A.R. Radcliffe-Brown argued that ritual should be distinguished from technical action, viewing it as a structured event: "ritual acts differ from technical acts in having in all instances some expressive or symbolic element in them." Edmund Leach , in contrast, saw ritual and technical action less as separate structural types of activity and more as
11110-497: The term ritual is sometimes used in a technical sense for a repetitive behavior systematically used by a person to neutralize or prevent anxiety; it can be a symptom of obsessive–compulsive disorder but obsessive-compulsive ritualistic behaviors are generally isolated activities. The English word ritual derives from the Latin ritualis, "that which pertains to rite ( ritus )". In Roman juridical and religious usage, ritus
11220-479: The thought without immediately responding to it. Although in traditional Buddhist faith, enlightenment is the desired end goal of meditation, it is more of a cycle in a literal sense that helps individuals better understand their minds. For example, meditation leads to understanding, leading to kindness, leading to peace, etc. In Christianity , a church service is a formalized period of communal worship, often but not exclusively occurring on Sunday (or on Saturday in
11330-431: The traditions of major religions , some Korean martial arts such as Taekwondo , and some Japanese martial arts , such as judo . It has influenced related concepts such as Benedict Anderson 's imagined communities and the pizza effect . Indeed, the sharp distinction between "tradition" and " modernity " is often itself invented. The concept is "highly relevant to that comparatively recent historical innovation,
11440-473: The unity of the Muslim community in life and death. Indigenous cultures may have unique practices, such as the Australian Aboriginal smoking ceremony, intended to cleanse the spirit of the departed and ensure a safe journey to the afterlife . In many traditions can be found the belief that when man was first made the creator bestowed soul upon him, while the earth provided the body. In Genesis
11550-465: The word magarac was a compliment, then laughed and talked to each other in their own language, which he did not speak. The word actually means "donkey" in Croatian, and is an insult. Since no trace of the existence of Joe Magarac stories prior to 1931 has been discovered, Francis's informants may have made the character up as a joke on him. In 1998, Gilley and Burnett reported "only tentative signs that
11660-470: The writers have the same claim as the original folk storytellers, Dorson writes that the difference amounts to the difference between traditional culture and mass culture . In addition to Paul Bunyan and Pecos Bill, Dorson identified the American folk hero Joe Magarac as fakelore. Magarac, a fictional steelworker , first appeared in 1931 in a Scribner's Magazine story by the writer Owen Francis. He
11770-524: Was a literal man of steel who made rails from molten metal with his bare hands; he refused an opportunity to marry to devote himself to working 24 hours a day, worked so hard that the mill had to shut down, and finally, in despair at enforced idleness, melted himself down in the mill's furnace to improve the quality of the steel. Francis said he heard this story from Croatian immigrant steelworkers in Pittsburgh , Pennsylvania; he reported that they told him
11880-402: Was a universal, and while its content might vary enormously, it served certain basic functions such as the provision of prescribed solutions to basic human psychological and social problems, as well as expressing the central values of a society. Bronislaw Malinowski used the concept of function to address questions of individual psychological needs; A.R. Radcliffe-Brown , in contrast, looked for
11990-597: Was presented as a folk hero of the American West but was actually invented by the writer Edward S. O'Reilly in 1923. Dorson also regarded Paul Bunyan as fakelore. Although Bunyan originated as a character in traditional tales told by loggers in the Great Lakes region of North America, William B. Laughead (1882–1958), an ad writer working for the Red River Lumber Company, invented many of
12100-517: Was the proven way ( mos ) of doing something, or "correct performance, custom". The original concept of ritus may be related to the Sanskrit ṛtá ("visible order)" in Vedic religion , "the lawful and regular order of the normal, and therefore proper, natural and true structure of cosmic, worldly, human and ritual events". The word "ritual" is first recorded in English in 1570, and came into use in
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