Religions reflect and reinforce the social organization of the cultures in which they is found. This is seen in the ceremonies which are associated with the economic activities of the society. Thus, in hunting and gathering societies, there are ceremonies relating to hunting practices and to the gathering of wild plants. In farming societies, there are ceremonies to increase the harvest; ceremonies to bring rain to water the fields; harvest ceremonies; planting ceremonies.
Human societies are different from those of apes in that humans play many different roles to foster the cooperation that makes us human. These roles are often defined by gender, age, ability, and other factors. As individuals move through life, they occupy different roles at different times and often the transition from one role to the next is sometimes marked with a special ceremony which anthropologists and sociologists call a rite of passage. In his book The Faith Instinct: How Religion Evolved and Why It Endures, Nicholas Wade writes:
“All societies have rites of passage, rituals that mark birth, puberty, marriage and death. The music that accompanies these often includes percussive effects, since drums or rhythmic beating are widely held to be a way of communicating with the spirit world. The initiation rites accompanying puberty often involve pain and terror, a way of instilling courage and loyalty in future warriors.”
Rites of passage, while nearly universal in all cultures, are not necessarily religious and many are purely secular. According to H. H. Turney-High, in his book Man and System: Foundations for the Study of Human Relations:
“These rites symbolize and emblemize the passage of a person from one status to another, from one transactional pattern to another. They objectify the already established fact that the person will never be the same again.”
In her book Blackfoot Ways of Knowing: The Worldview of the Siksikaitsitapi, Dr. Betty Bastien writes:
“Traditionally, rites of passage provide initiations into tribal responsibilities; they distinguish the phases of human development by marking transitions from one stage of life to another. In traditional Indigenous cultures, these transitions are made visible in ceremonies, such as puberty rites, vision quests, war success, and marriages, as well as in initiations into social and sacred societies.”
In many religious traditions, the sequence of the rites of passage begins close to birth when the newborn child or infant is ceremonially introduced to the family, the clan, and the community. In many of today’s Christian traditions, this ceremony takes the form of baptism. Among the Chiricahua Apache Indians in the American Southwest, the Cradle Ceremony is conducted four days after birth. The ceremony involves marking the child with pollen, presenting the cradleboard to the four directions, and then placing the child in the cradleboard.
Later in life, in some religious traditions, teenagers may go through a ceremony which marks their transition into adulthood. Among the Navajo Indians in the American Southwest, for example, girls go through a puberty ceremony known as kinaalda which is held over four nights. During the ceremony, the girl’s body is molded – symbolically pressed into a woman’s shape – so that she will be beautiful. The ceremony also involves ritual corn grinding, corn pollen offerings, ritual haircombing, blessing the hogan, running races, and painting the girl with white clay. The ceremony culminates with the making of a large cornmeal cake which is baked in the ground overnight. While this cake is cooking, songs are sung to ensure the girl’s health and prosperity.
Among the Native Americans in the Columbia Plateau Culture Area in North America, it was (and often still is) felt that having a special guardian spirit was essential for success in life. An important part of the spiritual life of the tribes focused on obtaining the help of guardian spirits. Among many of the tribes a young person was not considered to be an adult until the help of guardian spirits had been obtained. The vision quest is a ritual intended to aid in attracting a guardian spirit. Archaeologist James Keyser, in his book Indian Rock Art of the Columbia Plateau, writes:
“In this ritual, a man or woman sought to obtain a guardian spirit by retreating to a secluded, sacred place to fast and pray.”
In most of the Plateau cultures, a guardian spirit could be obtained only before puberty. Therefore, children—both boys and girls—received a lot of training oriented toward obtaining a guardian spirit. To obtain a guardian spirit, a child would be left alone and fasting. The child would abstain from both sleep and water and would wear only a minimum of clothing. It is through this physical deprivation that the guardian spirit would appear to the individual and bestow upon them two gifts: general good fortune and then a special talent. The guardian spirit would usually appear first in human form and then after giving the supplicant the special talent, the spirit would then reveal its animal form or other entity.
In some cultures, the transition from childhood to adulthood is marked by an initiation in which the children are isolated for a period of time during which they go through a number of trials of physical endurance. When they are brought back to the group they are introduced as adults. The initiation phase of this rite of passage may involve such things as tattooing, scarification, and circumcision, all of which provide visual identification of the adult status.
While the wedding ceremony is a common religious rite of passage in today’s Western cultures, in many cultures marriage does not involve any religious ritual. In modern American society the concept of marriage usually conjures up images of some type of ceremony—usually religious. However, in many of the world’s cultures, there was/is no marriage ceremony. While some religious traditions are concerned about marriage, there are other traditions in which marriage is not viewed as a religious matter.
Another rite of passage which is found in many cultures, particularly the complex cultures associated with political states, can be seen in the assumption of political leadership roles. One of the examples of this can be seen in the coronation ceremony of kings and queens, particularly in cultures in which kingship is seen as being associated with or derived from the gods. In Egypt’s Old Kingdom (2686-2181 BCE), for example, the king’s coronation re-created the myth of the god Horus ascending to the throne of his deceased father Osiris.
In the African kingdom of Bunyoro, the transition from prince to king involves a complex series of rituals symbolizing his political and military authority as well as his territorial authority.
Among the rites of passage the most common and perhaps the most ancient is the funeral, which marks the passage from the world of the living to some other realm. With regard to funerals, Richard Warms, James Garber, and Jon McGee, in their book Sacred Realms: Essays in Religion, Belief, and Society, write:
“Death is a cultural event that is acted out in mortuary rituals. Many such rituals help usher the deceased into a new status and location. They also typically reflect the values and beliefs of the society.”
In his book Religions of the World Made Simple, John Lewis puts it this way:
“Rites associated with death are designed to counteract the centrifugal forces of fear, dismay and demoralization. They provide the most powerful means of reintegration of the group’s shaken solidarity and the re-establishment of the morale.”
In general, funeral rites mark the passage from the world of the living to some sort of afterlife. In addition, these rites may also deal with the disposal of the body through burial, cremation, or placing it in water.
Religion 101/102
Religion 101/102 is a series which explores topics relating to religions of the world. Religion 102 is an expansion of an earlier essay. More from this series:
Religion 101: Women and marriage under ancient Irish Brehon law
Religion 101: Religious Prophets
Religion 101: Some Findings from Biblical Archaeology
Religion 101: Ceremonial Human Sacrifice