This article asks to what extent Greek ritual norms are homogeneous throughout the Greek world. It looks in particular at rules concerning priesthoods, purity and sacrifice. Only the first group displays a clear regional line of division: sale of priesthoods is only attested in the east Greek world, beginning at Andros. That distinction aside, some local singularities or outliers occur in all categories, and some differences that must be due to epigraphic habit. But substantial and regular regional differences (...) at the level of actual ritual practice do not appear. Study of Greek ritual norms may therefore suggest that in some aspects there existed a Greek religion, not just a multitude of locally varying Greek religions. (shrink)

This essay examines the theory of ritual propriety presented in the Xúnzǐ and criticisms of Xunzi-like views found in the classical Daoist anthology Zhuāngzǐ. To highlight the respects in which the Zhuāngzǐ can be read as posing a critical response to a Xunzian view of ritual propriety, the essay juxtaposes the two texts' views of language, since Xunzi's theory of ritual propriety is intertwined with his theory of language. I argue that a Zhuangist critique of the presuppositions (...) of Xunzi's stance on language also undermines his stance on ritual propriety. Xunzi contends that state promulgation of anelaborate code of ritual propriety is a key to good social order (zhi) and that state regulation of language is a key to smooth communication and thus also good order. The Zhuāngzǐ provides grounds for doubting both contentions. Claiming that ritual propriety causally produces social order is analogous to claiming that grammar causally produces smooth linguistic communication, when in fact it is more likely our ability to communicate that allows us to develop shared rules of grammar. Humans have fundamental social and communicative capacities that undergird our abilities to speak a language or engage in shared ritual performances. It is these more fundamental capacities, not their manifestation in a particular system of grammar or ritual norms, that provide the root explanation of our ability to communicate or to live together harmoniously. The Xunzi-Zhuangzi dialectic suggests that ritual is indispensable, but normatively justified rituals will be less rigid, less comprehensive, less fastidious, and more spontaneous than a Xunzian theorist would allow. (shrink)

Why is there such a striking discrepancy between the flexibility, democracy and empowerment that the Bologna process aims for, and the superficial educational activities that it actually results in? Our answer is based on the ritual theory of the American anthropologist Roy Rappaport and the psychoanalytical framework of the Austrian philosopher Robert Pfaller. Interpreting schoolified education as a ritual, we argue that both the reform initiative and its ensuing educational activities should be interpreted as mainly productive of a (...) certain appearance, of compliance with prominent norms of modern society: the norms are articulated in policy documents and enacted in educational activity. We take schoolified education to be a normal ritual, in that this appearance is accepted ‘as if’ it corresponded with reality, while at the same time most people are aware (in a certain sense) of its superficial and ritualistic character. A twist, however, is added by the fact that modern society is distinctly anti-ritualistic, and therefore constantly tries to make education work ‘for real’. Drawing on Pfaller’s distinction between belief and faith, we show that this pursuit of de-ritualisation actually makes education progressively more formalised and coercive. (shrink)

Ritual (li) is central to Confucian ethics and political philosophy. Robert Neville believes that Chinese Philosophy has an important role to play in our times by bringing ritual theory to the analysis of global moral and political issues. In a recent work, Neville maintains that ritual ‘needs a contemporary metaphysical expression if its importance is to be seen.’ This paper examines Neville's claim through a detailed study of the ‘ethics of ritual’ in one of the early (...) Confucian texts, the Xunzi. This text has sometimes been read as offering a form of naturalism in its discussions of ‘heaven (tian)’ as analogous to Western, even modern, concept of ‘nature,’ while other interpreters insist that tian is a normative notion. Does this concept of tian offer a metaphysical ground for ethics of ritual advocated in the text? If so, what kind of metaphysics is it? Does Confucian ritual ethics need any metaphysical grounding? There is no specific metaphysical theory in the Xunzi and passages which could be referring to or implying metaphysical assumptions are open to hermeneutical debates. Even if metaphysical assumptions are necessary or beneficial to an ethics of ritual, the paper argues that the ‘metaphysical flexibility’ of the text could work to its advantage in remaining relevant in contemporary context. The conclusion explores some possible directions for further exploring the metaphysics of ritual in a modern understanding of Xunzi. (shrink)

Presence suggests that adapting the experiences of leading innovators may address a nightmare scenario of environmental destruction, a growing divide between the rich and poor, and escalating violence around the world. Innovation occurs by transforming sensing to identify limitations in existing solution sets, transforming perception to envision an entire whole, and transforming action to realize the future seeking to emerge from the whole. This U sequence follows the rite-of-passage phases of separation, liminality, and reincorporation documented by Victor Turner. By ending (...) in spontaneous communitas and avoiding a normative model, the U does not discuss how to mobilize resources and develop systems of social control. This omission, as well as depending on the constructive power of human ritual without recognition of its destructive potential, significantly limits the U’s analytic validity. Despite these limitations, Presence is an encouraging set of stories of attempts within the industrial context to mitigate the nightmare scenario and work toward a sustainable future. (shrink)

Opponents of male circumcision have increasingly used human rights positions to articulate their viewpoint. We characterize the meaning of the term “human rights.” We discuss these human rights arguments with special attention to the claims of rights to an open future and to bodily integrity. We offer a three-part test under which a parental decision might be considered an unacceptable violation of a child's right. The test considers the impact of the practice on society, the impact of the practice on (...) the individual, and the likelihood of adverse impact. Infant circumcision is permissible under this test. We conclude that infant circumcision may be proscribed as violating local norms, even though it does not violate human rights. (shrink)

The degree to which the early dharma literature was an extrapolation from the earlier ritual codes can be seen from a number of shared features of form and content. One of these that has not received more than passing notice is the fact that the Dharmaśāstric principle of regarding customary norms as a valid basis of dharma, both in general and in limited spheres, has its origins in ritual rules in the śrautasūtras and gṛhyasūtras. Passages from the (...) Baudhāyanaśrautasūtra and numerous gṛhyasūtras show that already in these rulebooks established practices of particular social groups were accepted as a valid authority in certain contexts where explicit textual warrant was lacking, and that a further distinction was there made between the general norms of experts and the valid particular norms of locality or social group. (shrink)

In his edicts, the emperor Aśoka Maurya extols brāhmaṇas, usually alongside ascetics (śramaṇas), as deserving honor and generosity, though he never alludes to their connection with ritual, the central theme of early Brahmanical literature. On the other hand, in Rock Edicts I and IX, he disparages sacrifices, and ceremonies performed by women, advocating instead the practice of ethical virtues. Close attention to the wording of Rock Edict IX shows that Aśoka and the Brahmanical Gṛhyasūtras talk about domestic rites in (...) very similar terms, even describing them with the same adjective (uccāvaca). Both of them note the special role of women as a source of knowledge of such ceremonies, and differ only in how they evalute the value of such ceremonial: Aśoka disparages women’s rites, while some Gṛhyasūtras explicitly validate women as authorities in such matters. A comparison of these sources highlights the distinctive role of the term dhamma in Aśoka’s usage (in contrast to maṅgala (auspicious folk rites), and may provide some guidance for dating the Gṛhyasūtras. The fact that Aśoka does not explicitly connect such rites with the brāhmaṇas suggests that in his experience at least (i.e., in Magadha) Brahmins’ religious authority had nothing to do with domestic ritual. We may conclude that the Vedic canonization of Gṛhya ritual norms was not yet recognized outside of priestly circles, if it had developed yet at all. (shrink)

Throughout history, religion has had a significant and lasting influence on the structure of human civilizations. Its effect shapes people's and communities' collective consciousness on a cultural, ethical, and political level. The complex relationship between religion and the different aspects of modern life changes as societies do. In order to better understand the complex relationship between tradition and modernity and the effects of religious rituals, institutions, and beliefs on social cohesiveness, identity formation, and ethical frameworks, this article will explore the (...) many facets of religion in contemporary society. Setting this research within the larger historical framework is crucial to comprehending the function of religion in modern society. Since the beginning of human society, religion has played a crucial role in shaping political systems, ethical standards, and cultural norms. However, the importance of religion is prone to change as the world experiences significant shifts, such as globalization and technological advancements. By exploring the complicated ways in which religion continues to shape and be molded by the intricate fabric of modern society, this study aims to close knowledge gaps. This paper has two goals in mind. In order to create a full understanding of the relationship between religion rituals in fostering community cohesion, it first attempts to provide a thorough survey of the literature, drawing on multidisciplinary viewpoints from sociology, anthropology, psychology, and religious studies. Second, it aims to provide insightful information to the continuing discussion over how religion either promotes or undermines social harmony. This research aims to shed insight on the various ways that religion continues to be a powerful factor in creating the society we live in by observing at the historical development of this relationship and investigating modern manifestations. (shrink)

Ritual circumcision of infant boys is controversial in Norway, as in many other countries. The procedure became a part of Norwegian public health services in 2015. A new law opened for conscientious objection to the procedure. We have studied physicians’ refusals to perform ritual circumcision as an issue of professional ethics. Qualitative interview study with 10 urologists who refused to perform ritual circumcision from six Norwegian public hospitals. Interviews were recorded and transcribed, then analysed with systematic text (...) condensation, a qualitative analysis framework. The physicians are unanimous in grounding their opposition to the procedure in professional standards and norms, based on fundamental tenets of professional ethics. While there is homogeneity in the group when it comes to this reasoning, there are significant variations as to how deeply the matter touches the urologists on a personal level. About half of them connect their stance to their personal integrity, and state that performing the procedure would go against their conscience and lead to pangs of conscience. It is argued that professional moral norms sometimes might become more or less ‘integrated’ in the professional’s core moral values and moral identity. If this is the case, then the distinction between conscience-based and professional refusals to certain healthcare services cannot be drawn as sharply as it has been. (shrink)

In this paper, I analyze the relationship between Hume’s moral philosophy and a key aspect of classical Confucianism—namely, the concept of _lĭ_ (禮), which refers both to the virtue of ritual propriety and to rituals themselves. I argue not only that Hume employs conceptual correlates to each of these two aspects of _lĭ_ (禮), but also that he employs them in ways that have a similar, distinctively normative role in the process of moral formation. I illustrate these points by (...) elucidating Hume’s use of two pairs of concepts. The first is his presentation of decency and decorum. The second is his explanation of customs and manners. In so doing, I develop a line of inquiry that is important, novel, and promising both for Hume scholarship _per se_ and for comparative philosophical work on the relationship between Hume’s moral philosophy and that of classical Confucianism, especially as it is expressed in the works of Confucius, Mencius, and Xunzi. (shrink)

This paper aims to produce a defense of the ethical significance of Confucian ritual. An adequate defense must explain how these conventions are based in a culturally-neutral, objective ground. After a brief account of how Confucians view the relationship between rituals and moral goodness, I consider three sorts of justification. Mencian naturalism appeals to a conception of flourishing that is grounded in human nature. Xunzian consequentialism looks to how ritual brings about social order. I argue that both of (...) these approaches fail because they are unable to account for the normative fineness of rituals, which refers to the precision and detail of ritual propriety. Instead, I look to Xunzi for a justification of rituals in terms of their role in beautifying human nature. I argue that this view provides a sort of objective ground for ritual, while also preserving their normative fineness. I conclude with remarks on how Xunzian aestheticism may be useful for understanding other areas of moral life. (shrink)

Jacobs and Arora (2015) argue convincingly for the permissibility of ritual male infant circumcision in general, but they allow for the state to prohibit the practice if it violates local norms. They say that such a ban would be permissible unless it amounts to unethical discrimination. In other words, if male infant circumcision is outlawed, then, as they say, “the same state should protect all children from all unnecessary procedures and practices that are equally uncomfortable and unsafe.” While (...) such an approach has its merits, a more just approach will involve accommodating male circumcision regardless of local norms and customs. (shrink)

Yì 義 presents dual categories in classical Confucian conception. The first category is ethical-role duty originated from Zhou 周 ritual culture, which was a set of social norms defining ethical duties that fit each person’s role and status in the kinship group and society and regulating what was appropriate for a person’s behavior. The second category is moral conscience and rightness resulted from the internalization of social norms and ethical duties. From Confucius to Mencius, Xunzi 荀子, and (...) others, while inheriting and elaborating yì’s ethical implication of role duty from Zhou ritual culture, they also gradually internalized yì to become the subject’s moral conscience of doing right things. During this process, classical Confucianism gradually formed an ethico-moral conception of yì as both role duty and moral rightness that abridged the dual categories of social norms for interpersonal relations and moral values for personal autonomy. (shrink)

Toward the end of the twentieth century, Highland Maya intellectuals and activists in Guatemala began to argue for the recognition of indigenous customary law, rooted in traditional Maya moral and ritual discourse. Such law is often in tension with the Western notion of rights that undergirds national and international treatises regarding indigenous peoples. This essay identifies three distinct but mutually engaged pairs of moral concepts—hot/cold, left/right, and favorable/not favorable—articulated through K'iche' Maya quotidian and ceremonial practices and speech. It also (...) identifies the extent to which they do not necessarily align with Western notions of good and bad. These three pairs of moral terms, specifically as conserved through the high-register of Maya discourse used by traditional ceremonial specialists, illustrate a normative means by which Highland Maya discern understandings of justice, and ground their advocacy for restorative justice. (shrink)

Confucians think ritual propriety is extremely important, but this commitment perplexes many Western readers. This essay outlines the early Confucian Xúnzǐ’s defense of ritual, then offers a modified defense of ritual propriety as a real virtue, of value to human beings in all times and places, albeit one that is inescapably indexed to prevailing social norms in a non-objectionable way. The paper addresses five likely objections to this thesis, drawing on but going beyond recent Kantian defenses (...) of courtesy and civility. The objections concern cultural relativity, insincerity, separating style from substance, elitism, and possible incoherence in the virtue itself. (shrink)

This paper approaches the spectrum of theater studies in Indonesia in an interdisciplinary manner, encompassing both descriptive and normative perspectives. From a descriptive standpoint, the spectrum is shaped by various ways of attributing meaning to theater as an entity. In a normative approach, various disciplines offer perspectives that contribute to creating a spectrum of meaning for theater in relation to the life of Indonesian society. Through a literature review, the research identifies at least three approaches to constructing theater studies in (...) Indonesia: synchronic, diachronic and, combined. These three approaches are drawn from disciplines outside of theater, such as historical, anthropological, and sociological studies. Based on this perspectives, theater studies in Indonesia has moved from viewing theater in its meaning as a form of sacred ritual in the past to theater as symbolic capital today. These interdisciplinary perspective has an influence on the meaning of theater in theater studies itself as a discipline. Theater in Indonesia as a subject of study, therefore, is not only understood as an art that originates from dramatic works, but is more broadly understood as all forms of art that are centered on human action displayed in live performances, including sacred rituals, cultural performances, and theatrical protests. (shrink)

We analyze the section from Hesiod’s Works and Days (724–760) that equips the farmer with the expertise necessary to facilitate the household’s harmonious relationship with the gods. We propose that this section with its tabular ordinances represents the earliest collection of Greek religious norms, and we contextualize it both within the structure of the W&D and within the wider framework of Greek religion. The section is carefully developed and purposefully placed towards the end of the poem, with an eye (...) to symmetry and rhythm: Hesiod distributes divinely sanctioned social norms alongside religious norms in three distinct sections of the poem, providing ever more specific cautionary advice in the form of ordinances and injunctions. The passage 724–760 is also artfully structured and divided into ἀπό and ἐπί sections. By drawing attention to overlaps of the Hesiodic material and later inscriptional ritual norms, we demonstrate that they share common linguistic and thematic features. We also demonstrate that well-informed readers such as Plato, Plutarch, and Proclus repeatedly interpreted Hesiod’s norms in the light of their own religious experience. (shrink)

The present article is an elaborated and upgraded version of the Early Career Award talk that I delivered at the IAPR 2019 conference in Gdańsk, Poland. In line with the conference’s thematic focus on new trends and neglected themes in psychology of religion, I argue that psychology of religion should strive for firmer integration with evolutionary theory and its associated methodological toolkit. Employing evolutionary theory enables to systematize findings from individual psychological studies within a broader framework that could resolve lingering (...) empirical contradictions by providing an ultimate rationale for which results should be expected. The benefits of evolutionary analysis are illustrated through the study of collective rituals and, specifically, their purported function in stabilizing risky collective action. By comparing the socio-ecological pressures faced by chimpanzees, contemporary hunter-gatherers, and early Homo, I outline the selective pressures that may have led to the evolution of collective rituals in the hominin lineage, and, based on these selective pressures, I make predictions regarding the different functions and their underlying mechanisms that collective rituals should possess. While examining these functions, I echo the Early Career Award and focus mostly on my past work and the work of my collaborators, showing that collective rituals may stabilize risky collective action by increasing social bonding, affording to assort cooperative individuals, and providing a platform for reliable communication of commitment to group norms. The article closes with a discussion of the role that belief in superhuman agents plays in stabilizing and enhancing the effects of collective rituals on trust-based cooperation. (shrink)

This study examines the normative foundations of early Confucian ethics and suggests that rather than attempting to understand Confucian ethics in the language of ‘morality’ a more productive way would be to appreciate Confucianism as an ethics of propriety that can be articulated in terms of social roles, ritual decorum, and relational dependence. I argue that Western notions of ‘morality’ betray a thicker, more culturally loaded concept that possesses a limited utility in regard to comparative study. We can appeal (...) to a kind of methodological charity where we not only maximize the sense of the text or subject's sayings but also privilege the categories of thought that are native to the text's or speaker's lexicon. With this in mind, we can understand Confucian ethics as an ethics of propriety that departs substantially from Western moral systems, including virtue ethics, and challenges our received views on justice, autonomy, and personal identity. (shrink)

The article devoted to the study of elaborate correlation between language and ideology, language and culture. The author dwells on the shift in the key concept of social and humanitarian studies from a classical standard and language description to the flexibility in the language use and functioning. It is necessary to point out though that despite some similarities in correlation between language and culture on the one side and language and ideology on the other side, there are some differences in (...) the pragmatic perspectives between these categories. The discourse that has been formed under the ideological influence tends to be formal and ritualized to a greater extent than those language structures that have been developed due to culturally consistent processes i.e. connection and transmission between the generations. The author also makes an attempt to apply the paradox of globalization by A. Giddens to social linguistics. The runaway world theory introduced by a British sociologist A. Giddens singles out that the globalizing world does not become predictable as globalization predominates, but, on the contrary, social and linguistic processes become less and less manageable. The understanding of language and society becomes more complicated and demands new doctrines and innovative concepts, such as post-non-classical paradigm might conjure in. The author also takes into account the causes making standard language too flexible and changeable. The main cause of this process is an intent conditioned by certain communicative situation or by certain reasons to alter illocution of the utterances for representing identity, resulting in turn to more prestigious or more sophisticated language. (shrink)

In this article a case is made for considering the liturgy as theological norm par excellence. The case is built up by relying on an emphatic current of thought within the field of liturgical studies, namely the ‘liturgical theology’ as it was developed by Alexander Schmemann, Aidan Kavanagh, and David W. Fagerberg. After presenting the concept of ‘liturgical theology’ and the context out of which it emerged, its major characteristics are discussed. Particular attention is devoted to the radicalness of their (...) position. It can be called radical because the reversal of the relation between doctrine and liturgy is by no means evident for the vast majority of modern believers and theologians. However, ‘liturgical theology’ claims that it is not doctrine which determines liturgy but liturgy which determines doctrine. According to liturgical theologians, the liturgy is not simply the ritual expression of the content of faith, but itself theology, even theologia prima . Correspondingly, liturgical theologians point to the original wording of the famous adage lex orandi lex credendi , which is the following: ut legem credendi lex statuat supplicandi . Whereas the usual formulation suggests equality and mutual dependence, the original context lays bare a clear priority of the rule of prayer over the rule of faith. In the final part of the article I explore some avenues to the evaluation of ‘liturgical theology’. I argue that there is need for a more profound philosophical underpinning and historical adequacy. But nevertheless the idea that the liturgy constitutes a theological norm stands firmly and should be considered far more broadly and seriously among contemporary systematic theologians. (shrink)

This article is about the recognition of personhood when death occurs in early life. Drawing from anthropological perspectives on personhood at the beginnings and ends of life, it examines the implications of competing religious and customary definitions of personhood for a small sample of young British Pakistani Muslim women who experienced miscarriage and stillbirth. It suggests that these women's concerns about the lack of recognition given to the personhood of their fetus or baby constitute a challenge to customary practices surrounding (...) burial as a Muslim. The article suggests that these women's concerns cannot be adequately glossed as a clash of Islamic belief versus Western medicine. Rather, they represent a renegotiation of Islamic opinion and customary practices within the broader context of changes in the medical and social norms surrounding pregnancy loss and infant death in multi-ethnic British society. (shrink)

When scholars look for anticipations of libertarian ideas in early Chinese thought, attention usually focuses not on the Confucians, but on the Taoists. But in their account of spontaneously evolving social norms, their understanding of the price system, their penchant for public-choice analysis, their enthusiasm for entrepreneurship, their preference for noncoercive interpersonal relations, their call for a laissez-faire economic policy, and their rejection of Taoist primitivism, the Confucians show themselves to be the true precursors of modern libertarianism.

Christopher Bennett presents a theory of punishment grounded in the practice of apology, and in particular in reactions such as feeling sorry and making amends. He argues that offenders have a 'right to be punished' - that it is part of taking an offender seriously as a member of a normatively demanding relationship that she is subject to retributive attitudes when she violates the demands of that relationship. However, while he claims that punishment and the retributive attitudes are the necessary (...) expression of moral condemnation, his account of these reactions has more in common with restorative justice than traditional retributivism. He argues that the most appropriate way to react to crime is to require the offender to make proportionate amends. His book is a rich and intriguing contribution to the debate over punishment and restorative justice. (shrink)

Jagiello et al.'s bifocal stance theory provides a useful theoretical framework for attempting to understand the connection between greater adherence to traditional norms and greater sensitivity to threats in the world. Here, we examine the implications of the instrumental and ritual stances with regard to various evolutionary explanations for traditionalism–threat sensitivity linkages.

In the philosophy of Confucius, the concept _li_ is both central and elusive. While it is often translated 'ritual' or 'the rites,' I argue that there are numerous significant ways in which _li_ is as much an internal property of individuals as it is an external set of rules or norms. I discuss _li_ as deference, as developed dispositions, as embodied intelligence, and as personalized exemplary conduct. Finally, reflecting on the work of Fingarette, and Hall and Ames, as (...) well as Wilson's analysis of their work, I argue that the external _aspect_ of _li_, although reasonably understood under the rubric of 'traditional norms,' may nonetheless legitimately evolve, and that this coheres well with the notion that an internal sense-of-ritual is integral to the meaning of _li_. (shrink)

Hegel’s Social Ethics offers a fresh and accessible interpretation of G. W. F. Hegel’s most famous book, the Phenomenology of Spirit. Drawing on important recent work on the social dimensions of Hegel’s theory of knowledge, Molly Farneth shows how his account of how we know rests on his account of how we ought to live. Farneth argues that Hegel views conflict as an unavoidable part of living together, and that his social ethics involves relationships and social practices that allow people (...) to cope with conflict and sustain hope for reconciliation. Communities create, contest, and transform their norms through these relationships and practices, and Hegel’s model for them are often the interactions and rituals of the members of religious communities. The book’s close readings reveal the ethical implications of Hegel’s discussions of slavery, Greek tragedy, early modern culture wars, and confession and forgiveness. The book also illuminates how contemporary democratic thought and practice can benefit from Hegelian insights. Through its sustained engagement with Hegel’s ideas about conflict and reconciliation, Hegel’s Social Ethics makes an important contribution to debates about how to live well with religious and ethical disagreement. (shrink)

I am quite prepared to admit that modern western thought is shot through with contradictions. For example, it is not coherent to think both that the idea of human nature is an illusion and that eugenics is an out-and-out evil; or to claim to be a democrat and exclude a priori the topic of eugenics from political debate. However, I personally very much doubt that the notions of nature and democracy are themselves in crisis. In my view they simply give (...) rise to semantic confusion and false problems that certain basic twentieth-century discoveries - in the field of physics, anthropology and political science - ought to be able to clear up, if they were better known. We shall just touch on a few thinkers whose work may give us some pointers to a clearer, calmer view of things. First a philosopher, Raymond Ruyer (1902-1987), and an economist, Joseph Schumpeter (1883-1950), two of whose key ideas this paper will combine: a neo-Aristotelian conception of nature, implying the existence of regulating principles and norms, to which humans and their societies, like everything else, are subject; a procedural conception of democracy that says it is not an end in itself but, under certain conditions, an appropriate means of making political decisions and settling disputes. And in addition some anthropologists, who helped either to put human beings back into a neo-Aristotelian world, or to define more accurately the essence of the political: Claude Lévi-Strauss, whose structuralism gave back its full importance to the notion of formal cause and even to the idea of final cause, and André Leroi-Gourhan, who confirmed that ‘art imitates nature’ by demonstrating that technical skill is a natural extension of life, whose processes and results it mimics; Arthur Maurice Hocart, who demonstrated the ritual origin of all institutions, particularly political ones. (shrink)

We are all guided by thousands of norms, but how did our capacity for normative cognition evolve? I propose there is a deep but neglected link between normative cognition and practical skill. In modern humans, complex motor skills and craft skills, such as toolmaking, are guided by internally represented norms of correct performance. Moreover, it is plausible that core components of human normative cognition evolved as a solution to the distinctive problems of transmitting complex motor skills and craft (...) skills, especially skills related to toolmaking, through social learning. If this is correct, the expansion of the normative domain beyond technique to encompass more abstract norms of fairness, reciprocity, ritual and kinship involved the elaboration of a basic platform for the guidance of skilled action by technical norms. This article motivates and defends this “skill hypothesis” for the origin of normative cognition and sets out various ways in which it could be empirically tested. (shrink)

RiassuntoL’articolo prende in esame un ben noto frammento degli «Aitia» di Callimaco che offre la più importante testimonianza del culto dell’ecista nelle colonie siciliane. Una più approfondita indagine dei vv. 40–41 consente di istituire un parallelo con le norme rituali concernenti i Tritopatreis nella lex sacra di Selinunte (A 9–15). In entrambi i casi a un sacrificio animale con sversamento del sangue segue una libazione senza vino e un banchetto sacro. La sequenza rituale è inusuale e la sua diffusione nel (...) mondo coloniale siciliano mette in luce sia la complessità del culto dell’ecista dal punto di vista religioso, sia l’intimo nesso che lo connette con la memoria sociale e l’identità della comunità politica. (shrink)

It has been made clear for quite some time that if the Bible has become a classic of Western culture because of its normativity, then the responsibility of the biblical scholar cannot be restricted to giving readers clear access to the original intentions of the biblical writers. It must also include the question: ‘What does a reading of the biblical text do to someone who submits to its world of vision?’ This is a question that has been especially significant in (...) the study of apocalyptic literature, as all apocalypses are hortatory. The implication is that, even in the historical context in which the text was first produced, there is room to consider the earliest stages of audience interaction with the text. Interestingly, most studies making use of this model do not address what the implications of this kind of ‘reading as performance’ might be for today’s reader. This research argued that in the understanding of the biblical text as an oral performance, there is a need to leave room for all that happens to a text after it leaves the author’s hands. The method proposed urged ‘performers’ of texts to pay attention to how they bring themselves to interpretation. More specifically, this method aimed to make use of ritual and liturgy as the rhetorical or performative context within which biblical texts functioned and still function. This research thus proposed a liturgical-functional reading reading of biblical texts which integrates affective reading and the deliberate move from cognitive to affective processes. (shrink)

In this full length review, I create a running parallel between Martin Kern's Text and Ritual in Early China and Mark Edward Lewis' Writing and Authority in Early China. Both books cover the nexus of texts and their sociopolitical milieu, with Kern's book acting as a sort of update to Lewis'. I group the articles in Kern's book under the following headings: Texts and Authority (Nylan, Falkenhausen, Brashier), Textual Emergence (Boltz, Kern), and Ritual in Literary Genres (Schaberg, Csikszentmihalyi, (...) Gentz), summarizing the content of each article and relating it to Lewis' seminal work. Three further sections, under the heading of "Terminological Precision," are dedicated to issues raised by both books: the performative in ritual (gestures that presuppose a common set of cultural norms and that gain their efficacy from general community acceptance of such norms), the ritual (and performative) dimension of divination, and a functionalist perspective on ritual. (shrink)

The ‘multicultural clinical interaction’ presents itself as a dilemma for the mental health practitioner. Literature describes two problematic areas where this issues emerges - how to make an adequate distinction between religious rituals and the rituals that may be symptomatic of ‘obsessive compulsive disorder’ (OCD), and how to differentiate ‘normative’ religious or spiritual beliefs, behaviours, and experiences from ‘psychotic’ illnesses. When it comes to understanding service user’s ‘idioms of distress’, beliefs about how culture influences behaviour can create considerable confusion and (...) ‘normative uncertainty’ for mental health practitioners. In the absence of clear diagnostic and assessment criteria on distinguishing between ‘culture’ and ‘psychopathology’, practitioners have had to rely on their own intuition and seek out possible ‘strategies’ or ‘procedures’ from a contradictory and cross-disciplinary evidence base. Decontextualisation of service users’ experiences may result in the pathologisation of culturally ‘normative’ phenomenon, ‘category fallacy’ errors, and poor health care experiences and outcomes for service users. This paper situates this dilemma within a wider debate that has concerned both the biomedical and social sciences, namely, the unresolved question of ‘normality’ or ‘abnormality’. Indeed, issues that arise from dilemmas surrounding the question of ‘culture’ or ‘psychopathology’ are intimately tied to wider cultural ideas about what is considered ‘normal’. The disciplines of psychiatry, psychology, and medical anthropology have struggled to establish workable criteria against which to judge behaviour as ‘normal’, ‘abnormal’, or ‘pathological’. Three models for understanding mental ‘abnormality’ are evident in ‘transcultural psychiatry’ (what is now commonly known as ‘cultural psychiatry’), and these models have corresponded closely to the interpretive models used by anthropologists attempting to make sense of the apparent diversity of human societies. The three models of ‘absolutism’, ‘universalism’ and ‘cultural relativism’ have not only important consequences for the nature and conduct of research enquiry, but also have implications for how the dilemma of ‘culture’ or ‘psychopathology’ is attended to in clinical practice. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Integrating Christ and the Saints into Buddhist Ritual:The Christian Homa of Yogi ChenRichard K. PayneConcern with dual belonging reflects the increasing religious pluralism of European and American societies. This pluralism has included both an increasing variety of religious traditions from outside the monotheistic mainstream of Abrahamic religions as well as new movements and sects within that mainstream. Awareness that religious pluralism is a reality and that many people (...) have come to see this pluralism as offering viable religious alternatives has fostered much reflection, both scholarly and popular. This increasing variety of religions present in Europe and America results from broader social trends. Discussion of these broader social trends, however, lies outside the scope of this essay, which is an examination of the utility of the concept of dual belonging for the sociology of religion.1Dual belonging (also known as double belonging, multiple religious belonging, and so on) becomes a specifically religious issue against the background of theological responses to the reality of religious pluralism. These theological responses include, first, the comparative theology of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, then theology of religions as developed in the middle to late twentieth century, and then the “new” comparative theology2 that has developed from the end of the twentieth into the present century.3 Another dimension that has influenced the discussion of dual belonging has been the efforts of Buddhist-Christian dialogue.4 The concern on the part of religious authorities, theologians, and, one should add, parents has been not just that “they” are now “here,” but that awareness of other religions also creates the opportunity for them to be actively embraced as viable alternatives to more familiar, mainstream religious traditions.5 While conversion has been one of the motivating concerns, another can perhaps be described as the fear of impurity. As Meredith B. McGuire has noted, in contrast to “the Western image of a religion as a unitary, organizationally defined, and relatively stable set of collective beliefs and practices” stands the reality that “extensive religious blending and within-group religious heterogeneity are the norm, rather than the exception.”6 This reality conflicts [End Page 37] with legitimating rhetorics of purity and authenticity, and constitutes a challenge to the authority of those who claim the right to define and defend what they hold as the pure and authentic.yogi chen and religiously hybrid practiceThe discourse regarding dual belonging has largely focused on Christians residing in the cultural West, where they are members of the dominant society and dominant religious culture, but who also identify with Buddhism.7 This reflects the predominant role played by theological concerns in the creation and application of the category of dual belonging. Thus it seems appropriate that Wendy Cadge has asked whether the concept and its cognates can be employed as a “descriptive term for understanding issues of religious globalization and their expression at the level of individual religious commitment.” In order to answer this question, the concept of dual belonging needs to be evaluated, testing whether it is applicable to those who are not members of the demographic that has largely been the subject of study so far. Here we reverse the lens to look at someone who is both not originally a Christian, but who integrates Christian symbolism into his practice, and not part of the dominant culture, an immigrant, a minority both socially and religiously. This instance allows us to examine the category for wider application than to those to whom it has been applied to date.8 Our test case will be a Chinese Buddhist teacher known as Yogi Chen.Yogi Chen (1906–1987) was a Chinese practitioner of esoteric Buddhism who immigrated to the United States in 1972 and practiced in the San Francisco Bay Area for the last decade and a half of his life. Like many modern Chinese teachers, he claimed to bring together all of the teachings and practices of the Theravada, Mahayana, and Vajrayana strains of Buddhism. In addition to practicing in retreat in Hunan, he also studied and practiced with the expatriate Tibetan community in India. During the final period of his life, as an immigrant in the United States, he... (shrink)

I briefly present and motivate a ‘skill hypothesis’ regarding the evolution of human normative cognition. On this hypothesis, the capacity to internally represent action-guiding norms evolved as a solution to the distinctive problems of standardizing, learning and teaching complex motor skills and craft skills, especially skills related to toolmaking. We have an evolved cognitive architecture for internalizing norms of technique, which was then co-opted for a rich array of social functions. There was a gradual expansion of the normative (...) domain, with ritual playing an important role in bridging the gap between concrete, enacted norms and general, abstract norms, such as kinship norms. I conclude by stating nine predictions arising from the skill hypothesis. (shrink)

Robotics has been increasingly adopted by religious communities around the world. In late 2015, a prototype of the “robot-monk” Xian’er was inaugurated at the Longquan Monastery in Beijing, with a second-generation model added in 2016 and a third robot released in 2018. Since then, Xian’er has been reciting Buddhist mantras and offering guidance on matters of faith to the thousands of worshippers visiting the temple every year or connecting with it online. In 2017, a robotic arm performing the Hindu Aarti (...) ritual, which involves moving a light in front of a deity following a circular pattern, also appeared. The same year, on the occasion of the 500th anniversary of the Reformation, Germany’s Protestant Church introduced a “robot-priest” called BlessU-2, able to give blessings in several languages, with a male or female voice. In 2018, roboticist Gabriele Trovato designed SanTO (acronym of “Sanctified Theomorphic Operator”), a small robot drawing inspiration from the statues of saints, in the aim to offer spiritual succour to Catholic believers, keep them company during prayer, and teach catechism. Such innovations are markedly changing the way people experience faith and religious practices, through a process of _dis_- and _re_-embodiment of “officiating agents”, which entails relevant transformations in terms of meaning-making processes, as well as related to the way devotees engage in ethical reasoning and decision-making, and to the normative protocols needed to regulate them. This paper addresses these crucial issues through a semiocultural approach, combining theoretical reflection with the analysis of the above-mentioned case studies. (shrink)

Modern selfhood presents itself as autonomous, overcoming emotion by following cognitive, moral and linguistic norms on the basis of clear, rational principles. It is difficult to imagine how such normative creatures could have evolved from their purely biological, non-normative, primate ancestors. I offer a just-so story to make it easier to imagine this transition. Early hominins learned to cooperate by developing group identities based on tribal norms. Group identity constituted proto-selves as normative creatures. Such group identity was not (...) based on autonomous selfhood – such an explanation would be anachronistic -- but on emotional patterning. By imitation, music, dance, ritual and other emotional practices, proto-selves learned how to bind themselves to the norms of their culture. Such conformity was a transitional evolutionary stage between primates and selves. Emotion and rationality are not incompatible: even contemporary selfhood remains rooted in emotional identity. (shrink)

To say Early Confucians advocated the possession of a sense of shame as a means to moral virtue underestimates the tact and forethought they used successfully to mold natural dispositions to experience shame into a system of self, familial, and social governance. Shame represents an adaptive system of emotion, cognition, perception, and behavior in social primates for measurement of social rank. Early Confucians understood the utility of the shame system for promotion of cooperation, and they build and deploy cultural modules (...) – e.g., rituals, titles, punishments – with this in mind. These policies result in subtle alterations to components of the evolved shame system that are detectable in data form contemporary cross-cultural psychology that show that populations in the Confucian diaspora have a unique shame profile compared to Western and non-Western populations. The status of Confucian diaspora populations as outliers in the context of shame is partially explained by appeal to the cultural transmission and historical endurance of relevant Early Confucian cultural modules. (shrink)

This book examines, above all, the relationship between reason and Vedic revelation, and the philosophical responses to the idea of the Veda. It deals with such topics as dharma, karma and rebirth, the role of man in the universe, the motivation and justification of human actions, the relationship between ritual norms and universal ethics, and reflections on the goals and sources of human knowledge. Halbfass presents previously unknown materials concerning the history of sectarian movements, including the notorious "Thags" (...) (thaka), and relations between Indian and Iranian thought. The approach is partly philosophical and partly historical and philological; to a certain extent, it is also comparative. The author explores indigenous Indian reflections on the sources, the structure and the meaning of the Hindu tradition, and traditional philosophical responses to social and historical realities. He does not deal with social and historical realities per se; rather, basing his work on the premise that to understand these realities the reflections and constructions of traditional Indian theorists are no less significant than the observations and paradigms of modern Western historians and social scientists, he explores the self-understanding of such leading thinkers as Sankara, Kumarila, Bhartrhari and Udayana. (shrink)

In memory of Alexandru Avram In a recent article, Robert Parker (“Greek Religion 1828–2017: the Contribution of Epigraphy”, Chiron 48 [2018], p. 1–15) has summarized the contribution of inscription to the study of Greek religion in the last two hundred years. With the help of the Bulletin Épigraphique, the reborn Supplementum Epigraphicum Graecum, the revived Inscriptiones Graecae, online resources such as the Collection of Greek Ritual Norms, the systematic publication of local corpora, and...

Before I went to the university, whether at home, in primary or secondary school, all I studied was Confucian literature. In the first year of the university, the classes on Chinese culture amounted to rote learning of the Analects and Mencius. Traditional culture had been compressed into Confucian culture alone. Hence, as a young man, I often found it difficult to breathe in the narrow confines imposed by Confucian ritual norms. The monotonous, stifling, and insipid atmosphere of Confucian (...) thought was a major reason driving me in a way similar to Nietzsche's bacchanal philosophy of life. It was also a prime cause of my liking for the Zhuangzi. When I entered graduate school I occasionally had the chance to encounter the Zhuangzi. It was this that led me to realize that Chinese culture originally had another outlook on the world. (shrink)

Stephen Turner’s anti-normativism is based on the idea that the normative can be explained away by social science. Exploiting the idea fostered by the sociology of scientific knowledge that reasons can be understood naturalistically as the causes of the beliefs of scientists and endorsing a non-normative conception of rationality, Turner has argued that normative accounts are better understood as “Good Bad Theories” (GBT). GBT are understood as false accounts that play a role in social coordination like magical or religious rituals (...) in primitive societies (e.g. Tabu and the like). According to Turner, “norms,” “obligations,” “reasons,” and “commitments” are like Tabu and can be explained away as GBT. Hence, Turner expected normative accounts to disappear completely in a fully disenchanted world. Turner focuses on the idea, widespread among philosophers, that the normative does not reduce to the causal: his main claim is that social science succeeds in the reduction of the normative in causal terms, overcoming normative/causal dualism. Furthermore, this success is presented as creating a serious challenge for normativism. By focusing on certain (supposedly normative) features of beliefs like those involved in belief change dynamics, I will point out some interesting implications and problems for Turner’s anti-normativism. (shrink)

This essay examines the textual evidence and arguments for two rival ways of interpreting Xunzi's accounts of the origins and normative bases of ritual and the Way: a human-centered line of interpretation which maintains that the moral order constituted by the Confucian Way and its ritual tradition was the artificial creation of a group of ancient sages, and a Heaven-centered line of interpretation which maintains, in contrast, that those same sages based the Confucian Way and its ritual (...) tradition on a cosmic moral order that they discovered already existing in the world. It argues that the weight of textual evidence best supports a version of the former view, and shows that three representative versions of the latter view do not withstand critical scrutiny. (shrink)

Cultural evolution depends on both innovation (the creation of new cultural variants by accident or design) and high-fidelity transmission (which preserves our accumulated knowledge and allows the storage of normative conventions). What is required is an overarching theory encompassing both dimensions, specifying the psychological motivations and mechanisms involved. The bifocal stance theory (BST) of cultural evolution proposes that the co-existence of innovative change and stable tradition results from our ability to adopt different motivational stances flexibly during social learning and transmission. (...) We argue that the ways in which instrumental and ritual stances are adopted in cultural transmission influence the nature and degree of copying fidelity and thus also patterns of cultural spread and stability at a population level over time. BST creates a unifying framework for interpreting the findings of otherwise seemingly disparate areas of enquiry, including social learning, cumulative culture, overimitation, and ritual performance. We discuss the implications of BST for competing by-product accounts which assume that faithful copying is merely a side-effect of instrumental learning and action parsing. We also set out a novel “cultural action framework” bringing to light aspects of social learning that have been relatively neglected by behavioural ecologists and evolutionary psychologists and establishing a roadmap for future research on this topic. The BST framework sheds new light on the cognitive underpinnings of cumulative cultural change, selection, and spread within an encompassing evolutionary framework. (shrink)