Religion

Rites of Passage

-A special kind of ritual is a rite of passage. A rite of passage marks transition from one stage of life to another. -In contemporary society this includes bar/bat mitzvahs or baptisms but the concept could also be extended to military boot camp, fraternity hazing, quinceañeras, bachelor/bachelorette parties, graduation, or any other significant cultural events marking transition or changes in social status. -Rites of passage are marked by specific stages: separation, liminality, and incorporation. -First, individuals are first separated from their current social identity as they prepare to enter the next stage of life. -This is often marked by a physical separation from other community members, possibly with an age set of initiates. -Second, in the liminal period, individuals are in-between stages. They undergo tests, trials, or activities designed to prepare them for new social roles. -Third, individuals are incorporated back into the community but with a new social status. -Rites of passage are often collective events in which a group of individuals pass through the rites together. -There is emphasis on social solidarity and individuals must behave and dress similarly.

Religious Specialists

-All religions have some form of religious specialists. -Religious specialists are responsible for overseeing the practice and ritual. Rituals are complicated, and the outcomes are vital, so it is important to have a specialist. These individuals often have a high social status in their communities. -Priests or priestesses are full time religious specialists associated with an organized religion. Although different religions may have different terms for these individuals (i.e., rabbis, ministers, Imam, etc), their function is the same. They perform rituals to communicate with spiritual beings and guide believers in faith. However, priests and priestesses do not exert actual influence on situations and do not possess supernatural powers themselves—they act as in intermediary with the supernatural. -Shamans are often part time religious specialists associated with a religious belief system (but not an organized religion). They may have direct contact with the spirit world, usual while in a trance state. A shaman may be possessed by the spirits with which they communicate, and the spirits may speak their desires through the shaman.

Ritual

-Ritual is another common characteristic in religion. -Ritual is defined as formal, repetitive, stereotyped behavior based on a liturgical order. -A liturgical order refers to the importance of performing rituals in a certain sequence, using certain words and actions. -Rituals are usually performed in a special location, separating them from the mundane, and participants may wear different clothing. -Rituals are social and meaningful acts. They rely on participation from believers and provide information about traditions and beliefs. Some participants will be more committed than others to the beliefs but everyone who participates is still accepting of a common social and moral order. -Some rituals have a concrete purpose or goal, like a wedding ceremony. Other rituals are purely symbolic, like the act of taking communion. The activities in a ritual are meaningful and represent something larger than what they appear

Daily Rituals

-Some rituals are daily. For example, Muslims pray (salah) five times a day (pre-dawn, midday, afternoon, sunset, and at night). -Before salah begins, Muslims must perform a ritual purification known as wuḍūʾ, which involves washing parts of the body. -During prayer, they must face a certain direction (towards the qibla or towards Mecca).

Periodic Rituals

-Some rituals are periodic in that they occur once or twice a year. For example, Diwali is a Hindu festival of lights celebrated once a year. -Spiritually, Diwali signifies the victory of light over darkness, good over evil, knowledge over ignorance, and hope over despair. -During Diwali, participants will wear their best clothes, light many lamps and candles, offer prayers (puja) to the goddess Lakshmi, and share gifts.

Belief in the Supernatural

-Another common characteristic to religion is belief in the supernatural. Contrast the supernatural realm with the natural realm. -The supernatural realm exists outside of human control. It cannot be examined using a scientific epistemology because it is not logical, falsifiable, observable, or replicable. -The natural realm is empirical, predictable, and testable and you can examine it with the scientific method by asking logical, observable, falsifiable, and replicable questions. -The supernatural realm is ruled by forces not governed by natural laws. -Some supernatural forces are perceived to have human characteristics. These anthropometric supernatural forces may take the form of gods or spirits, in a human image. -Other supernatural forces are more generalized. The amount of influence that supernatural forces or entities have in the lives of humans varies cross-culturally. -Animatism is a belief in an impersonal supernatural force. As a silly example, let's think about the Force in Star Wars. -It is an unseen supernatural force that can be channeled and acts on the lives of individuals. -For example, Mana is an example of animatism. The word mana comes from Oceania and may have originally meant powerful wind, lightening, or storm. -Mana represents power, effectiveness, prestige, and authority. It is something that can be possessed by individuals, but it can also be in objects or places. -Animism is belief in a spiritual or supernatural force in plants, animals, and inanimate objects. -For example, Shintoism is a religion in Japan that recognizes the existence of spirits known as kami present in plants, animals, rocks, places and sometimes people. Shinto shrines are marked by gates that separate ordinary reality and a sacred space.

Common Characteristics: Cosmology and Myth

-Cosmology and myth are common elements found in all religions. Cosmology is a system for imaging and understanding the universe. Myth is an important component of cosmology. Myths are a set of shared beliefs, passed on in stories or narratives, from generation to generation. Common narratives seek answers to questions like: Where did we come from? Why are we here? Where are we going? -Myths provide "big picture" explanations for how human life was created and the forces and powers at work in the world. Are myths meant to present a literal truth or are they metaphorical? -Although the details of these narratives can vary tremendously, they tend to share common themes and provide the listener with values, morals, discussion of good vs evil, for example. -Let's look at another creation story—this one is from Madagascar. We often think of creation stories as explaining where humans came from. In this Malagasy creation story, we learn where lemurs came from. In this story, there are two wives cooking dinner. They begin to argue, and the first wife beat the second wife with a wooden spoon until she turns into a ring-tailed lemur. -Then the ring-tailed lemur picks up the wooden spoon and beats the first wife until she turns into a sifaka! -I think this narrative will seem pretty far-fetched to most of us but cultural relativism requires that we avoid making judgements about religious beliefs as true or correct—the veracity of belief is not the most important question. A more useful approach is to try and understand the multiple ways people interpret or make sense of their religious beliefs.

What is Religion ?

-It is defined as belief and ritual concerned with supernatural beings, powers, and forces. The supernatural realm influences events beyond human control and exists beyond the material, observable world. -However, the supernatural realm may act to affect the observable world. Religion must be accepted on faith. -I love these pictures because I think they really capture the heart of belief and faith in sports. These sports fan are praying so hard to help their teams. They are appealing to a supernatural being that acts beyond the natural realm to affect the observable world and influence events out of human control. -Emile Durkhein, who made early contributions to the anthropology of religion, distinguished between the sacred and the profane -Sacred objects or ideas are set apart from the ordinary and treated with great respect. In contrast, profane objects or ideas are ordinary and can be treated with disregard or even contempt. -To continue our sports analogy, consider the difference between a regular baseball bat and Babe Ruth's baseball bat (valued at almost a million dollars!). -You can pick up a regular baseball bat, play a game, throw it on the ground if you get angry, you might accidentally leave it at the park but no big loss—you can get another one! Would you treat Babe Ruth's baseball bat with the same regard?

Distribution of World Religions

-Religion of some form is found in virtually all human societies but there are many different forms of expression. Religion functions to create and bind communities is social solidarity. -Edward Sapir argued for a distinction between "a religion" and "religion". -The first category ("a religion") refers to one of the formally recognized world religions depicted in this image. -According to a Pew Research Center study conducted in 230 countries and territories, approximately 84% of the world's population (5.8 billion people) are affiliated with a religion. Out of the global religious population, 32% are Christian, 23% are Muslim, 15% are Hindu, 7% are Buddhist, and 0.2% are Jewish. Approximately 16% of the world's population are unaffiliated. -This image (below) is a breakdown of the geographic distribution of the regions in which the majority of a population subscribe to a particular religion. -You can see some trends, like Christianity dominating the Americas and Western Europe, Islam dominating North Africa and the Middle East, Hinduism dominating India (note that this is the third largest religion in terms of number of adherents, indicating the India is densely populated). -The only majority Jewish country is Israel. Eastern Asia is dominated by Buddhism, aside from a large section of China that is unaffiliated, due to historical events in the last 70 years (i.e., the Cultural Revolution). -The second category, "religion", refers more broadly to religious beliefs and behaviors, which exist in all societies even if they do not conform to a particular, identified world religion. Folk religions (i.e., traditional African, Native American, Chinese, and Australian aboriginal, for example) and other religions (i.e., Sikhism, Shintoism, Taois, Jainism, and Wicca, for example) account for almost 7%. -We see indigenous religions geographically throughout the Amazon Basin in South America, in Sub-Saharan Africa, parts of Australia, and Northern Russia.

Social Control

-Religion serves as a powerful means of controlling belief, customs, and behaviors through enculturation. -Religious norms often mirror society's norms. - Compliance with these norms and proper behavior is ensured through a system of rewards and punishments. -For example, in Christianity, the concepts of heaven and hell. Good behavior and faithful belief is rewarded fellowship in a religious community and eternal happiness in heaven. -Bad behavior and faithlessness is punished with expulsion from a religious community and eternal damnation in hell. -Moral codes provide order and stability to society and become internalized by adherents. Those beliefs are then passed on from generation to generation, just as in all culture. -Religions provide leveling mechanisms to control rule breakers. For example, when individuals break social norms or are seen to benefit disproportionately or at the expense of others in their community, they can be accused of witchcraft or sorcery in some cultures. -According to anthropologist Clyde Kluckholn, for the Navajo, the fear of becoming a victim of witchcraft encourages people to cooperate, share resources, and minimize public displays of anger. -However, it is socially acceptable for a witch to receive aggression or hostilities from the community.

Magic

-The next common characteristic in religious beliefs is magic. You probably think of magic as someone pulling a rabbit out of a hat, sawing a person in half, or making something disappear and reappear but those are magic tricks. -In religion, magic refers to supernatural techniques intended to accomplish specific aims. Using spells, formulas, incantations, offers, chants, or rituals, a magician (or sorcerer, witch, practitioner) can influence supernatural powers to act for good or evil purposes. -Magic is found in societies with diverse religious beliefs ranging from animism to theistic religions. -In imitative magic, an action that imitates a desired result produces an effect in the real world. -Poppets and voodoo dolls are a classic example of imitative magic. If a magician wants to produce an action in the real world, then they will use the doll as a stand in for the real person and cast spells or perform actions on the doll. -Many of us associate this with Haitian Vodou but it is also seen in the archaeological record in Europe and Britain. -In contagious magic, it is believed that anything that was once in contact with a person can still have an effect on them. If a magician obtains hair, teeth, fingernails, or clothing from someone, then they could perform magic on those items, causing something to happen to that person. -Imitative and contagious magic can be combined if a magician incorporates something that was once in contact with a person into their imitative poppets. Magic, sorcery, and witchcraft are used to explain illness, accidents, and other unexpected occurrences. - -Because it is often practiced in secrecy, it's existence and its ability to explain the root cause of these occurrences are difficult to argue against. -The culprit behind the magical cause of someone's misfortune is, therefore, difficult to find without divination. Divination is a magical procedure used to determine the cause of an event or the outcome of a future event.

Spiritual Beings

-The presence of spiritual beings is a common feature of many religious beliefs. In many cultures, people believe that the spirit is freed from the body when an individual dies but that it can retain an active presence... like a ghost! -The spirit may be well-intentioned or malevolent. -In the Philippines, a group called the Tausug believe the soul as four parts: 1) a transcendent soul that stays in the spiritual realm when a person is alive; 2) a life-soul that is attached to the body but can move through dreams, 3) the breath which is always attached to the body, 4) and the spirit soul (like a shadow). -Ancestral spirits are a common type of spiritual being found in many religious beliefs. An ancestral spirit retains an active interest in their family and society. -They must be treated nicely and honored or they will wreak havoc on the living. Continued care of ancestral spirits by living descents is accomplished through offerings or gifts. -European cultures often think of ghosts as dangerous. -We bury our dead in enclosed physical spaces that are removed from the living—cemeteries! -But in cultures where ancestral spirits are viewed as helpful and loving, the dead are often buried around the home to keep them close. -Some cultures have ritualized mortuary endo-cannibalism—consuming the body or drinking the ashes of a dead group member as a ritualized act to maintain that person's essence in the lineage. -In contrast to more general spiritual forces, such as in animatism, some spiritual beings may be zoomorphic (take the form of an animal) or anthropomorphic (take the form of a human). -Gods and goddesses are an example of anthropomorphic spiritual beings. In polytheistic religions, there are many gods, each responsible for exerting influence over a different realm of human life. -In monotheistic religions, there is just one all-powerful deity.

Uncertainty and Solace: Trobriand Fisherman

-The use of magic by Trobriand Island fisherman is a classic ethnographic example of individuals relying on religious beliefs when facing uncertainty. -Bronislaw Malinowski (1931) found that the Trobriand -Fishermen used a variety of magical practices when they went on long sailing trips. -They were capable seamen who engaged in a ritual exchange of goods with neighboring island groups. But the trips were long and unpredictable-- people cannot control matters like wind, weather, and or the fish supply. -When confronted with uncontrollable situations, the Trobriand Islanders turned from relying on their technology to relying on magic to decrease psychological stress. -They differentiate between a variety of different kinds of magic associated with weather, healing, gardens, fishing, sailing and canoes, love, and dark magic. -Magic is viewed as personal property and certain people have certain kinds of magic, which is inherited from their matrilineal relatives. -Someone with canoe magic, for example, may be an expert in canoe-making and may accept an apprentice to pass on the skills that can be taught (Senft 1997).

Why Religion? Uncertainty and Solace

-What role does religion play in maintaining and changing societies? -Religion serves emotional and cognitive needs by providing people with comfort, solace, and reduced anxiety in times of grief, crisis, and other uncontrollable life events. -Religion provides explanations for seemingly unexplainable events and provides adherents with the perception of control for outcomes beyond human control.

Social Control: Zombification in Haiti

-Zombification in Haiti is an excellent example of religion as a means of social control. -The Vodou (voodoo) religion has its roots in Africa and was brought to the Americas and the Caribbean through slavery. -In its present form, it is thought to be a combination of African, Catholic, and indigenous American traditions. -It is a community centered religion that supports individual experience, empowerment, and responsibility. They believe that there exists both a visible and an invisible world. -In the vouduo religion, there are two ways to die: naturally (via sickness or God's will) or unnaturally (murder). -The soul of someone who died unnaturally will linger around their grave and is vulnerable to being captured by a dark sorcerer (a bokor), who can use the person's soul to control their body and force them into slavery. -Zombies are real and the threat of being intentionally zombified is a real concern. Haitians do not fear zombies, they fear becoming a zombie against their will. -Ethnobotanist Wade Davis worked in Haiti to understand the process of zombification. He suggests that we can think of them not as the living dead but as the living drugged. -Davis found that the substance used to create a zombie contains a number of drugs including a chemical derived from the puffer fish that acts as a paralytic. -Once a person unknowingly ingested that, they appear dead to their community, the family hosts a funeral, and the person is buried. -Throughout this process, the person is awake and cognizant but unable to move and experiences their own death. The bokor responsible for making the zombie, will go to their grave and dig them up. -The physical effects of the drug are short term but the psychological effects of witnessing their own death, plus continued drugging by the bokor leaves the zombie in a state of hazy confusion. -Not everyone is at risk for being turned into a zombie. -Zombification is often used as a way to control deviant behavior or as a threat to curb rule breakers. - This phenomenon reflects the blending of religious beliefs with the violence of colonial-era slavery.