This page groups rituals by the year their recorded history begins. Wikipedia notes that "the word 'ritual' is first recorded in English in 1570, and came into use in the 1600s to mean 'the prescribed order of performing religious services'." Browsing by start year lets a visitor see how far back a given ritual's documented history actually reaches.
Facts
Origins
Whose Classification This IsInitiation is treated as a species of rite of passage on van Gennep's 1909 three-stage scheme - separation, liminality, incorporation - as elaborated by Victor Turner in 1969. The scheme is a comparative frame devised by its authors, not an account any tradition gives of its own rite. 2 Overview
What Defines This GroupingRites that admit a person to a status, community or degree of knowledge not previously held. The atlas records that such rites exist, who confers them and what they are held to accomplish. 2 Status
Standing as a Comparative CategoryA standard analytic category in the study of religion 2 Learn More
The Initiatory Rituals
This group holds initiatory rituals, the ceremonies by which a person is admitted into a religion, order or degree, or consecrated to a sacred role. Initiation typically enacts a symbolic death and rebirth, marking the passage into a new spiritual state.
The browser will find initiatory rituals from various traditions. The entries describe each rite's form and meaning, noting the tradition and the admission or elevation it enacts.
7th century
Filter Results2 entries
Sources
1. Divinity Atlas Directory Taxonomy, First Edition Category Tree
2. Ritual: Perspectives and Dimensions
Catherine Bell, Oxford University Press, 1997Basic Genres of Ritual ActionView the Source Divinity Atlas Directory Prose, First Edition Category Descriptions
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