Myth and ritual
Myth and ritual are two central components of religious practice. Although myth and ritual are commonly united as parts of religion, the exact relationship between them has been controversial among scholars. One of the approaches to this problem is "the myth and ritual, or myth-ritualist, theory," held notably by the so-called Cambridge Ritualists, which holds that "myth does not stand by itself but is tied to ritual." This theory is still disputed; many scholars now believe that myth and ritual share common paradigms, but not that one developed from the other.
Overview
The "myth and ritual school" refers to a group of authors who have concentrated their philological studies on the "ritual purposes of myths." Some of these scholars, such as W. Robertson-Smith, James George Frazer, Jane Ellen Harrison, and S. H. Hooke, endorsed the "primacy of ritual" hypothesis, which asserts that "every myth is derived from a specific ritual and that the syntagmatic quality of myth reflects the sequence of ritual acts."
Historically, significant approaches to the study of mythological thinking have included those of Vico, Schelling, Schiller, Jung, Freud, Lucien Lévy-Bruhl, Lévi-Strauss, Frye, the Soviet school, and the Myth and Ritual School.
In the 1930s, Soviet researchers such as Jakov E. Golosovker, Frank-Kamenecky, Olga Freidenberg, and Mikhail Bakhtin grounded the study of myth and ritual in folklore and the worldview of popular culture.
Following World War II, the semantic study of myth and ritual—especially by Bill Stanner and Victor Turner—has supported a connection between the two. However, it has not validated the idea that one preceded and produced the other, as proponents of the "primacy of ritual" hypothesis would assert. According to the current dominant scholarly view, the relationship between myth and ritual is that they share common paradigms.
Ritual from myth
One potential explanation arises right away: perhaps ritual originated from myth. Many religious rituals—including Passover for Jews, Christmas and Easter for Christians, and the Hajj for Muslims—celebrate events found in religious texts or involve their commemoration.
E. B. Tylor
Departing from the realm of historical religions, the ritual-from-myth perspective often views the connection between myth and ritual as similar to the relationship between science and technology. The pioneering anthropologist Edward Burnett Tylor is the classic representative of this viewpoint. He perceived myth as an effort to explain the world: for him, myth served as a form of proto-science. Ritual is secondary; just as technology applies scientific principles, ritual applies myth—an endeavor to achieve certain effects based on the presumed nature of the world: "For Tylor, myth serves to explain the world as an end in itself. Ritual applies that explanation to exert control over the world." A ritual always assumes the existence of a preexisting myth: in short, myth gives rise to ritual.
Myth from ritual (primacy of ritual)
Contrary to the intuitive belief that ritual reenacts myth or applies mythical theories, many 19th-century anthropologists endorsed the opposite view: that myth and religious doctrine emerge from ritual. This concept is known as the "primacy of ritual" hypothesis.
William Robertson Smith
This perspective was first proposed by the biblical scholar William Robertson Smith. Scholar Meletinsky observes that Smith introduced the concept "dogmatically." In his Lectures on the Religion of the Semites (1889), Smith differentiates between ancient and modern religions: in modern religion, doctrine is central, while in ancient religion, ritual takes precedence. Overall, Smith contends that ancient people tended to be conservative regarding rituals, ensuring they were passed down faithfully. In contrast, the myths that justified those rituals were subject to change. According to Smith, many of the myths that survive today emerged "after the original, nonmythic reason [...] for the ritual had somehow been forgotten."
As an example, Smith discusses the worship of Adonis. Worshipers mourned Adonis's mythical death in a ritual that coincided with the annual withering of vegetation. According to Smith, the ritual mourning initially had a nonmythical explanation: with the yearly dying of plants, "the worshippers lament out of natural sympathy [...] just as modern man feels melancholy at the falling of autumn leaves." Once the worshipers forgot the original, nonmythical reason for the mourning ritual, they created "the myth of Adonis as the dying and rising god of vegetation [...] to explain the ritual."
Stanley Edgar Hyman
In his 1955 essay "The Ritual View of Myth and the Mythic," Stanley Edgar Hyman presents an argument similar to Smith's:
- "In Fiji [...] the physical peculiarities of an island with only one small patch of fertile soil are explained by a myth telling how Mberewalaki, a culture hero, flew into a passion at the misbehavior of the people of the island and hurled all the soil he was bringing them in a heap, instead of laying it out properly. Hocart points out that the myth is used aetiologically to explain the nature of the island, but did not originate in that attempt. The adventures of Mberewalaki originated, like all mythology, in ritual performance, and most of the lore of Hocart's Fijian informants consisted of such ritual myths. When they get interested in the topology of the island or are asked about it, Hocart argues, they do precisely what we would do, which is ransack their lore for an answer."
Hyman argues against the etiological interpretation of myth, which posits that myths originated from attempts to explain the origins (etiologies) of natural phenomena. If this were true, the etiological interpretation would imply that myth is older than, or at least independent of, ritual—as E.B. Tylor contends. However, Hyman claims that people utilize myth for etiological purposes only after it is already established: in essence, myths did not arise as explanations of natural phenomena. Furthermore, Hyman contends that myth originates from ritual performance. Therefore, ritual precedes myth, and myth relies on ritual for its existence until it gains independent status as an etiological story.
James Frazer
The renowned anthropologist Sir James George Frazer asserted that myth originates from ritual in the natural course of religious evolution. Many of his ideas were influenced by those of Robertson Smith. In The Golden Bough (1890; 1906–1915), Frazer famously contends that humanity advances from belief in magic (and rituals based on magic) to belief in religion and, ultimately, to science. His argument is as follows.
- A person starts with a reflexive belief in a natural law. He believes that he can influence nature by properly applying this law: "In magic, an individual relies on his own strength to face the challenges and dangers around him. He trusts in a specific established order of nature that he can rely on and manipulate for his own purposes."
However, the natural law man imagines—namely, magic—does not work. When he sees that his pretended natural law is false, man gives up the idea of a knowable natural law and "throws himself humbly on the mercy of certain great invisible beings behind the veil of nature, to whom he now ascribes all those far-reaching powers which he once arrogated to himself." In other words, when man loses his belief in magic, he justifies his formerly magical rituals by saying that they reenact myths or honor mythical beings. According to Frazer,
- "Myth evolves while custom remains constant; people continue to do what their fathers did before them, even though the reasons for their fathers' actions have long been forgotten. The history of religion is a lengthy endeavor to reconcile old customs with new reasoning, striving to find a sound theory for an absurd practice."
Jane Ellen Harrison and S. H. Hooke
The classicist Jane Ellen Harrison and the biblical scholar S. H. Hooke viewed myth as closely tied to ritual. However, "against Smith," they "vigorously deny" that the primary purpose of myth is to justify a ritual by explaining how it originated (for example, justifying the mourning ritual of the Adonis worshipers by linking it to Adonis's mythical death). Instead, these scholars argue that a myth predominantly serves as a narrative description of a corresponding ritual: according to Harrison, "the primary meaning of myth ... is the spoken correlative of the acted rite, the thing done."
Harrison and Hooke explained why ancient people felt the need to describe rituals in narrative form. They suggest that, like the performed ritual, the spoken word was believed to possess magical potency: "The spoken word had the efficacy of an act."
Like Frazer, Harrison believed that myths could arise as the original reason why a ritual was forgotten or became diluted. For example, she cited rituals centered on the annual renewal of vegetation. These rituals often involve a participant who undergoes a staged death and resurrection. Harrison argues that the ritual, although "performed annually, was exclusively initiatory"; it was carried out on individuals to induct them into their roles as full members of society. At this early stage, the "god" was merely "the projection of the euphoria produced by the ritual." Later, however, this euphoria became personified as a distinct god, who eventually became the god of vegetation because "just as the initiates symbolically died and were reborn as fully-fledged members of society, so the god of vegetation and, in turn, crops literally died and were reborn." Over time, people lost sight of the ritual's initiatory purpose and only remembered its role as a commemoration of the Adonis myth.
Myth and ritual as non-coextensive
Not all students of mythology believe that ritual emerged from myth or that myth emerged from ritual; however, some grant myths and rituals a greater degree of independence from one another. While myths and rituals frequently coexist, these scholars do not believe that every myth has or had a corresponding ritual, or vice versa.
Walter Burkert
The classicist Walter Burkert believes that myths and rituals were originally independent. When myths and rituals come together, he argues, they do so to reinforce one another. A myth that describes how the gods established a ritual elevates that ritual by giving it divine status: "Do this because the gods did, or do it." A ritual based on a mythical event enhances the importance of that story, making the myth more significant because it narrates an event whose imitation is considered sacred.
Furthermore, Burkert argues that myth and ritual together serve a "socializing function." He illustrates this by discussing hunting rituals, stating that hunting took on a sacred, ritualistic significance once it was no longer essential for survival: "Hunting lost its basic function with the emergence of agriculture some ten thousand years ago. Yet, hunting ritual became so vital that it could not be abandoned." By participating in the hunting ritual collectively, an ancient society forged bonds among its members and offered a means for them to express their anxieties regarding their own aggressiveness and mortality.
Bronisław Malinowski
Like William Smith, anthropologist Bronisław Malinowski argued in his essay "Myth in Primitive Psychology" (1926) that myths serve as fictitious accounts of the origins of rituals, providing justification for those rituals: myth "gives rituals a hoary past and thereby sanctions them." However, Malinowski also points out that many cultural practices, besides rituals, have associated myths: for him, "myth and ritual are therefore not coextensive." In other words, not all myths arise from ritual, and not all rituals stem from myth.
Mircea Eliade
Like Malinowski, the religious scholar Mircea Eliade argues that myth's important function is to explain rituals. Eliade observes that, in many societies, rituals are deemed significant primarily because mythical gods or heroes established them. He favorably quotes Malinowski's assertion that a myth is "a narrative resurrection of a primeval reality." Eliade further states, "Because myth relates the gesta [deeds] of Supernatural Beings [...] it becomes the exemplary model for all significant human actions." Traditional individuals view mythical figures as role models to emulate. Therefore, societies assert that these mythical figures instituted many rituals, enhancing their significance. However, like Malinowski, Eliade notes that societies employ myths to legitimize various activities beyond just rituals: "For him, too, then, myth and ritual are not coextensive."
Eliade goes beyond Malinowski by providing an explanation for why myth can hold such significance for ritual: according to Eliade, "when [ritually] [re-]enacted, myth functions as a time machine, transporting one back to the time of the myth and thereby drawing one closer to God." However, Eliade also posits that myth and ritual are not synonymous: the same return to the mythical age can be achieved simply by retelling a myth, without any ritual reenactment. Traditional man, according to Eliade, views both myths and rituals as means for "eternal return" to the mythical age (see Eternal return (Eliade)).
"By imitating the exemplary acts of a god or a mythic hero, or simply recounting their adventures, a man from an archaic society detaches himself from profane time and magically re-enters the Great Time, the sacred time."
The recital of myths and the enactment of rituals serve a common purpose: they are two different means of remaining in sacred time.
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