From Ritual Practice to Esoteric Knowledge: The Problem of the Magi

2021 ◽  
pp. 321-342
Keyword(s):  
Ritual Practice ◽  
Esoteric Knowledge

The Exorcism of the Salt Ponds at Xie

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barend J. ter Haar
Keyword(s):  
Twelfth Century ◽  
Southern China ◽  
Ritual Practice ◽  
Salt Ponds ◽  
The South ◽  
New Type ◽  
The Way

The historical Guan Yu came from a village in Xie Prefecture (modern Yuncheng) in the south of the modern province of Shanxi, close to one of the main salt producing sites of traditional China. From the early twelfth century onwards a new type of worship for Lord Guan was transmitted throughout southern China by Daoist exorcist specialists, which was motivated by a story about his successful defeat of a demon causing mishap in the salt ponds of Xie. The Daoist connection of the deity was much stronger than the Buddhist one, but this was the Daoism of ritual practice, rather than the philosophical approaches as some may construct them from the Book of the Way and the Virtue that is ascribed to Laozi. A substantial numbers of temple foundations in southern China in particular can be explained through this Daoist connection.

The Concept of Rebirth as the Christ and the Initiatory Rituals of the Bridal Chamber in theGospel of Philip

Antichthon ◽  
1996 ◽  
Vol 30 ◽  
pp. 34-48
Author(s):  
Majella Franzmann
Keyword(s):  
Ritual Practice ◽  
Nag Hammadi ◽  
The World ◽  
Secret Knowledge ◽  
Bridal Chamber

In this article I begin with an outline of the connection between theological concepts related to the person of the Gnostic Christian Saviour and the ritual practice of Gnostic Christian groups. After setting the scene in this general way, I look specifically at theGospel of Philip, investigating the connection between the description of the rebirth of the Saviour at the Jordan and the rebirth of the Gnostic in the ritual of the bridal chamber.The Nag Hammadi corpus, to which theGospel of Philipbelongs, contains many texts which may be identified as Gnostic Christian, partly because of the fact that, in these texts, the key figure of the Saviour or Revealer is identified as Jesus or Christ. The work that Jesus performs in the world for the Gnostics is revelation, for the most part, rather than redemption in the sense in which mainstream Christianity identified his activity. His revelation may involve imparting secret knowledge, especially during that time prior to his final ascent into the heavenly region of light (for those texts which are closely aligned with the mainstream Christian pattern of descent and several stages of ascent for Jesus), but it must be generally categorised as activity designed to awaken the Gnostic to the insight (gnosis) which this person already possesses.

scholarly journals Is Liturgy Ludic? Distinguishing between the Phenomena of Play and Ritual

Religions ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 232
Author(s):  
Christina M. Gschwandtner
Keyword(s):  
Present Article ◽  
Phenomenological Analysis ◽  
Final Part ◽  
Ritual Practice ◽  
The Third ◽  
Ontological Claim

What is the nature (or “Wesen”) of the liturgical phenomenon? It has become immensely popular to describe liturgical or ritual practice as a kind of “holy play,” whether as metaphor, as productive analogy for pragmatic or theological purposes, or even as making an ontological claim about what liturgy “is” in its essence. The present article seeks to complicate the association of the phenomena of liturgy and of play. The first part traces the origins of the notion of play and the development of its application to ritual in the most influential sources from Kant to Gadamer. The second part highlights its prevalence in the contemporary discussion and elucidates how it is being used. The third part provides a phenomenological analysis to demonstrate important differences between the two phenomena and to question the contention that liturgy is a form of play. The final part tries to ascertain the broader practical and theological aims being served by the association of the two phenomena and—via a return to the question of the nature of the liturgical phenomenon in a more theological mode—suggests that these aims might be accomplished more productively in ways that avoid the downsides of identifying ritual or liturgy with play.

Archaeological Evidence of Domestic Sheep in the Namib Desert During the First millennium AD

2016 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-17 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Kinahan
Keyword(s):  
Southern Africa ◽  
Rock Art ◽  
Indirect Evidence ◽  
Domestic Sheep ◽  
Ritual Practice ◽  
Namib Desert ◽  
Broad Agreement ◽  
First Millennium ◽  
Changing Economy ◽  
Fundamental Shift

Bones of domestic sheep dated to the early first millennium AD are described from the Dâures massif in the Namib Desert. The remains confirm earlier investigations which inferred the acquisition of livestock from indirect evidence in the rock art, suggesting a fundamental shift in ritual practice at this time. Dating of the sheep remains is in broad agreement with the dating of other finds in the same area and in southern Africa as a whole. The presence of suspected sheep bone artefacts, possibly used for ritual purposes, draws attention to the importance of livestock as more than a component of diet in the changing economy of hunter-gatherer society.

scholarly journals SPACE-TIME TRANSFORMATIONS IN THE UPPER XINGU AND UPPER RIO NEGRO

2015 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 699-724
Author(s):  
Geraldo Andrello ◽  
Antonio Guerreiro ◽  
Stephen Hugh-Jones
Keyword(s):  
Social Organization ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Space Time ◽  
Unequal Distribution ◽  
Rio Negro ◽  
The People ◽  
The Social ◽  
Esoteric Knowledge ◽  
Spatio Temporal ◽  
Time Transformations

Abstract The multi-ethnic and multilingual complexes of the Upper Rio Negro and the Upper Xingu share common aspects that frequently emerge in ethnographies, including notions of descent, hierarchical social organization and ritual activities, as well as a preference for forms of exogamy and the unequal distribution of productive and ritual specialties and esoteric knowledge. In this article we investigate how the people of both regions conceive of their humanity and that of their neighbours as variations on a shared form, since in both regions ritual processes for negotiating positions and prerogatives seems to take the place of the latent state of warfare typical of the social life of other Amazonian peoples. In this article we will synthesize, for each region, the spatio-temporal processes that underscore the eminently variable constitution of collectivities, seeking, in conclusion, to isolate those elements that the two regions have in common.

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