The following writing is extracted from an assignment I did in 12th grade for my IB Social and Cultural Anthropology class, regarding a written article: The Adaptive Value of Religious Ritual by Richard Sosis.
Date: 03/10/2015
The Adaptive Value of Religious Ritual
Pexels: Pixabay
Richard Sosis' written article in 2004 entitled The
Adaptive Value of Religious Ritual talks about how religion as a ritual
contributes to one’s sense of personal security, individual responsibility, and
social harmony. He introduces us to the matter of religion as a ritual by
giving the readers an insight of how the Muslim religion works in Jerusalem. By
presenting religions from different countries and societies, he questions how
supernatural beliefs still exist with all the scientific and technological
advanced present today. How does having a religion benefit a person or the
community?
Rituals like religious ceremonies are created. A religion is not an
individual aspect, but a social aspect itself. It is not created by a person
but constructed by the society as a whole. The society
constructed religion for a group to have a sense of social
harmony. Religious activities serve as a form of communication, which promotes
cooperation within a group because it shows a person’s commitment to a
religion. Through the socialization between members of a
religious group, relationships could be made. Socialization through religious
actions and words itself makes it known by a person if an individual is of a
certain religion or not. Once
relationships are established, there is a unity within the group, creating social
harmony. Much like the religion Sosis observed, once a Muslim identifies
another as being from the Islamic faith through clothing or rituals that the
other follows, they could build relationships with that individual based on
their religion because of familiarity.
Pexels: Liza Rahman
Socialization between members of a religious group does not
only create social harmony, but secures a person's personal security as well.
The relationships created through communication secure trust between members of
that group. Once trust is built as foundations of the relationship between the
members, not only harmony, but a person's own security as an individual is
established.
The rituals followed in a religion could also be called as rites
of passage. The rites of passage in a religion is done for people to
recognize what religion or faith an individual has through signals. With that
said, signals can only be noticed if numerous amounts of people follow the
rituals imposed on them by their religion. This means that the greater the
demands a religion imposes, the greater the commitment and cooperation there is
within a religion group. This brings upon the topic of individual
responsibility. The number of committed followers a religion has is minimized
when most of the traditional rituals are ignored because of the changing
times. A responsible and committed
follower would go through and follow traditional rituals even when everything
around them is changing. Their responsibility to follow their religion at such
circumstances changes their status, status of being firm believers of faith.
This status could go both ways. Good, in a way that people would look up at
them for still following the traditional rituals, or bad, in a way that people
would be confused with their actions for not changing over time.
The author expressed his bias in the very beginning of his article. This is
done when he called rituals or behaviors of other religions or societies as
strange, comparing it to his own religion and society. Another instance in
which Sosis expressed his bias on the article is when he mentioned of the
secured trust between members of the same religion group. This is often
true. Sosis worded it as if trust is always seen among people of the same
religion and the only exception of the loss of trust among a society is when
non believers believers are within their society.
