Ritual and Its Consequences: An Essay on the Limits of Sincerity 1st Edition

by Adam B. Seligman (Author), Robert P. Weller (Author), Michael J. Puett (Author),

2 customer reviews

ISBN-13: 978-0195336016

ISBN-10: 0195336011

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This pioneering, interdisciplinary work shows how rituals allow us to live in a perennially imperfect world. Drawing on a variety of cultural settings, the authors utilize psychoanalytic and anthropological perspectives to describe how ritual--like play--creates "as if" worlds, rooted in the imaginative capacity of the human mind to create a subjunctive universe. The ability to cross between imagined worlds is central to the human capacity for empathy. Ritual, they claim, defines the boundaries of these imagined worlds, including those of empathy and other realms of human creativity, such as music, architecture and literature.

The authors juxtapose this ritual orientation to a "sincere" search for unity and wholeness. The sincere world sees fragmentation and incoherence as signs of inauthenticity that must be overcome. Our modern world has accepted the sincere viewpoint at the expense of ritual, dismissing ritual as mere convention. In response, the authors show how the conventions of ritual allow us to live together in a broken world. Ritual is work, endless work. But it is among the most important things that we humans do.

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Editorial Reviews

Review

"In this whirligig world we do not know what to do apart from the done thing. Ritual and courtesy are, in contemporary parlance, suspect activities surplus to requirements. Like conformity, ritual attracts the adjectives 'mere,' 'meaningless,' 'external,' 'empty' and 'inauthentic.' This book brilliantly expounds the creative potential and the necessity of ritual, and exposes the destructive possibilities of sincerity. It could be seen as part of a Jewish riposte to Christianity or a Confucian one to the Enlightenment, but Catholics and members of enclosed orders will like it too. Everybody should read it, especially American Protestants and post-Protestant secularists who suffer more than most from the ills of sincerity." --David Martin, Emeritus Professor of Sociology, London School of Economics

"In this whirligig world we do not know what to do apart from the done thing. Ritual and courtesy are, in contemporary parlance, suspect activities surplus to requirements. Like conformity, ritual attracts the adjectives 'mere,' 'meaningless,' 'external,' 'empty' and 'inauthentic.' This book brilliantly expounds the creative potential and the necessity of ritual, and exposes the destructive possibilities of sincerity. It could be seen as part of a Jewish riposte to Christianity or a Confucian one to the Enlightenment, but Catholics and members of enclosed orders will like it too. Everybody should read it, especially American Protestants and post-Protestant secularists who suffer more than most from the ills of sincerity." --David Martin, Emeritus Professor of Sociology, London School of Economics

"An enormously important and paradigm-changing book. The audacity of its scope is refreshing--a turn to grand theory in an academic culture whose trend is to say more and more and less and less."Common Knowledge

"...A new, interesting, and very fruitful approach towards understanding and using the concept of 'ritual.'"--Religion

About the Author

Adam B. Seligman is Professor of Religion and Research Associate at the Institute for Culture, Religion, and World Affairs at Boston University.
Robert P. Weller is Professor and Chair of the Department of Anthropology and Research Associate at the Institute for Culture, Religion, and World Affairs at Boston University.
Michael J. Puett is Professor of Chinese History at Harvard University.
Bennett Simon is Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and Training and Supervising Analyst at Boston Psychoanalytic Society and Institute.

Product details

Paperback: 248 pages
Publisher: Oxford University Press; 1 edition (March 24, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0195336011
ISBN-13: 978-0195336016
Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 0.8 x 6.1 inches
Shipping Weight: 15.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 2 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #533,965 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #274 in Books > Textbooks > Humanities > Religious Studies > Comparative Religion
- #870 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Religious Studies > Sociology
- #1414 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Religious Studies > Comparative Religion

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David lifschitz

giving a whole new prospective to ritual and its meaning ...

January 21, 2015

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giving a whole new prospective to ritual and its meaning. Interesting for both scholars and laymen who try to make sense of our needs for ritual in our daily and religious lives.
The introduction chapter provides a full outline of the theory advanced in the book and is very readable and thought provoking. The other chapters bring examples to the main theories and various angles but are a bit too academic and not very readable for layman.

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The authors' "authenticity" is not the real thing

March 21, 2015

This book has one of the ingredients for building a healthy society: ritual. The four authors, who co-wrote the whole thing, are very serious about the importance of ritual and how an ignorance of rituals tears apart societies. But they operate in a world where ritual is doing battle with another power: "authenticity", or "sincerity". "Ritual and sincerity offer alternative modes of framing social thought, action, and interaction." (p. 104) They believe that this is a struggle in which ritual must come out the victor over our "sincere feelings".

This way of framing things clouds the book badly. It sounds kind of bad, after all, if you participate in rituals like church or peace negotiations for insincere reasons. But in fact the authors' "authenticity" is not authentic, and their "sincerity" is not sincere. Their use of these terms is essentially therapeutic and has no basis in traditional understandings of sincerity, not even among the Calvinists whom they cite as the origin of the irritating current they are trying to suppress.

Ritual is central to the Chinese understanding of civic religion, generally called Confucianism. In Confucianism, though, the sincere and the good are the same thing. Acknowledging your commitments, to your family, your friends, and others around you, is the path to really being honest with yourself; ignoring those commitments and following your whims is dishonesty and the road to evil. The Japanese Confucian Kure Tomofusa has offered the example of a woman who cheated on her husband and divorced him. She declared to the Japanese press, "I just want to live honestly." But marriage, of course, is an eternal vow -- infidelity and divorce break a vow that you have made. There is nothing honest about divorce. It is only through twisted, psychological language that we can even associate the two. This ironic usage of sincerity, authenticity, and honesty is fully modern. Ritual does not have to battle with our honesty; properly, it needs to do battle with Freud.

The authors perpetrate a misunderstanding that is the cause of much distaste for ritual in our society; as a result, the book is not nearly as good as it could be.

16 people found this helpful

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