Dec 15, 2017
THE ROLE OF RITUALS IN PROPER ORDER
The term ritual is the term as activities sequence that are involving words, objects as well as the gestures which are performed in a particular place that is sequestered and again they are always performed as to the sequences that are set. The prescription of rituals maybe done by the community traditions which will include a community religion. Confucian elements became “embedded in the whole imperial system, dominating the way of thinking, acting and living for a long period.” (Yao, 181) There do exists characteristics of rituals but they are in no way defined by invariance, performance, rule of governance, formalism and sacral symbol.
All the known societies of human being do have rituals as a common factor that is known to them. The rituals consist of the rites of worship and the religions that are organized sacraments as well as cult, the passage of rites of the human beings, the rites of purification, allegiance as well as the oaths ceremonies that are organized mainly for dedication, funerals as well as marriages, and not leaving behind the atonement. The significant aspect of ritual is sacrifice, There are three Chinese characters for sacrifice: ji (祭), a hand (㐅) holding a piece of meat (⺥) offering it to the spirits or on a sacred altar si (示), a combination of a sacred altar and a human embryo; and xiang (享). The most important thing in our life is not the knowledge that you learned from the books, and how much you earned from your career, it is laying a solid foundation for our self-cultivation as a moral person. Confucian thoughts have always been influenced the right and proper way to shape people as a role of self-cultivation.
Many of the performed activities that are performed in a community ostensibly for the purposes that are concreate are always carrying themselves with actions that are symbolic to the community that are prescribed by the set rules or the traditions of that community and with this nature it is thus considered ritualistic. In Yao’s points, “Confucianism transformed the religions practice prevailing in the Shang and Zhou times and helped establish a systematic doctrine that was used as the guidelines for official and private religions practice.” (190) It is even much important to name that also the most common actions that we go through in our day to day activity which include the shaking of the hand while greeting people and also the saying of the word hello may at some point be considered to be a ritual for each community has its own way of doing it with its meaning.
The term ritual may at some point be defined in psychology as a behavior that is repetitive and is of a technical in sense that is employed into use systematically by someone in order to prevent or rather cut off anxiety that may befall.
It is believed that rituals could be used as a communicating tool as it is unusual and the communication done through rituals always do use vocabulary that is special, restricted and as well the number of illustrations that is permissible to use is always small and the grammar as well is always restrictive. Even more, the spiritual powers of communication is extends from rituals to propriety and moral rules for thinking, feeling and acting. (Yao, 190) With this in mind then it is clear that the utterance of the rituals when it is used a tool of communication is always and very predictable.
While trying to bring into light the position of the rituals to the stories of torah, I would share the approach given by rabbi Moshe ben nahman who was as well known as ramban within the holy place. During the explanation start of ramban while in terumah, he suggests that the main point of the place of worship was to be a modernization know-how in particular that was to be dramatic and that the people of Jewish had gone through shortly while on Mount Sinai. When the presence of God was experienced directly by the entire nation, and the moment the entire nation heard the word of God, it became the supreme moment for Jewish as well as human history.
The instruction given to Moshe to offer information to the Jews to put up a cabinet for it was to be employed into usage when the Jewish were at the desert. It would foreshadow the temple which was permanently be built in Israel.
It was made clear to them that the temple was not the sacrifice being offered or a place for prayers reciting by the nahmanides, its raison d’etre. He rather says that it is a continuation that is direct of the narrative of exodus.
The undisclosed of the cabinet is that the glory that is great and was believed to be on the Mount Sinai in a hidden manner rests upon the tabernacle. By that then the glory of God as well rested on the mountain. It is written that the glory of God has been shown to us by Him and also God has shown to his people His greatness and this is in relation to the tabernacle for it is believed that the tabernacle was filled by the glory of God. According to Yao’s perspective, “which is a sense of eternity and transcendence is slight through the pursuit of secular leaning and personal discipline.” (189) Discipline is systematic instruction for training a person to practice. A virtuous behavior or a negative behavior requires training too, as the old phrase says that age of three decides on the age of eighty. It is saying that every little boy should be taught as the role of ritual, if not, the more problems will be discovered in the future.
In accordance to the ramban, the Jerusalem temple was built so as to give the opportunity of exercising to the people over and over the history defining moments that is of the Jewish and that is the revelation of the Sinai. This act and belief was achieved only through the rituals that was performed; the vessels, priests, physical experience of sanctuary as well as the sacrifices made. The presence of God was felt in all coming together as to create an experience that was ultimate to the devotee also called the experience in Sinai. The means ae the ritual objects that are seen and the acts as well and one could important moment from them in our consciousness.
To my thinking, there is something that is important that is talked about is a gap or a crack in line with the life we live. This is between a life that is remembered, imagined or an anticipated reality that we live in. the people of Jewish at Sinai mountain had to go through a journey that is heroic and not forgettable and also had experience that was transcendent. By any definition of whatever that came next would be considered to be anti-climactic.
What followed the period of heroism of the Jewish from the genesis and migration that is the torah, we now make a step to face whatever question that all of us have to act upon in the lives we live. It states on how somebody can be in a position to live a life that is not associated with heroism at any point, life that is not connected to fantastic events which can be in a position to come to pass an individual or nation at large. This assures us that there is indeed an existence of a gap that is in our lives.
A small number of man are involved in living a powerfully life of activities that are heroic and have the meaning that is ultimate fully and supreme. “Shryock believed that the cult of Confucius was a hero worship deliberately adopted by the state at the insistence of a social group, the scholars, who acknowledged the leadership of the sage.” (Yao, 207) We should be in search of a life that is in line with such sentiments and acquire such kind of experience in our lives. As well as talking about the hero in family, society and family are linked between each other, why? Because people are always lack of self-control, after working for a long day, there are some negative emotions and moods would come up if your children do listen to you after you came back home, the reason is that you think you are the most powerful character
in your family as a hero – indicates earning money. If we have this thinking in our mind, it is demonstrating that we lack of familial responsibility. Like we learn in class of social responsibility, people do not like to sale, they love to buy. People love to be serviced, not to service somebody, it is inevitable. Use this term to think about, the responsibility of self-cultivation is applying any kind of situations, no matter where we go, this is going to change people with gratefulness.
We try to close the existing gap in the laws of parahsat mishpatim. This is as well in line with going with the disagreement. The torah gives the chance in recreate. This is done by the actions that we depict, some of the exit events that are considered to be brave. That if we were redeemed form Egypt by the God, we are hence being challenged by the Jewish laws to as well be redeemers. The law furthermore acts as a stepping stone by showing us on how to be the redeemers. It is clear that God lifted up the Jewish slaves who were highly oppressed, the law of the Jewish touching the charity part entails us to be and copy the behavior and acts that God performed and it also shows us the way we can emulate the acts. Therefore, we are ordered by the law that we should have some changes in our lives and move from being just people who read someone else story and be the brave men in the real life drama that we face every day where we can feel the dramatic story of émigré as well as restoration of our lives simply through behaving within the rules that are set by mishpatim that concerns moral and ethics in life.
Another offer is given to us by parashat terumah alternatively. This is a way that is so different from what we have seen already. It is urging us in making the life that we live so brave by rituals. The power of reclamation was felt by the Israelites on first hand right from Egypt. This is seen where we experience the splitting of the red sea that was done for them. Another instance of redemption occurs to the Israelites at Sinai Mountain where they received the torah. It is thus recommended that we are in a position to break through so many behaviors through rites the environment of the everyday life we tend to live in a heroic manor that is low and thus feel for ourselves these kinds of events that make it brave. It can happen if successfully we can give ourselves over to the set ritual strategies and also give ourselves hope and faith that the ritual will perform on us we will with no doubt experience the change that the Israelites had when they were moving.
At the Seder, on the Passover, it is clear that one can convert himself into being as the person who was transferred from Egypt. On reading regarding Purim that is on Esther, and not forgetting the rituals celebrations, the authenticity that we have may be exceeded in a way that the experience that the Jewish with Persia had can be shared as well with us. We came to understand that Persia in his life underwent through a terrible danger, and then it came the miracle that offered salvation to him. We are advised by the rabbis that we can through break that is ritualized, performing acts of prayers well as feasting, have the messianic era. These as well as other sacraments gives us a golden opportunity in living a period that is daring, and a moment that is shaped out otherwise would be considered to be history of a stuff that is dry. We can create existence as well as experiences that are not otherwise accessible to us the living but for which is yearned by the soul only through rituals.
In the Jewish world, we are told that we can separate, the living, the way and approaches by which we are living. There exists two approaches that we can emulate for achieving perfection within the routine that we are using. One comes by through our ways of decency dongs, reclamation, fairness and not leaving behind assistance that we can offer to others, we also have to seek to duplicate the work of God that is in miracles in exodus. The other way that we may live is one where by we should seek to present superior, valiant, and miraculous, through doings of procedural acts that we perform. We are encouraged that both the paths are always there for us to follow and take by employing the laws of mishpatim and thereafter soon after miracles of God that are evident in exodus book the terumah rituals.
In conclusion, being a vitreous role of ritual, prescribed by the community, family, and religions. Based on that people always characterized by traditionalism, rule of governance and others. Time is precious and most important in life, because everyone could not change things after it long gone. When we are still young, what I learned from Confucian is that at age between 20 to 30 should “learn” something instead of “gain” something. At age between 30 to 40 should use our knowledges and “burn” something instead of doing something with driftlessness. At age between 40 to 50 should start to “earn” something, through these processes are only illustrated a word called “mettle”.
Last but not least, in 21st century, Confucian still have great impacted on the society, the power of confucian thought is horizontal and influent many people. The most power thing is be generous to do, to teach, to learn, to think, to change our life as wonderful and peaceful in our family, society, community, etc… Being a virtuous role of ritual in proper order is not a class, not a speech, not a book for as to learn, it is a life lesson, it is a long processes that we pursue to the end of our life.