Can we ever know the rituals of the past?

Can we ever know the rituals of the past?

I read some blog recently that talked about the uncertainty of ancient rituals and our unending ignorance of them because we can never know exactly what was done. We will never "really" do Celtic rituals apparently.

While to an extent that is true I think that is both missing the point of ritual and not understand what a ritual actually is and why they are important.

I have quite a deep understanding of ritual practices of many kinds and have studied the processes of cultural ritualization in all kinds of contexts.

In some histories we have the words but not the movements or the physical symbolic context that was/is important to understand the ritual as a whole (The Mabinogion has much text and words, as well as stories and themes that speak to ritual, ritual context and ritual behaviour for example).

In other places we have oral and folk customs still practiced but not always full understood in terms of their ritual symbolism or context (Mari Lwyd).  

While I would suggest that Rhiannon and Mari Lwyd and Pwyll clearly have a connection and a ritualized context we can not easily historically marry them together in the present.

Yet if we understand the process of ritual behaviour we can see themes and modes crystallizing like salt solution. 

Ritual is where new ideas, symbols and structures are formed, born and sometimes die. It is a liminal space. Outside of cultural norms and rules and governed by dream logic and intense emotion people are beasts, and gods, and the dead, and themselves. 

A ritual is transformative. It changes those within it's ethereal confines, acknowledges the changes in the wider world (seasons/wars/peace/death) and gives expression to the sublimated, the repressed and unspoken.

Knowing this I can watch, participate or write a ritual for while some of the local nuances might be missed, I understand the deeper cross cultural symbols and the energy flow enough to understand what the ritual is doing. What the ritual is for. The tools may change. The costumes too. Yet underlying that is a process which I can follow in any language. Symbols are the nuts and bolts of a ritual, and from their placing I can tell what the ritual is doing.

If a ritual is about a change of status for an individual or a group it is a Rite of Passage ritual. It has three clear phases. Separation. Transition. Incorporation. (Interestingly quest stories as well as stories of people being changed into animals or the dead often follow this ritual pattern, as this being classed as animal or dead was and is often the first part of this process.) The length of these stages varies dependent on the focus of the particular Rite of Passage. Separation is the focus of death or leaving rituals, transition for birthing, marriage and initiation and incorporation.

Season rituals are about reconciling differences as a community, touching something deep as a collective and conscious act. This does not mean that many of the same symbols will not be present as they are in the Rites of Passage rituals. They may well even be a ritual within a ritual. Yet the focus is not a personal liminal space. 

I may never "perform" a ritual exactly like on my ancient ancestors did. Yet the thread, though thin is not completely cut. They would watch a ritual of mine, with curious and dark eyes and understand the symbols, the process, maybe even the story. For they had no word for internal psyche, or psychic landscape, or psychological construct. Their language for that place of dream and magick was Anwen. Was in The Dreaming, in this world but not of it. If I didn't say their words, if I didn't dance they way they did, but I gave them my cup filled with deep red liquid they would know what to do. They might drink it, anoint themselves with it, pour it over their bodies and the ground and it would all be RIGHT and correct for the ritual.

Ritual is a social, cultural and magickal tool. If you know how to use it, construct it, de-construct it then you can never get it wrong. While there are no doubts in my mind that our rituals would be different what makes them similar is far far more important.

Bright Blessings xxx