Rock painting of the women's Eland dance in celebration of a girl's first initiation, Fulton's Rock, Drackerberg
Monkey carved in wood representing the Drummer who announces the opening of the initiation ceremony, Zaire
The
innumerable variety of rituals associated with initiation permit one to
experience in an orderly manner the changing states of an individual. Some
rites involve physical pain and separation and in others an adolescent may
need to undergo a severe test of endurance, courage, perseverance and
obedience. In Africa and in the Indian tradition, the symbolic cutting of
flesh in the rite of circumcision, or undergoing physical pain, is
symbolic of getting rid of the period of childhood or ‘dying’ to
childhood and being reborn to assume responsibility of adulthood.
Initiation may also signal an official entry into the community life and
sharing an unconscious bond, and the interdependence of the individual
with the collective. In some rituals the neophyte is asked to stare at a
mirror until the face of the ancestor appears and merges with his own.
Since the individual is regarded as a microcosm, whatever is enacted by
him during ritual inevitably transforms the collective social groups.
Navjot a boy being initiated into the Parsi faith
An
adolescent girl, Madhya Pradesh
Old
age represents the apex of human wisdom. In traditional cultures, the wise
elders are fully integrated into the life of the community. Just as a
ripened fruit falls from a tree to seed again, so the wise elders sow the
seed of knowledge in the young with their distilled wisdom.
I am the Essence of life which is old age.
A Navajo Blessing
