Synopses & Reviews
Review
"Bloch presents a strong theory of human behaviour based on the discovery of a 'minimum irreducible structure which is common to many ritual and other religious phenomena.'...I appreciate his robust theoretical reason...." Robert Hamerton-Kelly, Method and Theory in the Study of Religion
Synopsis
In this book Maurice Bloch synthesises a radical theory of religion. Rituals in a great many societies deny the transcience of life and of human institutions. Bloch argues that they enact this denial by symbolically sacrificing the participants themselves, so allowing them to share in the immortality of a transcendant entity. Such sacrifices are achieved through acts of symbolic violence, ranging from bodily mutilations to the killing of animals. He develops the theme with reference to rituals of many types and concludes by considering the indirect relation of symbolic and ritual violence to political violence.
Description
Includes bibliographical references (p. 110-113) and index.
Table of Contents
Foreword; Acknowledgements; 1 Introduction; 2 Initiation; 3 Sacrifice; 4 Cosmogony and the State; 5 Marriage; 6 Millenarianism; 7 Myth.