Tradition: Difference between revisions

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Ways to celebrate holidays may be passed down as traditions, as in this Polish Christmas meal and decorations

Tradition includes a number of related ideas:

Beliefs or customs taught by one generation to the next, often orally. For example, we can speak of the tradition of sending birth announcements, and family traditions at Christmas.
Beliefs, customs and practices maintained by social interaction, such as saying "thank you", sending birth announcements, greeting cards, etc.
Beliefs, customs and practices maintained by societies and governments, such as Federal holidays in the United States.
Beliefs, customs and practices maintained by religious denominations and church bodies that share history, customs, culture, and, to some extent, body of teachings. For example, one can speak of Islam's Sufi tradition or Christianity's Lutheran tradition.
Beliefs, customs and practices that are Prehistoric or have lost/arcane origins, such as trade, the teaching of language and education in general.

Traditions serve to preserve a wide range of culturally significant ideas, specific practices and the various methods used by distinct cultures. The word tradition comes from the Latin traditionem which is the accusative case of traditio which means "handing over, passing on".

Traditions and stylings of the mannerism

Olin Levi Warner, *Tradition* (1895). Bronze tympanum over the main entrance, Library of Congress Thomas Jefferson Building, Washington, D.C.

A tradition is a practice, custom, or story that is memorized and passed down from generation to generation, originally without the need for a writing system. Tools to aid this process include poetic devices such as rhyme and alliteration. The stories thus preserved are also referred to as tradition, or as part of an oral tradition.^{[original research?]}

Traditions are often presumed to be ancient, unalterable, and deeply important, though they may sometimes be much less "natural" than is presumed. Some traditions were deliberately invented for one reason or another, often to highlight or enhance the importance of a certain institution. Traditions may also be adapted to suit the needs of the day, and the changes can become accepted as a part of the ancient tradition.^[1].

Some examples include "the invention of tradition" in Africa and other colonial holdings by the occupying forces. Requiring legitimacy, the colonial power would often invent a "tradition" which they could use to legitimize their own position. For example, a certain succession to a chiefdom might be recognized by a colonial power as traditional in order to favour their own candidates for the job. Often these inventions were based in some form of tradition, but were exaggerated, distorted, or biased toward a particular interpretation.^[1]

Traditionalism

In the Roman Catholic Church, traditionalism is the doctrine that Sacred Tradition holds equal authority to Holy Scripture. In the Orthodox Church, scripture is considered to be the core constituent of a larger revelation. These views are often condemned as heretical by Protestant churches, who hold the Bible to be the only valid authority. Inspired by the Protestant rejection of traditionalism, some in the so called "Age of Enlightenment" began to question even the authority of the Bible itself. The parentage of liberalism stems from this such attack on accepted notions of European traditional institutions, religious belligerence, state interference and aristocratic privilege.

Traditionalist Catholic refers to those, such as Archbishop Lefebvre, who want the worship and practices of the church to be as they were before the Second Vatican Council (1962–65).

"Radical Traditionalism" refers to a worldview that stresses a return to traditional values of hard work, craftsmanship, local culture, tribal or clan orientation, and non-material values in response to a perceived excess of materialism, consumerism, technology, and societal homogeneity. Most Radical Traditionalists choose this term for themselves to stress their reaction to 'modern' society, as well as an equal disdain for more 'recent' forms of traditionalism based on Judeo-Christian and early-Industrial Age values. It is often allied with branches of Paganism that stress a return to old cultural values that predated the existence of the state system.

In Islam, traditionalism is the orthodox form, which places importance on traditional forms of learning and acknowledges different traditional schools of thought.

Archaeology

In archaeology, the term tradition is a set of cultures or industries which appear to develop on from one another over a period of time. The term is especially common in the study of American archaeology.

References

^ ^a ^b E. J. Hobsbawm and Terence Ringer, eds., "The Invention of Tradition", p5. Cambridge University Press, 1983. ISBN 0521437733

Sowell, T (1980) Knowledge and Decisions Basic Books. ISBN 0-465-003738-0
Polanyi, M (1964) Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy ISBN 0-226-67288-3
Klein, Ernest, Dr., A comprehensive etymological dictionary of the English language: Dealing with the origin of words and their sense development thus illustrating the history and civilization of culture, Elsevier, Oxford, 7th ed., 2000

External links

cafetraditions.com, an online community for cataloging, creating and exchanging traditions

[invention-1] E. J. Hobsbawm and Terence Ringer, eds., "The Invention of Tradition", p5. Cambridge University Press, 1983. ISBN 0521437733

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