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A blood ritual is any ritual that involves the intentional release of blood.
| This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page . (Learn how and when to remove these messages)
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A blood ritual is any ritual that involves the intentional release of blood.
Some blood rituals involve two or more parties cutting themselves or each other followed by the consumption of blood. The participants may regard the release or consumption of blood as producing energy useful as a sexual, healing, or mental stimulus.[ citation needed ] In other cases, blood is a primary component as the sacrifice, or material component for a spell. Blood rituals are practiced by various groups of people, including those with religious or political affiliations. Some of the rituals involving blood have been practiced for many centuries, and are still being practiced in the 21st century (Baker 1, Copeman 2, Malik 2).
Blood rituals often involve a symbolic death and rebirth, as literal bodily birth involves bleeding. Blood is typically seen as very powerful, and sometimes as unclean. Blood sacrifice is sometimes considered by the practitioners of prayer, ritual magic, and spell casting to intensify the power of such activities.[ citation needed ]
The Aztecs participated in blood rituals around 500 years ago (Pendragon 1). The blood in the rituals has a symbolic meaning, depending on the group and ritual being performed. Around 1376 to 1521 AD, Aztecs used blood and sacrifice frequently as an offering to the Sun God (Pendragon 2). The Aztecs saw death as part of life, just like birth (Pendragon 2). They believed the gods sacrificed their own blood to create the universe, so in turn, the Aztecs offered blood to the Gods as a sort of reciprocal exchange and gift for their creations (Pendragon 2). Furthermore, the supply of ritual blood was believed to maintain plentiful fertile crops and aid in the continuation of the Aztec world. The author Jasmyne Pendragon, who has a bachelor of archaeology, stated in her Article The Purpose of Aztec Blood Rituals Part 1, that “The Aztecs lifestyles were governed by a need to supply fresh-blooded sacrificial victims to the sun god who required the hearts of men to give life to the world and assist the souls of dead warriors to the Aztecs version of heaven” (2). The rituals maintained a relationship between Aztecs and their gods (Pendragon 2). The Aztecs believed the gods would provide plentiful crops and healthy long lives as long as blood was ritually given (Pendragon 2). If blood was not sacrificed to the gods, the humans believed they would be punished and endure excessive pain “more violent than any man could ever do” (Pendragon 3).
Some Indians practice a political ritual voluntarily where the people donate blood as a way to remember politicians who have died (Copeman 126). The blood donation is literally a donation to people who need transfusions (Copeman 132). The participants donate at donation camps during the birthday or the anniversary of the politician's death (129). Jacob Copeman, a lecturer in social anthropology at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, states in his article “Blood Will Have Blood: A Study in Indian Political Ritual,” that Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi are the two politicians who are mainly “remembered” during the blood donations (131). These two politicians were assassinated and seen as dying for India, or important individuals who “…shed their blood for the nation” (Copeman 131). According to Copeman, in a speech Indira Gandhi made in 1984, she “…strikingly associated her blood with the health of the nation. Her blood would continue to nurture the nation even after her death…” (132). The reason behind the donation is to keep life going or to give the individuals receiving the blood more time to live (Copeman 130). The reason why the politicians are involved with this is because the donors are making a connection with the dead, symbolizing the blood being donated to the blood of the politician being honored (Copeman 131). This is important because even though these people died, they are still helping preserve life, by the people of India donating blood in their honor. (Copeman 135).
Blood rituals play a crucial role in the Bible, often symbolizing purification and the establishment of sacred covenants. One prominent example is found in Exodus 24:3-8, which describes a covenant ceremony between God and the Israelites at Mount Sinai. The blood ritual described in this passage is a key example of the use and significance of blood in biblical tradition. The ritual involves the sacrifice of animals and the division of their blood into two halves, with one half sprinkled on the altar, representing God, and the other half sprinkled on the people. [1]
Another example of a biblical blood ritual is found in John 6:54-57, in which John the Apostle recited the words of Jesus, highlighting the importance of the Eucharist for the sake of gaining eternal life. In this recitation, he explains that in order to gain everlasting life, his followers must eat his flesh and drink his blood. This was expanded upon in 1 Corinthians 10:16, in which the cup of blessing and bread are described as representations of the blood and body of Christ. [2]
The Shi’ite Muslims practiced a ritual called Matam in 2002 in Britain (Malik 2).
Body piercing can also be part of a blood ritual, as it can result in the release of blood. Piercing has been practiced in a number of indigenous cultures throughout the world, usually as a symbolic rite of passage, a symbolic death and rebirth, an initiation, or for reasons of magical protection.[ citation needed ]
A common blood ritual is the blood brother ritual, which began in ancient Europe and Asia. Two or more people, typically male, intermingle their blood in some way. This symbolically brings the participants together into one family. This can be an unsafe practice where blood-borne pathogens are concerned; the use of safe, sterilized equipment such as a lancet can mitigate this problem.[ citation needed ]
The Native American Sun Dance is usually accompanied by blood sacrifice.[ citation needed ]
The Book ofLeviticus is the third book of the Torah and of the Old Testament, also known as the Third Book of Moses. Many hypotheses presented by scholars as to its origins agree that it developed over a long period of time, reaching its present form during the Persian Period, from 538 to 332 BC, although this is disputed.
Child sacrifice is the ritualistic killing of children in order to please or appease a deity, supernatural beings, or sacred social order, tribal, group or national loyalties in order to achieve a desired result. As such, it is a form of human sacrifice. Child sacrifice is thought to be an extreme extension of the idea that the more important the object of sacrifice, the more devout the person rendering it.
Sacrifice is the offering of material possessions or the lives of animals or humans to a deity as an act of propitiation or worship. Evidence of ritual animal sacrifice has been seen at least since ancient Hebrews and Greeks, and possibly existed before that. Evidence of ritual human sacrifice can also be found back to at least pre-Columbian civilizations of Mesoamerica as well as in European civilizations. Varieties of ritual non-human sacrifices are practiced by numerous religions today.
Human sacrifice is the act of killing one or more humans as part of a ritual, which is usually intended to please or appease gods, a human ruler, public or jurisdictional demands for justice by capital punishment, an authoritative/priestly figure, spirits of dead ancestors or as a retainer sacrifice, wherein a monarch's servants are killed in order for them to continue to serve their master in the next life. Closely related practices found in some tribal societies are cannibalism and headhunting. Human sacrifice is also known as ritual murder.
Tezcatlipoca Classical Nahuatl: Tēzcatlipōca ) or Tezcatl Ipoca was a central deity in Aztec religion. He is associated with a variety of concepts, including the night sky, hurricanes, obsidian, and conflict. He was considered one of the four sons of Ometecuhtli and Omecihuatl, the primordial dual deity. His main festival was Toxcatl, which, like most religious festivals of Aztec culture, involved human sacrifice.
Huitzilopochtli is the solar and war deity of sacrifice in Aztec religion. He was also the patron god of the Aztecs and their capital city, Tenochtitlan. He wielded Xiuhcoatl, the fire serpent, as a weapon, thus also associating Huitzilopochtli with fire.
A flower war or flowery war was a ritual war fought intermittently between the Aztec Triple Alliance and its enemies on and off for many years in the vicinity and the regions around the ancient and vital city of Tenochtitlan, probably ending with the arrival of the Spaniards in 1519. Enemies included the city-states of Tlaxcala, Huejotzingo, and Cholula in the Tlaxcala-Pueblan Valley in central Mexico. In these wars, participants would fight according to a set of conventions.
A libation is a ritual pouring of a liquid as an offering to a deity or spirit, or in memory of the dead. It was common in many religions of antiquity and continues to be offered in cultures today.
In creation myths, the term "Five Suns" refers to the belief of certain Nahua cultures and Aztec peoples that the world has gone through five distinct cycles of creation and destruction, with the current era being the fifth. It is primarily derived from a combination of myths, cosmologies, and eschatological beliefs that were originally held by pre-Columbian peoples in the Mesoamerican region, including central Mexico, and it is part of a larger mythology of Fifth World or Fifth Sun beliefs.
The Holy of Holies is a term in the Hebrew Bible that refers to the inner sanctuary of the Tabernacle, where the Shekhinah appeared. According to Hebrew tradition, the area was defined by four pillars that held up the veil of the covering, under which the Ark of the Covenant was held above the floor. According to the Hebrew Bible, the Ark contained the Ten Commandments, which were given by God to Moses on Mount Sinai. The first Temple in Jerusalem, called Solomon's Temple, was said to have been built by King Solomon to keep the Ark.
The Priestly source is perhaps the most widely recognized of the sources underlying the Torah, both stylistically and theologically distinct from other material in it. It is considered by most scholars as the latest of all sources, and “meant to be a kind of redactional layer to hold the entirety of the Pentateuch together,” It includes a set of claims that are contradicted by non-Priestly passages and therefore uniquely characteristic: no sacrifice before the institution is ordained by Yahweh (God) at Sinai, the exalted status of Aaron and the priesthood, and the use of the divine title El Shaddai before God reveals his name to Moses, to name a few.
The Hebrew Bible makes reference to a number of covenants with God (YHWH). These include the Noahic Covenant set out in Genesis 9, which is decreed between God and all living creatures, as well as a number of more specific covenants with Abraham, the whole Israelite people, the Israelite priesthood, and the Davidic lineage of kings. In form and terminology, these covenants echo the kinds of treaty agreements existing in the surrounding ancient world.
Zipporah at the Inn is the name given to an episode alluded to in three verses in the 4th chapter of the Book of Exodus. The much-debated passage is one of the more perplexing conundrums of the Torah due to ambiguous references through pronouns and phrases with unclear designations. Various translations of the Bible have sought to make the section clearer through a restructuring of the sentences with a more indirect, yet more straightforward, interpretation.
Bloodletting was the ritualized practice of self-cutting or piercing of an individual's body that served a number of ideological and cultural functions within ancient Mesoamerican societies, in particular the Maya. When performed by ruling elites, the act of bloodletting was crucial to the maintenance of sociocultural and political structure. Bound within the Mesoamerican belief systems, bloodletting was used as a tool to legitimize the ruling lineage's socio-political position and, when enacted, was important to the perceived well-being of a given society or settlement.
The Aztec religion is a polytheistic and monistic pantheism in which the Nahua concept of teotl was construed as the supreme god Ometeotl, as well as a diverse pantheon of lesser gods and manifestations of nature. The popular religion tended to embrace the mythological and polytheistic aspects, and the Aztec Empire's state religion sponsored both the monism of the upper classes and the popular heterodoxies.
Human sacrifice was common in many parts of Mesoamerica, so the rite was nothing new to the Aztecs when they arrived at the Valley of Mexico, nor was it something unique to pre-Columbian Mexico. Other Mesoamerican cultures, such as the Purépechas and Toltecs, and the Maya performed sacrifices as well and from archaeological evidence, it probably existed since the time of the Olmecs, and perhaps even throughout the early farming cultures of the region. However, the extent of human sacrifice is unknown among several Mesoamerican civilizations. What distinguished Aztec practice from Maya human sacrifice was the way in which it was embedded in everyday life. These cultures also notably sacrificed elements of their own population to the gods.
The Passover sacrifice, also known as the Paschal lamb or the Passover lamb, is the sacrifice that the Torah mandates the Israelites to ritually slaughter on the evening of Passover, and eat lamb on the first night of the holiday with bitter herbs and matzo. According to the Torah, it was first offered on the night of the Exodus from Egypt. Although practiced by Jews in ancient times, the sacrifice is today not performed by the vast majority of Rabbinic Jews, but part of Beta Israel, Karaite and Samaritan observance.
In the Bible, a scapegoat is one of a pair of kid goats that is released into the wilderness, taking with it all sins and impurities, while the other is sacrificed. The concept first appears in the Book of Leviticus, in which a goat is designated to be cast into the desert to carry away the sins of the community.
Then Aaron shall lay both his hands on the head of the live goat, and confess over it all the iniquities of the people of Israel, and all their transgressions, all their sins, putting them on the head of the goat, and sending it away into the wilderness by means of someone designated for the task. The goat shall bear on itself all their iniquities to a barren region; and the goat shall be set free in the wilderness.
Mesoamerican religion is a group of indigenous religions of Mesoamerica that were prevalent in the pre-Columbian era. Two of the most widely known examples of Mesoamerican religion are the Aztec religion and the Mayan religion.
Netotiliztli, often known as the dance of celebration and worship, was a traditional dance practiced by the Mexica people. As a pre-Hispanic tradition, it was a spiritual dance, deeply associated with the worship of Aztec gods. Each movement had a connection to the four elements and to the four cardinal points.