Primitive Age Initiations in the Circle of "Eternal" Questions

Abstract

The article addresses controversial questions pertaining to the classification of rites of passage and the taxonomical grounds for separating out the initiation rites; this, on the one hand, distinguishes the age initiations among the multiplicity of life cycle rituals; on the other, makes it possible to reclassify to the same category a variety of different phenomena such as joining a sect, lodge, or fraternity, ordaining a king or knight to an order, as well as baptism, confirmation, and age initiations. The author discusses an array of aspects of initiations: sacrament and access to esoteric knowledge; mechanisms of identifi cation with a new social role; death symbolism; and pain in initiations and various approaches to its interpretation.