Religion and Ritual are Useless Words

A rant on various related topics:

The word "religion" doesn't meant much. The OED says the English word "religion" is of doubtful etymology but appears to come from the word for being bound (or even imprisoned, in some early usages). The modern Hebrew word for religion - "דת" - originally means law or practice. Nothing in antiquity - when, incidentally, Christianity, Judaism, and countless other "religions" grew up - was called "religion." There was no category into which you could put all the building blocks of religion, nor could this non-category exclude other elements of life. I don't know whether it was a medieval or modern creation, but the concept of "religion" doesn't draw much of a clear circle around any given set of... well, anything.

Nor, for that matter, does "ritual", another late-comer. And even if it could draw a neat circle around a certain set of practices, does a circle that includes brushing one's teeth right alongside child sacrifice really mean that much? Is it useful?

Of course, Departments of Religion at universities do make sense. One day, in fact, I would be happy to be hired by one. But that's pragmatic. Many academic disciplines are like that. We need some way of organizing subjects. And the colloquial use of the words religion and ritual is useful as well - it's not quite accurate but it's way quicker than spelling out all the details of what exactly we mean when that's not even relevant (or particularly plausible in a given setting).

What's important to me is that we don't actually think of all those things that make up "religion" (or a given religion) and "ritual" (or a given ritual) and their meanings as the meaning of every other religion and ritual. What is so glorious about embracing religion is that it doesn't - and could not possibly - mean just one thing or work in just one way.

And practices should be distinguished from one another - and prioritized over one another - based not on whether they are "religious" or "ritual," but on their individual content, and the other practices to which they're most related. (I feel like I'm railing against linguistic racism.)

There's a great line from the Simpsons in the episode where Lisa and Ralph date. Ralph is walking her home and doesn't know what to say to make conversation, so he says, "So, do you like... stuff?" When someone says "ritual is great" or "ritual is terrible" or I like or don't like ritual, they might as well be saying "stuff is great," or "stuff is terrible," or I like or don't like stuff. Almost everything can be called a ritual. So it's not a category.

People who describe religion or ritual as such are a priori incorrect in their descriptions.

And it's also why I think it makes perfect sense to think some rituals are great, and other rituals are stupid, and others are neither here nor there. "Picking and choosing" (so often criticized) is actually what discerning, thoughtful, good people do. There is no such thing as religion whole cloth, or ritual whole cloth.

Unless of course you're chareidi, and you think all the mitzvot came directly from God's mouth to the Talmud and medieval responsa and codes and into your chareidi rabbi's mouth, and should not be distinguished or measured or thought about. Sure, in that case, it makes perfect sense to talk about Jewish ritual as all one thing. But then you have to be chareidi, so I decline.