Tradition 101: Seminar 1, Footnote 1(b)

"Once this false opposition (between tradition and modernity) is set aside and the problem of tradition ceases to be defined as a resistance to modernity, tradition becomes again a means of raising essential questions about the ways in which we pass on the life of cultures - questions that necessarily include issues of authority  as well as invention, practice as well as interpretation." Mark Salber Phillips, What is tradition when it is not 'invented'? A historiographical introduction.  In Questions of Tradition, edited by MS Phillips and G Schochet.

Tradition 101: Seminar 1, Footnote i(a)



Lamb that died for tradition



"(W)e may view tradition as the way society formulates and deals with the basic problems of human existence. In other words, it is the way society comes to terms with the insoluble problem of life and death, including such life and death matters as food and water in a world of scarcity. In this respect, of course it is not different from modernity. Since the fundamental problem of life and death is truly insoluble, it has to be attacked, formulated, and dealt with each time anew under a different aspect. Tradition therefore is and has to be bound up with the ever-shifting present. Hence the irritating flexibility and fluidity of tradition." Heerstemann, J.C. The inner conflict of tradition: essays in Indian ritual, kinship and society.