For an atheist, any religious rites, even the most harmless ones, may seem to be meaningless. The diligent thought or prayer of a believer who asks the Creator to change everything for the better is absurd for an atheist, since, in his opinion, nothing will change if you sit in one place.
But a humble believer finds meaning in every religious action, clearly following the "guidelines from above." At the same time, some ceremonies and rituals make everyone shudder except for the person participating in them. This is called the power of faith. We present you the 10 most terrifying religious ceremonies. Faint of heart, please leave.
The most shocking religious rites of the world:
1
Cybele and Self-Cluster
The Great Mother of the Gods or Cybele is a Phrygian deity (a region in the territory of modern Turkey), revered in the Middle East, in Ancient Greece and Rome. Drawings and sculptures were often given to Cybel surrounded by lions and with a tambourine in his hands. It was believed that she was the mother of all living things on earth, including gods, people, and even animals. Archaeologists have found images similar to the Great Mother of the gods, whose age was about 8 thousand years.
When the cult of Cybele reached Ancient Greece and Rome, worship of the goddess was somewhat different from religious rites associated with other gods. The priests of Cybele, called the Gauls, were eunuchs. At the annual festival, which took place in March and was called "Blood Day," the priests introduced themselves into a trance, inflicting multiple wounds, after which they independently scattered.
Small clamps were used to stop bleeding after castration. As soon as the priest lost his genitals, he put on a woman’s dress, bracelets, earrings and applied makeup. To some authors in ancient Rome, this might have seemed unmanly, but for the sake of Cybele, the great mother of the gods, you could do anything.
2
Righteous mortification
For many Christians, the body is a prison that prevents them from becoming saints. It is difficult to focus on fellowship with God when you are distracted by worldly affairs and flesh. As the apostle Paul wrote to the Romans: “If you live according to the flesh, you will die, and if you put the body to death in the spirit, you will live.” Mortification in the simplest sense is a deliverance from worldly concerns. For example, fasting is one type of deliverance. But there are those who have gone much further in their “limitations”.
❗️ TheBiggest.ru editorial team in no way shares such beliefs and does not advise you to take them to heart.
Saint Gemma Galgani practiced mortification in order to experience the suffering of Jesus. Initially, she tightly bound herself with a rope with multiple nodes. When the nodes began to dig into the skin, leaving wounds, the priest forbade Gemma to torture himself in this way. Then she began to scourge herself with whips. Later, the killing ceremony was complicated - the girl was tied with a rope with nails.
In an attempt to show an aversion to worldly life, many saints went to extremes. Some of the men who stood at the origins of the Christian church lived in the desert and, in all weathers, wore goat hair, which was very irritating to the skin.
Others considered water a devil’s tool, encouraging people to thirst in the sun. The following lunatics stood motionless until their feet began to rot. Hands extended to the sky until they faded. For nothing, killing means "becoming like a dead man."
By the way, on our site thebiggest.ru there is a fascinating article about the most terrible traditions and rituals in the world.
3
Aztec sacrifice
In some religions, in order to approach the gods, it is not necessary to sacrifice your body or life. To do this, just sacrifice someone else. And given the number of sacrifices performed by the Aztecs, one would think that they have accumulated huge debts to the gods.
Almost all the ancient tribes that inhabited the territory of North and South America committed ritual killings, but they did not come close to the scale of the Aztecs.
At the Tlakashipeualistic festival and other religious festivals, hundreds and even thousands of people were put to death in rituals designed to pacify the gods. Since the gods were too overworked when creating people and the universe, they had to receive a generous reward for their efforts, which was presented in the form of hundreds of human hearts and other parts of the body. Even the Sun refused to rise in the morning without receiving a human sacrifice.
Most often, the Aztecs captured during numerous battles acted as ritual victims. This made practical sense, since during the sacrifices a huge number of enemy soldiers were destroyed, which weakened the enemy and made him afraid even of the thought of attacking a great nation. Bloody rivers descending from the Aztec altars impressed all the inhabitants of the region.
4
Vattienti's Bloody Rite
As in many Italian cities, there are many Christians on the streets of Nocera Terinese who demonstrate their faith on Good Friday. The difference is that the fanatics in Nocher Terines demonstrate faith in an amazingly bloody way.
While the streets of the city carry a statue of the Virgin Mary and the crucified Jesus, young people in the square are preparing for their own procession. They wash their feet in warm water with the addition of rosemary, so that the limbs get blood before they release it.
Using glass fragments attached to a cork (something similar to our “rose”), young people beat themselves in the legs to make bloody wounds. At the other end of their weapon, they leave bloody marks throughout the procession. Near each bleeding fanatic there is a boy in a red toga. He is tied to a man by a rope and carries a red cross, which should symbolize the connection between the sufferings of Christ and man.
Despite numerous attempts to ban the rite, it is still being held today. At the end of the ritual, the wounds are washed with the same water with rosemary to relieve inflammation and relieve pain. No one knows where this tradition is rooted, but apparently, it will not stop in the near future.
5
Sokushimbutsu
The process of mummification is known in many cultures, but the Japanese surpassed everyone, creating mummies from living people. No, it was not forced mummification, since Buddhist monks voluntarily went to turn their bodies into mummies. The ceremony is known as sokushimbutsu ("Buddha in this body"), and today it has been possible to find 24 mummies of monks who have overcome the path to immortality.
The founder of the Shingon school, the monk Kukai, is considered the ancestor of the rite. It is believed that he did not die, but went into his tomb for meditation, intending to return to people later. However, not all attempts to copy Kukai were successful. Most of the monks hiding in the tombs simply rotted. To create a mummy, a complex process was developed, divided into three stages, each of which lasted 1 thousand days.
The first stage consisted of the strictest diet, which was to remove all the fat from the bodies of the monks. They refused grain, eating nuts in order to “dry” their body. Later, the monks switched to salted water to reduce the amount of fluid in the body. At the second stage, their diet consisted of pine roots and bark, as well as a small amount of poison extracted from the varnish tree. The poison slowly killed the monk, preserving his body.
At the last stage, the future mummy was lowered into a pre-prepared tomb, covered with coal, for meditation. Inside was a breathing tube and a small bell. The daily ringing of the bell alerted those present that the monk was still alive. After the cessation of ringing, the air supply pipe was removed. After three years, the grave was opened, and if the mummification process was successful, the body of the monk was placed in the temple.
It is not known exactly how many mummies were made in this way, however, historians suggest that most of the mummies were unsuccessful, and the bodies of the monks indulged in reburial without any noise.
6
Kawadi
At the Taipusam Hindu festival, held in Malaysia, India and other countries where Tamils live, you can see many religious rituals from prayers and songs to the Kawadi dance, during which sharp objects pierce your flesh.
The festival is held in honor of the deity of Murugan, and it is visited by hundreds of thousands of believers throughout the region. Before the main event of the evening, in a silver chariot, an image of Murugan is carried through the streets of the cities to the temple, where celebrations will be held.
One way to show your devotion to Murugan (by the way, the god of war) is to join the procession, carrying milk as an offering. But many consider such an offering insufficient, preferring an extreme form of worship. This worship includes wearing wooden frames decorated with various objects.
Frames or kavadi are attached to human skin using hooks. Other participants in the procession attach the other end of the hooks to the carts and pull with their own skin all the way to the temple.
The next form of reverence is the threading of metal skewers, symbolizing spears, through both cheeks and tongue. A person deprived of the opportunity to talk can fully concentrate on worshiping the deity. Having entered the temple, the faithful unfasten all the “ornaments” and indulge in prayer.
7
Flagellation
Self-flagellation is very popular in many faiths. Christians scourge themselves with whips in memory of the blows inflicted on Jesus Christ during his crucifixion.
In the middle of the fourteenth century, when the plague was raging in Europe, Christians believed that black death was sent by God as a punishment for sins. Then huge crowds of self-incriminators beat themselves before the appearance of a bloody mess on the body in search of forgiveness.
In medieval Germany, flagellation was accompanied by special chants called Geisslerlieder, which helped people to go into a trance. Even today, some Catholics continue to scourge. They say that Pope John Paul II beat himself with a belt.
In other religions, there are also many admirers of religious mutilation. Shiite Muslims on the day of Ashur, mourning for Hussein ibn Ali and other Shiite martyrs, engage in self-flagellation. They walk in the streets in black robes, beating themselves with whips, chains or interlocked blades to bleed.
Sometimes the victim is too big. Ten men from Britain contracted the virus, which was transmitted through the blood, during the ritual cutting of the skin on the forehead. The knife was poorly sterilized and passed from man to man.
8
Sati
Sati - these are the Hindu ritual, which, most likely, was inspired by the actions of the goddess of the same name. Upset by her father, who looked down upon her husband Shiva, Sati burned her body.
Since the flame consumed Sati, apparently, she did not feel pain. However, many of her followers who took part in the ritual could well feel something. The ritual is the burning of a widow alive with her dead husband on a funeral bed.
The British, who ruled India, found something terrible in this ritual (thebiggest.ru edition fully understands them), calling him not the highest degree of devotion to her husband, but insane suicide. Members of the British government in India thought that not a single woman would voluntarily do so. They firmly believed that the family was pushing them to self-immolation.
In the end, such a practice was outlawed. And although the ritual has almost become obsolete, in 2002 there was a case when Kuttu Bai put herself on fire with her deceased spouse. Despite opposition from the police, Kuttu died on fire.
9
Crucifixion
The crucifixion of people on the cross did not stop with the death of Jesus. Nowadays, it was used by ISIS as a form of terrorism for punishment and executions in territories subject to a terrorist organization. There are also reported cases of people being crucified in Saudi Arabia, although the government carefully conceals these incidents by declaring victims of violence dead.
Although the moment of the crucifixion of Christ, as well as his resurrection, is one of the main symbols of Christianity, there are people who give this meaning more than ordinary symbolism. In the Philippines, a ritual of the crucifixion of believers arose.
Voluntarily going to the crucifix, they try in this way to show their devotion or ask God for help. And also there are people who want to thank the heavenly forces for their help, and find nothing better than to hang on the cross.
Christian leaders condemn the practice of crucifixion, when people are first tied to the cross with ropes and then driven into their palms with nails. However, every year a similar ritual is performed somewhere.
By the way, do not miss on our site thebiggest.ru interesting material about the TOP 15 most famous statues of Jesus Christ in the whole world.
10
Festival urs
Every year, thousands of Muslims visit Ajmer in India to attend the Urs Festival. This Sufi festival marks the death of St. Moynuddin Chishti. During the process, ordinary things happen: believers pray, read poetry, sing songs and make donations. They also insert spikes and blades into the eye sockets so that the eyeball looks out.
While some find lashing out with whip sufficient, others want to show devotion to religion by driving sharp objects into their tongue. But the eyes rolling out are certainly beyond competition. In this way, believers show trust in the Almighty, who will not allow physical injury.
Sufis believe that the angel Djibril told Muhammad: "Worship and serve Allah, as if you can see him, but if you do not see him, he looks at you." Although, one careless movement of the blade, and you can not see anything else.
Finally
We hope you were interested in learning about some religious rites. In conclusion, I would like to ask you to write in the comments about what, in your opinion, shocking religious rites should have been on our list, but not on it. Our editorial staff is waiting for your comments.