Ritual Metaphysics

In this paper, I seek to show the fruitfulness of connecting the study of ritual activities to the ritualists' metaphysics, which is to say, to their understanding of the necessary conditions of life. I suggest that some rituals may be seen as inscribing bodies with messages that are, properly speaking, metaphysical in this sense, and that some rituals may be seen as embodied inquiries into the metaphysical nature of things. By so doing, I hope to provide conceptual tools for those who see rituals as having a cosmic dimension, and thereby to improve the generally weak relationship between the study of rituals and philosophy.