the.com/traditionalism
Worshipping the ashes instead of keeping the fire going.
means An attachment to inherited customs, beliefs, or practices as valuable in themselves, often resisting change simply because 'this is how it's always been done.'
from Built from 'tradition' (from Latin 'traditio,' meaning a handing-over or handing-down, itself from 'tradere'—to deliver or transmit, the same root that gives us 'traitor,' someone who hands something over to the enemy) plus the suffix '-ism,' which turns a practice into a doctrine. So 'traditionalism' is literally 'the handing-down, made into a creed'—the moment a passed-along custom hardens from something lived into something defended.
- vs tradition
- tradition evolves, traditionalism freezes it in amber
- favorite argument
- we have always done it this way
- political flavor
- often weaponized to resist change, not preserve wisdom
- irony
- most traditions were once radical innovations themselves