«Tradition has nothing to do with the so-called local colour or folklore, nor with the various local customs recorded by folklorists. Tradition has to do with the origins and transfer throughout the centuries of a set of notions, perspectives and conceptions that help people who are a living part of the specific tradition to interpret both themselves and the natural and moral environment in a very specific way. Tradition is a way of seeing and the knowledge transferred from one generation to the next, passing through the filters of social and moral differentiations and reaching its partakers always accurate and respected.
Tradition concentrates in its essence everything that has been; all the ways, the narratives, the unspoken, the myths, the rites that have been expressed within its context in the past and at the same time all that have not yet been expressed but exist in a state of potentiality. At any given moment, tradition is complete and at the same time has the capacity to evolve. It embodies internal knowledge that co-exists harmoniously with every aspect of life: personal, collective, political. It is universal transfer and universal experience, given that the only thing that may vary among its different partakers is the extent and quality of this transfer and experience.
Tradition is always objective (contrary to the subjective, individual perception and view). It is always ancestral and ethnic. It can never be imposed from one nation to another. There is no tradition shared by more than one nation.»
Source: Supreme Council of Ethnic Hellenes (YSEE), What does the term παράδοση (paradosi – tradition) mean to you? (FAQ English), Question no. 13. URL: https://www.ysee.gr/faq-eng.html#13 (as consulted online on November 9, 2019).
Hellenismos heute 