<p><strong>Noun</strong></p><ul><li>an established or prescribed procedure for a religious or other rite.</li><li>a system or collection of religious or other rites.</li><li>observance of set forms in public worship.</li><li>a book of rites or ceremonies.</li><li>a book containing the offices to be used by priests in administering the sacraments and for visitation of the sick, burial of the dead, etc.</li><li>a prescribed or established rite, ceremony, proceeding, or service: the ritual of the dead.</li><li>prescribed, established, or ceremonial acts or features collectively, as in religious services.</li><li>any practice or pattern of behavior regularly performed in a set manner.</li><li>a prescribed code of behavior regulating social conduct, as that exemplified by the raising of one's hat or the shaking of hands in greeting.</li><li>Psychiatry: a specific act, as hand-washing, performed repetitively to a pathological degree, occurring as a common symptom of obsessive-compulsive neurosis.</li></ul><p><strong>Adjective</strong></p><ul><li>of the nature of or practiced as a rite or ritual: a ritual dance.</li><li>of or relating to rites or ritual: ritual laws.</li></ul>