The transformation of the religious ritual into the national holiday

National holiday is an organic part of traditional culture. The modern national holiday is dedicated to special calendar dates. The author assumes that the composition of a national holiday typical for Dagestan traditions shows the historical transformation of a religious ritual of Sufi Muslims. The ceremony of sama is considered to be one of the sources of the modern national holiday. The syncretism of sama ritual, which includes the movements to the music, instrumental music, recitation of poetic and sacred texts, is found in the modern national holiday embedded in the traditional culture of the Dagestan people. The traditional culture festival became a new modification stage of sama ritual through a national holiday. The ontological relationship with a ritual partly explains the popularity of and the demand for such festivals in the cultural space of modern Dagestan.