Ritual theorists have rightfully argued for the distinction between a ritual act and a written description of (or prescription for) that ritual act – certainly, the latter does not constitute a ritual. This has served as an important corrective to biblical scholars who, in studying ancient ritual activity, have understandably given a great deal of weight to the primary object of study available to us – the biblical text. This paper makes the suggestion that the line between text and experience is not always so clear. While texts about rituals do not replicate the experience of ritual activity, a text can, in fact, mimic the characteristics of ritual: just as more or less ritualized behaviors can be identified through the relative presence of specific features (e.g. repetition, formalism, traditionalism, etc.), so too can a text be identified as more or less ritualized by the presence of these features in literary form. After a discussion of methodological issues through the engagement of literary and ritual theory, this paper uses the description of the tabernacle in Exod 25-40 as an exemplar of such a ritualized text. Recognizing the ability of text to serve as raw material in ritual experience – requiring no action other than reading – broadens our understanding of the pool of ritual experiences available in the biblical world, and allows for a conversation that takes seriously the role of the biblical text in ritual experience.