This article examines how Villiputturar’s fourteenth-century Paratam, the most important Tamil retelling of the Mahabharata, focuses on Sisupala’s tirade against Krsna at Yudhisthira’s sacrifice. This passage, which has fascinated many poets across the subcontinent over many centuries, is dealt with interestingly by Villiputturar, an erudite Srivaisnava scholar and possibly a court poet. While his knowledge of the Sanskrit texts clearly shows in his verses, there is also something very peculiar in his treatment of Sisupala and his speech that is unique, and which could be the result of the Alvars’, and perhaps even the Srivaisnava Acaryas’, compositions. This article will examine the words of Villiputturar’s Sisupala in light of a selection of texts, and will also assess his impact on the later Tamil poets, notably on the two poets who rendered the Bhagavatapurana into the vernacular language barely a century or two later.
{"title":"When Blame Turns into Praise","authors":"Suganya Anandakichenin","doi":"10.1558/rosa.24405","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/rosa.24405","url":null,"abstract":"This article examines how Villiputturar’s fourteenth-century Paratam, the most important Tamil retelling of the Mahabharata, focuses on Sisupala’s tirade against Krsna at Yudhisthira’s sacrifice. This passage, which has fascinated many poets across the subcontinent over many centuries, is dealt with interestingly by Villiputturar, an erudite Srivaisnava scholar and possibly a court poet. While his knowledge of the Sanskrit texts clearly shows in his verses, there is also something very peculiar in his treatment of Sisupala and his speech that is unique, and which could be the result of the Alvars’, and perhaps even the Srivaisnava Acaryas’, compositions. This article will examine the words of Villiputturar’s Sisupala in light of a selection of texts, and will also assess his impact on the later Tamil poets, notably on the two poets who rendered the Bhagavatapurana into the vernacular language barely a century or two later.","PeriodicalId":38179,"journal":{"name":"Religions of South Asia","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-12-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42686665","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article focuses on two exquisitely carved stone panels from Rajaona in Lakhisarai district, Bihar, depicting animated scenes from the Ramayana. The panels were first reported by Frederick Asher in 1986 and since his concise overview no further analysis has been forthcoming. This article seeks to identify the seven Ramayana episodes represented across the two panels and to analyse them within the broader context of early visual Ramayanas, and especially those from Bihar and Bengal. Contrary to what has previously been suggested, the scenes depicted are from the Yuddhakanda of the Ramayana, and of the seven parts, most comprise the earliest extant visual renderings of these stories. The panels have previously been dated to the Gupta period (c.319–550 ce) but following a stylistic analysis I propose instead an early post-Gupta date. This suggested dating conforms with the trajectory of Ramayana imagery in early India, which otherwise does not seem to have been adopted on temples in the eastern regions of the Indian subcontinent until the late sixth/early seventh century.
{"title":"Art of Storytelling","authors":"L. Greaves","doi":"10.1558/rosa.24404","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/rosa.24404","url":null,"abstract":"This article focuses on two exquisitely carved stone panels from Rajaona in Lakhisarai district, Bihar, depicting animated scenes from the Ramayana. The panels were first reported by Frederick Asher in 1986 and since his concise overview no further analysis has been forthcoming. This article seeks to identify the seven Ramayana episodes represented across the two panels and to analyse them within the broader context of early visual Ramayanas, and especially those from Bihar and Bengal. Contrary to what has previously been suggested, the scenes depicted are from the Yuddhakanda of the Ramayana, and of the seven parts, most comprise the earliest extant visual renderings of these stories. The panels have previously been dated to the Gupta period (c.319–550 ce) but following a stylistic analysis I propose instead an early post-Gupta date. This suggested dating conforms with the trajectory of Ramayana imagery in early India, which otherwise does not seem to have been adopted on temples in the eastern regions of the Indian subcontinent until the late sixth/early seventh century.","PeriodicalId":38179,"journal":{"name":"Religions of South Asia","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-12-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46004096","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article explores the scene in Ramayana 1.2 where a hunter kills a crane and Valmiki curses the hunter. The curse is explored as a stand-in for Valmiki’s composition and Rama’s education, prompted by Sita’s suffering at Valmiki’s ashram. The first half of the article discusses, but does not apportion, the blame for Sita’s abandonment. The second half discusses the blame for Sita’s suicide.
{"title":"Who Was it Was Cursed by the First Sloka Verse?","authors":"S. Brodbeck","doi":"10.1558/rosa.24399","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/rosa.24399","url":null,"abstract":"This article explores the scene in Ramayana 1.2 where a hunter kills a crane and Valmiki curses the hunter. The curse is explored as a stand-in for Valmiki’s composition and Rama’s education, prompted by Sita’s suffering at Valmiki’s ashram. The first half of the article discusses, but does not apportion, the blame for Sita’s abandonment. The second half discusses the blame for Sita’s suicide.","PeriodicalId":38179,"journal":{"name":"Religions of South Asia","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-12-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47996577","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper studies some unpublished smaller antiquities in stone, terracotta and copper alloys, made between the tenth and the thirteenth centuries, from the region of Bengal Duars, housed at the Archaeological Survey of India site-shed at Gosanimari, Coochbehar, and at the Akshaya Kumar Maitreya Heritage Museum of North Bengal University. While some of them represent a style stemming from the late-Pala period, others present a unique and region-specific artistic idiom. Most were found accidentally and collected by local historians and antiquarians, and were donated to the AKMHM; others were found at three prominent sites: Bhitargarh, Ghoshpukur and Gosanimari. These sites, situated in an ecologically fragile region, have a rich history of different kinds of local worship which were attuned to the environment and nature; the art of the region also reflects an interaction with the larger milieu of Indic and Himalayan religious practices. This article further investigates a large stone sculpture housed at the AKMHM, also from the Bengal Duars, and questions its labelling as a Danapati.
{"title":"New Discoveries in Smaller Antiquities and a Unique Portrait Sculpture from Medieval Bengal Duars","authors":"Archishman Sarker","doi":"10.1558/rosa.23304","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/rosa.23304","url":null,"abstract":"This paper studies some unpublished smaller antiquities in stone, terracotta and copper alloys, made between the tenth and the thirteenth centuries, from the region of Bengal Duars, housed at the Archaeological Survey of India site-shed at Gosanimari, Coochbehar, and at the Akshaya Kumar Maitreya Heritage Museum of North Bengal University. While some of them represent a style stemming from the late-Pala period, others present a unique and region-specific artistic idiom. Most were found accidentally and collected by local historians and antiquarians, and were donated to the AKMHM; others were found at three prominent sites: Bhitargarh, Ghoshpukur and Gosanimari. These sites, situated in an ecologically fragile region, have a rich history of different kinds of local worship which were attuned to the environment and nature; the art of the region also reflects an interaction with the larger milieu of Indic and Himalayan religious practices. This article further investigates a large stone sculpture housed at the AKMHM, also from the Bengal Duars, and questions its labelling as a Danapati.","PeriodicalId":38179,"journal":{"name":"Religions of South Asia","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-07-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41641517","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The Oxford History of Hinduism: Modern Hinduism, edited by Torkel Brekke. New York:Oxford University Press, 2019. xi + 317 pp., £73 (hb). ISBN 9780198790839.
{"title":"The Oxford History of Hinduism: Modern Hinduism, edited by Torkel Brekke.","authors":"Brian A. Hatcher","doi":"10.1558/rosa.23309","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/rosa.23309","url":null,"abstract":"The Oxford History of Hinduism: Modern Hinduism, edited by Torkel Brekke. New York:Oxford University Press, 2019. xi + 317 pp., £73 (hb). ISBN 9780198790839.","PeriodicalId":38179,"journal":{"name":"Religions of South Asia","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-07-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44658503","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Botanical Ecstasies: Psychoactive Plant Formulas in India and Beyond, by Matthew Clark. London: Psychedelic Press, 2021. 69 pp. £9.99 (pb). ISBN 978191626711.
{"title":"Botanical Ecstasies: Psychoactive Plant Formulas in India and Beyond, by Matthew Clark.","authors":"F. Ferrari","doi":"10.1558/rosa.23308","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/rosa.23308","url":null,"abstract":"Botanical Ecstasies: Psychoactive Plant Formulas in India and Beyond, by Matthew Clark. London: Psychedelic Press, 2021. 69 pp. £9.99 (pb). ISBN 978191626711.","PeriodicalId":38179,"journal":{"name":"Religions of South Asia","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-07-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42289980","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The Visnu Purana: Ancient Annals of the God with Lotus Eyes, translated from the Sanskrit by McComas Taylor. Canberra: Australian National University Press, 2021. xvi + 562 pp., $75 (print), free download (press.anu.edu.au). ISBN 9781760464400 (print), 9781760464417 (online).
{"title":"The Visnu Purana: Ancient Annals of the God with Lotus Eyes, translated from the Sanskrit by McComas Taylor.","authors":"S. Brodbeck","doi":"10.1558/rosa.23307","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/rosa.23307","url":null,"abstract":"The Visnu Purana: Ancient Annals of the God with Lotus Eyes, translated from the Sanskrit by McComas Taylor. Canberra: Australian National University Press, 2021. xvi + 562 pp., $75 (print), free download (press.anu.edu.au). ISBN 9781760464400 (print), 9781760464417 (online).","PeriodicalId":38179,"journal":{"name":"Religions of South Asia","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-07-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42971923","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In this paper, I discuss Latvian participation in the Nath Sampradaya on the background of a deep history of Baltic fascination with the East. I highlight three different levels of self-understanding for the practitioners of this religious movement: historical imaginary, ritual practice, and interfaith dialogue. While partaking of the rhetoric of Indo-Baltic kinship that has by now become part of the self-representation of the Balts, the Latvian yogis do not strive for a Hindu-pagan revival, but identify instead in forms of esoteric ritual practice (tantra) and bodily discipline (yoga) a preferred tool to regain a notion of themselves as self-ruling, empowered subjects, thus projecting onto the realm of the embodied self the quest for independence historically expressed in the public sphere. Interfaith dialogue, represented by their collaboration with a Catholic priest, emerges as an unexpected element.
{"title":"Self-Orientalism at Europe’s Margins","authors":"Eloisa Stuparich","doi":"10.1558/rosa.23306","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/rosa.23306","url":null,"abstract":"In this paper, I discuss Latvian participation in the Nath Sampradaya on the background of a deep history of Baltic fascination with the East. I highlight three different levels of self-understanding for the practitioners of this religious movement: historical imaginary, ritual practice, and interfaith dialogue. While partaking of the rhetoric of Indo-Baltic kinship that has by now become part of the self-representation of the Balts, the Latvian yogis do not strive for a Hindu-pagan revival, but identify instead in forms of esoteric ritual practice (tantra) and bodily discipline (yoga) a preferred tool to regain a notion of themselves as self-ruling, empowered subjects, thus projecting onto the realm of the embodied self the quest for independence historically expressed in the public sphere. Interfaith dialogue, represented by their collaboration with a Catholic priest, emerges as an unexpected element.","PeriodicalId":38179,"journal":{"name":"Religions of South Asia","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-07-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46879285","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article analyses the figures of four contemporary Sufi peers who have established a formally unrecognized yet authoritative position despite their lack of ties to established Sufi transmission lineages or access to either symbolic or concrete capital. These peers operate in the lower strata of Delhi’s urban society, in ‘economies of despair’, composed of concentric circles of unfavourable life circumstances, limited resources, under-recognition and the deepening communal divide. Through a methodological combination of ethnography, participatory observation and textual analysis I examine their life trajectories to better understand the ways in which hyperlocal peers craft jugaad (improvised) authorities; the issue of space—the aspiration to exert power over a shrine and the transformation of the space, in some cases, from concrete to virtual. Finally, I address the transformations in peeri-mureedi relations in the neoliberal era through the prism of the consumer society.
{"title":"Jugaad Authorities","authors":"Ronie Parciack","doi":"10.1558/rosa.23305","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/rosa.23305","url":null,"abstract":"This article analyses the figures of four contemporary Sufi peers who have established a formally unrecognized yet authoritative position despite their lack of ties to established Sufi transmission lineages or access to either symbolic or concrete capital. These peers operate in the lower strata of Delhi’s urban society, in ‘economies of despair’, composed of concentric circles of unfavourable life circumstances, limited resources, under-recognition and the deepening communal divide. Through a methodological combination of ethnography, participatory observation and textual analysis I examine their life trajectories to better understand the ways in which hyperlocal peers craft jugaad (improvised) authorities; the issue of space—the aspiration to exert power over a shrine and the transformation of the space, in some cases, from concrete to virtual. Finally, I address the transformations in peeri-mureedi relations in the neoliberal era through the prism of the consumer society.","PeriodicalId":38179,"journal":{"name":"Religions of South Asia","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-07-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44363002","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Modern Sufis and the State: The Politics of Islam in South Asia and Beyond, edited by Katherine Pratt Ewing and Rosemary R. Corbett. New York: Columbia University Press, 2020. 360 pp., £108 (hb), £28 (pb). ISBN 9780231195744 (hb), 9780231195751 (pb).
{"title":"Modern Sufis and the State: The Politics of Islam in South Asia and Beyond, edited by Katherine Pratt Ewing and Rosemary R. Corbett.","authors":"Ronie Parciack","doi":"10.1558/rosa.23310","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1558/rosa.23310","url":null,"abstract":"Modern Sufis and the State: The Politics of Islam in South Asia and Beyond, edited by Katherine Pratt Ewing and Rosemary R. Corbett. New York: Columbia University Press, 2020. 360 pp., £108 (hb), £28 (pb). ISBN 9780231195744 (hb), 9780231195751 (pb).","PeriodicalId":38179,"journal":{"name":"Religions of South Asia","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-07-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46175122","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
京公网安备 11010802042870号
京ICP备2023020795号-1
扫码关注我们
求助内容：
应助结果提醒方式：