Jñāndev Studies

Jñāndev Studies

Author: Catharina Kiehnle

Publisher: Franz Steiner Verlag

Published: 1997

Total Pages: 136

ISBN-13: 9783515069229

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In Maharastra sind viele der Anschauungen und Praktiken der mittelalterlichen Nath-Yogis noch lebendig bzw. wurden von der visnuitischen Varkari-Bewegung absorbiert, die heute eine der wichtigsten religi�sen Gruppierungen des Landes ist. In Band I sind die Yoga-Lehren ausfuehrlich dargelegt anhand von 150 erstmals kritisch edierten und in eine westliche Sprache uebersetzten Liedern, die dem Nationalheiligen J�andev zugeschrieben werden. Dabei wird auch die seit Ende des 19. Jahrhunderts viel diskutierte Autorschaftsfrage unter Beruecksichtigung sprachlicher und inhaltlicher Faktoren behandelt, und in Band II auf 50 Lieder visnuitischer Pr�gung ausgeweitet.


Alternative Krishnas

Alternative Krishnas

Author: Guy L. Beck

Publisher: State University of New York Press

Published: 2012-02-01

Total Pages: 227

ISBN-13: 079148341X

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Krishna—widely venerated and adored in the Hindu tradition—is a deity of many aspects. An ancient manifestation of the Supreme God Vishnu, or the Godhead itself, Krishna is the bringer of Yoga philosophy and the creator of the universe, the destroyer of evil tyrants, and the hero of the epic Mahabharata. He is also described in classical Sanskrit texts as having human characteristics and enjoying very human pursuits: Krishna is the butter thief, cowherd, philanderer, and flute player. Yet even these playful depictions are based upon descriptions found in the Sanskrit canon, and mostly reflect familiar, classical Pan-Indian images. In this book, contributors examine the alternative, or unconventional, Krishnas, offering examples from more localized Krishna traditions found in different regions among various ethnic groups, vernacular language traditions, and remote branches of Indian religions. These wide-ranging, alternative visions of Krishna include the Tantric Krishna of Bengal, Krishna in urban women's rituals, Krishna as monogamous husband and younger brother in Braj, Krishna in Jainism, Krishna in Marathi tradition, Krishna in South India, and the Krishna of nineteenth-century reformed Hinduism.


The A to Z of Sacred Music

The A to Z of Sacred Music

Author: Joseph P. Swain

Publisher: Scarecrow Press

Published: 2010-04-09

Total Pages: 336

ISBN-13: 1461672120

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Nearly all religious traditions have reserved a special place for sacred music. Whether it is music accompanying a ritual or purely for devotional purposes, music composed for entire congregations or for the trained soloist, or music set to holy words or purely instrumental, in some form or another, music is present. In fact, in some traditions the relation between the music and the ritual is so intimate that to distinguish between them would be inaccurate. The A to Z of Sacred Music covers the most important aspects of the sacred music of Buddhism, Christianity, Confucianism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, and other smaller religious groups. It provides useful information on all the significant traditions of this music through the use of a chronology, an introductory essay, a bibliography, appendixes, and hundreds of cross-referenced dictionary entries on major types of music, composers, key religious figures, specialized positions, genres of composition, technical terms, instruments, fundamental documents and sources, significant places, and important musical compositions.


Caitanya Vaiṣṇavism in Bengal

Caitanya Vaiṣṇavism in Bengal

Author: Joseph T. O'Connell

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2018-10-29

Total Pages: 493

ISBN-13: 0429817967

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Within the broad Hindu religious tradition, there have been for millennia many subtraditions generically called Vaiṣṇava, who insist that the most appropriate mode of religious faith and experience is bhakti, or devotion, to the supreme personal deity, Viṣṇu. Caitanya Vaiṣṇavas are a community of Vaiṣṇava devotees who coalesced around Kṛṣṇa Caitanya (1486–1533), who taught devotion to the name and form of Kṛṣṇa, especially in conjunction with his divine consort Rādhā and who also came to be looked upon by many as Kṛṣṇa himself who had graciously chosen to be born in Bengal to exemplify the ideal mode of loving devotion (prema-bhakti). This book focusses on the relationship between the ‘transcendent’ intentionality of religious faith of human beings and their ‘mundane’ socio-cultural ways of living, through a detailed study of the social implications of the Caitanya Vaiṣṇava devotional Hindu tradition in pre-colonial and colonial Bengal. Structured in two parts, the first analyzes the articulation of Kṛṣṇa-bhakti within the broad Hindu sector of Bengali society. The second section examines Hindu–Muslim relationships in Bengal from the particular vantage point of the Caitanya Vaiṣṇava tradition, and in which the subtle influence of Kṛṣṇa-bhakti, it is argued, may be detected. In both sections, the bulk of attention is given to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, when Bengal was under independent Sultanate or emergent Mughal rule and thus free of the impact of British and European colonial influence. Arguing that the Caitanya Vaiṣṇava devotion contributed to the softening of the potentially alienating socio-cultural divisions of class, caste, sect and religio-political community in Bengal, this book will be of interest to academics in the field of Asian Religion and Hinduism, in particular devotional Hinduism, both premodern and modern, as well as to scholars and students of South Asian social history, Hindu-Muslim relations, and Bengali religious culture.


Religion and Public Memory

Religion and Public Memory

Author: Christian Lee Novetzke

Publisher: Columbia University Press

Published: 2008-07-01

Total Pages: 334

ISBN-13: 0231512562

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Namdev is a central figure in the cultural history of India, especially within the field of bhakti, a devotional practice that has created publics of memory for over eight centuries. Born in the Marathi-speaking region of the Deccan in the late thirteenth century, Namdev is remembered as a simple, low-caste Hindu tailor whose innovative performances of devotional songs spread his fame widely. He is central to many religious traditions within Hinduism, as well as to Sikhism, and he is a key early literary figure in Maharashtra, northern India, and Punjab. In the modern period, Namdev appears throughout the public spheres of Marathi and Hindi and in India at large, where his identity fluctuates between regional associations and a quiet, pan-Indian, nationalist-secularist profile that champions the poor, oppressed, marginalized, and low caste. Christian Lee Novetzke considers the way social memory coheres around the figure of Namdev from the sixteenth century to the present, examining the practices that situate Namdev's memory in multiple historical publics. Focusing primarily on Maharashtra and drawing on ethnographies of devotional performance, archival materials, scholarly historiography, and popular media, especially film, Novetzke vividly illustrates how religious communities in India preserve their pasts and, in turn, create their own historical narratives.


The Legacy of Vaiṣṇavism in Colonial Bengal

The Legacy of Vaiṣṇavism in Colonial Bengal

Author: Ferdinando Sardella

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2019-11-25

Total Pages: 458

ISBN-13: 1351357778

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This book offers a focused examination of the Bengali Vaiṣṇava tradition in its manifold forms in the pivotal context of British colonialism in South Asia. Bringing together scholars from across the disciplines of social and intellectual history, philology, theology, and anthropology to systematically investigate Vaiṣṇavism in colonial Bengal, this book highlights the significant roles—religious, social, and cultural—that a prominent Hindu devotional current played in the lives of wide and diverse sections of colonial Bengali society. Not only does the book thereby enrich our understanding of the history and development of Bengali Vaiṣṇavism, but it also sheds valuable new light on the texture and dynamics of colonial Hinduism beyond the discursive and social-historical parameters of an entrenched Hindu "Renaissance" paradigm. A landmark in the burgeoning field of Bengali Vaiṣṇava studies, this book will be of interest to scholars of modern Hinduism, religion, and colonial South Asian social and intellectual history.


The Fading Light of Advaita Acarya

The Fading Light of Advaita Acarya

Author: Rebecca J. Manring

Publisher: OUP USA

Published: 2011-08-17

Total Pages: 305

ISBN-13: 0199736464

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Rebecca J. Manring offers a hagiographical treatment of Advaita Acarya, a fifteenth century leader in a new devotional school of Vaisnavism. She uses the Bengali material as a case study of how to read and understand hagiographical literature.


Unifying Force of Hinduism

Unifying Force of Hinduism

Author: Haripada Adhikary

Publisher: AuthorHouse

Published: 2012-04-27

Total Pages: 289

ISBN-13: 1468503936

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The contents of the book are based upon the materials collected through extensive and careful research, for the preparation of a thesis for a higher degree for the Lancaster University. It deals with the conception of Hindu religion, its history and progress along with the gradual rationalization of the belief and practices with the time, since Rigveda and its effect on the caste system. Special attempt has been made to present many complex theological topics, in a simpler way for the easy understanding of the young generation, on whom the religion depends enormously, for its future growth and expansion. The vast amount of information has been accumulated here in a concise form to make it a useful reference book for the students of religious studies and sociology.