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A free ebook version of this title is available through Luminos, University of California Press’s new open access publishing program for monographs. Visit www.luminosoa.org to learn more. Hindu devotional traditions have long been recognized for their sacred geographies as well as the sensuous aspects of their devotees' experiences. Largely overlooked, however, are the subtle links between these religious expressions. Based on intensive fieldwork conducted among worshippers in Bengal’s Navadvip-Mayapur sacred complex, this book discusses the diverse and contrasting ways in which Bengal-Vaishnava devotees experience sacred geography and divinity. Sukanya Sarbadhikary documents an extensive range of practices, which draw on the interactions of mind, body, and viscera. She shows how perspectives on religion, embodiment, affect, and space are enriched when sacred spatialities of internal and external forms are studied at once.
What role do pre-modern religious traditions play in the formation of modern secular identities? In Unforgetting Chaitanya, Varuni Bhatia examines late-nineteenth-century transformations of Bengali Vaishnavism-a vibrant and multifaceted religious tradition that traces its origins to the fifteenth century Krishna devotee Chaitanya (1486-1533). Drawing on an extensive body of hitherto unexamined archival material, Bhatia finds that both religious modernizers and secular voices among the Bengali middle-class invoked Chaitanya, portraying him simultaneously as a local hero, a Hindu reformer, and as God almighty. She argues that these claims should be understood in relation to the recovery of a "pure" Bengali culture and history in a period of nascent, but rising, anti-colonialism in the region. Who is a true Vaishnava? In the late nineteenth century, this question assumed urgency as debates around questions of authenticity appeared prominently in the Bengali public sphere. These debates went on for years, even decades, causing unbridgeable rifts in personal friendships and tarnishing reputations of established scholars. Underlying these debates was the question of authoritative Bengali Vaishnavism and its role in the long-term constitution of Bengali culture and society. At stake, argues Bhatia, was the very nature and composition of an indigenously-derived modernity inscribed through the politics of authenticity, which allowed an influential section of Hindu, upper-caste Bengalis to excavate their own explicitly Hindu pasts in order to find a people's history, a religious reformer, a casteless Hindu sect, the richest examples of Bengali literature, and a sophisticated expression of monotheistic religion.
This book examines the practice of poetry in the devotional Vaiṣṇava tradition inspired by Śrī Kṛṣṇa Caitanya (1486-1533), through a detailed study of the Sanskrit poetic works of Kavikarṇapūra, one of the most significant sixteenth-century Caitanya Vaiṣṇava poets and theologians. It places his ideas in the context both of Sanskrit literary theory (by exploring his use of earlier works of Sanskrit criticism) and of Vaiṣṇava theology (by tracing the origins of his theological ideas to earlier Vaiṣṇava teachers, especially his guru Śrīnātha). Both Kavikarṇapūra's poetics as well as the style of his poetry is in many ways at odds with those of his time, particularly with respect to the place of phonetic ornamentation and rasa. Like later early modern theorists, Kavikarṇapūra reaches back to the earliest Sanskrit poeticians whom he attempts to harmonise with the theories current in his time, to develop a new poetics that values both literary ornamentation and the suggestion of emotion through rasa. This book argues that the reasons of and purposes for Kavikarṇapūra's literary innovations are firmly rooted in his unique Vaiṣṇava theology, and exemplifies this through a careful reading of select passages from the Ānanda-vṛndāvana, his poetic retelling of Kṛṣṇa's play in Vṛndāvana.
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 Present Book Is A Comprehensive And Comparative Study Of The Origin And Development Of The Concept Of Avatèra In The Theological And Biographical Literature Of India: Vedic, Sanskrit, Pali And Bengali. It Seeks To Understand The Incarnated Divinity Of Chaitanya (1486Å1533) And The Socio-Religious And Psychological Factors Responsible For His Apotheosis During His Life-Time. The Study Also Shows How The Concept Of Avatèra, Though Un-Vedic In Origin, Has Absorbed Many Vedic Elements Of Solar Myth And Natural Allegory, Has Synthesized Various Elements From The Epico-Purè!Ic Tradition And Has Ultimately Blossomed Forth As An Eclectic Theory In The Bengal School Of Vai !Avism. It Further Shows That Both Vai !Avism And The Concept Of Avatèra Owe Their Origin To K !A Vèsudeva, The Great Synthesizer Of The Aryan And Non-Aryan Cultures In Ancient India And Ascribes The Theoretical Development Of The Concept Of Avatèra In The Medieval Period To Various Attempts Of Interpreting Chaitanya S Life And Personality. In This Study, Avatèravèda Does Not Merely Remain To Be A Theological Doctrine, But Turns Out, On In-Depth Scrutiny, To Be Also A Method Of Analysis And Interpretation Of Both History And Its Maker With Stress On Synthesis And Syncretism.The Study Dwells Upon Many Relevant Topics Like Relationship Between Avatèravèda And Vyêhavèda, Psychosomatic Symptoms Of Avatèrahood, Zoomorphism And Mythic Elements In The Stories Of The Ten Incarnations Of Vi !U, Historical Significance Of The Episode Of Kalki And Chronology Of The Mytho-Historic Avatèras With The Help Of The Purè!Ic Calendar Of The Four Ages.
Religion in decline in an age of progress -- Untidy realms -- A Swadeshi Chaitanya -- Recovering Bishnupriya's loss -- Utopia and a birthplace.
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.