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Downloaded from Brill.Com09/25/2021 02:32:37PM Via Free Access 28 Denapoli … Religion and Gender 9 (2019) 27–49 brill.com/rag A Female Shankaracharya? The Alternative Authority of a Feminist Hindu Guru in India Antoinette E. DeNapoli Texas Christian University [email protected] Abstract This article examines the practices through which a female religious leader (guru) in India by the name of Trikal Bhavanta Saraswati (in shorthand, “Mataji”) constructs women’s alternative authority in a high powered lineage of male Hindu gurus called Shankaracharyas. Mataji’s appropriation of the Shankaracharya leadership demon- strates an Indic example of “dharmic feminism,” by virtue of which she advocates the female as normative and, through that radical notion, advances a dharmic platform for gender equality in institutions in which women rarely figure among the power elite. Through narrative performance, Mataji reshapes the boundaries of religious lead- ership to affirm new possibilities for female authority in a lineage that has denied women’s agency. Exploring her personal experience narratives and the themes they illuminate can shed light on why her leadership intervenes in an orthodox lineage of male authority to exercise alternative authority and exact transformation of contem- porary Hinduism. Keywords Hindu Gurus – gender – performance – power – authority – feminism – Sadhus © koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2019 | doi:10.1163/18785417-00901002Downloaded from Brill.com09/25/2021 02:32:37PM via free access 28 denapoli … “Hindu religion respects women. But patriarchal interpretations of it have put many restrictions on women. Akhara Pari will release women from this cage of limitations. Through this akhara women everywhere, like birds in flight, will be free and they will know their true power.” Jagadguru Shankaracharya Trikal Bhavanta Saraswati, 2014 ∵ 1 Performing the Feminism of Dharma: A Guru and Her Transformation of Authority This article calls attention to the ritual and rhetorical practices through which the female religious leader (guru) Trikal Bhavanta Saraswati (henceforth, Mataji) renders explicit the transformation of a traditional category of male religious authority in the high powered lineage of Hindu spiritual teachers called Shankaracharyas.1 As a controversial guru who is striving to end gender- based discrimination against women in Hindu religious institutions, with a focus on women ascetics (sadhus) and their struggles to obtain power and authority, her life and work remain unknown to Westerners. This article fills a lacuna in the scholarship on women gurus in South Asia by shining light on the new leadership of the female Shankaracharya emerging within contem- porary Hinduism, through which Mataji confronts the uncomfortable relation between religion and gender inequality sanctioned by an endemic culture of misogyny in Indic society. On April 26, 2016, in the pilgrimage town of Ujjain, Madhya Pradesh (MP) state, Mataji intended to take live samadhi during the Kumbh Mela.2 The day before she declared to the media, the chief minister of the state, and the leaders 1 The Indian language term Shankaracharya characterizes a traditional lineage of Hindu spir- itual preceptors (acharya) who have been Brahmin men situated in an apostolic line of suc- cession going back to the first preceptor Adi Shankara. There are five Shankaracharyas who lead monastic centers (maths) located in the four corners of India, with a fifth monastery located in Kanchipuram, Tamil Nadu. 2 The Indian language term “samadhi” denotes in the framework of Samkhya-Yoga the highest state of mental absorption by the adept in the divine. In the context of Mataji’s performance, samadhi became a ritual means to agitate the government officials (or mela authorities) to uphold the protected constitutional rights of women pilgrims and practitioners attending Religion andDownloaded Gender from 9 Brill.com09/25/2021 (2019) 27–49 02:32:37PM via free access a female shankaracharya? 29 of the All India Akhara Council3 her intention to take samadhi. Her motiva- tion was to draw attention to and combat the oppression of women sadhus in religious organizations known as akharas. To give a brief context, akharas rep- resent “distinctive ascetic institutions” that operate a lot like monastic centers and provide lodging and training facilities for their members (Gross 2001, 66; Lochtefeld 2010; Hausner 2006).4 Twenty-four hours after making her declara- tion, Mataji entered a ten-foot pit dug by disciples and sat in the yogic posture of meditative absorption. With her eyes closed, and as she chanted Vedic mantras (prayers), she prepared to leave her physical body and embrace the ultimate. Devotees offered flowers in reverence and called her a “jagadguru” (world spir- itual teacher) who has come to “save” Hindu dharma.5 As the fresh petals fell to the ground where Mataji sat in meditation, two disciples ritually covered Mataji’s body with sacred earth. Within minutes, however, the ritual came to an abrupt end when the Indian police burst onto the scene.Two policewomen entered the pit and pleaded with Mataji to end her samadhi. All the while, police officers forcefully removed the two disciples and the bevy of devotees gathered at the site in support of Mataji. The event culminated in her arrest. According to the leaders of the Akhara Council who gave interviews to the media, Mataji “defied” a 1200 year-old tradi- tion that many of these authorities said began with the first jagadguru, Acharya the Kumbh Mela to equal treatment and non-discrimination in access to resources, includ- ing police protection of women’s camps, on par with those provided by the mela officials to the male akharas. 3 This is a non-sectarian religious organization, or executive council (parishad), which admin- isters the akharas within the loosely organized institution of Hindu renunciation (sannyasa) in India. 4 The akharas are located at the sites of India’s Hindu sacred geography, notably in the pil- grimage centers of India where the Kumbh Mela festivals are held every 3 (Kumbh Mela), 6 (Ardh Kumbh Mela), and 12 years (Maha Kumbh Mela). Sadhus are thought to be itinerant wanderers journeying along India’s pilgrimage cities. By this logic, the akharas offer places of respite for sadhus travelling the pilgrimage routes. Thirteen akharas have been recognized as “official” organizations by the All India Akhara Council. It does not recognize Akhara Pari. 5 Jagadguru denotes “world teacher.” It carries the double signification of “teacher” and the “tra- dition” transmitted by the guru to disciples.The concept implies that the guru has attained the highest state of wisdom characterized by the attributes of truth (sat), consciousness (chid), and bliss (ananda), which are said to be the properties of God (Brahman) consciousness. It is a title bestowed on spiritual preceptors (acharya). The attribution of acharya to a female spir- itual preceptor is not exclusive to Mataji. She may be the first female acharya in Shankara’s lineage, but she is not the first female acharya of India. That distinction has been obtained by Mate Mahadevi who, until her death (March 14, 2019), was the leader of the Lingayat tradi- tion practiced in South India. (See Charpentier 2010). See also Narayanan 2005. (See further Pechilis 2015). Religion and Gender 9 (2019) 27–49 Downloaded from Brill.com09/25/2021 02:32:37PM via free access 30 denapoli Adi Shankara. They quickly denounced her claim of having the authority to take live samadhi and to be a jagadguru at all. Some of these leaders went so far as to label her a “false guru.” But what incited the vitriol of the Akhara Council officials involved a revolu- tionary ritual consecration that Mataji performed two years earlier during the Magh Mela in Prayagraj, where her temple is also located.6 On February 10, 2014, along the banks of the Triveni Sangam where the Ganga, Jamuna, and (hid- den) Saraswati rivers form a sacred confluence, Mataji ritually established the first, and the only, women’s akhara of India, namely Shri Sarveshwar Mahadev Vaikunth Dham Muktidwar Akhara Pari (“Akhara Pari”). Declaring herself a jagadguru, and situating her akhara within the lineage of the first preceptor, Adi Acharya Shankara (ca. 9th century), Mataji’s ritual dramatized the alterna- tive authority of a female Shankaracharya.7 Taking live samadhi and consecrating a women’s akhara perform what I term Mataji’s “dharmic feminism.” My conceptualization of dharmic feminism is informed by the work of social anthropologist Emma Tomalin (2011), who has coined the phrase “religious feminism” to describe feminist perspectives synchronized with religious worldviews that critique and transform the patri- archal values of a religion in order to raise women’s social status. As Tomalin has said, “Such a strategy is attractive to women who wish to employ a reli- gious narrative to guide their politics of empowerment, rather than relying on the secular rhetoric of mainstream (Western) feminist discourses.” (2011, 37) To my mind, Mataji’s dharmic feminism demonstrates an Indic “style” of religious feminism taking shape in South Asian contexts. Based on a religious conception of God (Shiva) and Goddess (Shakti) as equal and interdependent, it affirms in theory and in practice the radical idea that the female is as nor- mative as the male, and that women as much as men deserve the equal right to participate in the institutional structures of the power elite. For Mataji, the acquisition of power is neither anathema to the religious path, nor simply a narcissistic grab for absolute control. Rather, exercising power can further 6 “Magh Mela” refers to a religious festival that is celebrated during the month of Magh (January–February) in India. It is considered to be a smaller version of India’s largest religious festival known as the Kumbh Mela (“festival of the water pot”). In October 2018, the Hindu nationalist government, namely the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), of Uttar Pradesh changed the name Allahabad to Prayagraj, which the government claims is the original name of the ancient city.
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