HIMALAYA, the Journal of the Association for Nepal and Himalayan Studies

Volume 37 Number 2 Article 28

December 2017

Review of Kailas Histories: Renunciate Traditions and the Construction of Himalayan Geography by Alex McKay

Himani Upadhyaya

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Recommended Citation Upadhyaya, Himani. 2017. Review of Kailas Histories: Renunciate Traditions and the Construction of Himalayan Sacred Geography by Alex McKay. HIMALAYA 37(2). Available at: https://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/himalaya/vol37/iss2/28

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License. This Review is brought to you for free and open access by the DigitalCommons@Macalester College at DigitalCommons@Macalester College. It has been accepted for inclusion in HIMALAYA, the Journal of the Association for Nepal and Himalayan Studies by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@Macalester College. For more information, please contact [email protected]. region. The broader context of McKay’s questions posed by the texts, nuanced and critical reading of various Pali references to ‘Kelasa’ in early oral and textual narratives around Indic Buddhist texts do not support Kailas is state power and contestation. the modern Buddhist understanding that Kailas is the home of the Tantric There are four sections in the book, deity Demchok/Chakrasamvara. The which are laid out in line with the geographical locations of the modern defining principles that Kailas- day Kailas and the Kelasa of Pali texts Mansarovaris not “a place of timeless also seem dissimilar. sanctity” (p. 452) and that “there is no one Kailas history to be discov- In the second section, “Kailas ered” (p. 10). In the first section, titled of ,” our attention is “Indic Histories,” the author examines extended to the western Himalayas, how Kailas and Mansarovar figure southwest of Mount Kailas where in Sanskrit and Pali Indic texts. He at least five different mountains or Kailas Histories: Renunciate situates Kailas in a wider early pan- smaller ranges are currently identi- Traditions and the Construction of Asian context of sacred mountains and fied by the toponym Kailas. We are Himalayan Sacred Geography. renunciate traditions and moves on to given a glimpse into their local and analyse references in Sanskritic texts to regional histories. These mountains are Alex McKay. Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2015. ritual specialists who enabled terri- united in the author’sconceptualiza- 530 pages. ISBN 9789004304581. torial expansion into the Himalayas. tion of a western Himalayan Cultural He points out that while there are no Complex defined by the resilience Reviewed by Himani Upadhyaya specific references to Kailas in the of the indigenous territorial deity Kailas Histories is a very timely and Vedas, in the epics and Puranas Kailas system in dynamic interaction with the well-researched book on an ‘age-old’ often gets invoked only as a toponym Sanskritic and Tibetan politico-cultural Himalayan sacred site which has gained in a metaphorical or mythical sense centres. Similar to the case of Kailas- immense popularity in recent times: without earthly connotations. Moving Mansarovar, he observes that at most Mount Kailas (6,660 m) and the lakes of to the medieval period, he discusses of these sacred sites, it is actually a Mansarovar and Rakas Tal in the south- how various Tantric renunciates in Naga lake that predates the veneration western corner of the Tibetan plateau. their search for alchemical agents were of the . Additionally, provid- The book is of particular appeal for drawn to this region as a part of a larger ing patronage to Shaivaite renunciates researchers working on the western circuit spanning through the western who venerated a local mountain as Himalayas and Tibet. It is a result of Himalayas and Tibet. It is only from the the abode of was in some cases a nearly three decades of critical engage- eighteenth century CE onwards that strategy to legitimize regional political ment by the author with an impressive clear and conclusive historical refer- authority on the Sanskritic pan-Indian range of textual and non-textual ences of renunciates (particularly of the model. A closer look at the regional sources as well as anthropological Giri order) reaching the Kailas region histories of these Kailas mountains field research. As the subtitle suggests, emerge. The modern understanding also reveals that renunciates remained McKay identifies Shaivaite and Tibetan of Kailas-Mansarovar as the abode of relevant even during the period of renunciates who ventured beyond the Shiva, accessible to ordinary Hindu modern scientific geography as they “known and tamed world” (p. 448) as pilgrims, emerges in a peculiar context re-imagined, re-invented and re-cre- key historical actors in the construc- between the late eighteenth and early ated earlier bodies of knowledge in line tion of Kailas-Manasarovar as a sacred nineteenth century CE. Similar to with newer contexts (p. 225). Swami

HIMALAYA Volume 37, Number 2 | 143 Kailas Histories is encyclopedic in its scope. It takes the reader on a long and exciting Himalayan journey that traverses many texts and persons, both mythical and historical, in different time periods.

Himani Upadhyaya on Kailas Histories: Renunciate Traditions and the Construction of Himalayan Sacred Geography

Tapovan and Swami Pranavananda inscribed the of his tutelary and exciting Himalayan journey that were two such modern English- deity Demchok onto the landscape traverses many texts and persons, both educated renunciates who contributed and for having ‘opened’ the site to the mythical and historical, in different significantly to the elevation of the householder-pilgrim, extending access time periods. During all of it, the status of Sri Kailas in Gangotri and to beyond just the Tantric renunciate. author remains firmly anchored in Mount Kailas, respectively. critical historical analysis, which is the McKay’s study further argues strength of this work. This is well- Narratives that gained prominence in convincingly that the status of Kailas- exhibited in the painstaking attention the modern period, however, silenced Mansarovar gets significantly elevated to detail given in the footnotes of the non-Indic understandings of Tise, to a wider audience under the specific- book (see, for example, n.13, p. 276). the toponym Tibetans use to identify ities of the colonial context in the early This work benefits greatly from the the mountain now widely known as twentieth century CE. The last section author’s prior expertise and knowledge Kailas. The third section of the book of the book, “Modern Histories,” on Anglo-Tibet relations and extends is about “Tibetan Histories.” McKay situates key persons and their writ- it further by drawing into its fold his points out that like the Indic sources, ings (including English translations) own field visits and interviews with key it is only in the 2nd millennium CE concerning the Kailas-Mansarovar persons. Though it is well-illustrated that Tibetan sources give us evidence region. He delineates how the often- with a set of nine maps, the focus for Tise being a great sacred site. The cited travel account Western Tibet and of each map is within the western earliest references to the sacredness the British Borderland (1906) by the Himalayas and Tibet, thereby assuming of the region are infact related with British official C.A. Sherring was actu- the reader’s familiarity with the subject the Mapham (Mansarovar) lake rather ally strategically intended to stimulate of study. The book is a commendable than Tise and suggest an association to Kailas-Mansarovar as a contribution to the history of the with the Naga lakes of the western possible source of increased revenue Himalayas and Tibet. Its translation Himalayan Cultural Complex. He from a predominantly mountainous into other languages would greatly maintains that the absence of histori- British territory. Colonial interests benefit the scholarship emerging cal records for western Tibet prior to in the expansion of the empire drew from the regions that are a subject of the 7th century C.E. is noteworthy and upon wider contemporary discourses McKay’s study. thus situates later and Buddhist of timelessness imposed on Tibet narratives of Tise in the context of the which also shaped the accounts of Himani Upadhyaya holds an M.Phil. in politics of state and identity formation the Swedish explorer Sven Hedin’s modern Indian History from Jawaharlal in western Tibet. While doing so, he ventures in western Tibet. With the Nehru University, India. Her research avoids approaching his subject through spread of the Theosophist movement revolved around aspects of colonial an easy antagonistic binary between and the publication of Bhagwan Shri power and knowledge in the Himalayan an indigenous Bon and dominant Hamsa’s The Holy Mountain in 1934, borderland of British Kumaon-Tibet in the . He identifies renunciates Kailas was subsumed within universal nineteenth century CE. She is currently as important agents here too – as esoteric associations.The subsequent working at the International Centre revealed by the story of how Tise was travel account of a German Buddhist, for Integrated Mountain Development Buddhacized as a result of the victory of Lama Anagorika Govinda, gave full (ICIMOD), Nepal and has previously been the Buddhist renunciate Milarepa over fruition to Kailas-Mansarovar as a New a part of the Kailash Sacred Landscape the Bon renunciate Naro Bonchung in Age universal spiritual center no longer Conservation and Development Initiative at a contest of magical powers. Further, restricted to Asian . ICIMOD and the Sacred Himalaya Initiative the renunciate of the Drukpa sect, of the India China Institute, The New School Kailas Histories is encyclopedic in its Gotsangpa, is credited with having University, USA. scope. It takes the reader on a long

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