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'Newar Buddhism and Its Hierarchy of Ritual' by David Gellner

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'Newar Buddhism and Its Hierarchy of Ritual' by David Gellner HIMALAYA, the Journal of the Association for Nepal and Himalayan Studies Volume 16 Number 1 Himalayan Research Bulletin No. 1 & Article 15 2 1996 Book review of 'Newar Buddhism and its Hierarchy of Ritual' by David Gellner Theodore Riccardi Jr. Columbia University Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/himalaya Recommended Citation Riccardi, Theodore Jr.. 1996. Book review of 'Newar Buddhism and its Hierarchy of Ritual' by David Gellner. HIMALAYA 16(1). Available at: https://digitalcommons.macalester.edu/himalaya/vol16/iss1/15 This Book 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]. Contested Hierarchies opens with an excellent occurred since the emergence of the Peoples' Movement introduction By David Gellner which summarizes the in 1990, the rapid 'development' which has occurred valley's historical background and the contemporary since 1951, as well as the overcrowding, inadequate context of Newar society. The central chapters trace out drainage, pollution, traffic jams, water and electrical most of the major Newar caste groups: Buddhist shortages, and soaring land prices that have become a merchants and priests, urban Sresthas, village patrons, part of everyday life since the 1980's. This lacuna is Brahman kingly councilors, and various low castes such not really the fault of the authors, considering that most as the Citrakars. Chapters Six and Eight by Gerard of the field work was done before these changes became Toffin are extremely useful because so little of this so drastic. Still, a welcome supplement to the book eminent ethnographer's work has been translated into would be a second volume which takes Nepal's English. Chapter two by Todd Lewis on the Buddhist contemporary history into account, while still Merchants of Asan Twah, is also exciting, because of concentrating on indigenous social structures. Such a how it so clearly contextualises the Uray in a specific work could discuss how Newars are using older social geographic and historical location. Declan Quigley patterns to negotiate new trends in social mobility, the concludes Contested Hierarchies with a relaxation of caste barriers, and the rise of ethnic comparative analysis which locates Newar caste identity based on culture and language. It should be structures within a wider scholarly context. Quigley stressed, that my concluding criticism is offered as illustrates the necessity of using examples of caste from constructive response, and in no way diminishes the the Kathmandu Valley for wider theoretical debates. book's importance. In fact, I hope the authors take it to heart, and produce a second volume which highlights While Contested Hierarchies is a welcome such contemporary changes. addition to Nepalese and South Asian studies, one feature of the book slightly diminishes its effectiveness. Gregory Price Grieve Except Todd Lewis' chapter, the book tends to ignore University of Chicago contemporary history. The radical changes which have Monk, Householder, and Tantric Priest. Newar Buddhism and its Hierarchy of Ritual. David N. Gellner. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992. Pp. xxiii + 428, 12 Plates. The Newars have had as much scholarly attention, that has existed for so long in the literature of Buddhist perhaps more, than any group living in Nepal. One studies. It gives, as far as I know, the most complete thinks immediately of the large works of Gerard Toffin, description of Newar Buddhism that is now in print. It Robert Levy, Siegfried Lienhard, Dhanavajra is essentially a synchronic work, though it uses history Vajracharya, Kamal Prakas Malia, and John Locke, but in a variety of ways. also of the numerous smaller if no less important Gellner's first chapter is devoted to his aims and contributions of Todd Lewis, Declan Quigley, Niels methods. In addition to the goals I have alluded to Gutschow, Michael Witzel, and many others. And of above, the author is interested in showing how Newar course, David Gellner. Already well known through a Buddhism relates to other kinds of Buddhism, in series of excellent articles and papers, Gellner particular Theravada Buddhism, and to Hinduism, establishes himself with this work as one of the major particularly as the latter can be defined in Nepal. His students of Newar Buddhism. Much of the field work for theory and methodology are influenced by the writings it was done over a period of nineteen months from 1982 of Durkheim, Weber, Evans-Pritchard, and Dumont, on to 1984 and was continued in later trips to Nepal in '85, caste and religion and by Sylvain Levi, among many, '86 and '89. Originally written as a doctoral dissertation on Nepal. at Oxford, the work that we have is considerably expanded and revised from its dissertation form. The site In the succeeding chapters, Gellner moves through for the research was Patan, though the author lived in caste and religious affiliation (chapter 2), the relation of Kathmandu during his brief visit in 1989. Hinduism and Buddhism (chapter 3), the basic notions of Newar Buddhism (chapter 4), and its basic rituals This is a long, careful narrative, one that contains (chapter 5). He sees as part of his central task the much that is interesting methodologically, one that is creation of a conceptual framework that is not imposed rich in detail. It will benefit all who give it the on his subject from without. Thus, he tells us, his thoughtful reading and study that it deserves. There is approach is at least in part an ernie one, an attempt to almost no issue, no concept, no argument concerning include "not just what people do, but what they think the intricacies of Buddhism in the Kathmandu Valley they are doing. Since Newars view their religion that the author does not touch on and attempt to answer. primarily as a set of practices, it is ritual and custom In that sense, it fulfills its mission to provide a general that hold the centre stage." (p. 3) He also takes pains to statement about Newar Buddhism, thus filling a gap 58 HIMALAYAN RESEARCH BULLETIN XVI (1-2) 1996 give agency to his informants, such as Asha Kaji monasticism in the history of Nepal, though he is less VaJracharya, whose words are quoted and views credited. definite in his position. He is aware of, and rejects, the It is through this emic process that the book analyzes Snellgrovian vision of Patan at some point in its past Newar Buddhism through the institutions of monk, as a vast university town, a vision that has part of its householder, and tantric priest. These Three Ways, "a source possibly in Sankalia's unfortunate book on fundamental Newar Buddhist schema", organize the Nalanda, part of it in the notions of a pure monastic major part of the description (chapters 6 through 10). Buddhism as the real Buddhism and all other forms as Chapter II discusses the uses of tantra, its places "degenerate" . All this is to the good. But one needs to within Hinduism and Buddhism. its relation to healers. take an even harder look at the paltry evidence that mediums, and witches, and finally the decline of Tantric supports the view that there ever was widespread Buddhism. celibate monkhood and extensive monasteries as corporate institutions in Nepal, particularly as Gellner In the final chapter, entitled Social and Religious presents that evidence. Inscriptional evidence of the Hierarchies, Gellner lists the general themes that by this Li~chavi period is at best ambiguous, subject to the point "have emerged from the material and have been usual problems of Sanskrit polysemy and interpretation, used to organize it." These are that "(i) Newar Buddhism and the vamsavalis have very little, if any, evidentiary stands somewhere between Theravada Buddhism and value on this point, Sthiti Malia and Shankaracharya Hinduism; but it is significantly different from both; notwithstanding. Available architecture tells us nothing, (ii) The hierarchy of the Three Ways provides a and, while negative arguments are never conclusive, the framework which integrates and makes sense of the lack in Nepal of a long, creative, original intellectual diverse practices which make up Newar Buddhism; (iii) and philosophical Buddhist tradition of text and There are different, hierarchically ordered levels of commentary, as one finds those traditions in India and mterpretation of the same rite. (iv) Newar data support Tibet, should surely give one pause -- unless one is an analytical clistmction between three hierarchically willing to assume that all the Buddhist literature that is ordered types of religion, a distinction which may indeed found in Nepal is a Nepalese creation. Indeed, one could he universally valid: between soteriology and worldly argue plausibly that Newar Buddhism chose, as in religion, in the first place, and within the latter between Kashmir, a non-celibate way for its religious virtuosi at social religion and instrumental religion ... These a very early moment rather than a later one, one that themes mterlock and each supports the others." (P. 337) made sense in the social and political context of Nepal, Finally, Gellner is firm, and I think correct, in his and one that may indeed explain, at least in part, the conclusion that Newar Buddhism is a distinctive form of survival of Newar Buddhism. Buddhism and is not merely a form of Hinduism. It is not a mere "buddhized aspect of contemporaneous This last point leads me directly to Gellner's Nepalese Hinduism, as Greenwald would have it, interpretation of Max Weber. Gellner remarks at the following La Vallee Poussin", nor is it really outset of his book that Weber underestimated "the comparable to the married Saivite renouncers described degree to which Buddhism always was a religion of the by Bouiller (p.
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