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REL 3337 Religions in Modern India Vasudha Narayanan
1 REL 3337 Religions in Modern India Vasudha Narayanan, Distinguished Professor, Religion [email protected] (Please use email for all communications) Office hours: Wednesdays 2:00-3:00 pm and by appointment Credits: 3 credit hours Course Term: Fall 2018 Class Meeting Time: M Period 9 (4:05 PM - 4:55 PM) AND 0134 W Period 8 - 9 (3:00 PM - 4:55 PM) In this course, you will learn about the religious and cultural diversity in the sub-continent, and understand the history of religion starting with the colonial period. We will study the major religious thinkers, many of whom had an impact on the political history of India. We will study the rites-of-passage, connections between food and religion, places of worship, festivals, gurus, as well as the close connections between religion and politics in many of these traditions. The religious traditions we will examine and intellectually engage with are primarily Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism, as well as Christianity and Islam in India. We will strike a balance between a historical approach and a thematic one whereby sacraments, rituals, and other issues and activities that are religiously important for a Hindu family can be explained. This will include discussion of issues that may not be found in traditional texts, and I will supplement the readings with short journal and magazine articles, videos, and slides. The larger questions indirectly addressed in the course will include the following: Are the Indian concepts of "Hinduism" and western concepts of "religion" congruent? How ha colonial scholarship and assumptions shaped our understanding of South Asian Hindus and the "minority traditions" as distinct religious and social groups, blurring regional differences? How are gender issues made manifest in rituals? How does religious identity influence political and social behavior? How do Hindus in South Asia differentiate among themselves? Course Goals When you complete this course, you will be able to: 1. -
HINDUISM in EUROPE Stockholm 26-28 April, 2017 Abstracts
HINDUISM IN EUROPE Stockholm 26-28 April, 2017 Abstracts 1. Vishwa Adluri, Hunter College, USA Sanskrit Studies in Germany, 1800–2015 German scholars came late to Sanskrit, but within a quarter century created an impressive array of faculties. European colleagues acknowledged Germany as the center of Sanskrit studies on the continent. This chapter examines the reasons for this buildup: Prussian university reform, German philological advances, imagined affinities with ancient Indian and, especially, Aryan culture, and a new humanistic model focused on method, objectivity, and criticism. The chapter’s first section discusses the emergence of German Sanskrit studies. It also discusses the pantheism controversy between F. W. Schlegel and G. W. F. Hegel, which crucially influenced the German reception of Indian philosophy. The second section traces the German reception of the Bhagavad Gītā as a paradigmatic example of German interpretive concerns and reconstructive methods. The third section examines historic conflicts and potential misunderstandings as German scholars engaged with the knowledge traditions of Brahmanic Hinduism. A final section examines wider resonances as European scholars assimilated German methods and modeled their institutions and traditions on the German paradigm. The conclusion addresses shifts in the field as a result of postcolonial criticisms, epistemic transformations, critical histories, and declining resources. 2. Milda Ališauskienė, Vytautas Magnus University, Lithuania “Strangers among Ours”: Contemporary Hinduism in Lithuania This paper analyses the phenomenon of contemporary Hinduism in Lithuania from a sociological perspective; it aims to discuss diverse forms of Hindu expression in Lithuanian society and public attitudes towards it. Firstly, the paper discusses the history and place of contemporary Hinduism within the religious map of Lithuania. -
Cow Care in Hindu Animal Ethics Kenneth R
THE PALGRAVE MACMILLAN ANIMAL ETHICS SERIES Cow Care in Hindu Animal Ethics Kenneth R. Valpey The Palgrave Macmillan Animal Ethics Series Series Editors Andrew Linzey Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics Oxford, UK Priscilla N. Cohn Pennsylvania State University Villanova, PA, USA Associate Editor Clair Linzey Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics Oxford, UK In recent years, there has been a growing interest in the ethics of our treatment of animals. Philosophers have led the way, and now a range of other scholars have followed from historians to social scientists. From being a marginal issue, animals have become an emerging issue in ethics and in multidisciplinary inquiry. Tis series will explore the challenges that Animal Ethics poses, both conceptually and practically, to traditional understandings of human-animal relations. Specifcally, the Series will: • provide a range of key introductory and advanced texts that map out ethical positions on animals • publish pioneering work written by new, as well as accomplished, scholars; • produce texts from a variety of disciplines that are multidisciplinary in character or have multidisciplinary relevance. More information about this series at http://www.palgrave.com/gp/series/14421 Kenneth R. Valpey Cow Care in Hindu Animal Ethics Kenneth R. Valpey Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies Oxford, UK Te Palgrave Macmillan Animal Ethics Series ISBN 978-3-030-28407-7 ISBN 978-3-030-28408-4 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-28408-4 © Te Editor(s) (if applicable) and Te Author(s) 2020. Tis book is an open access publication. Open Access Tis book is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made. -
Christ-Centered Bhakti:A Literary and Ethnographic Study of Worship
Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies Volume 32 Discussion of Nathaniel Roberts, To Be Cared For: The Power of Conversion and Article 5 Foreignness of Belonging to An Indian Slum. 2019 Christ-Centered Bhakti:A Literary and Ethnographic Study of Worship Nadya Pohran University of Cambridge Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.butler.edu/jhcs Recommended Citation Pohran, Nadya (2019) "Christ-Centered Bhakti:A Literary and Ethnographic Study of Worship," Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies: Vol. 32, Article 5. Available at: https://doi.org/10.7825/2164-6279.1731 The Journal of Hindu-Christian Studies is a publication of the Society for Hindu-Christian Studies. The digital version is made available by Digital Commons @ Butler University. For questions about the Journal or the Society, please contact [email protected]. For more information about Digital Commons @ Butler University, please contact [email protected]. Pohran: Christ-Centered Bhakti:A Literary and Ethnographic Study of Worsh Christ-Centered Bhakti: A Literary and Ethnographic Study of Worship Nadya Pohran Abstract: Bhakti (loving devotion) centered on commonly known expressions—most of which and directed to Jesus Christ—or what I here are in Hindu contexts. call "Christ-centred bhakti"—is an The second half of this paper focuses on increasingly popular religious practice in Christ-centered bhakti, drawing from both India and elsewhere. The first half of this ethnographic fieldwork and literary analysis, paper seeks to explore some of the roots of the and explores how Christ-centered bhakti can contemporary spiritual practice of bhakti be situated within bhakti’s broader historical poetry which has been written and/or is being and literary expressions. -
The Living Traditions of Hindu Yoga Fall 2013 Prof
Images from 1.thesecretofom.com/chakras.html-Image;2.shaivismtoday.blogspot.com/2010_04_01_archive.html;3. www.stephen- knapp.com/krishna_print_fifty.htm; http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_dkGlaUn1src/TTnBYVzBJrI/AAAAAAAAAbc/v4QIAiDxOhQ/s320/Radha-Krishna.jpeg ARLT 100g | Section 35249R Arts and Letters: The Living Traditions of Hindu Yoga Fall 2013 Prof. Rita D. Sherma | Office: ACB 233 Rel. Office Tel: 213-740-0272 COURSE DESCRIPTION Yoga is now practiced globally and has extensive branches in the West. The interpretations and adaptations of yoga in the West are almost exclusively associated with fitness and wellness in the popular imagination. Yet, the history of yoga includes but surpasses wellness. Yoga, with millennia-old roots in the Hindu spiritual ethos, has traditionally been understood to represent major types of paths, each meant to lead the practitioner to enlightenment, and the fulfillment of the human potential defined differently by different yoga traditions. This course will study the living traditions of Hindu yoga, including the paths of knowledge, wisdom, love, and selfless service, and explore the yogic journey through its narrative literature, philosophy, art, music, and contemporary research on yogic states of consciousness. COURSE MEETINGS Day and Time: M W 2:00 – 3:20 PM Location: VKC 252 Final Exam: final research paper due in lieu of final exam in last class on December 4th. COURSE OBJECTIVES *To develop skills for critical analysis through deep engagement with works that show the different ways in which yoga has been -
Body, Mind and Spirit: a Therapeutic Turn in Muslim-Majority Kosovo
OCCHIALÌ – RIVISTA SUL MEDITERRANEO ISLAMICO (N.5/2019) Body, Mind and Spirit: A Therapeutic Turn in Muslim-majority Kosovo Cecilie Endresen Abstract: Yoga, meditation, guru movements, and alternative healing that combine elements from a variety of religious traditions are gaining ground all over the world. Also a lot of Muslims and people with a Muslim background are currently practicing health and body practices informed by non-Islamic traditions and contemporary New Age spirituality. Over the last years, “mind-body-spirit”-oriented activities and discourses have become more widespread also among Muslims in the Balkans. In Kosovo, which has more than 90% Muslims, a lot of people with surnames Mehmeti, Bajrami and Ramadani, indicating a Muslim family background, are using alternative body techniques and therapies involving controlled breathing, mindful meditation, and prescribed postures. Their motivation can vary: subjective wellbeing, health benefits, spiritual self-awareness and/or personal growth. To what extent people emphasise the spiritual and religious dimensions of their practice can vary considerably, and be situational (Gilhus 1999, 45). Based on available electronic sources and fieldwork data, this article provides a snapshot of this field in contemporary Kosovo, and discusses the local reception of yoga, meditation, and neo-Hindu guru movements. This shows we are witnessing the development of a “holistic milieu” in a traditionally Muslim population. Keywords: Yoga – Kosovo – Meditation – New Age *** INTRODUCTION Studies of Islam in contemporary Kosovo tend to focus on Wahhabbism, Salafism, and Jihadism: fundamentalist, strict and “loud” forms of Islam with hard boundaries. At the same time, a silent, “invisible” change is taking place in the traditionally Muslim population. -
Wandering Religious Poets in India, Tibet, and Japan
This book consists of seven chapters on the subject Songs on the Road of poetry and itinerancy within the religious Songs on the Road traditions of India, Tibet, and Japan from ancient to modern times. The chapters look, each from Wandering Religious Poets in India, Tibet, and Japan a different angle, at how itinerancy is reflected in religious poetry, what are the purposes of the wanderers’ poems or songs, and how the wandering poets relate to local communities, Edholm (Eds.) af Larsson & Kristoffer Stefan sacred geography, and institutionalized religion. We encounter priest-poets in search of munificent patrons, renouncers and yogins who sing about the bliss and hardship of wandering alone in the wilderness, Hindu pilgrims and opponents of pilgrimage, antinomian Buddhist-Tantric poets from Bengal, and the originator of the haiku. We are led along roads travelled by many, as well as paths tread by few. Edited by Stefan Larsson & Kristoffer af Edholm Songs on the Road Wandering Religious Poets in India, Tibet, and Japan Edited by Stefan Larsson & Kristoffer af Edholm Published by Stockholm University Press Stockholm University SE-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden www.stockholmuniversitypress.se Text © The Author(s) 2021 License CC-BY 4.0 Supporting Agency (funding): Vetetenskapsrådet (The Swedish Research Council) and Riksbankens Jubileumsfond Grant number: Vetetenskapsrådet, projekt, 2013-1421 (”Utanför klostrets murar”) Riksbankens Jubileumsfond, projekt, P19-0419:1 (”Frihetssånger”) First published 2021 Cover Illustration: A Wandering Shaivite -
Hindu Mythology – of Gods, Sages & Cowherd Maidens
Hindu Mythology, Religion 4990 1 HINDU MYTHOLOGY – OF GODS, SAGES & COWHERD MAIDENS _____________________________________________________________________ Jonathan B. Edelmann, Ph.D. Philosophy & Religion Department 53 Morgan Ave, (662) 325-2382 Office HoUrs: 11-12 AM, T & H [email protected] ABOUT THIS COURSE This course examines Classical Myth in the Hindu Traditions, or the narrations about the Gods, Goddesses, Sages, Kings and Queens of Indian, which form the basis for Hindu religious practice, theology and self-identity. H. Rodrigues writes: “While the term ‘myth’ is commonly used to mean a false belief, religious studies scholars use it to refer to narratives that are believed to be true by adherents of a particular tradition” (Introduction to the Study of Religion). The Greek word mythos meant “authoritative speech,” “story” or “plot,” but today scholars mean it as “a traditional story with collective importance.” Ancient and contemporary Hindus take myths seriously; this course provides an overview of the central divine characters, stories, and imagery found in Hindu sacred literature. We will examine the manner in which mythology teaches central Hindu philosophical, cosmological and theological concepts. Known for its richness, spirituality and imaginative beauty, we will examine how divine myth, yoga practice and theology are intertwined in some of humanity’s oldest reflections on absolute reality. TEXTBOOKS (1) KLAUS KLOSTERMAIER, A Survey of Hinduism (SUNY). (2) DAVID KINGSLEY, Hindu Goddesses: Visions of the Divine Feminine in the Hindu Religious Tradition (University of California Press). (3) GRAHAM SCHWEIG, Dance of Divine Love: The Rāsā-Līlā of Krishna from the Bhāgavata Purāna (Princeton University Press). (4) Optional – WENDY DONIGER, Hindu Myths (Penguin). -
Vaishnavism, Antievolutionism, And
VAISHNAVISM, ANTIEVOLUTIONISM AND AMBIGUITIES: REVISITING ISKCON’S DARWIN- SKEPTICISM by Oliver Zambon and Thomas Aechtner Oliver Zambon is a PhD Candidate at the University of Queensland, School of Historical and Philosophical Inquiry, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, St. Lucia, Australia; email: [email protected]. Thomas Aechtner is Lecturer in Religion and Science, University of Queensland, School of Historical and Philosophical Inquiry, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, St. Lucia, Australia; email: [email protected]. The International Society of Krishna Consciousness, commonly known as the Hare Krishna Movement or ISKCON, was founded in 1966 by the religious leader A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada. After gathering a counterculture following in the United States, the Hare Krishnas spread from New York City to the rest of the country, before mustering an international community of adherents. This, in part, because the movement attracted several high-profile celebrities such as Allen Ginsberg and members of The Beatles. Celebrating its fiftieth year anniversary in 2016, the Hare Krishnas now claim to have “five hundred major centers, temples and rural communities, nearly one hundred affiliated vegetarian restaurants, thousands of namahattas or local meeting groups, a wide variety of community projects, and millions of congregational members worldwide” (iskcon.org 2014a). Intriguingly, ISKCON has not only represented an emergent form of Western Hinduism, but Bhaktivedanta and his Hare Krishna followers have also frequently been associated with vocal objections towards modern science. This is the author manuscript accepted for publication and has undergone full peer review but has not been through the copyediting, typesetting, pagination and proofreading process, which may lead to differences between this version and the Version of Record. -
Conversion and Ritualisation: an Analysis of How Westerners Enter the International Society for Krishna Consciousness and Assimilate Its Values and Practices
Conversion and Ritualisation: an Analysis of How Westerners Enter the International Society for Krishna Consciousness and Assimilate its Values and Practices A thesis submitted to the University of Wales Trinity Saint David In fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2016 Luc De Backer Acknowledgements I would like to thank all those who have supported me on my way. My gratitude to my supervisor Maya Warrier for her encouragements and five years of continued guidance, and to my second supervisor Bettina Schmidt for her valuable advice. My gratitude also goes to Kenneth Valpey, Matylda Obryk, Nima Gajjar, and Rogier Vrieling for proof reading my chapters and to all ISKCON devotees who have participated in this project. I also offer my special gratitude to Hridaya Chaitanya Dasa, ISKCON GBC Zonal Secretary for Spain, France, and the Benelux, for authorising me to conduct this research and to Yadunandana Swami for his encouragement to take up this scholarly endeavour. 2 Abstract The central aim of my thesis is to examine the processes by which individuals from a Western background enter the International Society for Krishna Consciousnes (ISKCON), a transnational religious movement with its roots in Chaitanya Vaishnavism, a Hindu tradition originating in India. The central argument of my research is that extant models of conversion do not do justice to the process by which individuals enter ISKCON and assimilate its values, beliefs, and practices. This thesis thus critically examines conversion models/theories and seeks to refine our understanding of conversion, especially in relation to groups in which everyday ritual practice plays a central role. -
Religious Experiments in Colonial Calcutta
FERDINANDO SARDELLA Religious experiments in colonial Calcutta Modern Hinduism and bhakti among the Indian middle class alcutta, 1874: it was one hundred and nine years since the British East India CCompany had taken possession of Bengal, sixteen years since the British Raj officially took over its rule and seventy-three years before Indian inde- pendence.1 A vast and ancient civilisation lived under the rule of the inhabit- ants of a small North Atlantic island, who had managed to project their cul- ture, their religion—and their economic interests—into almost every corner of the globe. It was a time when India was the jewel in the crown of the British Raj and Calcutta had been transformed into a Eurasian metropolis second only to London itself. 1874 was also the year when Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī, a Vaishnava of the devotional (bhakti) school of Chaitanya (1486–1534), was born; he died sixty-three years later in 1937. The span of his lifetime was en- trenched in circumstances and events that occurred in and around the city of Calcutta and came to shape the foundation of what is generally known as ‘modern Hinduism’ (the term ‘Hinduism’ will be discussed more in detail at the end of the chapter). For this reason, these years will serve as a suitable focus for this chapter.2 The year 1874 came round at a time of transition in India, when events that began more than a century earlier had started to produce novel patterns of change. In 1757 the Battle of Plassey had paved the way for total domin- ation, as Britain won over French influences in the East. -
I Challenging Advaitic and Universalist Notions of Hinduism By
Challenging Advaitic and Universalist Notions of Hinduism by Akshay Gupta Graduate Program in Religion Duke University Date:_______________________ Approved: ___________________________ David Need, Supervisor ___________________________ Leela Prasad ___________________________ Graham Schweig Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in the Graduate Program in Religion of Duke University 2019 i v ABSTRACT Challenging Advaitic and Universalist Notions of Hinduism by Akshay Gupta Graduate Program in Religion Duke University Date:_______________________ Approved: ___________________________ David Need, Supervisor ___________________________ Leela Prasad ___________________________ Graham Schweig An abstract of a thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in the Graduate Program in Religion of Duke University 2019 Copyright by Akshay Gupta 2019 Abstract Within the academic study of Hinduism, there is a tendency to misrepresent Indian religion by portraying it as entirely Advaita Vedānta, the monistic ideology commonly associated with Śaṅkara. By looking at reasons for Advaita Vedānta’s popularity as well as the history of Vaiṣṇavism, this paper will challenge claims that Hinduism is best represented by Advaita Vedānta. Ultimately, what I find is that Hinduism is better used as a broad category for the varieties of diverse Indian religious expression, rather than as a single unified ideology that defines itself in terms of Advaita Vedānta. iv