The feminization of love and the indwelling of god: Theological investigations across indic contexts

Our essay is a thematic exploration of the malleability of idioms, imageries, and affectivities of Hindu bhakti across the borderlines of certain Indic worldviews. We highlight the theological motif of the feminine-feminised quest of the seeker (virahiṇī) for her divine beloved in some Hindu expressions shaped by the paradigmatic scriptural text Bhāgavata-purāṇa and in some Punjabi Sufi articulations of the transcendent God’s innermost presence to the pilgrim self. The leitmotif that the divine reality is the “intimate stranger” who cannot be humanly grasped and who is yet already present in the recesses of the virahiṇī’s self is expressed with distinctive inflections both in bhakti-based Vedānta and in some Indo-Muslim spiritual universes. This study is also an exploration of some of the common conceptual currencies of devotional subjectivities that cannot be straightforwardly cast into the monolithic moulds of “Hindu” or “Muslim” in pre-modern South Asia. Thus, we highlight the essentially contested nature of the categories of “Hinduism” and “Indian Islam” by indicating that they should be regarded as dynamic clusters of constellated concepts whose contours have been often reshaped through concrete socio-historical contestations, borrowings, and adaptations on the fissured lands of al-Hind.</jats:p

Critical Edition of the Gha&#7789;akharpara&#7789;&#299;k&#257; attributed to T&#257;r&#257;candra

Critical edition of an unpublished Sanskrit tex

Bhakti Religion and Tantric Magic in Mughal India: Kacchvahas, Ramanandis, and Naths, circa 1500-1700

This dissertation sheds new light on the nature and development of Hindu devotional religiosity (bhakti) by drawing attention to bhakti's understudied historical relationships with Tantra, Yoga, and Sufism. Specifically, this thesis explains the phenomenal rise of bhakti in early modern north India as a process of identity and community formation fundamentally connected to Sufi-inflected critiques of tantric and yogic religiosity. With the advent of the Mughal Empire in the sixteenth century, new alliances--most notably Akbar's with the Kacchvaha royal clan of Amer--led to the development of a joint Mughal-Rajput court culture and religio-political idiom in which Vaishnava bhakti institutional forms became key symbols of power and deportment, and thus bhakti communities became beneficiaries of extensive patronage. Through a study of the life and works of the important but little-known bhakti poet-saint Agradas, this thesis offers insight into how these bhakti communities competed for patronage and followers. If the rise of bhakti was inseparable from Mughal socio-political developments, it was also contingent upon the successful formation of a new bhakti identity. This thesis centers on the Ramanandi community at Galta, comparing them with the Nath yogis to show the development of this bhakti identity, one defined especially in opposition to the "other" of the tantric yogi and shakta. It also contributes a broad study of early modern bhakti poetry and hagiography demonstrating the rise of new, Sufi-inflected, exclusivist bhakti attitudes that stigmatized key aspects of tantric and yogic religiosity, and that therein prefigured orientalist-colonialist depictions of bhakti as "religion" and Tantra as "magic.

Kingship, Poetry, and Devotion in a Medieval Kāvya from Kashmir: Maṅkha and his Śrīkaṇṭhacarita

The present doctoral thesis examines the court poem (mahākāvya) Śrīkaṇṭhacarita, composed by the poet Maṅkha in the twelfth century, during the reign of Jayasiṃha (1128-1155) in Kashmir. The work has been only partially translated, into German, by Walter Slaje, and deserves a more in-depth study from both an exegetical and philological perspective. The first part of this dissertation consists of an introductory thematic journey on the concepts of kingship, poetry, and devotion that have emerged both from the study of the autobiographical and historical sargas (the second, third, and twenty-fifth) and from the analysis of four other cantos, which have been selected on the basis of their content: in the fourth sarga, the "description of Mount Kailāsa", the mountain is presented as a sovereign-poet; in the fifth sarga, the "description of the Lord", Śiva is the supreme king and object of veneration by Maṅkha; in the sixth sarga, the "description of Spring", Vasanta becomes the king of seasons; finally, in the seventeenth sarga, the "description of the assembly of Śiva and the gods", Śiva assumes royal dignity and his authority is recognized by the other deities through a philosophical hymn. The second part of this dissertation contains the first translation into a European language (in English) of the four cantos previously analyzed, each accompanied by explanatory notes. The third part, finally, is dedicated to the philological study of the text. A detailed description of the printed editions and manuscripts of the Śrīkaṇṭhacarita is followed by the critical edition of the mūla text of the four cantos, while a final section explores the uncertain passages of the only existing commentary, that of Jonarāja from the fifteenth century. More generally, this research aims to renew interest in the study of Sanskrit court poems and the Śrīkaṇṭhacarita in particular, not as standardized and monolithic literary works, but as living and contextual ones

Theatre and Its Other: Abhinavagupta on Dance and Dramatic Acting

What is Dance? What is Theatre? What is the boundary between enacting a character and narrating a story? When does movement become tinted with meaning? And when does beauty shine alone as if with no object? These universal aesthetic questions find a theoretically vibrant and historically informed set of replies in the oeuvre of the eleventh-century Kashmirian author Abhinavagupta. The present book offers the first critical edition, translation, and study of a crucial and lesser known passage of his commentary on the Nāṭyaśāstra, the seminal work of Sanskrit dramaturgy. The nature of dramatic acting and the mimetic power of dance, emotions, and beauty all play a role in Abhinavagupta’s thorough investigation of performance aesthetics, now presented to the modern reader

Theatre and Its Other

In Theatre and Its Other, Elisa Ganser revisits a telling debate on the intertwined natures of dance and dramatic acting; preserved in Abhinavagupta’s eleventh-century commentary on the Nāṭyaśāstra, it reflects complex historical shifts in aesthetic theory and performance practice. ; Readership: All those interested in the history of Indian dance and theatre and in Abhinavagupta’s aesthetics, including scholars and students of Indology, performance, dance, and theatre studies, as well as performers

Sacred Sounds and Sacred Books: A History of Writing in Hindi

This dissertation combines methods from literary history, book history and religious history in order to map formerly unknown regions of Hindi literary culture in early modern North India. By sketching the broad contours of the manuscript archive and also looking closely at the material aspects and histories of individual text artifacts including notebooks, anthologies, and scriptures, it reveals connections and distinctions between audiences, genres, and canons that could not otherwise be seen. As the vernacular language of Hindi gradually came to displace the cosmopolitan language of Sanskrit as the medium of literary, scholastic and religious discourse over the fourteenth through seventeenth centuries, new configurations of oral performance practices and written manuscripts came into being; these practices and manuscripts in turn helped to consolidate new networks, and eventually bring new publics into being. For the religious communities associated with bhakti in particular, the process of vernacularization opened up opportunities for innovation concerning genre and style: by adopting certain literary techniques and particular inscriptional practices, these groups were able to deploy their writings as literature, scholarship, scripture, or a combination of all three. The distinctions that traditions like the Sikhs, the Dadu Panth, and the Niranjani Sampraday made between these different discourses and genres are reflected in the manuscripts that they created, and in the performance modes of which those manuscripts were a part. In the process of creating physical scriptures, they also transformed themselves into a different type of textual community

The Feminization of Love and the Indwelling of God: Theological Investigations Across Indic Contexts

Our essay is a thematic exploration of the malleability of idioms, imageries, and affectivities of Hindu bhakti across the borderlines of certain Indic worldviews. We highlight the theological motif of the feminine-feminised quest of the seeker (virahiṇī) for her divine beloved in some Hindu expressions shaped by the paradigmatic scriptural text Bhāgavata-purāṇa and in some Punjabi Sufi articulations of the transcendent God&rsquo;s innermost presence to the pilgrim self. The leitmotif that the divine reality is the &ldquo;intimate stranger&rdquo; who cannot be humanly grasped and who is yet already present in the recesses of the virahiṇī&rsquo;s self is expressed with distinctive inflections both in bhakti-based Vedānta and in some Indo-Muslim spiritual universes. This study is also an exploration of some of the common conceptual currencies of devotional subjectivities that cannot be straightforwardly cast into the monolithic moulds of &ldquo;Hindu&rdquo; or &ldquo;Muslim&rdquo; in pre-modern South Asia. Thus, we highlight the essentially contested nature of the categories of &ldquo;Hinduism&rdquo; and &ldquo;Indian Islam&rdquo; by indicating that they should be regarded as dynamic clusters of constellated concepts whose contours have been often reshaped through concrete socio-historical contestations, borrowings, and adaptations on the fissured lands of al-Hind

Unfulfilled love through the eyes of a woman - virahini in Mahadevi Varma's poetry

Praca podejmuje temat wirahini (virahiṇī), czyli kobiety pozostającej w separacji ze swoim ukochanym, w poezji Mahadewi Warmy (Mahādevī Varmā). Pierwszy rozdział ma na celu ukazanie elementów życia pisarki, które miały wpływ na stworzenie jej świata poetyckiego. Przedstawiony jest zatem opis czasów i nurtu ćhajawadu (chāyāvād), w którym tworzyła, jak i streszczony jest jej życiorys. Wstępnie ukazane są sposoby analizy oraz charakterystyka jej poezji. W następnym rozdziale zawarte są interpretacje wybranych wierszy. Mają one na celu ukazanie rozwoju świata emocjonalnego postaci wirahini, szczególną uwaga jest zatem zwrócona na uczucia oraz rozważania podmiotu lirycznego, w odniesieniu do elementów filozofii buddyzmu i adwaita-wedanty. Zakończenie podsumowuje próbę przedstawienia emocjonalnej opowieści o opuszczonej kobiecie, którą stworzyła w swojej twórczości poetka ćhajawadu.The theme of this work is the motif of virahini (virahiṇī), a woman who is in separation with her beloved, present in the poetry of Mahadevi Varma (Mahādevī Varmā). First chapter shows those elements of writer’s life, which had an impact on creation of her poetical world. Thus it describes the times of her life and the chhayavad age (chāyāvād), as well it sketches her biography. It also introduces ways of analysis and characteristics of Mahadevi’s poetry. Next chapter contains interpretations of chosen poems. The purpose is to show the development of emotional world of virahini, therefore a special attention is paid to feelings and thoughts of the lyrical subject as well, with reference to buddhist thought and advaita-vedanta philosophy. The conclusion summarizes the effort to present an emotional story of a woman who has been abandoned, created by the chhayavadi poetess, Mahadevi