Reflections on resemblance, ritual, and religion PDF
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Reflections on Resemblance, Ritual, and Religion Reflections on • Resemblance, Ritual, and Religion BRIANK.~H New York Oxford OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS 1989 Oxford U nivcrsity Press Oxford New York Toronto Delhi Bombay Calcutta Madras Karachi Petaling Jaya Singapore Hong Kong Tokyo Nairobi Dar es Salaam Cape Town Melbourne Auckland and associated companies in Berlin Ibadan Copyright© 1989 by Oxford University Press, Inc. Published by Oxford University Press, Inc., 200 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016 Oxford is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced. stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior permission of Oxford University Press. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Smith, Brian K., 1953- Reflections on resemblance, ritual, and religion/ Brian K. Smith. p. cm. Bibliography: -p. Includes indexes. ISBN 0-19-505545-4 I. Hinduism-Rituals. 2. Hinduism-Doctrines. I. Title. BLl226.12.S65 1989 294.5 '38--dc 19 88-4009 Cl P Printing (last digit): 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 I Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper To the memory of Dr. V. V. Bhide, who rectified the names: teacher, scholar, pandit, friend, host, Brahmin, father, and man. I miss him terribly. And for Wendy, who made it all more-ish. Preface Scholars of the discipline alternately labeled Comparative Religion or the History of Religions are notoriously, and sometimes dangerously, schizophrenic. I speak here not of the more ordinary academic malaise that splits the individual into two personae-teacher of the uninitiated and hair-splitting author of learned works for other specialists, friends, and fellow conventioneers. The particular bifurcation I am referring to is peculiar to a discipline that requires its adherents to address, simulta neously, two different audiences in their research reports. On the one hand, in order to be taken seriously at all in a highly territorial academic world, one must engage one or more of the estab lished bureaus of academic knowledge, such as sociology, anthropology, history ( and all its branches), area studies, Sinology, Buddhology, Indology, and ancient studies. On the other hand, one is expected as a comparativist to uncover something of comparative consequence to those in the field of religion in all its diversity. It is often a difficult tightrope to walk. I have attempted to address two audiences in this work, and I hope that by doing so I have not lost both. Straight comparativists (if I might be forgiven the oxymoron) and those simply interested in the problems and methods of an approach to religion which is neither theological nor "scientific" might find much of the Indological detail of the work tough going. Philologically oriented Indologists and other specialists in Things Indian may very well become exasperated with the introductory and concluding chapters, as well as certain portions interspersed throughout the book, in which I attempt to move out of the specifics of Vedism into the larger realm of theoretical and methodological issues pertaining to the study of religion as a whole. I will only say here that the author's Preface Vlll intention was to write a book whose parts cohered, and whose data and approach to them were in a relation of mutual resemblance. But then the author's intention these days is far from being the only criterion of either meaning or value. Although this book is meant primarily as a contribution to Indian studies, it is simultaneously an attempt to exercise one kind of interpreta tion of culturally and historically specific material from the vantage point of the discipline of Comparative Religion or the History of Reli gions. This is not simply because issues of comparative interest-the definition of religion, the nature and purpose of ritual, the dynamics of sacrifice and substitution, change and continuity in religious traditions are directly addressed at various junctures. More critically, I have tried to present the specifics of Vedism and Hinduism in such a way as to exemplify theoretical and methodological issues of general import within the larger study of religion. I have not always been explicit in my intention to make Vedism and Hinduism say something of interest to those whose professional or intel lectual attention is not usually focused on Indian culture and religion; and I have not always spared the reader the particularistic details of often very technical Sanskritic texts. I have, for all that, tried to repre sent ancient Indian religion in such a way that it might usefully serve as an "e.g." for comparative and theoretical problems within the academic study of religion. In this I follow the programmatic trail blazed by recent thinkers who are attempting to reconstitute a field whose past excesses and errors still cling to it. Parts of this book have been published before in other forms and in other places. Chapter 1 previously appeared as part of "Exorcising the Transcendent: Strategies for Defining Hinduism and Religion" in His tory of Religions. Portions of Chapter 2 were published as "Vedic Field work" in Religious Studies Review. Other sections of Chapters 2 and 8 appeared in "Ideals and Realities in Indian Religions," also in Religious Studies Review. Some of Chapters 3 and 4 were incorporated in "Gods and Men in Vedic Ritualism: Toward a Hierarchy of Resemblance" in History of Religions, "Sacrifice and Being: Prajapati's Cosmic Emission and Its Consequences" in Numen, and "Ritual, Knowledge, and Being: Initiation and Veda Study in Ancient India," also in Numen. Portions of Chapters 6 and 7 comprise "The Unity of Ritual: The Place of the Domestic Sacrifice in Vedic Ritualism" in lndo-lndianJournal, and "Sac rifice and Substitution: Ritual Mystification and Mythical Demystifica tion," in Numen. I would like t~ thank Barnard College and the American Institute . Preface IX of Indian Studies for timely grants that helped considerably in bringing this work to its conclusion. Special thanks are due to Wendy Doniger for preparing the index. I also take this opportunity to acknowledge gratefully the debt I owe to those who, in one way or another, have taught me: Wendy Doniger, V. V. Bhide, Holland Hendrix, Wayne Proudfoot, Bruce Lin coln, Ron Inden, Frank Reynolds, Arthur Droge, Alan Segal, Marilyn Harran, G. U. Tuite, Wade Wheelock, James Fitzgerald, Barbara Stoler Miller, John Stratton Hawley, Ainslie Embree, William Harman, David Carpenter, Frederick Smith, Karen Guberman, Craig, John, Tim, Chris, Madhav, Celia, Ann, Judy and Steve, Gene (wherever you are), Mom and Dad, Angela, Justin, Karen, and all my students. Sine qua non. New York and Chicago B. K. S. June 1988 .
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