Regional Communities of Devotion in South Asia: Insiders, Outsiders, and Interlopers PDF
Preview Regional Communities of Devotion in South Asia: Insiders, Outsiders, and Interlopers
Regional Communities of Devotion in South Asia This book explores the key motif of the religious other in devotional (bhakti) lit- eratures and practices from across the Indian subcontinent and unmasks pro- cesses of representation that involve adoption, appropriation, and rejection of different social and religious agents. The book reconsiders and challenges inherited notions of the bhakta’s or dev- otee’s other. Considering the ways in which bhakti might be conceived as having an inter- regional impact—as a force, discourse, network, mythology, ethic—the book critically engages with extant scholarly narratives about what bhakti is and traces when and how those narratives have been used. The sheer diversity of South Asia’s devotional traditions renders them an especially rich resource for examining social and religious fault lines, thereby furthering scholarly under- standing of how communalism and sectarianism originate and develop on local or regional levels, with wider geographic implications. Bringing together studies from a subcontinent-w ide variety of linguistic, geo- graphical, and historical frames for the first time, this book will be an important contribution to the literature on bhakti and will be of interest to scholars of South Asian Religions and Asian Religions. Gil Ben- Herut is Associate Professor of South Asian Religions in the Depart- ment of Religious Studies at the University of South Florida, USA. Jon Keune is Assistant Professor of South Asian Religions in the Department of Religious Studies at Michigan State University, USA. Anne E. Monius is a Professor of South Asian Religions at Harvard Divinity School, Massachusetts, USA. 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Jacobsen and Kristina Myrvold 12 The Baghdadi Jews in India Maintaining Communities, Negotiating Identities, and Creating Super- Diversity Edited by Shalva Weil 13 Regional Communities of Devotion in South Asia Insiders, Outsiders, and Interlopers Edited by Gil Ben-H erut, Jon Keune, and Anne E. Monius Regional Communities of Devotion in South Asia Insiders, Outsiders, and Interlopers Edited by Gil Ben-H erut, Jon Keune, and Anne E. Monius First published 2020 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2020 selection and editorial matter, Gil Ben-H erut, Jon Keune, and Anne E. Monius; individual chapters, the contributors The right of Gil Ben-H erut, Jon Keune, and Anne E. Monius to be identified as the authors of the editorial matter, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-i n-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-i n-Publication Data A catalog record has been requested for this book ISBN: 978-1-138-49583-8 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-351-02338-2 (ebk) Typeset in Times New Roman by Wearset Ltd, Boldon, Tyne and Wear We dedicate this book to the memory of Anne Monius, who unexpectedly passed away when it was being printed. Her inspiring spirit and intellectual rigor permeates these pages, as it does in our and so many other scholars’ lives. Her intellectual leadership, unfailing smile, and readily available advice will be dearly missed. Contents Notes on contributors ix Introduction 1 GIL BEN- HERUT, JON KEUNE, AND ANNE E. MONIUS 1 From foolish ascetics to enemies of Śiva: the fate of Jains as religious others in Tamil Śaiva literature 12 ANNE E. MONIUS 2 Kālī dances into the cremation grounds of the Tamil land 31 ELAINE CRADDOCK 3 Arguing with Vaiṣṇavas, annihilating Jains: two religious others in early Kannada Śivabhakti hagiographies 54 GIL BEN- HERUT 4 Bhakti Inc., Kerala: alienated selves and assimilated others 73 RICH FREEMAN 5 The challenge of the swappable other: a framework for interpreting otherness in bhakti texts 101 JON KEUNE 6 The political field of bhakti at the emergence of Marathi literature in premodern India 122 CHRISTIAN LEE NOVETzKE 7 The Datta saṃpradāya and its others 137 JEREMY G. MORSE viii Contents 8 Lost in the lake: Tulsīdās and his others 160 PHILIP LUTGENDORF 9 Are there atheists in potholes? Mīmāṃsakas debate the path of bhakti 177 ANAND VENKATKRISHNAN Index 192 Contributors Gil Ben-H erut is Associate Professor in the Religious Studies Department, University of South Florida. His research interests include premodern reli- gious literature in the Kannada language, South Asian bhakti traditions, and the vernacularization of Sanskrit poetics and courtly poetry. Dr Ben-H erut’s book, Śiva’s Saints: The Origins of Devotion in Kannada according to Hari- hara’s Ragaḷegaḷu, is the first study in English of the earliest Śaiva hagiogra- phies in the Kannada-s peaking region, and it argues for a reconsideration of the nature and development of devotionalism associated today with the Vīraśaivas. Ben-H erut is currently co-t ranslating selections from this hagio- graphical collection for a separate publication. Elaine Craddock is Professor of Religion and affiliated faculty in Feminist Studies at Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas. Her research inter- ests include the worship of Hindu goddesses, Śaiva bhakti in Tamil Nadu, and gender and sexuality in religion. Her publications include Śiva’s Demon Devotee: Kāraikkāl Ammaiyār. Rich Freeman (Department of History, Duke University) is a cultural anthro- pologist with a background in classical Indology whose fieldwork, historical, and literary projects focus on Kerala and greater South India. Recent publica- tions include “Śaktism, Polity, and Society in Medieval Malabar” in Goddess Traditions in Tantric Hinduism (Routledge, 2015). His work at the intersec- tion of high- caste, literary, and religious history with folk culture, ritual, and spirit possession, converges in a work- in-progress on the development of Hinduism in premodern Kerala. Jon Keune is Assistant Professor in Religious Studies at Michigan State Univer- sity. His main research area is Maharashtra, where he considers questions of social history and historiography between 1,500 and the present. He is writing a book that takes a multidisciplinary approach to the tangled question of how bhakti traditions criticized and accommodated caste, observing the Vārkarī tra- dition and stories of transgressive commensality as case studies. He also has comparative interests in central Europe and East Asia, and he is working on a new project on contemporary transnational connections of Ambedkar Buddhists
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