[INDOLOGY] bhakti

[Nagaraj Paturi]

Luis,

I am bringing up comparative study which distinguishes the modern cultural
study from the pre-modern one.

Most of what you say, 'invoking Vedas and Vedic knowledge', sectarian
claims etc. are all textual and are applicable to the 'academic' sections
of the 'educated' or some such sections of the 'elite'. You expressed
awareness of this when you said, " It can be a different matter for the
everyday believer, who doesn't need to be bothered with theological
distinctions." But the point is that it is the everyday believers who are
the majority and what is found in a small minority can not be generalized
for the whole.

Even while working on the textual aspect or this minority of  'academic'
sections of the 'educated' , each case being studied on its own merits
yields a more complex understanding than a reductionist one.

On Fri, Nov 11, 2016 at 3:33 AM, Luis Gonzalez-Reimann <reimann at berkeley.edu
> wrote:

> Nagaraj,
>
> You are generalizing.
>
> I simply point out the fact that invoking the Vedas or Vedic knowledge to
> boost one's own tradition is commonplace in Indian religious traditions.
> Yes, each case can be studied in its own cultural context and so on, but
> that doesn't change the fact. In some cases, it may almost a cliche, but it
> is prevalent. The sectarian competition is clear in the literature. It can
> be a different matter for the everyday believer, who doesn't need to be
> bothered with theological distinctions.
>
> For the *Bhagavad Gītā* the Supreme god is Kr̥ṣṇa, for the* Īśvara Gītā*
> it is Śiva, for the *Devī Bhāgavata Purāṇā* it is Devī. Likewise,
> different texts say that their preferred divinity* is* the Vedas, or
> brahman, or some variant of that idea. And Puranic stories often tell of
> how a certain god couldn't accomplish a certain job and had to ask for help
> from another one who, therefore, is portrayed as the highest.
>
> Regards,
>
> Luis
>
> _____
>
> On 11/9/2016 8:44 PM, Nagaraj Paturi wrote:
>
> 1. Cultures mixing with each other, new mixed cultures being born out of
> intercultural interactions, religious and cultural syncretisms, these
> products of mixtures being named after one of the components of the
> mixture are all not the special features of India.How such syncretisms are
> received too varies from social group to social group. It may be called a
> 'good thing' like here
> <http://www.tomorrowsworld.org/commentary/is-religious-syncretism-a-good-thing>.
> It may not be called a 'good thing' elsewhere.
>
> 2. One model of such namings of the mixtures can be called a
> river-tributary model. Even after tributaries join the main river , later
> course is called with the name of the main river only. In some cases, the
> cultures/traditions being given the name 'Vedic' has this feature.
>
> 3. When cultural assimilations take place using the (perceived or real)
> commonalities between the two or more interacting cultures, these
> commonalities, described in Indian Sanskrit knowing sections using the
> word ēkavākyatā, are described using the language of the available
> doctrinal articulations. Upanishads and Vedanta are examples of such
> articulations used to describe the ēkavākyatā.
>
> 4. Viewing ancient intercultural interactions deterministically in a
> (class)-conflict model, and viewing ancient cultural assimilations as
> class-war averting or class-war pre-empting strategies on the part of one
> of the components of admixture is a typical deductive and historical
> determinist model.
>
> 5. Most of the findings of cultural mixings, or assimilations or anything
> like that found in a current culture by the researchers of that current
> culture may not be known to the insiders of that investigated culture. So
> to theorize as if the culture insider knew the 'non-Vedic nature' of his
> culture and still used the word Vedic for a prestige is to attribute
> unjustifiable motives to the tradition bearer.
>
>
>
>
>
> On Thu, Nov 10, 2016 at 4:39 AM, Luis Gonzalez-Reimann <
> reimann at berkeley.edu> wrote:
>
>> I sent this response yesterday, but by mistake it only went to Patrick
>> and not the list, so I resend it here.
>>
>> I now see that Valerie made the same point about using "Indian astrology."
>>
>> _____
>>
>> Hi Patrick,
>>
>> It would be easy to replace the name Vedic astrology with Indian
>> astrology. It's more accurate, anyway, because that encompasses what could
>> be called Jain, Buddhist, Hindu, etc. astrology.
>>
>> There certainly has been a pattern for centuries of appropriating the
>> label "Vedic" for enhancing the prestige of one's own tradition or text and
>> making it seem very ancient. There are claims of being the nectar of the
>> Vedas, as in the *Bhāgavata Purāṇa*, as well as statements about the
>> Vedas ultimately being about this or that god or goddess. These are clearly
>> sectarian claims.
>>
>> Best,
>> Luis
>> _____
>>
>>
>> On 11/8/2016 4:27 PM, patrick mccartney wrote:
>>
>> Robert,
>>
>> The term 'Vedic astrology' is certainly interesting. I have been
>> contacting astrologers in the West who use this term on their websites.
>> Their responses as to what they actually mean by it are revealing of a
>> certain discomfort and cognitive dissonance. One particular respondent said
>> they did not like the term but it was something of an 'industry standard',
>> so not using the term was counter productive to their own vocational
>> interest. They also said that 'Hindu astrology' sounded even 'less
>> authentic'. This is while knowing that the predictive aspects of 'Vedic
>> astrology' developed well past the Vedic period.
>>
>> Personally, I find the phrases 'Vedic capitalism
>> <http://www.sabhlokcity.com/2012/09/vedic-capitalism-clear-affirmation-of-equality-and-pursuit-of-wealth/>',
>> 'Vedic socialism
>> <http://www.sabhlokcity.com/2010/08/what-is-vedic-socialism/>' and 'Vedic
>> communism
>> <http://vaniquotes.org/wiki/I_think_the_Vedic_concept_of_socialism_or_communism_will_much_improve_the_idea_of_communism>'
>> to be amongst my favourites.
>>
>> I wonder if anyone has a .pdf of this book
>> <http://www.worldcat.org/title/vedic-socialism/oclc/643866103> ?
>>
>>
>>
>> All the best,
>>
>> Patrick McCartney, PhD
>> Fellow
>> School of Culture, History & Language
>> College of the Asia-Pacific
>> The Australian National University
>> Canberra, Australia, 0200
>>
>>
>> Skype - psdmccartney
>> Phone + Whatsapp:  +61 414 954 748
>> Twitter - @psdmccartney
>>
>>
>> academia <https://anu-au.academia.edu/patrickmccartney>
>>
>>    -
>>
>> Linkedin
>> <https://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=241756978&trk=nav_responsive_tab_profile>
>>
>> Edanz
>> <https://www.edanzediting.com/expert/anthropology/patrick-mccartney>
>>
>> #yogabodyANU2016 symposium <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X80KxW2bb0w>
>> <http://chl.anu.edu.au/news-events/events/658/yoga-and-body-past-and-present-symposium?#tab>
>>
>> Ep1 - Imagining Sanskrit Land <https://youtu.be/jMi7tkPBbJ4>
>>
>> Ep 2 - Total-am <https://youtu.be/7tAp8m9RHPU>
>>
>> Ep 3 - Jalam ≠ Chillum <https://youtu.be/cLZeuCT_mwQ>
>>
>> Ep 4 - It's Time to get Married
>> <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_B3un7aHEAc>
>>
>> A Day in our Ashram
>> <https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=ek+din+hamaare+ashram+mein>
>>
>> Stop animation short film of Shakuntala
>> <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LVqBD_2P4Pg>
>>
>> Forced to Clean Human Waste <http://youtu.be/y3XfjbwqC_g>
>>
>> One of my favourite song
>> <http://trinityroots.bandcamp.com/track/all-we-be>s
>>
>> The Philosophy of Cycling
>> <http://elibrary.com.ng/UploadFiles/file0_2221.pdf>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Nov 9, 2016 at 4:59 AM, Robert Zydenbos <zydenbos at uni-muenchen.de
>> > wrote:
>>
>>> By coincidence, just yesterday I gave a lengthy interview to a lady from
>>> the Bavarian radio who is doing a program on bhakti. She came with a heap
>>> of references and quotes and asked me what we are to make of all this. As
>>> with so many things, it is context-sensitive.
>>>
>>> patrick mccartney wrote:
>>>
>>> > While 'bhakti' is mentioned at least in the above upanishad, I thought
>>> 'bhakti yoga' was quite clearly a post-vedic development, and that the
>>> bhakti movement developed from the 6th century CE. To the devotee this
>>> statement might seem unproblematic, but to the scholar it appears to
>>> conceptually and temporally conflate disparate things.
>>>
>>> Perhaps it is relevant to stress that the occurrence of a word as a
>>> series of writing symbols in a text is one thing, and that the meaning of
>>> the word in a given context may differ from the one in another context. For
>>> instance,
>>>
>>> Howard Resnick wrote:
>>>
>>> > […] I will add that the Bhagavad-gita often mentions bhakti,
>>> bhakti-yoga, bhakta etc, and the Gita is one of three standard members of
>>> the ‘Vedanta apparatus.’
>>>
>>> Shyam Ranganathan wrote:
>>>
>>> > When I was a grad student in Joseph O'Connell's class on Bhakti in the
>>> 90s, he started the class with a review of some portions of the Mantra
>>> section of the Vedas, as a backdrop to later developments in Tamil (āḻvārs
>>> etc.,) and further developments in Bhakti Vedanta---including Gaudiya
>>> Vaishnavism.
>>>
>>> If such statements are meant as claims that bhakti is Vedantic or even
>>> ‘Vedic’, they are purely theological, not historical. By this I mean that a
>>> word such as ‘bhakti’ is ‘interpreted’ by later religious thinkers as
>>> ‘implied’ in the ‘Veda’ or ‘Vedānta’. Indeed, as
>>>
>>> George Hart wrote:
>>>
>>> > Gaining legitimacy through identification with the Vedas is nothing
>>> new.
>>>
>>> Already at a conference in Toronto, 26 years ago, I argued that the word
>>> ‘Vedic’ in a traditional sense is just a sort of sociological label and
>>> means nothing more than ‘accepted by brahmins’. (Here one must again be
>>> careful and ask ‘which brahmins’ and ‘why’.) Only when one accepts the
>>> religious authority of brahmins does the ‘legitimacy’ to which George Hart
>>> refers become relevant. (For instance, Vīraśaivism is a bhakti tradition,
>>> but for the vast majority of Vīraśaivas it is not relevant whether bhakti
>>> can be called ‘Vedic’ or not.)
>>>
>>> Therefore (this is for Patrick): watch out. Böhtlingk and Roth’s
>>> Petersburger Wörterbuch (vol. 5, col. 163) tells us that the word ‘bhakti’
>>> is already found in the Ṛgveda (8,27,11) in the sense of ‘distribution’
>>> („Austheilung, Vertheilung“). Böhtlingk and Roth give a long list of other,
>>> later meanings. But if you say
>>>
>>> > […] I thought 'bhakti yoga' was quite clearly a post-vedic
>>> development, and that the bhakti movement developed from the 6th century CE.
>>>
>>> then you are starting from a particular concept that is labelled
>>> ‘bhakti’, and in that sense you are right. If, for instance, one soberly
>>> reads the Bhagavadgītā without later commentaries, one must conclude that
>>> later ‘bhakti’ is a far cry from the rather subdued theism in that text.
>>> The same goes for the Śvetāśvataropaniṣat.
>>>
>>> > I am interested in how organisations operationalise the 'vedic' sign
>>> in their marketing and promotional material to generate 'authenticity' and
>>> legitimacy.
>>>
>>> It is basically simple: the brāhmaṇa varṇa claims the exclusive right to
>>> vedādhyāpana, in other words: traditionally, brahmins decide what the Vedas
>>> and ‘Vedic’ literature are and what their meaning is. With some
>>> imagination, one can declare all sorts of things ‘Vedic’ (my personal
>>> favourite is ‘Vedic astrology’).
>>>
>>> The words ‘Veda’ and ‘Vedic’ at some point in time acquired a special
>>> halo, and this is associated with the brāhmaṇa varṇa in its idealized,
>>> mythical form (cf. BhG XVIII.42: śamo damas tapaḥ śaucaṃ, etc.). This
>>> sometimes happens to words (e.g., ‘democracy’. Everybody wants to be
>>> ‘democratic’, even if there are big differences of opinion about just what
>>> democracy is and how it should be. Meanwhile, it’s November 8, and the
>>> world is shuddering…).
>>>
>>> RZ
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Prof. Dr. Robert J. Zydenbos
>>> Institut für Indologie und Tibetologie
>>> Department für Asienstudien
>>> Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (LMU)
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
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>
> --
> Nagaraj Paturi
>
> Hyderabad, Telangana, INDIA.
>
> Former Senior Professor of Cultural Studies
>
> FLAME School of Communication and FLAME School of  Liberal Education,
>
> (Pune, Maharashtra, INDIA )
>
>
>
>
>
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-- 
Nagaraj Paturi

Hyderabad, Telangana, INDIA.

Former Senior Professor of Cultural Studies

FLAME School of Communication and FLAME School of  Liberal Education,

(Pune, Maharashtra, INDIA )


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