[INDOLOGY] Comparison of Brahmins (and their cultural context) with Nazis (and their cultural context)? both inappropriate and inapt

Mon May 10 15:46:09 UTC 2021

Dear Colieagues,

Re Heesterman's rajasuya text. Here's what I was able to find:

https://archive.org/stream/in.ernet.dli.2015.142124/2015.142124.The-Ancient-Indian-Royal-Consecration_djvu.txt

Best,

Artur

<https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=webmail>
Wolny
od wirusów. www.avast.com
<https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=webmail>
<#m_-855663695347796132_DAB4FAD8-2DD7-40BB-A1B8-4E2AA1F9FDF2>

pon., 10 maj 2021 o 16:26 Caley Smith via INDOLOGY <
indology at list.indology.info> napisał(a):

> Dear Joanna and Jan (and other interested parties),
>
> I have a pdf of Heesterman 1957, but it is just an image scan not
> "searchable" unfortunately.
>
> Best,
> Caley
>
> On Mon, May 10, 2021 at 3:58 AM Jan E.M. Houben <jemhouben at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Dear Joanna,
>> I have Heesterman's 1957 book on the Rajasuya but I don't have a scan or
>> pdf...
>> No result on archive.org either.
>> Needless to say I would be really grateful in case anyone does have such
>> a scan and can share it...
>> Best regards,
>> Jan
>>
>> On Mon, 10 May 2021 at 00:24, Joanna Jurewicz <j.jurewicz at uw.edu.pl>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Thank you, Caley, for your inspiring remarks.
>>>
>>>  Am I right that a Vaiśya is one among those who sprinkled water over a
>>> king during the Rajasuya? This could be a hint that the merchants were also
>>> to some extent included into creation of royal power. My copy of
>>> Heesterman's analysis of this ritual is somewhere lost among the papers...
>>>
>>> best wishes,
>>>
>>> Joanna
>>>
>>> ---
>>>
>>> Prof. dr hab. Joanna Jurewicz
>>>
>>> Katedra Azji Południowej /Chair of South Asia Studies
>>>
>>> Wydział Orientalistyczny / Faculty of Oriental Studies
>>>
>>> Uniwersytet Warszawski /University of Warsaw
>>>
>>> ul. Krakowskie Przedmieście 26/28
>>>
>>> 00-927 Warszawa , Poland
>>>
>>> Department of Linguistics and Modern Languages
>>>
>>> College of Human Sciences
>>>
>>> UNISA
>>>
>>> Pretoria, RSA
>>>
>>> Member of Academia Europaea
>>>
>>> https://uw.academia.edu/JoannaJurewicz
>>>
>>>
>>> niedz., 9 maj 2021 o 21:06 Caley Smith via INDOLOGY <
>>> indology at list.indology.info> napisał(a):
>>>
>>>> Dear Artur,
>>>>
>>>> Thank you for your interest, but my latest research on the way Vedic
>>>> texts conceptualize and reflect ideas like society, lineage, family, etc.
>>>> and their conceptual history in the post-Vedic period...is not published
>>>> yet and I'm still trying to think through it (some of my thoughts on this
>>>> are in "The Invention of Vedic Authority" which will come out in Bloomsbury'*s
>>>> A Cultural History of Hinduism in Antiquity *ed by Jarrod Whitaker). I
>>>> will instead refer to other scholars' work which has influenced my thinking
>>>> about the *yajña *a great deal (too name just a few: Proferes 2007 *Vedic
>>>> Ideals of Sovereignty and the Poetics of Power, *Ferrara 2016 "One
>>>> Yajña, Many Rituals" and Ferrara 2016 "The Function of the Yajña Between
>>>> Practitioners and Clients", Jamison 2019 "Vedic Ritual: The Sacralization
>>>> of the Mundane and the Domestication of the Sacred" (in the same volume as
>>>> Jan's "Ecology of Ritual Innovation in Ancient India: Textual and
>>>> Contextual Evidence.” ed. by Lauren Bausch)
>>>>
>>>> Most of my published work focuses on theorizing Vedic
>>>> performativity/textuality (
>>>> https://www.academia.edu/39608974/Adhiyaj%C3%B1a_Towards_a_Performance_Grammar_of_the_Vedas
>>>> )
>>>> and then using this performative lens to read Vedic narrative through
>>>> that specific context
>>>> (
>>>> https://www.academia.edu/39278725/How_is_a_Vehicular_Homicide_Like_the_Sacrifice
>>>> )
>>>> (https://www.academia.edu/28122184/Exploring_impossible_authors_)
>>>>
>>>> Best,
>>>> Caley
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On Sun, May 9, 2021 at 1:13 PM Artur Karp <karp at uw.edu.pl> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Dear Caley,
>>>>>
>>>>> Thanks for your thoughts - good material for meditation. Would you,
>>>>> please, attach here the list of your publications?
>>>>>
>>>>> Best,
>>>>>
>>>>> Artur
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> <https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=webmail> Wolny
>>>>> od wirusów. www.avast.com
>>>>> <https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=webmail>
>>>>> <#m_-855663695347796132_m_3322488977977144814_m_3409913668191668636_m_4870047943634231980_m_4815751820438796764_m_5368552174539207762_m_8649802251600418683_DAB4FAD8-2DD7-40BB-A1B8-4E2AA1F9FDF2>
>>>>>
>>>>> niedz., 9 maj 2021 o 18:12 Caley Smith <smith.caley at gmail.com>
>>>>> napisał(a):
>>>>>
>>>>>> Dear Artur,
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I would say... I don't know? Most Vedic ritual activities depict
>>>>>> themselves as being ideally patronized by a materially-wealthy financiers
>>>>>> or hoping for that (and despising stingy ones). The ritual moment is a kind
>>>>>> of public moment when many clans are together and so the proto-śrauta
>>>>>> system, I see, as a kind of inter-clan negotiation one
>>>>>> which can produce a coalition, a detente to hostilities, as well as
>>>>>> consecration, marriage, funerary activities. So the focus is really on the
>>>>>> poetic-priestly tradition and these patrons as the audience. Not much
>>>>>> mention of cities, urban life, etc. but it's also not necessarily the case
>>>>>> that a clan that patronized Vedic ritual
>>>>>> could not be construed through the categories of "farmers, craftsmen,
>>>>>> merchants" in addition to what we expect (that is ranchers). I would say
>>>>>> the texts care little for this kind of vision of society, and rather are
>>>>>> focused on a society made of  generous and hospitable patrons (as opposed
>>>>>> to stingy ones), and those in our coalition (as opposed to
>>>>>> enemies/outsiders). But on urban life in the Vedas proper I have heard a
>>>>>> vast silence---and that makes sense because cities were not "on the ritual
>>>>>> ground" and nearly everything topical and of concern to the Vedas is
>>>>>> happening on the ritual ground or is embedded in an aetiological narrative
>>>>>> justifying something happening on the ritual ground. That does not mean
>>>>>> that they didn't know about cities, but in my published work I don't write
>>>>>> about urban life either because it is not the topic at hand (as I imagine
>>>>>> Buddhist dhāraṇīs, for instance, don't have much to say about urban
>>>>>> logistics either...). In which case, we wouldn't speak of "Vedic
>>>>>> civilization" either, we would speak of Vedic "ceremony-networks" from
>>>>>> which perhaps we can infer things about the historical political
>>>>>> organizations that employed them.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On the other hand, by this description I am inherently assuming Vedic
>>>>>> tradition is something that has to do with the "Vedic period" and "the
>>>>>> Vedas," there are of course much later (pre/post Classical) texts that
>>>>>> would claim the mantle of the Vedic tradition that *may* have a good deal
>>>>>> to say about urban life, but if so I am ignorant of them currently and
>>>>>> would love to know more.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Best,
>>>>>> Caley
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On Sun, May 9, 2021 at 11:49 AM Artur Karp <karp at uw.edu.pl> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Tak.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> A few questions, perhaps simplistic, but nevertheless necessary.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Did something described as "Indian civilization" actually exist
>>>>>>> (Caley:  <I am not sure if we should continue to call it "Vedic
>>>>>>> civilization" at that point.>).
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> If so - then when, where, in what forms?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Did farmers, craftsmen, merchants fully participate in it?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Were the religious messages preserved in the Vedic texts accessible
>>>>>>> to them linguistically - and conceptually?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Were early urban organisms administered by reference to Vedic legal
>>>>>>> formulas, including, but not limited to, the cleaning up of urban spaces of
>>>>>>> refuse, of animal and human excrement? Including taxation?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I would like to know where in the Vedic tradition I could find these
>>>>>>> kinds of formulas. I see them in the Buddhist tradition, clearly - but in
>>>>>>> the Vedic tradition?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Best,
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Artur
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> <https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=webmail> Wolny
>>>>>>> od wirusów. www.avast.com
>>>>>>> <https://www.avast.com/sig-email?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_campaign=sig-email&utm_content=webmail>
>>>>>>> <#m_-855663695347796132_m_3322488977977144814_m_3409913668191668636_m_4870047943634231980_m_4815751820438796764_m_5368552174539207762_m_8649802251600418683_m_-9035632625090394276_m_696913473187357508_m_4192862688876529753_DAB4FAD8-2DD7-40BB-A1B8-4E2AA1F9FDF2>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> niedz., 9 maj 2021 o 16:51 Caley Smith via INDOLOGY <
>>>>>>> indology at list.indology.info> napisał(a):
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Dear Jan,
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Thank you for making this PDF available, I have a hard copy but
>>>>>>>> it's always useful to have a digital one too.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> I too feel the comparison is fraught, please correct me if my
>>>>>>>> musings are completely wrong, but it seems to narrowly define Nazism as a
>>>>>>>> kind of anti-urban sentiment, and I don't think that is the case at all.
>>>>>>>> Rather, the Nazis who patronized the House of German Art were
>>>>>>>> *urban*! We know of many lyric poetic traditions (from the Sangam
>>>>>>>> to the troubadours of Provençe) who loved to represent the bucolic scene in
>>>>>>>> their verbal art yet that art was performed at a courtly non-rural setting.
>>>>>>>> So are all these "anti-urban" and thus some species of Nazism? Hardly.
>>>>>>>> There is a much more immediate reason why urban Nazis might have preferred
>>>>>>>> landscapes, namely they figured themselves to be natural inherent landlords
>>>>>>>> of the country (the Volk) and thus the sole owners/stakeholders of the
>>>>>>>> government. Everyone else is either an outsider or a service tenant in this
>>>>>>>> model, no? Urbanites viewing scenes of ruralia seems to me to be more about
>>>>>>>> constructing a vision of themselves as these landlords, like the
>>>>>>>> slave-owning plantation owners in the US that Hitler admired (and of course
>>>>>>>> a feature of classical liberalism is that only landed gentry can vote, that
>>>>>>>> is "own" the govt; "manifest destiny" easily becomes the quest for
>>>>>>>> Lebensraum). In other words, the museum becomes a way for urban Nazis to
>>>>>>>> conceive of their place in their domain.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> And maybe this isn't the whole story, but it seems to be radically
>>>>>>>> different from the middle (even late) Vedic situation, which derives
>>>>>>>> directly from a real pastoral/horticultural mode of subsistence in which
>>>>>>>> pasturage/fields are not part of self-idealization but actually the basis
>>>>>>>> of food production. The elaborate inter-clan hospitality rituals of the
>>>>>>>> Vedas speaks more to an anxiety of the fragile nature of that existence and
>>>>>>>> the tenuous balance of power. Rather than anti-urban, I imagine that urban
>>>>>>>> centers were simply irrelevant to Vedic civilization at first, their more
>>>>>>>> immediate concerns were inter-clan politics on the ground. Now,
>>>>>>>> post-Alexander and post-Aśoka we may have a very different story but I am
>>>>>>>> not sure if we should continue to call it "Vedic civilization" at that
>>>>>>>> point. And if we are talking about post-Alexander/post-Aśoka then we are
>>>>>>>> talking about a radically different community, arguably traumatized, and
>>>>>>>> newly reactionary. I think that's a very different and new set of aesthetic
>>>>>>>> commitments and social concerns guiding the proto-Dharma tradition than
>>>>>>>> that of the middle/late Vedic period proper.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Perhaps there is something in the comparison I have completely
>>>>>>>> misunderstood, and if so mea culpa, but otherwise I don't get it.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Best,
>>>>>>>> Caley
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> On Sun, May 9, 2021 at 9:59 AM Jan E.M. Houben via INDOLOGY <
>>>>>>>> indology at list.indology.info> wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Dear All,
>>>>>>>>> A fascinating symposium on "Greater Magadha" is at present taking
>>>>>>>>> place at Edmonton (Alberta), Canada, and on account of the ongoing epidemic
>>>>>>>>> it is entirely online: the announcement (
>>>>>>>>> http://eventleaf.com/GreaterMagadha) is accessible on several
>>>>>>>>> lists.
>>>>>>>>> In a brief presentation and subsequent discussion of his theory at
>>>>>>>>> the beginning of this symposium -- a detailed argument and extensive
>>>>>>>>> references to pieces of evidence for this stimulating and well-researched
>>>>>>>>> theory is found in his *Greater Magadha: Studies in the culture
>>>>>>>>> of early India* (Leiden 2007) --   Johannes Bronkhorst referred
>>>>>>>>> briefly to his comparison between Brahmins (and their cultural context) and
>>>>>>>>> the German Nazis (and their cultural context). On this specific reference
>>>>>>>>> by Johannes Bronkhorst during the symposium, I posed a question in the
>>>>>>>>> special section set up by the organizers of the conference: "Questions and
>>>>>>>>> answers will be conducted over a separate service, sli.do."
>>>>>>>>> Since my question, although it received several "upvotes", did not
>>>>>>>>> pass the censorship of the anonymous "moderator" of the online questions --
>>>>>>>>> who wrote to me "3 days ago (only visible to you) There was no such
>>>>>>>>> comparison" -- it would be useful to pose the question in other fora such
>>>>>>>>> as this Indology List.
>>>>>>>>> Those familiar with the work and especially the *Greater Magadha*
>>>>>>>>> book of Johannes Bronkhorst -- this apparently does not include the
>>>>>>>>> anonymous moderator of the Questions section of the symposium -- will have
>>>>>>>>> immediately recognized that the remark by Johannes Bronkhorst refers to pp.
>>>>>>>>> 251-252 of *Greater Magadha* (and similar passages elsewhere),
>>>>>>>>> where we read:
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> "when it came in contact with cities, Vedic civilization did not
>>>>>>>>> like them.
>>>>>>>>> ...
>>>>>>>>> It is hard to resist the temptation of a comparison with the Third
>>>>>>>>> Reich.
>>>>>>>>> Among the hundreds of paintings brought together in the House of
>>>>>>>>> German Art
>>>>>>>>> in Munich, opened by Hitler in 1937, not a single canvas depicted
>>>>>>>>> urban and
>>>>>>>>> industrial life (Watson, 2004: 311-312)."
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> The comparison is both inappropriate and inapt, especially since a
>>>>>>>>> very different analysis of the situation of the community of practicing
>>>>>>>>> Brahmins in ancient India is possible, for instance the one proposed by me
>>>>>>>>> in:
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> “From Fuzzy-Edged ‘Family-Veda’ to the Canonical Śākhas of the
>>>>>>>>> Catur-Veda: Structures and Tangible Traces.” In: *Vedic Śākhās:
>>>>>>>>> Past, Present, Future. Proceedings of the Fifth International Vedic
>>>>>>>>> Workshop, Bucharest* 2011, ed. by J.E.M. Houben, J. Rotaru and M.
>>>>>>>>> Witzel, p. 159-192. Cambridge, Mass. : Harvard University, 2016.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> As the book is at present no more available but will soon again be
>>>>>>>>> available in a new edition, I have made this study *temporarily* accessible
>>>>>>>>> on my Academia.edu page.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> The main principles followed in this study to explain the
>>>>>>>>> situation of the community of practicing Brahmins in ancient India are (1)
>>>>>>>>> "natural selection" in the transmission of knowledge through any current
>>>>>>>>> medium of transmission (at first exclusively ritual, next ritual plus
>>>>>>>>> written texts, inscriptions and manuscripts -- much later printing is added
>>>>>>>>> and at present the internet...): see e.g. Houben 2001; (2) ritual in the
>>>>>>>>> context of an *evolving* economical and ecological world: see Houben 2019
>>>>>>>>> (see also: Gadgil and Guha, *This Fissured Land: an Ecological
>>>>>>>>> History of India*, 1992 and Perennials edition 2013).
>>>>>>>>> N.B. Both Houben 2001:
>>>>>>>>> “’Verschriftlichung' and the relation between the *pramāṇa*s in
>>>>>>>>> the history of Sāṁkhya.” *Études de Lettres* 2001.3: *La
>>>>>>>>> rationalité en Asie / Rationality in Asia*, ed. by J. Bronkhorst:
>>>>>>>>> 165-194.
>>>>>>>>> and Houben 2019:
>>>>>>>>> “Ecology of Ritual Innovation in Ancient India: Textual and
>>>>>>>>> Contextual Evidence.” [NB: partly comparing and contrasting Vedic and
>>>>>>>>> ancient Iranian ritual.] In: *Self, Sacrifice, and Cosmos: Vedic
>>>>>>>>> Thought, Ritual, and Philosophy. Essays in Honor of Professor Ganesh
>>>>>>>>> Umakant Thite’s Contribution to Vedic Studies*, ed. by Lauren M.
>>>>>>>>> Bausch, pp. 182-210 (References to this article integrated in id.,
>>>>>>>>> “Bibliography,” pp. 223-238.) Delhi: Primus Books
>>>>>>>>> are now accessible on my Academia.edu page.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> I hope and expect the issue will lead to further fruitful
>>>>>>>>> discussions.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> All best, Jan Houben
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> --
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> *Jan E.M. Houben*
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Directeur d'Études, Professor of South Asian History and Philology
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> *Sources et histoire de la tradition sanskrite*
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> École Pratique des Hautes Études (EPHE, Paris Sciences et Lettres)
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> *Sciences historiques et philologiques *
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Groupe de recherches en études indiennes (EA 2120)
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> *johannes.houben [at] ephe.psl.eu <johannes.houben at ephe.psl.eu>*
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> *https://ephe-sorbonne.academia.edu/JanEMHouben
>>>>>>>>> <https://ephe-sorbonne.academia.edu/JanEMHouben>*
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> *https://www.classicalindia.info*
>>>>>>>>> <https://www.classicalindia.info>
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> LabEx Hastec OS 2021 -- *L'Inde Classique* augmentée:
>>>>>>>>> construction, transmission
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> et transformations d'un savoir scientifique
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>>>>>> INDOLOGY mailing list
>>>>>>>>> INDOLOGY at list.indology.info
>>>>>>>>> https://list.indology.info/mailman/listinfo/indology
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>>>>> INDOLOGY mailing list
>>>>>>>> INDOLOGY at list.indology.info
>>>>>>>> https://list.indology.info/mailman/listinfo/indology
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> INDOLOGY mailing list
>>>> INDOLOGY at list.indology.info
>>>> https://list.indology.info/mailman/listinfo/indology
>>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> INDOLOGY mailing list
>>> INDOLOGY at list.indology.info
>>> https://list.indology.info/mailman/listinfo/indology
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>>
>> *Jan E.M. Houben*
>>
>> Directeur d'Études, Professor of South Asian History and Philology
>>
>> *Sources et histoire de la tradition sanskrite*
>>
>> École Pratique des Hautes Études (EPHE, Paris Sciences et Lettres)
>>
>> *Sciences historiques et philologiques *
>>
>> Groupe de recherches en études indiennes (EA 2120)
>>
>> *johannes.houben [at] ephe.psl.eu <johannes.houben at ephe.psl.eu>*
>>
>> *https://ephe-sorbonne.academia.edu/JanEMHouben
>> <https://ephe-sorbonne.academia.edu/JanEMHouben>*
>>
>> *https://www.classicalindia.info* <https://www.classicalindia.info>
>>
>> LabEx Hastec OS 2021 -- *L'Inde Classique* augmentée: construction,
>> transmission
>>
>> et transformations d'un savoir scientifique
>>
>
> _______________________________________________
> INDOLOGY mailing list
> INDOLOGY at list.indology.info
> https://list.indology.info/mailman/listinfo/indology
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://list.indology.info/pipermail/indology/attachments/20210510/90f38850/attachment.htm>