Proceedings of the Purāṇa Section of the 17th World Sanskrit Conference, July 9-13, 2018 (original) (raw)
Related papers
Studia Orientalia, Vol. 121, 2020
viii of the two volumes, on the condition that the two volumes would first appear in Studia Orientalia, the journal of the Finnish Oriental Society. Republication of a printed version of these volumes is the prerogative of the MLBD, who, we trust, will also be happy for the completion of the series. Dr. Butters is a specialist of Indo-Tibetan Buddhism and thus also qualified to handle Sanskrit studies. It has been an arduous task for him, but he has succeeded. We are most grateful to him, and also to all the authors who nearly without exception have welcomed his initiative.
2018
This volume contains 20 papers emerging from the Epics and Purāṇas panel at the 15th World Sanskrit conference (New Delhi, January 2012). A body of scholars of international standing pursue a diverse range of inquiries into the Mahābhārata, Harivaṃśa, Rāmāyaṇa and the Purāṇas. Offering new and often provocative insights into their narratives, textual histories, ideological concerns, theological agendas and reception histories, these papers provide an excellent overview of the current state of epic and Purāṇic research. Twelve of the articles primarily concern aspects of the Mahābhārata and its khila, the Harivaṃśa. Two of these explore the relationship of the Mahābhārata to Buddhism. Two papers offer stimulating discussions of matters arising from the preparation of the concluding volume to the 30-year Princeton Rāmāyaṇa translation project, a landmark in Indological research. The remaining six papers analyse aspects of the Purāṇas, three within the broader mythological and ideological contexts shared by the epics and Purāṇas, and three in regard to the regional traditions represented by Sthala- Purāṇas and Māhātmyas. The sum of this volume’s parts demonstrate the vibrancy of the fields to which it contributes, a vibrancy underscored by the diversity of their methodological approaches and insights. Many of these insights will endure; some chart new and promising directions in Indological research. Above all, this volume further reinforces the foundational and enduring importance of these immense texts to the literatures, histories and cultures of South Asia and beyond.
Lucifer, 1891
THE advent of Sanskrit on the field of European linguistic studies marks an era of great importance in the history of the world. Although the accounts I have been able to lay before you are few and necessarily very meagre, I hope nevertheless to have established that the Purānas, when read by the light of the Upanishads, become a clear commentary of the Vedas, which, in their turn, cease at once to be the first thoughts of an imaginary primitive humanity. Philology must give way to symbology in order that this result may be appreciated in its true light. It ought, in fact, to be the sole or at least principal instrument of ancient research. Symbology is the language of humanity, nay it is the language of nature. It is pre-eminently the universal language known to antiquity—the language whose alphabets are indelibly fixed on the tablet of the human mind, and whose eternal volume is the ever unalterable book of nature. Nothing but a clear, careful, and patient study of the alphabets of this language can lead us nearer that day in the history of the world, when all the different creeds will melt into one universal basis of belief and love.
NINTH DUBROVNIK INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON THE SANSKRIT EPICS AND PURĀṆAS (DICSEP 9)
2020
This is a report on DICSEP: the triennial conference on the Sanskrit epics and Purāṇas held in Dubrovnik from September 21-26, 2020. The recently concluded conference was the ninth in the series. The author's association with the conference extends back to the fifth meeting (in 2008). He has attended every meeting since. This report provides a review of the methodology and academic quality of the papers presented along with an assessment of the impact of COVID-19 on this year's conference and the future prospects of the conference series.
Journal of American Oriental Society, 2024
UniVersity of oxford This paper argues that a concept of rebuking God (bhagavannindā) existed as a prohibited act in premodern Sanskrit Brahmanical texts, with the earliest examples in medieval Vaiṣṇava narratives (in the Bhāgavata Purāṇa and Viṣṇu Purāṇa) of Vena and Śiśupāla. The concept of bhagavannindā problematizes the Bhāgavata Purāṇa rereading of the Śiśupāla story: how can someone rebuke a god (here Kṛṣṇa) and be seemingly rewarded (through sāyujya [union] with the god)? I argue that to this problem in Vaiṣṇava and epic narratives the Bhāgavata Purāṇa offers dveṣabhakti / vairānubandha (liberation through enmity or hatred) as a potential solution. Finally, through investigation of two early modern commentaries on the Mahābhārata, I argue that reading this concept of divine censure into the epics was not without tensions. The epic commentators sometimes reveal their own ambivalent readings of episodes where Kṛṣṇa is rebuked. The paper draws attention to the importance of the Bhāgavata Purāṇa as a commentary on the Mahābhārata, upon which later exegetes relied. It surveys how and why the peculiar concept of dveṣabhakti emerges in Vaiṣnava theology and presents narrative as both the source where this orthodox concept of divine censure emerges and the site where the concept is reinforced in commentary. Author's note: This article was made possible through the support of the Leverhulme Trust (RPG2021-177). I thank Robert Goldman and Christopher Minkowski for their comments on earlier drafts of this paper. Furthermore, I am grateful to the anonymous referees and to Stephanie Jamison for improving the quality of this work with their feedback. 1. Mahābhārata Critical Edition (hereafter MBh CE) 7.118.14: ko hi nāma pramattāya pareṇa saha yudhyate/ īdrṣaṃ vyasanaṃ dadyād yo na kṛṣṇasakho bhavet //.
Introduction to Special Issue: Transcreating the Bhāgavata Purāṇa
International Journal of Hindu Studies, 2018
From the fifteenth century onward, the Bhāgavata Purāṇa (seventh century?) attained unprecedented popularity in northern India. In the Braj country Vaiṡṅava sects centered on Kṙṡṅa made the Sanskrit Bhāgavata Purāṇa their foundational text and assigned to it the rank of the fifth Veda, in effect endowing it with the authority of the Veda. Accordingly, the Purāṅa was also subjected to Vedic exegesis. Novel ways of viewing the relationship of Kṙṡṅa and the world through the prism of bhakti evolved, while Vedic orthodoxy was claimed for the text. This scholarly approach, articulated in Sanskrit, was a tour de force, taking off from the widespread popularity of the Kṙṡṅa theme and its Purāṅic and other antecedents. At the same time the Kṙṡṅa theme, and particularly the Bhāgavata Purāṇa, flourished in vernacular literatures and found expression in visual art, drama, and music. Kṙṡṅa bhakti became the recipient of imperial and subimperial patronage. Rājpūt dynasties complemented the multilayered religious foundations of their rule by Vaiṡṅavism. Courts and court poets engaged with the vernacular poetry on the Kṙṡṅa theme. Kṙṡṅa bhakti attained orthodox respectability thanks to the efforts of sectarian theologians who by the quasi-Vedic strategies taken in their commentaries strove to put it on a par with the nonsectarian, Smārta scholarship. Well connected as locales of Kṙṡṅa bhakti, the Rājpūt courts were also inextricably connected with the imperial court, politically and by emulating its Persianate cultural model. This led to the formation of the Hindu-Persianate culture typical of the early modern period, and the processes of transmission were embedded in the political interdependence between