Religion occupies an important place in both the private and public domains in India. This volume is a collection of essays on India's major religions as practised in everyday life. It approaches religion from the perspectives of ethnography and history. It takes stock of traditions, culture, history, and politics of India's faiths. The readings explore sacred places and performances, bonding, mediators and thinkers, charisma, spiritual power and innovation, which are significant components of cultural traditions as well. Beginning with the concept of the sacred defined by its otherness, the book proceeds to explore how the hiatus that otherness creates may overcome by bonding via piety and passion. The process of overcoming separation, or bonding, is universally facilitated by mediators of one kind or another, such as magicians, spiritual masters, or martyrs. Traditions are constructed, preserved, and transmitted in a number of ways that include the oral narrative and the literary text. This does not mean, however, that religious traditions are static. They, in fact, grow gradually and sometimes change radically. The dominant themes dealt with here include those of death, food, worship and devotion, spiritual masters, martyrs, and dharma.
The second edition includes a new Appendix with a comparative regional perspective, and a new Preface.
PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION ; PREFACE ; INTRODUCTION: INDIA'S RELIGIONS: PLURALITY AND PLURALISM ; T. N. MADAN; SECTION I: SETTING APART: SACRED PLACES AND PERFORMANCES (PREFATORY REMARKS) ; 1. The Eucharist in a Syrian Christian Church, Susan Visvanathan ; 2. The Food Area in a Hindu Home, R. S. Khare ; 3. Death and Cosmogony in Kashi, Jonathan P. Parry ; SECTION II: BONDING TOGETHER: PIETY AND PASSION ; 4. Hindu Worship, C. J. Fuller ; 5. Virashaiva Devotion, A. K. Ramanujan ; 6. Faith and Suffering in Shia Islam, Akbar S. Ahmed ; SECTION III: MEDIATIONS: CHARISMA AND SPIRITUAL POWER ; 7. Jain Monks, Lawrence A. Babb ; 8. Muslim Spiritual Masters, Desiderio Pinto ; 9. Sikh Martyrs, Louis E. Fenech ; SECTION IV: TRADITIONS: ORAL NARRATIVES AND CANONICAL TEXTS ; 10. Folklore, Viramma, Josiane Racine and Jean-Luc Racine ; 11. Dharma, Gavin Flood ; 12. The Khalsa Rahit, W. H. McLeod ; SECTION V: INNOVATIONS: RELIGIOUS CREATIVITY AND SOCIAL CHANGE ; 13. The Kabir-Panth, David N. Lorenzen ; 14. The Ramakrishna Mission, Krishna Prakash Gupta ; 15. Ambedkar's Buddhism, Martin Fuchs ; SECTION VI: INTERTWINEMENTS: RELIGION, SOCIETY, AND POLITICS ; 16. The South Indian Temple: Authority, Honour, and Redistribution, Arjun Appadurai and Carol A. Breckenridge ; 17. Church and Community in Goa, Rowena Robinson ; 18. Religious Devotion and Politics at Hazratbal in Kashmir, Muhammad Ishaq Khan ; EPILOGUE: RELIGION IN INDIA: AN ESSAY IN INTERPRETATION ; APPENDIX: INCLUSION AND EXCLUSION IN INDIA, PAKISTAN, AND BANGLADESH ; NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS ; INDEX
