Pradyumna in the Mahābhārata

Pradyumna ◽

10.1093/oso/9780190054113.003.0003 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 29-52

Author(s):

Christopher R. Austin

Keyword(s):

Reference Points ◽

Sex And Gender ◽

Physical Evidence ◽

And Gender

This chapter introduces the earliest extant textual materials concerning Pradyumna in the Mahābhārata, and examines first the Saubhavadhaparvan of Book 3 and the club battle of the Vṛṣṇis in Book 16. In both of these episodes, Pradyumna doubles or stands in for his father in ways that prefigure later developments of the Pradyumna mythology. Second, the chapter pursues the connection between the physical evidence of the preceding chapter and the emerging Pāñcarātra movement as attested by the Mahābhārata’s Nārāyaṇīyaparvan. Finally and more broadly, certain patterns in the Mahābhārata’s discourses on sex and gender are introduced, which remain key reference points in all subsequent chapters. Most important here are a set of conflicting essentializations regarding the nature of women, and the ideological premises of the Mahābhārata’s universe that conduce to the association of sex with violence.

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Completing the Picture: Women and the Female Principle in the Mithraic Cult

Numen ◽

10.1163/156852706776942302 ◽

2006 ◽

Vol 53 (1) ◽

pp. 48-77 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Alison Griffith

Keyword(s):

The Other ◽

Sex And Gender ◽

Physical Evidence ◽

Female Sex ◽

And Gender ◽

Epigraphic Evidence

AbstractIn the recently revived debate on the possible involvement of women in the Mithraic cult the main points of contention are the value and reliability of limited archaeological and epigraphic evidence and of two passing references to women's involvement in works by Porphyry and Tertullian. At one end of the spectrum, Richard Gordon proposed an alternate "Mithraic" world that not only excluded women but also subverted the female principle entirely. At the other end, Jonathan David challenged the claim that women were excluded from the Mithraic cult and proposed the possibility of lea and mater grades. The first part of this paper tackles the vexed issue of "evidence" by conducting a more thorough and stringent review of the physical evidence than that offered by David on this subject. The conclusion that none of this evidence is unequivocally Mithraic is hardly new; the aim is to put the debate to rest. The second part of this paper explores Porphyry's distinct but ambiguous reference to women as "hyenas" in the context of the Mithraic cult. In this section Gordon's theory of an alternate Mithraic reality is modified in order to reconcile numerous female sex and gender associations apparent in the iconography of the tauroctony scene.

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