Gandhi, Hinduism, and Humanity

While Gandhi spoke frequently about humanity and humanitarianism, he was deeply suspicious of any attempt to serve or even speak in the name of the human race. In Hind Swaraj or Indian Home Rule, his manifesto from 1909, he wrote, ‘I am so constructed that I can only serve my immediate neighbours (āspās vastā mānaso in the Gujarati text), but in my conceit I pretend to have discovered that I must with my body serve every individual in the Universe. In thus attempting the impossible, man (mānas jāt) comes in contact with different natures, different religions, and is utterly confounded’ (Gandhi 2008: 42). Gandhi considered the effort to address mankind as a whole fundamentally violent, and often described it as a sin. This was because man’s universality could only become manifest by destroying the social particularities that both obscured and made it possible.

Women’s Observances

The Sanskrit term vrata, often translated as ‘vow’ or ‘votive ritual’, refers in contemporary Hinduism to a specific type of Hindu religious observance with a set of defining characteristics. South Asian Christians, Muslims, Jains, and Buddhists may also perform religious vows but the word vrata refers in particular to this type of ritual in its Hindu contexts. Hindus practise vratas under different vernacular names as well—vrat, brata, and nōṉpu, for example—all over India and across regional, sectarian, caste, linguistic, and class boundaries. In contemporary Hinduism, the term has come to refer primarily to a religiously sanctioned votive rite performed at a particular time with particular desires or intentions in mind on the part of the petitioner. Vratas usually entail some kind of promise directed towards a deity, often in exchange for a boon, and a predetermined form of ritual observance. Men, women, boys, and girls may all perform various vratas. There are many vratas, however, that only females undertake in contemporary Hindu practice. In fact, vratas are among the practices most broadly associated with contemporary Hindu women’s religious observance. The meanings and practices evoked by the word vrata are nevertheless historically and textually contingent and have evolved over the course of many centuries.

Vaiṣṇava Practice

This chapter attempts to offer not a historical overview of Vaiṣṇava practice, but an overview of the ways Vaiṣṇavas have viewed their own practice. Given the enormous variety of Vaiṣṇava traditions and their very regional nature, any overview of Vaiṣṇava practice is necessarily selective. The chapter draws upon the writings of Vaiṣṇavas from most major traditions, and on a wide range of scriptural texts. After an analysis of the Vaiṣṇava understanding of bhakti, I discuss just four distinct Vaiṣṇava practices, which Vaiṣṇava Purāṇas proclaim to be the principal practices for the four cosmic ages (yuga): Vedic ritual, image worship, praising God, and meditation. Examining the various practices indicated by just these four, while not exhaustive, does demonstrate the great diversity of Vaiṣṇava practice, and also brings to light how these practices, despite their apparent differences, are all interconnected and, in the Vaiṣṇava mind, all have the same aim: constant remembrance of God.

The Quest for Liberation-in-Life

The Haṭha- and Rājayoga texts which were composed before the Haṭhapradīpikā (mid-fifteenth century CE) provide a window onto what might be considered the formative phase of these types of yoga. This chapter will present the first survey of this corpus’ content on liberation (moḳsa) and meditative absorption (generally known as samādhi). Although each text contains distinctive features and teachings, this survey reveals the principal meaning of the term rājayoga and several pervasive themes, such as the transformational role of the practice of samādhi and the general acceptance of liberation-in-life (jīvanmukti) as the goal of yoga. After discussing the relationship between Rājayoga and liberation-in-life, an essential conception of which can be traced back to earlier Kaula traditions, the chapter concludes by examining how the author of the Haṭhapradīpikā interpreted this relationship and resolved tension between transcendence and power, which is apparent in many of the earlier works.

Gurus in Contemporary Hindu Practice

Gurus as authoritative teachers have long played important roles in Hindu traditions, but in an increasingly globalized world these roles have taken some new turns. Modern transport and communications have let some gurus gain very large followings in India and abroad, which necessarily affects their relationships with individual disciples. Even while adapting to new situations, however, most still draw on specific religious traditions, which give them distinct identities and differentiate the teachings and practices they offer. Although they all tend to use a language of truth and knowledge to refer to spiritual reality, the quality of the reality to which each points seems to vary, coloured by different experiences of divine love and power. The guru’s often powerful presence, moreover, may be given different roles in any practical techniques they offer. This chapter examines three contemporary traditions of practice that highlight the figure of the guru in different ways.

The Modern Spirit of Yoga

This chapter presents a brief re-examination of the modern yoga phenomenon and field of studies. Based on the author’s previous publications on the topic, it aims to improve and expand earlier observations, to integrate some new and older scholarship, and to comment on more recent modern yoga developments. It starts with the briefest historical summary of the emergence of modern yoga, now fairly well mapped in various academic studies. It then goes on to argue that, developing in the wider ideological context of modern spirituality and mirroring different socio-cultural milieus, modern yoga gave rise to five main yoga idioms or discourses: the revivalist, from which emerged the nationalist, and the transnational (in its monastic and non-monastic variants), from which emerged the globalized. Last but not least, we find the pervasive healthist idiom.

Practice in the Tantric Religion of Śiva

By the early medieval period the religion focused on Śiva was on the rise politically, socially, and culturally, coming to dominate the South Asian context and beyond to South East Asia. The origins of Śaivism, the religion of Śiva, are ancient and certainly those of devotion to Śiva, whose early form is Rudra, stretch back to the Vedic period. With the Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad he becomes elevated to the supreme deity. But it is with the tantric revelation that Śiva comes into his own and it is this tradition that will be the focus of the chapter. The practices of the tantric revelation vary from fairly standard temple worship for those in mainstream society to fringe groups that performed unconventional and polluting practices (such as ritualized sex outside of caste restrictions) to go against orthodoxy in pursuit of power. The chapter examines these developments.

Measuring Innovation

Pūjā is often perceived as a predominantly Hindu form of veneration of gods, as it is currently the main ritual for almost one billion followers of Hinduism (about 15 per cent of the world’s population), with approximately 800 million of them living in India. It is less known that pūjā is also used as the main ritual in other religious communities, specifically different groups of contemporary Buddhists and Jains, as well as of Sikhs and various India-orientated spiritual practices and religious movements such as ISKCON. This makes pūjā not only a pan-Indian form of worship but the worldwide ritual that crossed the borders of its native country and gained many adepts all over the world. This chapter examines the genesis and development of this religious practice.

The Early History of Renunciation

The terms ‘renunciation’ and ‘renouncer’ have become commonplace in modern scholarship on ancient and medieval Indian religions. One of the prominent examples of the use of these terms is the seminal study of Louis Dumont (1960), ‘World Renunciation in Indian Religions’, which had a profound impact on later scholarship. He makes several sweeping assertions relating to the centrality of renunciation both within Hinduism and more generally in Indian religions. ‘The secret of Hinduism’, he claims, ‘may be found in the dialogue between the renouncer and the man-in-the-world’ (37). While the ‘man-in-the-world’ is bound in a network of relationships including caste, the renouncer ‘depends upon no one but himself, he is alone’; ‘he thinks as an individual and this is the distinctive trait which opposes him to the man-in-the-world and brings him closer to the western thinker’ (46). It is not this chapter’s intention to analyse these assertions or determine their historical accuracy. Rather, the beginning of this chapter, devoted to exploring the origins of the institution that Dumont elevates to such a central position, defines the terms and categories used. What is ‘renunciation’? Who is a ‘renouncer’? To which Indian institutions and indigenous terms and categories do they refer?

Sounding Out the Divine

From Vedic sacrifices to kīrtan podcasts, sound art and music shape how Hindu religions are experienced. Nonetheless, the social and discursive value of music is easily underemphasized in accounts of religious practice and thought: frequently, music is either viewed as a technical field—best left alone by non-specialists—or taken for granted and dismissed as part of the ‘background’ in rituals and texts. However, the auditory dimensions of religion have very real consequences: historically, musical transmission has been crucial in the dissemination of ideas and texts, while soundscapes and performance genres continue to cultivate identities and moral positions. There is more to music than decoration or mediation: in some contexts, it is possible to consider music and sonic practices as the substance of a theological system, the centre of gravity for doctrine, behaviour, and soteriology.