Sanskritic civilization · Tantric studies · Newar & Nusantaran Buddhism
Electronically find in Muktabodha’s latest e-texts gems such as:
pañcarātrādayo mārgāḥ kālenaivopakārakāḥ |
bauddhatantrāṇi deveśi varttante subahūny api ||tāni proktāni sarvāṇi bauddharūpeṇa viṣṇunā |
na tatra dharmaleśo'sti mohanāni durātmanām ||
(But as the Newars say:)
evaṃ sa vaiṣṇavān sarvān viṣṇurūpeṇa bodhayan |
bodhimārge niyujyāpi cārayati jagaddhite ||
Two recommended review essays:
Andrea Acri. ‘Alternative approaches to eighth-century Central Javanese Buddhist architecture’. Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- end Volkenkunde 167, No. 2-3 (2011), pp.313-321. [abstract/PDF]
Dick van der Meij. ‘Kakawin Sutasoma and Kakawin Nāgara Kṛtāgama’. Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- end Volkenkunde 167, No. 2-3 (2011), pp.322-332. [abstract/PDF]
Valerio-Baumann, Sabine. ‘Die Bedeutung weiblicher Gottheiten im ikonographischen Programm des Vaitāl Deul. Eine Kritische Analyse unter Berücksichtigung der Devī-Darstellungen von Śakti-Tempeln in Orissa.’ Diplomarbeit (Magistra der Philosophie), Universität Wien. 2011. 140 pp. [official site/PDF]
This thesis focuses on the significance of the female goddesses in the iconographic program of one of the most important Śakti-temple in Orissa – the Vaitāl Deul. This monument is situated in the city of Bhubaneśvar and was built during the reign of the Bhauma-Karas-dynasty. […] While a large number of devīs can be found on the temple walls and inside the sanctum, male figures are rare but situated on important positions of the building, e.g. in the caitya-medallions of the gaṇḍi or inside the shrine. Part of this thesis focuses on the sociohistorical and religious background of the Vaitāl Deul. By means of a comparative analysis, I studied the relation of the iconographic program of the Vaitāl Deul both with Sanskrit-śilpa-manuscrip[t]s (Śilpa-Prakāśa and Śilparatnakośa) and with the iconographic programs of other, representative Śakti-temples of Orissa. These analyses have shown that every Śakti-Temple has its own independent iconographic program. […]
(Fortunately, this Orissan masterpiece is still standing. It helps to be on the right side of history in Hindustan — not like these guys.)
Olga Serbaeva-Saraogi. ‘A Tentative Reconstruction of the Relative Chronology of the Śaiva Purāṇic and Śaiva Tantric Texts on the Basis of the Yoginī-related Passages’. In: Jezic, M; Koskikallio (eds.) Parallels and Comparisons: Proceedings of the Fourth Dubrovnik International Conference on the Sanskrit Epics and Purāṇas. Zagreb: 2009, pp.313–348. [official / PDF]
Dr. Serbaeva-Saraogi’s article inspired me to create the ‘required reading’ tag. This impressive piece of research is associated with a recently completed project at Universität Zürich, which sounds equally intriguing: ‘Translating the Non-Evident: “Altered States of Consciousness” in Vidyapitha Tantras and in Western Transcreations of “Tantrism”‘.
The contributors to this volume are from different academic disciplines and treat examples of both kinds of rituals in various religious settings. Of special interest in this collection of essays are interrelationships among initiations and their relations to other kinds of rituals. The papers are devoted to the study of minute details and point to the dynamics of initiations. The transfer of ritual elements accompanied by readjustments to new contexts as the modification of procedures or the reassignment of meanings is one of the recurring traits. Other aspects addressed by the authors include the relation of script (ritual handbooks) to performance or various forces of change (e.g. the economics of ritual, gender-related variations, modernization and democratization). Continue reading “Zotter & Zotter, ‘Initiations in India & Nepal’ (2010)”
Dozens of other Himalayan and South Asian ethnic groups are represented in the collection, which is a real mine of information for researchers in the field, well worth the cost of digitization. The copyrights — yes, they still matter — are reserved by SOAS and Nicholas Haimendorf.
Link: Fürer-Haimendorf collection, SOAS (at digital.info.soas.ac.uk/).
Two dissertations on the eighth-century Śaiva author Sadyojyoti, both supervised by Krishna Sivaraman, have recently become available online at McMaster University:
Leon E. Hannotte. Philosophy of God in Kashmir Śaiva Dualism: Sadyojyoti and His Commentators. PhD Diss., McMaster University, 1987. Open Dissertations and Theses, Paper 2089. [abstract & pdf]
Wayne Andrew Borody. The Doctrine of Empirical Consciousness in the Bhoga Kārikā. PhD Diss., McMaster University, 1988. Open Dissertations and Theses, Paper 2073. [abstract & PDF]
For students of late Indian Buddhism, Sadyojyoti is a person of interest, given his advocacy of epistemes such as the sākārajñānavāda / nirākārajñānavāda dyad, which was already known to Kamalaśīla, as well as to some later Buddhist authors.
Hannotte’s dissertation was published by the National Library of Canada in 1989, and as F. S. kindly pointed out to me, Borody’s dissertation finally came out with Motilal Banarsidass in 2005. Nonetheless, it is handy to be able to freely access both dissertations.
A recent post on H-Buddhism from Dr. Hidenori Sakuma (佐久間秀範) questions the identity of two authors called Asvabhāva: one a commentator on the Mahāyānasutrālaṅkāra, another a commentator on Kambala’s Ālokamālā.
Not wanting to brave H-Buddhism’s shaky moderation — as seen, for example, in the oblivious reposting of Sakuma’s apparently private replies — I responded off-list. My main observation was this: the strong likelihood that the Ālokamālā belongs to a much later era of the Mahāyāna is reflected in the fact that only late authors cite it. Only tantric authors from the tenth century or later, such as Puṇḍarīka and Abhayākaragupta, know about the Ālokamālā. [Edited, 2011/09/23: ninth-century Āryadeva also knows about Kambala, though he refers to a different work.]
Moreover, there is the striking fact that it is cited by name by Śaiva tantric authors who were active in this period. Utpala’s Spandapradīpikā quotes Ālokamālā 141cd and 142, with a couple of variants, and the latter verse appears in Kṣemarāja’s commentary on the Spandakārikās, the Spandanirṇaya.*
The point here is not that this high-level form of Śaivism has such a profound intellectual debt to Buddhism that it must clarify its ideas through direct engagement with Buddhist authors. That is surely old news in this field, if rarely acknowledged in scholarship nowadays. Rather, I want to observe that the Ālokamālā is regarded as a vital tract in this particular period, and no earlier — certainly not in the fifth century, as posited by Chr. Lindtner (and repeated in Potter’s Encyclopedia). This date is probably about half a millennium400 years too early.
It could also be argued, perhaps by someone with more time and resources than myself, that the authors of the Mahāyānasutrālaṅkāra and Ālokamālā in some ways address themselves to different concerns which, it might also be surmised, are characteristic of different eras. The former is conscious of a threat from the Hīnayāna — a phenomenon which it defines with a particular clarity, seemingly lost on many scholars who have fretted about this term — and became a work of almost incontestable authority among Buddhists in India. The Ālokamālā, on the other hand, has other priorities, as did those late tantric authors who found a place for it in their own writings.
* Dyczkowski, The doctrine of vibration, Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1989, p.248, n.31. The verse numbers in the Ālokamālā are supplied by myself.