Description
Book Synopsis* Presents the most recent scholarly thinking about Hinduism in an accessible way. * Leading scholars make their views and research available to a wider readership. * Divided into four sections covering theoretical issues, textual traditions, science and philosophy, and Hindu society and politics.
Trade Review“This collection offers a new way to parse the multiple entryways into the vast arena of Hinduism. Using the general divisional categories of theoretical issues, text and tradition, systematic thought, and society, politics and nation, Flood has achieved significant breadth in disciplines, subjects and historical perspectives.”
Choice
“This is a most welcome, timely, and authoritative assessment of the entire field of study, a most commendable response to an enormous challenge.” Journal of Contemporary Religion
“It effectively serves to condense the proliferation of scholarship on Hinduism... The approach is interdisciplinary and places Hinduism not within a sphere of its own, but within a larger context, reading it as a dynamic product of historical global exchange. The Blackwell Companion to Hinduism also has an important section devoted to the Indian Sciences (language, mathematics, astrology, astronomy and medicine) which collectively destabilize colonialism’s claim that Hinduism was arbitrary and irrational. … A handsome addition to academic and personal libraries.” Asian Studies Review
Table of ContentsContributors x
Preface and Acknowledgments xii
Introduction: Establishing the Boundaries 1
Gavin Flood
Part I Theoretical Issues 21
1 Colonialism and the Construction of Hinduism 23
Gauri Viswanathan
2 Orientalism and Hinduism 45
David Smith
Part II Text and Tradition 65
The Sanskrit Textual Traditions 67
3 Vedas and Upanisads 68
Michael Witzel
4 The Dharmaúâstras 102
Ludo Rocher
5 The Sanskrit Epics 116
John Brockington
6 The Purânas 129
Freda Matchett
Textual Traditions in Regional Languages 144
7 Tamil Hindu Literature 145
Norman Cutler
8 The Literature of Hinduism in Malayalam 159
Rich Freeman
9 North Indian Hindi Devotional Literature 182
Nancy M Martin
Major Historical Developments 199
10 The Saiva Traditions 200
Gavin Flood
11 History of Vaisnava Traditions: An Esquisse 229
Gérard Colas
12 The Renouncer Tradition 271
Patrick Olivelle
13 The Householder Tradition in Hindu Society 288
TN Madan
Regional Traditions 306
14 The Teyyam Tradition of Kerala 307
Rich Freeman
15 The Month of Kârtik and Women's Ritual Devotions to Krishna in Benares 327
Tracy Pinchman
Part III Systematic Thought 343
The Indian Sciences 345
Introduction 346
Frits Staal
16 The Science of Language 348
Frits Staal
17 Indian Mathematics 360
Takao Hayashi
18 Calendar, Astrology and Astronomy 376
Michio Yano
19 The Science of Medicine 393
Dominik Wujastyk
Philosophy and Theology 410
20 Hinduism and the Proper Work of Reason 411
Jonardon Ganeri
21 Restoring "Hindu Theology" as a Category in Indian Intellectual Discourse 447
Francis Cloone. SJ
22 Mantra 478
André Padoux
Part IV Society, Politics, and Nation 493
23 On the Relationship between Caste and Hinduism 495
Declan Quigley
24 Modernity, Reform and Revival 509
Dermot Killingley
25 Contemporary Political Hinduism 526
C Ram Prasad
26 The Goddess and the Nation Subterfuges of Antiquity, the Cunning of Modernity 551
Sumathi Ramaswamy
27 Gender in a Devotional Universe 569
Vasudha Narayanan
Index 588
