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Religious thought and practice in Vaikhānasa Viṣṇuism1
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 December 2009
Extract
The question as to how many individuals in one of the religious communities of ancient and modern India at a given historical moment understood all the meanings and implications of their traditional ritual symbolism may to a considerable extent be irrelevant, but the relation between religious practice and the philosophical or theological doctrines underlying it is of outstanding interest. Whereas we are, as far as this relation between thought and practice in Vedic religion is concerned, placed in favourable circumstances because the Brāhmaṇas explaining the thought solve many problems arising from a study of the sūtras describing the ritual acts, ritual texts compiled in the Hindu period, and even those which originated in the centuries of transition, often force us to apply modified methods of investigating these connexions. A special importance attaches to those documents, which, from one point of view that is often shared by the indigenous tradition, may be regarded as late representatives of Vedism, and from another as early products of Hinduism characterized by the prominence of other gods and the appearance of other cults. Among these texts those issuing from the religious community of the Vaikhānasas, which, as a small but important group, continues to exist in the South of India, are of special interest because they embody the tradition of a society of Indian devotees which at first constituted a Vedic school belonging to the Taittirīya branch of the Black Yajurveda, and in the transitional period and the centuries after came to transform itself into a community of devout worshippers of Viṣṇu.
- Type
- Aeticles and Notes and Communications
- Information
- Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , Volume 40 , Issue 3 , October 1977 , pp. 550 - 571
- Copyright
- Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London 1977
References
1 Abbreviations used: AiB—Aitareyabrāhmana; ĀnandaS—Ānandasaṃhitā;Āp.—Āpostamba; ĀpDhS—Āpastambadharmasūtra; ĀpGS—Āpastambagṛhyasūtra; ĀpŚS—Āpastam-baśrautasūtra; ĀśvGS—Āśvalāyanagṛhyasūtra; AtriS—Atrisaṃhitā; B—Baudhāyana; BĀU—Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad; BGS—Baudhāyanagṛhyasūtra; BhG—Bhagavadgītā; BPS—Baudhā-yanapitṛmedhasūtra; ChU—Chāndogya Upaniṣad; G—Gobhila; GB—Gopathabrāhmaṇa; HGS—Hiraṇyakeśigṛhyasūtra; Hir.—Hiraṇyakeśin; K—Kātīya; KāśyS—Kāśyapasaṃhitā; KauṣU—Kauṣītaki Upaniṣad; KB—Kauṣītakibrāhmaṇa; Kh.—Khādira; KS—Kāṭhaka-saṃhitā; MahāNU—Mahānārāyaṇa Upaniṣad; MānAnugS—Mānava Anugrāhikasūtra; MāṇḍU—Māṇḍūkya Upaniṣad; MatsyaP—Matsyapurāṇa; MS—Maitrāyaṇīyasaṃhitā; MŚS—Mānavaśrautasūtra; P—Pāraskara; ParāśaraS—Parāśarasaṃhitā; PB—Pañcaviṃ-śabrāhmaṇa; RV—Ṛgveda; RVKh.—Ṛgvedakhila; Śāṅkh.—Śāṅkhāyana; ŚB—Śatapatha-brāhmaṇa; ŚGS—Śāṅkhāyanagṛhyasūtra; ŚvU—Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad; TĀ—Taittirīya Āraṇyaka; TB—Taittirīyabrāhmaṇa; TS—Taittirīyasaṃhitā; VaikhS—Vaikhānasasaṃhitā; VaikhSmS—Vaikhānasasmārtasūtra; VāsDhS—Vāsiṣṭhadharmasūtra; ViṣṇuP—Viṣṇupurāṇa; ViṣṇuS—Viṣṇusmṛti; VS—Vājasaneyisaṃhitā; Yājn.—Yājñavalkyasmṛti.
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8 In the literature it is usual to quote mantras occurring in the Saṃhitā or Brahmaṇa to which a text attaches itself by their opening words (pratīka only).
9 Edition: Vaikhānasagranthamālā, 7 and 14, Madras, 1920.
10 The Jn¯anakāṇḍa, a name used also for the whole Kāśyapasaṃhitā (two other parts of which have not been found) was edited by B. Pārthasārathi Bhattacharya, Tirupati, 1948, and translated by Goudriaan, op. cit.
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30 These rites did not of course discourage those compilers who focused their attention on temple ritual.
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36 The ritual use of which I intend to discuss elsewhere.
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38 I refer also to my remark made on p. 553, 11. 10 ff.
39 God's ‘forms’.
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55 Caland refers to TS 6, 2, 4, 5, and TB 3, 2, 4, 3 (op. cit., p. 64, n. 4).
56 As is often the case in Hindu treatises of this character references to the authoritative texts are also formulated as follows: According to the Scriptures, as we know, Nārāyana ‘has pervaded this whole existence and stays in it’ (KāśyS 68; the text is MahāNU 11, 6 = 245).
57 The identity of these authorities may occasionally be established: thus the expression ‘face of Agni’ (agnimukham), occurring in VaikhSmS 1, 15Google Scholar was already used in BGS 1, 3, 32.Google Scholar
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61 This point will be discussed elsewhere.
62 The mantra ā mā gantu pitaro … has been borrowed from Baudhāyana (Caland, W., Altindischer Ahnencult, Leiden, 1893, 259).Google Scholar
63 I refer to another publication.
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