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Introduction: Process and Structure in South Asian Religion

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 March 2011

David G. Mandelbaum
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Extract

The studies in this volume explore some of the main aspects of Hinduism in India and of Buddhism in Ceylon. Because each article is based on the author's field observations, it deals with the realities of religion as well as with its ideology, and with actual religious behavior no less than with its hopes and beliefs. These papers are not intended to give a systematic coverage of the two religions; each is rather a systematic analysis of a certain part of the religion as practiced. The emphasis is on structure and process more than on description and content. The gods are not catalogued nor are the main ceremonies enumerated; rather, the meaning of deities and of ritual in the lives of the practitioners is examined.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 23 , supplement S1: Aspects of Religion in South Asia , June 1964 , pp. 5 - 20
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1964

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References

1 This listing of the main features of each complex is a preliminary sorting out. As noted above, there is always some overlap in certain particulars in any one locality.

2 This is another general distinction between the supernaturals of the ultimate and those of the proximate complex. Officiants of the high gods are expected to keep themselves in a more intense and continual state of purity than is required for the servants of the local supernaturals, but the high gods are also less perturbed by a breach of purity in their vicinity.