Nonviolence in the Mahabharata: Siva's Summa on Rishidharma and the Gleaners of Kurukshetra

ISBN-13: 9780367000813 / Angielski / Miękka / 2018 / 175 str.

Alf Hiltebeitel (The George Washington U

Opis

In Indian mythological texts like the Mahabharata and Ramayana, there are recurrent tales about gleaners. The practice of "gleaning" in India had more to do with the house-less forest life than with residential village or urban life or with gathering residual post-harvest grains from cultivated fields. Gleaning can be seen a metaphor for the Mahabharata poets' art: an art that could have included their manner of gleaning what they made the leftovers (what they found useful) from many preexistent texts into Vyasa's "entire thought"-including oral texts and possibly written ones, such as philosophical debates and stories. This book explores the notion of non-violence in the epic Mahabharata. In examining gleaning as an ecological and spiritual philosophy nurtured as much by hospitality codes as by eating practices, the author analyses the merits and limitations of the 9th century Kashmiri aesthetician Anandavardhana that the dominant aesthetic sentiment or rasa of the Mahabharata is shanta (peace). Mahatma Gandhi's non-violent reading of the Mahabharata via the Bhagavad Gita are also studied. This book by one of the leaders in Mahabharata studies is of interest to scholars of South Asian Literary Studies, Religious Studies as well as Peace Studies, South Asian Anthropology and History.

Spis treści

1. Introduction: Gleaners Were and Are for Real 2. Peace and Non-violence in the Mahābhārata 3. Śiva’s Summa on Gleaners 4. Gleaners and Beggars, Buddhist, Jain, and Brahmanical 5. Daṇḍaka Forest 6. Approaching Balarāma’s Tīrthayātrā and Kuruksetra with Three Hypotheses 7. More Homespun Tales of Kurukṣetra: Further towards a Mahābhārata Ethnography 8. Naimiṣeya Kuñja: The Mahābhārata’s Chief Holdout for Gleaners 9. The Gleaning Seam along Balarāma’s Route 10. King Kuru and the Kurus 11. King Kuru at Kurukṣetra 12. Gleaners of the Text 13. Conclusion: Non-violence and Śāntarasa en–route to Kurukṣetra

O autorze

Alf Hiltebeitel is Columbian Professor of Religion, History, and Human Sciences in the Department of Religion at The George Washington University, USA.