Health and Religious Rituals in South Asia

Health and Religious Rituals in South Asia
Author: Fabrizio Ferrari
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 257
Release: 2011-03-07
Genre: History
ISBN: 1136846298

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Drawing on original fieldwork, this book develops a fresh methodological approach to the study of indigenous understandings of disease as possession, and looks at healing rituals in different South Asian cultural contexts. Contributors discuss the meaning of 'disease', 'possession' and 'healing' in relation to South Asian religions, including Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism and Sikhism, and how South Asians deal with the divine in order to negotiate health and wellbeing. The book goes on to look at goddesses, gods and spirits as a cause and remedy of a variety of diseases, a study that has proved significant to the ethics and politics of responding to health issues. It contributes to a consolidation and promotion of indigenous ways as a method of understanding physical and mental imbalances through diverse conceptions of the divine. Chapters offer a fascinating overview of healing rituals in South Asia and provide a full-length, sustained discussion of the interface between religion, ritual, and folklore. The book presents a fresh insight into studies of Asian Religion and the History of Medicine.

Consecration Rituals in South Asia

Consecration Rituals in South Asia
Author: István Keul
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 405
Release: 2017-02-06
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9004337180

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The essays in the volume Consecration Rituals in South Asia address the ritual procedures that accompany the installation of temple images in Shaiva, Vaishnava, Buddhist and Jain contexts, in various traditions and historical periods.

Words and Deeds

Words and Deeds
Author: Jörg Gengnagel
Publisher: Otto Harrassowitz Verlag
Total Pages: 304
Release: 2005
Genre: Buddhism
ISBN: 9783447051521

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Words and Deeds is a collection of articles on rituals in South Asia with a special focus on their texts and context. The volume presupposes that a comprehensive definition of "ritual" does not exist. Instead, the papers in it avoid essentialist definitions, allowing for a possible polythetic definition of the concept to emerge. Papers in this volume include those on Initiation, Pre-Natal Rites, Religious Processions, Royal Consecration, Rituals which mark the commencement of ritual, Rituals of devotion and Vedic sacrifice as well as contributions which address the broader theoretical issues of engaging in the study of ritual texts and ritual practice, both from the etic and the emic perspective. These studies show that any study of the relationship between the text and the context of rituals must also allow for the possibility that different categories of performers can and do subjectively constitute the relationship between their ritual knowledge and ritual practice, between text and context in differing and nuanced ways.

Dealing with Deities

Dealing with Deities
Author: Selva J. Raj
Publisher: State University of New York Press
Total Pages: 310
Release: 2012-02-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0791482006

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Drawing on original field research, Dealing with Deities explores the practice of taking ritual vows in the lives of ordinary religious practitioners in South Asia. The cornerstone of lay religious activity, vow rituals are adopted by Muslims, Hindus, Christians, Buddhists, Jains, and Sikhs who wish to commit themselves to ritually enacted relationships with sacred figures in order to gain earthly boons and spiritual merit. The contributors to this volume offer a fascinating look at the varieties and complexities of vows and also focus on a unique characteristic of this vow-taking culture, that of resorting to deities and shrines of other religions in defiance of institutional directives and religious boundaries. Richly illustrated, the book explores the creativity of South Asian devotees and their deeply felt convictions that what they require, they can achieve faithfully—and independently—by dealing directly with deities.

Religious Traditions in South Asia

Religious Traditions in South Asia
Author: Geoffrey A. Oddie
Publisher: Psychology Press
Total Pages: 172
Release: 1998
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9780700704217

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These studies focus on questions of religious interaction and change in India from the sixth century B.C. to the present day. They represent the work of scholars in a range of disciplines and who are resident mostly in Australia

Ritual Innovation

Ritual Innovation
Author: Brian Kemble Pennington
Publisher: Suny Press
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2019
Genre: Ritual
ISBN: 9781438469027

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Challenges prevailing conceptions of what religious ritual does and how it achieves its ends.

Disease, Religion and Healing in Asia

Disease, Religion and Healing in Asia
Author: Ivette M. Vargas-O'Bryan
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 283
Release: 2014-11-20
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1317689941

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Recent academic and medical initiatives have highlighted the benefits of studying culturally embedded healing traditions that incorporate religious and philosophical viewpoints to better understand local and global healing phenomena. Capitalising on this trend, the present volume looks at the diverse models of healing that interplay with culture and religion in Asia. Cutting across several Asian regions from Hong Kong to mainland China, Tibet, India, and Japan, the book addresses healing from a broader perspective and reflects a fresh new outlook on the complexities of Asian societies and their approaches to health. In exploring the convergences and collisions a society must negotiate, it shows the emerging urgency in promoting multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary research on disease, religion and healing in Asia. Drawing on original fieldwork, contributors present their latest research on diverse local models of healing that occur when disease and religion meet in South and East Asian cultures. Revealing the symbiotic relationship of disease, religion and healing and their colliding values in Asia often undetected in healthcare research, the book draws attention to religious, political and social dynamics, issues of identity and ethics, practical and epistemological transformations, and analogous cultural patterns. It challenges the reader to rethink predominantly long-held Western interpretations of disease management and religion. Making a significant contribution to the field of transcultural medicine, religious studies in Asia as well as to a better understanding of public health in Asia as a whole, it will be of interest to students and scholars of Health Studies, Asian Religions and Philosophy.

Ismaili Hymns from South Asia

Ismaili Hymns from South Asia
Author: Zawahir Moir
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 274
Release: 2013-07-04
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1136822771

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The Aga Khans have long played a prominent part on the international stage, but much less tends to be understood about the most important group of their followers, the Khoja Ismailis of South Asia, who are now also settled in many other parts of the world. Even less is generally known about the hymns, called ginans, which have historically formed so central an element in the religious life and rituals of the Ismaili community. The principal aim of this anthology is to fill this gap by providing a sympathetic introduction to this still largely unexplored tradition of South Asian devotional literature, and to draw attention to the many features of remarkable interest which it contains.

Indian Religions

Indian Religions
Author: Peter Heehs
Publisher: Orient Blackswan
Total Pages: 648
Release: 2002
Genre: India
ISBN: 9788178240794

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This Book Is An Anthology Of Written And Oral Texts By Spiritual Teachers From South Asia, Covering The Period Of The Rig Veda To The 1980S. All The Major Traditions (Vedic-Hindu, Jain, Buddhist, Sufi And Sikh) As Well As Heterodox And Transgressive Traditions, Are Represented.

Food, Faith and Gender in South Asia

Food, Faith and Gender in South Asia
Author: Nita Kumar
Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
Total Pages: 233
Release: 2020-02-20
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1350137065

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How do women express individual agency when engaging in seemingly prescribed or approved practices such as religious fasting? How are sectarian identities played out in the performance of food piety? What do food practices tell us about how women negotiate changes in family relationships? This collection offers a variety of distinct perspectives on these questions. Organized thematically, areas explored include the subordination of women, the nature of resistance, boundary making and the construction of identity and community. Methodologically, the essays use imaginative reconstructions of women's experiences, particularly where the only accounts available are written by men. The essays focus on Hindus and Muslims in South Asia, Sri Lankan Buddhist women and South Asians in the diaspora in the US and UK. Pioneering new research into food and gender roles in South Asia, this will be of use to students of food studies, sociology, anthropology and cultural studies.