In the last few decades, yoga has helped millions of people to improve their concepts of themselves. Yoga realises that man is not only the mind, he is body as well. Yoga has been designed in a such a way that it can complete the process of evolution of the personality in every possible direction. Kundalini yoga is a part of the tantric tradition. Even though you may have already been introduced to yoga, it is necessary to know something about tantra also. Since the dawn of creation, the tantrics and yogis have realised that in this physical body there is a potential force. It is not psychological or transcendental; it is a dynamic potential force in the material body, and it is called Kundalini. This Kundalini is the greatest discovery of tantra and yoga. Scientists have begun to look into this, and a summary of the latest scientific experiments is included in this book.

At first sight the lives of hermits, living in solitude and committed to a life of prayer and contemplation seems to be a world apart of the active practice of interfaith dialogue. Yet, there is a long tradition of seeking the divine together and thus making a contribution to better mutual understanding and an active contribution to peace between Christianity, Hinduism and Buddhism in India. Drawing on his experience of travelling to some of India's holy places, the life and work of writers like Thomas Merton, Charles de Foucauld and Abishaktanda and being himself a Benedictine hermit and Professor of Divinity at the University of St Andrews, Mario Aguilar opens up new possibilities for dialogue between three of the world's major religions in today's world. He shows how his own experience of an eremitic life has brought him into deep communion with pilgrims of other faiths, be it through shared silence or listening to each other's experience, through reading sacred scriptures together, through poetry or interfaith worship that draws on practices and texts from Hinduism, Buddhism and Christianity. This is a book for all engaged in interfaith dialogue and seeking to explore how spiritualities of silence, contemplation and prayer can make a contribution to peace and harmony in the world today.

Here is a storybook for everyone - with lions and kings, rogues and saints, a boy who can stop an elephant, and a milkmaid who can walk on water! Filled with wisdom, adventure and surprises, these timeless tales remind us of what is important as we enter the twenty-first century. At once entertaining and instructive, these simple, practical stories have been related by Sri Swami Satchidananda, who is well-known and well-loved for his deep spiritual insight, as well as his sense of humor. Some of the stories that he tells have been drawn from nature; others have been passed on from generation to generation. Some come from ancient scriptures, others from folklore of India. They enlighten us about how to lead easeful, peaceful, useful lives and, ultimately, attain spiritual realization.

Sri Swami Satchidananda gives a remarkably thorough overview of the various techniques of meditation in relatively few pages. The booklet describes the use of mantras, yantras, and specific breathing practices.

Composed by three poet-saints between the sixth and eighth centuries A.D., the Tevaram hymns are the primary scripture of the Tamil Saivism, one of the first popular large-scale devotional movements within Hinduism. Indira Peterson eloquently renders into English a substantial portion of these hymns, which provide vivid and moving portraits of the images, myths, rites, and adoration of Siva and which continue to be loved and sung by the millions of followers of the Tamil Saiva tradition. Her introduction and annotations illuminate the work's literary, religious, and cultural contexts, making this anthology a rich sourcebook for the study of South Indian popular religion. Indira Peterson highlights the Tevaram as a seminal text in Tamil cultural history, a synthesis of pan-Indian and Tamil civilization, as well as a distinctly Tamil expression of the love of song, sacred landscape, and ceremonial religion. Her discussion of this work draws on her pioneering research into the performance of the hymns and their relation to the art and ritual of the South Indian temple. Originally published in 1989. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Swaminarayan Hinduism is rooted in its formation in India at the cusp of the early modern and colonial period. This book explores the new discoveries, recent research and interpretation of the history, doctrine, devotional arts, and transnational developments provide a foundation for a more comprehensive understanding of contemporary Swaminarayan growth, belief and practice. The themes that trace through the analyses are tradition and adaptation in the historical and social process of creating a complex new religious identity in response to social, economic and political changes. The book contains current academic research from several disciplinesincluding history, theology, the arts, architecture, sociology, and migration studiesto analyze how the stories, texts, and arts shape and reveal the thought, devotion, conduct, and socio-religious community that guide Swaminarayan Hindus through major transitions across time and space in several contexts. Swaminarayan is one of the rapidly expanding transnational Hindu movements with followers and institutions throughout India and abroad, especially in the United States, Britain, East Africa and Australasia.

This book explores the representation of Hinduism through myth and discourse in urban Hindi theatre in the period 1880-1960. It discusses representative works of seven influential playwrights and looks into the ways they have imagined and re-imagined Hindu traditions. Diana Dimitrova examines the intersections of Hinduism and Hindi theatre, emphasizing the important role that both myth and discourse play in the representation of Hindu traditions in the works of Bharatendu Harishcandra, Jayshankar Prasad, Lakshminarayan Mishra, Jagdishcandra Mathur, Bhuvaneshvar, Upendranath Ashk, and Mohan Rakesh. Dimitrova'a analysis suggests either a traditionalist or a more modernist stance toward religious issues. She emphasizes the absence of Hindi-speaking authors who deal with issues implicit to the Muslim or Sikh or Jain, etc. traditions. This prompts her to suggest that Hindi theatre of the period 1880-1960, as represented in the works of the seven dramatists discussed, should be seen as truly 'Hindu-Hindi' theatre.

After looking at the basis of the Hindu understanding of the world, this introductory account describes the world of the Hindu gods; the Hindu scriptures; the castes, death, and rebirth; monks, saints, and ascetics; and Hindu temples and worship. Herbert Ellinger is the director of a pharmaceutical company. He has spent many years in the far East and has a deep interest in religion and philosophy.

'I have heard the supreme mystery, yoga, from Krishna, from the lord of yoga himself.' Thus ends the Bhagavad Gita, the most famous episode from the great Sanskrit epic, the Mahabharata. In its eighteen short chapters Krishna's teaching leads the warrior Arjuna from perplexity to understanding and correct action, in the process raising and developing many key themes from the history of Indian religions. The Bhagavad Gita is the best known and most widely read Hindu religious text in the Western world. It considers social and religious duty, the nature of sacrifice, the nature of action, the means to liberation, and the relationship of human beings to God. It culminates in an awe-inspiring vision of Krishna as God omnipotent, disposer and destroyer of the universe. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

An illustrated presentation of the fascinating world of Hindu deities and places of worship, this book should appeal to anyone interested in Indian art and culture. The book features 47 popular images and shrines and has been pictorially embellished and extensively illustrated throughout with photographs and hand painted designs. It is a celebration of India's heritage. The first half of the book features Hindu Gods, with specially designed full page illustrations and the second half features the shrines, with full page photographs.

The Vaisnava-sahajiya cult that arose in Bengal in the sixteenth century was an intensely emotional attempt to reconcile the sensual and the ascetic. Exploring the history and doctrine of this cult, Edward C. Dimock, Jr., examines the works of numerous poets who are the source of knowledge about this sect. Dimock examines the life of the saint Caitanya, the mad Baul singers, the doctrines of Tantrism, the origins of the figure of Radha, and the worship of Krishna. His study will appeal to students of the history of religion as well as of Indian culture. This edition includes a new Foreword by Wendy Doniger.
"This is a magnificent book--painstakingly researched and gracefully written. . . . Professor Dimock's book is one of the most rewarding and stimulating studies to appear in recent years."--G. Richard Weldon, "Journal of Asian Studies "

Snakes exist in the myths of most societies, often embodying magical, mysterious forces. Snake cults were especially important in eastern India and Bangladesh, where for centuries worshippers of the indigenous snake goddess Manasa resisted the competing religious influences of Indo-Europeans and Muslims. The result was a corpus of verse texts narrating Manasa's struggle to win universal adoration. The Triumph of the Snake Goddess is the first comprehensive retelling of this epic tale in modern English. Scholar and poet Kaiser Haq offers a composite prose translation of Manasa's story, based on five extant versions. Following the tradition of mangalkavyas-Bengali verse narratives celebrating the deeds of deities in order to win their blessings-the tale opens with a creation myth and a synopsis of Indian mythology, zooming in on Manasa, the miraculous child of the god Shiva. Manasa easily wins the allegiance of everyone except the wealthy merchant Chand, who holds fast in his devotion to Shiva despite seeing his sons massacred. A celestial couple is incarnated on earth to fulfill Manasa's design: Behula, wife to one of Chand's slain sons, undertakes a harrowing odyssey to restore him to life with Manasa's help, ultimately persuading Chand to bow to the snake goddess. A prologue by Haq explores the Bengali oral, poetic, and manuscript traditions behind this Hindu folk epic-a vibrant part of popular Bengali culture, Hindu and Muslim, to this day-and an introduction by Wendy Doniger examines the history and significance of snake worship in classical Sanskrit texts.

Written in the form of a poetic dialogue, it probes Hindu concepts of the nature of God and what man should do to reach him, providing a fascinating synopsis of the religious thought and experience of India through the ages. This edition offers the classic English verse translation by Sir Edwin Arnold (1832-1904). Explanatory footnotes.

The search for a higher state of consciousness takes many forms: eastern religions, meditation, mysticism, and transpersonal psychology, to name a few. But one common theme unites these seemingly diverse approaches to spirituality-kundalini, a Sanskrit word that refers to our potential to reach a higher spiritual plane. Through kundalini yoga our vital life force is channeled up through the spine and concentrated in the brain, resulting in personal transformation and enlightenment. Here are the most authentic and insightful writings on every aspect of this fascinating phenomenon including: - Traditional views of kundalini - Personal accounts of the kundalini experience - Scientific explorations in kundalini research - Advice for seekers This volume includes the writings of Gopi Krishna, Swami Rama, Yogi Bhajan, Christopher Hills, Lee Sannella, and Ken Wilbur, among others. The views of these respected authorities provide the most reliable information on kundalini and valuable guidance for getting in touch with your spiritual self.

Good and evil, loyalty and treachery, faith and doubt, honour and ignominy--the Mahabharata has served as a primer for codes of conduct of generations of Hindus. Over time, the epic has also fascinated those who love a tale well told. In its telling, however, the story has lost much of its richness and nuance, and the characters have become one-dimenssional cut-outs--either starkly good or irredeemably evil. In this reinterpretation, Meena Arora nayak analyses how the values espoused in the Mahabharata came to be distorted into meagre archetypes, creating customary laws that injure society even today.

A free open access ebook is available upon publication. Learn more at www.luminosoa.org. The Emergence of Modern Hinduism argues for the importance of regional, vernacular innovation in processes of Hindu modernization. Scholars usually trace the emergence of modern Hinduism to cosmopolitan reform movements, producing accounts that overemphasize the centrality of elite religion and the influence of Western ideas and models. In this study, the author considers religious change on the margins of colonialism by looking at an important local figure, the Tamil Shaiva poet and mystic Ramalinga Swami (1823-1874). Weiss narrates a history of Hindu modernization that demonstrates the transformative role of Hindu ideas, models, and institutions, making this text essential for scholarly audiences of South Asian history, religious studies, Hindu studies, and South Asian studies.

Standard works on Christology seldom give much consideration to the way Christ is perceived outside the Western tradition. The Other Jesus is an in depth study of understandings of the person of Jesus Christ by major Asian Christian theologians of the 20th century. Taking examples mainly from India and Japan, the author shows how the religious and social contexts of these countries have shaped the way in which Jesus has been understood. The final chapters examine how new approaches to Jesus have emerged from people movements in Asia in Dalit, Minjung, and feminist perceptions. Throughout the author seeks to relate Asian perspectives to Western Christologies, and to suggest ways in which they present challenges to the world wide church.

Learn more at www.luminosoa.org. Impersonations: The Artifice of Brahmin Masculinity in South Indian Dance centers on an insular community of Smarta Brahmin men from the Kuchipudi village in Telugu-speaking South India who are required to don stri-vesam (woman's guise) and impersonate female characters from Hindu religious narratives. Impersonation is not simply a gender performance circumscribed to the Kuchipudi stage, but a practice of power that enables the construction of hegemonic Brahmin masculinity in everyday village life. However, the power of the Brahmin male body in stri-vesam is highly contingent, particularly on account of the expansion of Kuchipudi in the latter half of the twentieth century from a localized village performance to a transnational Indian dance form. This book analyzes the practice of impersonation across a series of boundaries-village to urban, Brahmin to non-Brahmin, hegemonic to non-normative-to explore the artifice of Brahmin masculinity in contemporary South Indian dance.