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Sunday 13 October – Saturday 7 December 2024
Library opening hours are Monday to Friday, 9.30-5.30.
Prof. Gavin Flood FBA
Weeks 1-8, Monday, 2.00-3.00,
Gibson Building
These lectures offer a thematic and historical introduction to the sources and development of Hindu traditions from their early formation to the medieval period. We will explore the formation of Hindu traditions through textual sources, such as the Vedas, Upaniṣads and Bhagavad Gītā, along with the practices and social institutions that formed classical Hindu traditions. The lectures will include an introduction to Hindu philosophy.
Dr Bjarne Wernicke-Olesen
Weeks 1-8, Wednesday, 4.30-5.30, Friday, 10.00-12.00,
OCHS Library
The course provides an introduction to Sanskrit for the preliminary paper of the Theology and Religion Faculty in Elementary Sanskrit. Students of Pali will join the Sanskrit course in Michaelmas Term and for the first four weeks of Hilary Term. From week 5 of Hilary Term, Sanskrit and Pali will be taught as two separate courses, i.e. Sanskrit Prelims and Pali for Sanskritists.
Sanskrit Prelims: A range of relevant Hindu and Buddhist texts will be chosen for translation and philological comment in the Sanskrit course. The class is designed to introduce students of Theology and Religion to the essentials of Sanskrit grammar, syntax, and vocabulary and its importance for the exegesis of Sanskrit texts. Students will learn to appreciate the interpretative nature of translation as a central discipline for the study of religions. By the end of the course students will have gained a basic competency in translating classical Sanskrit and reading relevant passages from texts such as the Chāndogya Upaniṣad, the Bhagavadgītā, the Haṭhayogapradīpikā and the Buddhist Heart Sūtra. The course book will be Walter Maurer’s The Sanskrit Language. Sanskrit Prelims continues throughout Michaelmas and Hilary Terms and for the first four weeks of Trinity.
Pali Prelims: The Pali course is designed to provide an easy philological introduction to Pali Buddhist texts via Sanskrit and introduce students of Theology and Religion to the essentials ofPali grammar, syntax, and vocabulary. A range of relevant Pali Buddhist texts will be chosen for translation and philological comment. We will read classical Theravāda Buddhist discourses from the Pāli Canon such as the Fire Sermon (Ādittapariyāya-sutta) and Dependent Origination (Paṭiccasamuppāda) as well as passages from the Dhammapadaand the Jātaka tales. Students will learn to appreciate the interpretative nature of translation as a central discipline for the study of religions. The course book will be Dines Andersen, A Pāli Reader and Pali Glossary, 2 vols. (1901) supplemented by Rune E. A. Johansson, Pali Buddhist Texts: An Introductory Reader and Grammar (1981).
Pali students will attend the same ‘Sanskrit and Pali’ classes as Sanskrit students in Michaelmas Term and weeks 1-4 of Hilary Term. From week 5 of Hilary Term, Pali and Sanskrit students will study in separate classes.
Dr Bjarne Wernicke-Olesen
Weeks 2, 4, 6, and 8, Tuesday, 3.00-4.00,
OCHS Library
The Netratantra (NT), the ‘Tantra of the Eye’, is an important Śākta-Śaiva text in Kashmir and Nepal, dating from around the early ninth century. The NT occupies a middle ground and claims universality as a sarvasāmānya tantra overriding the distinctions between the orthodox Vedic scriptures, the Śaiva Siddhānta, the Mantramārga, and the Kulamārga as well as divisions outside of Śaivism. The text has absorbed material from different social strata and a variety of Indian traditions in its aim for a universal appeal. Indeed, the NT is strongly influenced by goddess worship and the Kulamārga and represents an important early point of entry and incorporation of the Śākta tradition into Śaivism. Thus, along with Śaivism and the tantric traditions there seems to have developed a distinct tradition, that we might call Śāktism, focused on the Goddess as śakti in her many forms.
We will read and discuss Śākta sections of the NT in transliteration based on the oldest surviving Nepalese manuscript (Amṛteśatantra, NAK MS 1-285, NGMPP Reel No. B 25/4 from 1200 CE) with reference to the KSTS edition and the OCHS Manuscript Database. These reading sessions and seminars are intended for students who have an elementary or intermediate knowledge of Sanskrit and are interested in Śāktism, yoga, and the tantric traditions.
Convened by Dr Jessica Frazier
Weeks 2, 4 and 6, Wednesday, 5.00-6.30,
OCHS Library
This series of regular seminars brings together scholars and students working on Indic philosophies and religions. It focuses on topics of current research: in each session, two people will present a context they are investigating for 20min, and then open it for discussion on key questions. This term we will have a great list of speakers, all sharing ideas, puzzles, and questions from their work on Indian Philosophy for the group to discuss. All scholars, graduates and finalists in all areas are welcome to join.
All events are in the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies (OCHS) Library, 15 Magdalen Street, OX1 3AE.
Week 2
Dr Marie Helene Gorisse, Birmingham: “On how to distinguish curd and camels: The Jain-Buddhist dispute over the non-one-sidedness of things”
In this talk I will assess whether – with its doctrine of non-one-sidedness (anekāntavāda) – Jain philosophy of language really fails at denoting. This will be the occasion to examine what distinguishes it from Buddhist philosophy of language. I will notably focus on Akalaṅka and on the Buddhist criticism as featured in Śāntarakṣita.
Dr Jessica Frazier, Oxford: Radical Phenomenology in Indian Cultures: Devising a Symposium
Indian thought aims humans at some of the most extreme re-structurings of conscious known to history. Across different traditions, some have advised systematically destroying the structures of the ego, dissolving all reification, totally absorbing in a single object, or re-identifying as the whole of reality. This discussion asks what phenomenologies exist, and what they add to our understanding of the untapped potentialities of consciousness, with an eye to setting up a Symposium in Spring. All welcome to discuss and get involved!
Week 4
Dr Zishan Khawaja, Manchester: Svabhāva, Pratītya Samutpāda and Nirvāṇa: Is Nāgārjuna Consistent?
This talk thinks about whether there is a consistent philosophy in the work of Nagarjuna, focusing specifically on the apparent tension between a rejection of intrinsic nature, a commitment to dependent-origination, and the description of Nirvana as the cessation of conceptual proliferation.
Dr Szilvia Szanyi, Oxford: Sthiramati on Rebirth and the Notion of the Self
Sthiramati (c. 6th century CE) is one of the most prominent commentators of the Yogācāra tradition, especially on the treatises of Vasubandhu (c. 4th–5th century CE). Despite his crucial role in shaping the identity of the Yogācāra school, Sthiramati’s works and original contributions to addressing key issues in Buddhist philosophy are still often overlooked in scholarship. In the first half of my talk, I will briefly discuss Sthiramati’s interpretation of the various mental afflictions (kleśa) that contribute to the emergence and entrenchment of the mistaken notion of the self in the cognitive architecture of the human mind. In the second half, I will examine Sthiramati’s highly technical account of rebirth, which interestingly combines some earlier and novel considerations to explain the perpetuation of saṃsāric existence.
Week 6
Dr Monima Chadha, Oxford: Vasubandhu’s account of Agency and Responsibility
In Abhidharmakośabhāṣya IX, Vasubandhu denies the ultimate existence of persons and selves because they lack causal efficacy. Who, then, is the agent of (moral) action and the bearer of moral responsibility?
Dr Karen O’Brian-Kopp, KCL: A shared argument between Patañjali, Vasubandhu and Asaṅga on causality and rebirth.
This talk examines cross-traditional dialogue in early South Asia between the Sāṃkhya-Yoga philosopher Patañjali and the Buddhist philosophers Vasubandhu and Asaṅga concerning how ethical causality, or karma, determines rebirth.
Prof. Gavin Flood FBA
Weeks 1-8, Monday, 12.00-1.00,
OCHS Library
Phenomenology is one of the most important developments in philosophy in the twentieth century, and it has also had a deep impact on other theoretical fields more widely conceived. This term we read Merleau-Ponty, The Phenomenology of Perception
Prof. Gavin Flood FBA
Weeks 4, 6 and 8, Thursday, 2.00-3.00,
OCHS Library
These lectures present an account of the concept of mind in Hindu Tantra. Through a study of religious and philosophical texts in the post-Gupta period we come to understand how the mind is conceptualized both as that which keeps a person bound to the cycle of reincarnation and as having transformative potential in allowing a person to achieve liberation or salvation. The lectures trace a history of the idea of the mind from the earliest occurrences of the terms for ‘mind’ (manas and citta) in Vedic and Buddhist literature, to tantric traditions of Śiva and the Goddess. The inspiration behind the lectures is Herbert Guenther’s masterful study of the mind in Buddhism published in 1956.
The Concept of Mind in Indian Thinking
Week 4, Thursday 7 November, 2.00-3.00, OCHS Library
This first lecture will describe the concept of mind in early sources from the Vedas to Buddhism. The category of the ‘mind’ would seem to be quite ancient and appears for the first time in the Ṛg-veda and is arguably a foundational category of pre-philosophical speculation along with speech (vāc) and sacrifice (yajña). It is Buddhism that develops a keen mentalistic vocabulary and influences classical Yoga’s understanding. It is these traditions, the Vedic, the Buddhist, and the Yogic, that I will argue influence and form tantric concepts of mind.
The Mind in Śaiva Scriptures
Week 6, Thursday 21 November, 2.00-3.00, OCHS Library
This second lecture raises the question about models of mind presented in Śaiva scriptures and how the category of ‘mind’ – as a translation of citta and manas – has a both a negative and positive evaluation, that which keeps us trapped in compulsive responses to world and as that which has the capacity to liberate.
Grounding the Mind
Week 8, Thursday 5 December, 2.00-3.00, OCHS Library
Having described models of the mind in tantric literature, this lecture will raise the question as to what lies behind these representations? Why do our texts understand mind and consciousness in the ways that they have, such that they can also be overlaid with a distinct dualistic or non-dualistic metaphysics? In this lecture we will probe a deeper cultural and social level that is the precondition for the discourse we have exposed. We need to move to a cultural ontology that is the necessary condition for the languages of awareness to develop. To do this, once more we must revert to our texts: to the proto-philosophical ideas in the scriptural revelation we have described along. We see that concepts of mind are not isolated from the wider cultural and social life within which these reflections arose. There are three elements to this underlying cultural ontology we can identify: sacrifice (yajñā), self (ātman), and boundary variability (also called ‘body’, śarīra).
Prof. Knut Jacobsen
Week 3, Thursday 31 October, 2.00-3.00,
OCHS Library
One type of Hindu migrants is the spiritual migrants eager to spread the message of Hindu spirituality and Hindu civilization to the rest of the world. The lecture analyses this type of Hindu migrants, the motivations and purposes and in particular looks at the first Hindu guru to settle permanently in Europe, and perhaps in the Western world, who was from Bengal and arrived in Europe in 1911. The lecture looks in particular at his spiritual linage. By relating his teachings to those of his guru, a better understanding of his mission and teaching can be attained.
Prof. Knut Jacobsen
Week 5, Thursday 14 November, 2.00-3.00,
OCHS Library
It has been argued that when approaching early Sāṃkhya traditions, one should allow for the greatest possible plurality. In this lecture I argue that it is advisable that this principle be followed when trying to understand Sāṃkhya in all periods of Indian history. Some contemporary approaches to Sāṃkhya tend to essentialize Sāṃkhya and make it ahistorical. While this ahistorical method is inherently problematic in itself, Sāṃkhya is much more than the Sāṃkhyakārikā and Sāṃkhyasūtra tradition. The different Sāṃkhya philosophies and traditions represent a variety of views, and in the lecture, I argue that plurality characterizes the history of Sāṃkhya. The Sāṃkhya teachers did probably represent a wide range of views and seem not only to have repeated a fixed system of doctrines.
Knut A. Jacobsen is Professor in the Study of Religions at the University of Bergen, Norway. His main fields of research include Sāṃkhya and Yoga theory and practice, Hindu sacred geography and pilgrimage, transnational Hinduism, religion and public space, and pluralism of religions in South Asia and in the South Asian diasporas. He is the author of four monographs, Prakṛti in Sāṃkhya-Yoga: Material Principle, Religious Experience, Ethical Implications (Peter Lang, 1999), Kapila: Founder of Sāṃkhya and Avatāra of Viṣṇu (Munshiram Manoharlal, 2008), Pilgrimage in the Hindu Tradition: Salvific Space (Routledge, 2013), and Yoga in Modern Hinduism: Hariharānanda Āraṇya and Sāṃkhyayoga (Routledge, 2018), and is the editor or co-editor of numerous books, the latest of which are the two volumes Handbook of Hinduism in Europe (Brill 2020), Routledge Handbook of South Asian Religions (Routledge 2021), Hindu Diasporas (Oxford University Press 2023) and Routledge Handbook of Contemporary India, 2nd ed. (2024). He is the editor in chief of the seven volumes Brill’s Encyclopedia of Hinduism (Brill 2009-2023).
Dr Joel Bordeaux
Week 1, Thursday 17 October, 2.00-3.00,
OCHS Library
Popular legends centered on the prince Gopicandra can be found in several northern Indian languages. This story builds on the ‘royal renunciate’ motif familiar from Buddhist hagiography but with the twist that the titular protagonist is entirely uninterested in trading his throne and palace for the trials of a religious mendicant and must instead be persuaded to do so by his mother the queen. Alternately farcical and poignant, these stories emerged, alongside much of what we now know as Hatha Yoga, within the broader milieu of the medieval Nath Sampradaya.
In versions of the story transmitted through Bengali householder Nath/Jogi communities, the dowager queen is an immortal sorceress who exhorts the prince to likewise pursue immortality through ascetic self-cultivation. Her rationale in these texts draws on yogic theories linking [male] mortality to the expenditure of a finite reserve of vital reproductive fluids, but the non-monastic authors of the texts apparently harbor reservations about both the possibility of a woman effectively transmitting such teachings and the very enterprise of celibate asceticism.
Dr Joel Bordeaux
Week 7, Thursday 28 November, 2.00-3.00,
OCHS Library
Inexpensively produced Bengali booklets with titles like Fulfilling the Heart’s Desires Through Mantra —in many senses, the modern descendants of famous tantric digests like the Mantra-mahodadhi and Bṛhat-Tantrasāra— are both ubiquitous and understudied. They typically feature unsourced Bengali and Hindi charms for quotidian ends, presenting these ‘mantras’ alongside their Sanskrit counterparts with minimal ritual instructions. These vernacular mantras especially appear to be tailored more for use by ojhās (village healers/cunning men) and housewives than for traditional elite tantric virtuosi.
Drawing on discussions of so-called śābara mantras in premodern Sanskrit sources, this presentation surveys possible emic rationales for the ritual efficacy of vernacular mantras before turning to formal and rhetorical analysis from etic perspectives, with particular attention to those sections designated explicitly for women, childcare, and other domestic concerns. Preliminary reading suggest that these are often less normatively ‘Hindu’ and closer in genre to vernacular verbal charms than the mantras presented under less explicitly feminized subheadings.
Joel Bordeaux is a specialist in South Asian religions with a PhD from Columbia University (2015). He has published on East Indian Śākta traditions, early modern Hindu statecraft, Nath Yogi literature from Bengal, and Tibetan Buddhism in Anglophone popular culture. He is a Research Fellow at the International Institute for Asian Studies in Leiden and a member of the research group Body and Embodiment in the Middle Bengali Imaginary based at Jagiellonian University (Kraków). https://linktr.ee/JoelBordeaux
Dr Sanjukta Dasgupta
Week 2, Monday 21 October, 2.00-3.00,
OCHS Library
Along with the recurrent themes of love, freedom, mysticism and transcendentalism that characterize his poetry, the first Nobel laureate of India, poet Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) has addressed the challenges of death, loss, longing and letting go in his poetry, throughout his long literary career. The sensitive elegiac poems of Smaran and Palataka trace the journey of the aggrieved poet’s eventual liberation from a sense of torment and guilt through introspection and mystical contemplation. In this talk I will focus on my translations into English of two volumes of Tagore’s Bengali elegiac poetry titled Smaran and Palataka, that bemoan the death of his wife Mrinalini in 1902 and daughter Madhurilata in 1918. Smaran and Palataka have been translated into English by me for the first time and the book titled In Memoriam: Smaran and Palataka has been published by the Sahitya Akademi, New Delhi, in 2022.
Sanjukta Dasgupta, Professor and Former Head, Dept of English and Former Dean, Faculty of Arts, Calcutta University has been the recipient of several national and international fellowships and awards. She has lectured and taught at various universities in the USA, UK, Europe and Australia. Dasgupta is a poet, short story writer, critic and translator and has 27 published books.
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