Academic Archives - Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies

In the study of Jainism, it has become a truism to say that Jainas were interested in knowing the religious other. This is not a novel argument. What is less studied are the social identities that structure these encounters in stories, not to mention the literary methods used to write about the religious other. Put simply, when Jainas write stories about the religious other, who are the characters involved? And what motivates these characters to talk about non-Jaina religions?

In the Śvetāmbara suttas, it is usually the Jaina ascetic who encounters non-Jainas while on the road searching for alms. This makes for a narrative focused entirely on a conversation between Jaina ascetic and his other—a rather dry story devoid of any plotline because the ascetic has renounced all familial and sexual ties. But that is not the case for the Vasudevahiṇḍī, a fifth century CE Śvetāmbara narrative. There, it is sons who are looking for their long-lost fathers. And kings and nuns who try to justify incest and adultery. Such stories about day-to-day dramas inside the home become, I argue, the site for talking about non-Jaina religions. In this talk, I showcase such narratives, and answer how and why they use familial and sexual relationships to talk about unfamiliar religions.

Seema K. Chauhan is an Assistant Professor of Asian Religions at Trinity College Dublin. Prior to this appointment, she completed her doctorate at the University of Chicago Divinity School and held the Asoke Kumar Sarkar Early Career Fellowship in Classical Indology at Balliol College. She specialises in the history of early Jainism, Hinduism, and Sanskrit and Prakrit literature.

Bursaries and Scholarships: Open for applications! Total: £20,412

Posted on April 30, 2026April 30, 2026 by user

Applications are now open for the 2026 OCHS Bursaries and Scholarships.

Each year, the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies awards a range of bursaries and scholarships on behalf of our generous donors. This year, a total of £20,412 is available. All registered OCHS students are eligible to apply — awards can be used towards fees, maintenance, or research costs.

To apply, send a one-page application along with the completed application form to secretary@ochs.org.uk.

The deadline for submissions is Tuesday, 26 May 2026 at 12:00 PM.

Full details of all available bursaries and scholarships, along with the application form, can be found at

Bursaries and Scholarships

16 April | Lecture on “Sāṃkhya as the Philosophy of India and the story of its many lives” by Prof. Diwakar Acharya

Posted on April 14, 2026 by user

18th & 19th April | Interdisciplinary Symposium: “Hindu Approaches to Dialogue”

Posted on April 14, 2026April 14, 2026 by user

An Online Event
Organised by the Network of Hinduism in Dialogue
18th & 19th April 2026

Programme

18th April 2026

11am
Inauguration session

Welcome address
Dr Shruti Dixit, University of St. Andrews, UK

Introduction
Prof Neelima Shukla-Bhatt, Wellesley College, USA

Keynote speech:
Hindu Approaches to Dialogue – Beyond Words and Toward Shared Being
Prof Diwakar Acharya, University of Oxford, UK

12 noon
Panel 1: Art and Aesthetics
Moderator: Prof Neelima Shukla-Bhatt, Wellesley College, USA

2pm
Panel 2: The Feminine and Goddess Traditions
Moderator: Dr Shruti Dixit, University of St Andrews, UK

4pm
Panel 3: Textual Traditions
Moderator: Dr Patricia Palazzo Tsai, Methodist University of Sao Paulo, Brazil

19th April 2026

11 am
Panel 4: Epistemology, Philosophy, and Indian Knowledge Traditions
Moderator: Dr Shruti Dixit, University of St Andrews, UK

1pm
Panel 5: Comparative Religion and Interreligious Interaction
Moderator: Dr Leena Taneja, Zayed University, United Arab Emirates

3pm
Panel 6: Diaspora
Moderator: Dr Melanie Barbato, RWTH Aachen University, Germany

Followed by
Closing Remarks
Dr Melanie Barbato, RWTH Aachen University, Germany
Dr Shruti Dixit, University of St Andrews, UK

Register at: www.shorturl.at/tJHoz

Talk 25 Feb 2.30 pm | “Epistemic Limitation and the Critique of Absolutism in Malliṣeṇa’s Interpretation of Verse 21 of the Anyayogavyavaccheda” by Dr Aarti Gulgulia

Posted on February 16, 2026February 17, 2026 by user

Abstract: In this paper, I show how verse 21 of Hemacandra’s Anyayogavyavaccheda, as interpreted in Malliṣeṇa’s Syādvādamañjarī, illuminates the epistemic limitations of absolutist judgments. Verse 21 asserts that existing entities are non-one-sided, as they simultaneously undergo origination (utpāda), destruction (vyaya), and persistence (dhrauvya). Malliṣeṇa explains this by distinguishing between substances (dravya) and modes (paryāya) as simultaneously fundamental parts of existing entities. From this, he criticises thinkers who, despite routinely engaging with non-one-sided entities, focus solely on one side of reality and fail to recognize its multiple aspects; they know reality “in an absolute way,” i.e., ruling out the existence of its other potential sides. According to Malliṣeṇa, such absolutist claims are due to intellects clouded by beginningless ignorance (mohaniya) and desire. Using textual analysis, I reconstruct Malliṣeṇa’s methodological approach, showing how one entity can be described in more than one way without contradiction. He does so by using examples coming from diverse sources, from earlier Śvetāmbara and Digambara sources to examples of everyday life found in Jain narrative literature. These examples range from the apparent colours of conch shells in jaundice, to mereological considerations around cut nails, and to the example of two brothers sharing the same mother. By situating syādvāda as a reasoning method to speak about multi-aspectual entities, this paper highlights three contributions of Malliṣeṇa’s thought: clarifies the limits of absolutist cognition, the importance of context-sensitive observation, and the constant use of examples provides a model for understanding non-one-sided reality that is more intuitive and that posits Malliṣeṇa’s thought within a specific lineage. This framework remains relevant for contemporary debates on epistemic pluralism.

Bio: Aarti Gulgulia completed her Ph.D. in Sanskrit at Amity University, Uttar Pradesh, India, where her doctoral research focused on Jain Yoga and Bauddha Yoga: A Comparative Analysis. She is currently pursuing an M.A. by Research in the Department of Theology and Religion at the University of Birmingham. Her research specializes in Jain epistemology, with particular attention to the doctrines of non-absolutism (Anekantavada), conditional predication (Syädvada), and sevenfold exposition (Saptabhargi). She has served as Visiting Faculty at Amity Law School, Junior Research Fellow awarded by the University Grants Commission, and Associate Editor of Dharma for Life Echoes (ISSN: 3049-2459). She has also worked as Editorial Assistant at the International School for Jain Studies and has qualified for the UGC-NET for Assistant Professor in both Prakrit and Buddhist, Jaina, Gandhian, and Peace Studies.

Publications:

The Many Faces of Renunciation: A Comparative Study of Asceticism Across
World Religions
Contours of Early Indian Yoga: A Comparative Inquiry into Vedic and Jain
Traditions

Talk 11 March 2.30pm | “Material, subtle, gendered and perfect bodies in Jain Yoga” with Dr Ruth Westoby

Posted on February 13, 2026February 13, 2026 by user

Jain Seminar Series
Hilary Week 8, 11 March 2026, 2.30pm
Dr Ruth Westoby

Abstract

Jain yoga sources in the early centuries of the second millennium adopt practices of physical yoga and adapt them to distinctly Jain theories of the body and soul (jīva), metaphysics, and stages of spiritual perfection. Sources such as Śubhacandra’s Jñānārṇava and Hemacandra’s Yogaśāstra teach physical practices, yet subordinate such physical practices to meditative techniques. There are many similarities with the Haṭha Yoga that emerges at a similar historical moment in sources from the Amṛtasiddhi to the Haṭhapradīpikā. This paper explores the presentation of the body in Jain sources in order to analyse both the rationale and efficacy of physical practices, and the role of materiality and gender in the physical—and liberated, body. Similarities and tensions are identified in the presentation of yogic bodies in the Haṭha corpus. I suggest that, for Jain sources, gender is a characteristic of the body in saṃsāra that is attenuated as the practitioner progresses. Though the perfected (siddha) body is in some ways beyond gender, it nevertheless also represents the paradigmatic male body.

Biography

Dr Ruth Westoby is a researcher in South Asian Religions and a yoga practitioner. She is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Jaina Studies at the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies, focusing on technologies of the body in Jainism. As Affiliate Researcher at Inform, King’s College London and Associate Researcher at SOAS, University of London, Ruth researches bdoily practices and menstruation in yoga, tantra and neo-tantra. Her current book project is a study of the stopping of menstruation in South Asian religions. She teaches MA Yoga in the Modern World as Senior Teaching Fellow at SOAS. Her PhD from SOAS (2024), supervised by Prof. James Mallinson, explored The Body in Early Haṭha Yogaand was funded by CHASE-AHRC. She also collaborated with the SOAS Haṭha Yoga Project (2015-2020) interpreting early modern yoga postures, contributing to an emergent research methodology, ‘embodied philology’.