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.
Lecture tag: Hinduism
Concepts of Self in the History of Hinduism, II (MT23)
There is a history to ideas about the self. These two lectures will sketch some shifts in the ways the self has been conceptualised in that history and will in particular pay attention to tensions in Brahmanical thinking between different metaphysics of the self and social, transaction reality of persons as social actors.
Lecture 2: The possessed self, the personal self, transcendence, and its collapse
Moving forward in time to the eve of modernity, we will contrast an older view of self as being able to be possessed by supernatural powers in the Śākta tradition (that Godfrey Lienhardt called the ‘passiones’ model of the self), with a view of the self that emerged in the sixteenth century with Caitanya (1486-1533) and the emergent devotional tradition, contrasting this with the collapse of transcendence to immanence with Raghunātha Śiromaṇi (c. 1460-1540) of the Navya Nyāya, once the tantric kingdoms (apart from Nepal) were gone. We will offer a hypothesis that these conceptions of self present a new vision by re-tooling older ideas of both possession and transcendence. We will raise questions about whether such new conception has potential for social critique and how these new ideas affected modern concepts of self and society in India.
Seminar on Indian Philosophy, II (MT23)
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. All researchers, graduates and finalists in all areas are welcome to join.
Prof. John Nemec: On the effects of causes and causes that could have an effect: The Śaiva theory of the eternality of what is produced
This presentation explores the manner of manifestation and non-manifestation of objects of cognition in a Śaiva satkāryavāda explanation. The problem is that if the effect preexists its manifestation in the form of its identity with its cause, then it should be perceptible even before it is manifested. In an argument against the Sāṅkhya, Somānada offers the “sadāsatkāryavāda” or doctrine of the perpetual real existence of the effect. In looking at the text, we will find that it has a nice conceptual twist and turn to it.
Jacob Mortimer: The canonical roots of Buddhist phenomenalism
This presentation argues that there is a substantial overlap between the Yogācāra doctrine of vijñaptimātra (‘mere representation’) and expressions of phenomenalism found in early Buddhist texts such as the Sabba Sutta. I argue that the phenomenalism of early Buddhism offers a justification of key doctrines such as no-self and the denial of a creator god, and that it might furthermore be an implicit assumption of later schools of Buddhist philosophy including Abhidharma and Madhyamaka. This theory suggests that the innovations of Yogācāra are more subtle than previously thought; it also suggests that philosophical challenges that have until now been considered unique to Yogācāra (particularly the threat of solipsism) might be faced by other Buddhist schools.
Hinduism 1: Sources and Formations, VII (MT23)
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.
Hinduism 1: Sources and Formations, VI (MT23)
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.
Connecting the Epistemology of Nyaya to 20th Century Analytic Epistemology (MT23)
This lecture will present how and why it is important to study cross-cultural epistemology. I will focus on Nyaya and Analytic epistemology, especially Gangesha, the Oxford Realists, such as H.A. Pritchard and T. Williamson, the Los Angeles Externalist, T. Burge, and the Pittsburgh Disjunctvist, J. McDowell. I will discuss three topics. First, the analysis of knowledge and justification. Second, the philosophy of perception. Third, the relevance of the theory of certification in Nyaya as an intervention into Analytic epistemology. Along the way I will suggest some revisions to Gangesha so as to update how his theory can engage contemporary epistemology.
Prof. Anand Jayprakash Vaidya is Professor in the Department of Philosophy, San Jose State University. Among his research interests is the epistemology of modality or how we come to know what is possible and necessary for the variety of kinds of particulars that there are. He defends an epistemological approach to show how we can know what is metaphysically possible and necessary.
Artist in Residence Talk: Art, Non-dualism, and the Divine (MT23)
Rosanna will discuss how her art practice is led by her study of yoga, philosophy & Sanskrit alongside a broader focus on the importance of female authorship of cultural foundational stories. Her work brings together divergent ways in which the divine is represented from East to West and are meditations on non-dualism and how the stories we are told shape our future. She is currently using painting, meditation, physical yoga & sound to explore concepts such as Para, the point at which form again touches formlessness and the Sadhana’s psychosomatic efforts to assimilate one’s body to higher and higher levels of cosmic body pattern. She will pose questions about where this work can be positioned, authorship and the importance of listening.
Rosanna Dean is a multi-disciplinary artist living in London. She received her MA from the Royal College of Art (2019), studied old master painting in Florence at the Angel Academy (2014). She has spoken on spiritual practice in contemporary art at the Courtauld Institute of Art and following a year residency at the Florence Trust received EU funding to develop her work exploring and converging different ways of representing the divine. Her journey with yoga began 12 years ago discovering ashtanga following a sudden and traumatic experience with death. In 2020 she went to India to deepen her yoga practice, qualifying as an Ashtanga yoga teacher in Mysore and researching ritual practices including Tantra and Theyyam in Karnataka.
Listen to the radio that Rosanna mentioned in her talk from here:
https://soundcloud.com/voicesradio_ldn/the-world-is-sound-w-rosanna-dean-190923
https://m.mixcloud.com/VoicesRadio/sounds-from-the-studio-w-rosanna-dean-281123/
Hinduism 1: Sources and Formations, V (MT23)
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.
Indian Logic and the Existence of God 2: The Theist’s Response to the Atheist’s Arguments (MT23)
In the previous lecture we saw how Jayanta, writing in the voice of the atheist opponent (pūrvapakṣin), argued against the existence of God. In this lecture we see how Jayanta switches to writing in his own voice and presents his actual view (siddhānta). He argues that if the atheist’s rejection of the God-inference were accepted, then we would have to reject the validity of all inference, including the paradigmatic inference of fire from smoke.
Prof. Alex Watson is Professor of Indian Philosophy at Ashoka University, prior to which he was Preceptor in Sanskrit at Harvard. His DPhil was from the University of Oxford. He is author of The Self’s Awareness of Itself (2006) and, with Dominic Goodall and Anjaneya Sarma, An Enquiry into the Nature of Liberation (mokṣa) (2013), as well as numerous articles on the History of Indian Philosophy. He works on debates between Śaivism, Nyāya, Mīmāṃsā and Buddhism.
Hinduism 1: Sources and Formations, IV (MT23)
Weeks 1-8, Friday 4.00-5.00
Faculty of Theology and Religion, Gibson Building
Dr Rembert Lutjeharms
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.