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One God, Two Goddesses, Three Studies of South Indian Cosmology

One God, Two Goddesses, Three Studies of South Indian Cosmology

by Don Handelman
One God, Two Goddesses, Three Studies of South Indian Cosmology

One God, Two Goddesses, Three Studies of South Indian Cosmology

by Don Handelman

Overview

One, God, Two Goddesses presents three studies, one of Tamil myths of the god Murugan and two of goddess rituals: Gangamma in Tirupati and Paiditalli in Vizianagaram, both in Andhra Pradesh. All three essays search for lineaments of the cosmos that these deities inhabit and shape. These cosmoi are characterised by the dynamism of their incessant interior movement. Should they become still, they would die. Deities activate and regenerate such a cosmos. The dynamism of Murugan’s cosmos eliminates the chaotic. Through ritual, Gangamma regenerates her cosmos through feminising it. Through ritual, Paiditalli annually re-grows the historic little kingdom of Vizianagaram, regenerating its kingship. All three studies point to the need to rethink cosmology in South India.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9789004256156
Publisher: Brill Academic Publishers, Inc.
Publication date: 09/15/2013
Series: Jerusalem Studies in Religion and Culture , #18
Edition description: xviii, 216 pp, index
Pages: 216
Product dimensions: 6.20(w) x 9.50(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Don Handelman, Ph.D. (1971), Manchester University, is Shaine Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at Hebrew University. He publishes extensively on ritual and religion, including Models and Mirrors (Berghahn 1998) and co-authored with David Shulman God Inside Out (Oxford, 1997) and Śiva in the Forest of Pines (Oxford, 2004).

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations ix

Acknowledgments xi

Contributors xiii

Preface xv

1 The Cosmic Vortex and Don Handelman's Anthropological Vision: A Personal View Bruce Kapferer 1

2 Myths of Murugan: Asymmetry and Hierarchy in a South Indian Puranic Cosmology Don Handelman 23

From Fragmentation to Encompassment: The Asymmetry of Shiva 27

The Death of Kama: Asceticism Ascendant and the Nadir of Shakti 27

The Creation: A Chain Reaction of Fragmentation 29

The Asura Wars: The Assimilation of Shakti and the Encompassment of Cosmos 32

The Asuras: The Asymmetry of Shakti 38

The Birth of the Asuras: Seduction and Illusion 38

The Education of the Asuras: The Value of Materialist Reality 40

The Incorporation of Evil 42

From Encompassment to Immanence 44

Shakti and the Devolution of the Divine 46

Iconography, Reflexivity, and Shakti 48

Encompassment and Immanence: Acting in the World 54

Conclusion 58

3 The Guises of the Goddess and the Transformation of the Male: Gangamma's Visit to Tirupati, and the Continuum of Gender Don Handelman 63

Gangamma in Tirupati 65

Gangamma's Story 68

Gangamma Comes Home 69

The Goddess Disguised 72

Gangamma's Feet 83

The Goddess Revealed 84

Multitudes of Gangamma 91

Gangamma Meets Gangamma and Transcends Herself 92

Gender, Cosmos, Caste 98

Bibliography 111

4 Growing a Kingdom: The Goddess of Depth in Vizianagaram Don Handelman M. V. Krishnayya David Shulman 115

Prologue: Every King Needs a Goddess. On the Curved and the Flat, Wilderness and Civilization 116

The Birth of Paiditalli 124

Historical Excursus 131

Goddesses are Grown (Gods are Not) 135

The (Re)Birth of Paiditalli: The Ritual of Devara Pandaga 142

The Growing of Rice 158

Pot-Paiditalli Furrows and Sows 162

The Tevadam Rite: Bringing the Sprouting Goddess Out of the Earth 166

Nearing the Sirimanu: Ratham, Swing, and Totellu-the First Furrow 172

The Sirimanu Jatra 190

Uyyala Kambalu-Swinging Away to the Wilderness 201

Concluding Thoughts 204

Index 215

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