The Domain of Constant Excess: Plural Worship at the Munnesvaram Temples in Sri LankaThe Sri Lankan ethnic conflict that has occurred largely between Sinhala Buddhists and Tamil Hindus is marked by a degree of religious tolerance that sees both communities worshiping together. This study describes one important site of such worship, the ancient Hindu temple complex of Munnesvaram. Standing adjacent to one of Sri Lanka's historical western ports, the fortunes of the Munnesvaram temples have waxed and waned through the years of turbulence, violence and social change that have been the country's lot since the advent of European colonialism in the Indian Ocean. Bastin recounts the story of these temples and analyses how the Hindu temple is reproduced as a center of worship amidst conflict and competition. |
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Plural Worship at the Munnesvaram Temples in Sri Lanka Rohan Bastin. Catholic, Hindu and in a few cases Muslim.11 This book is largely an exploration of this power, which I shall term more specifically as 'potency' or 'potentiality ...
... Hindu temple and to explore the marvellous potentiality of Hindu temples as remarkable human achievements. The Polysemy of the Hindu Sacred in the Conditions of Violence The anthropology of ritual and religion has long recognised the ...
... Hindu temple and its world, a world of complex social relations not simply reducible to a sense of a singular system ... Hinduism is more accurately called Saivism. Put simply, Saivism specifies the centrality of the god Siva, his ...
... Hindu temples in Sri Lanka, especially the Siva temples, is a port-town temple whose fame and earlier grandeur convey the importance of these port-temples as nodal points in complex social fields articulating agriculture and commerce ...
... Hindu traditions brother-in-law) Visnu, the pre-eminent god of Sinhala Buddhism.16 So while Siva's divine and honourable qualities are celebrated by both the Munnesvaram priests and the Tamil Saivites who worship 'Munnesvara' as the ...
Contents
1 | |
15 | |
Chapter 3 Myths and Marginality | 43 |
Chapter 4 Ritual Practices and Religious Identity | 59 |
Chapter 5 The Saivite Temple as a Monumental Architecture | 89 |
Puja and Arccanai | 117 |
Chapter 7 The Presence of Sakti | 133 |
Chapter 8 Guardians Games and the Formation of Power | 145 |
Chapter 9 The World Inside Out | 163 |
Chapter 10 The Domain of Excess | 183 |
Divine Kings and Regal Gods Temples in Society and History | 195 |
References | 213 |
Index | 227 |
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The Domain of Constant Excess: Plural Worship at the Munnesvaram Temples in ... Rohan Bastin No preview available - 2002 |