ABSTRACT
The Routledge Handbook of South Asian Religions presents critical research, overviews, and case studies on religion in historical South Asia, in the seven nation states of contemporary South Asia: India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, Sri Lanka, and the Maldives, and in the South Asian diaspora.
Chapters by an international set of experts analyse formative developments, roots, changes and transformations, religious practices and ideas, identities, relations, territorialisation, and globalisation in historical and contemporary South Asia. The Handbook is divided into two parts which first analyse historical South Asian religions and their developments and second contemporary South Asia religions that are influenced by both religious pluralism and their close connection to nation states and their ideological power. Contributors argue that religion has been used as a tool for creating nations as well as majorities within those nations in South Asia, despite their enormous diversity, in particular religious diversity. The Handbook explores these diversities and tensions, historical developments, and the present situation across religious traditions by utilising an array of approaches and from the point of view of various academic disciplines.
Drawing together a remarkable collection of leading and emerging scholars, this handbook is an invaluable research tool and will be of interest to researchers and students in the fields of Asian religion, religion in context, and South Asian religions.
Introduction: Historical and Contemporary South Asian Religions Part I Historical South Asian Religions: Formative developments 1. The Veda 2. The rise of Classical Brahmanism 3. Identity in Early Indian Religion 4. Dharma in Classical Hinduism 5. Reason, Dharma, and the discovery of Faith: Insights from the Modes of Classical Hinduism 6. From Yajña to Pūjā? 7. Early Pilgrimage Traditions in South Asia 8. Sri Lanka's Place in the History of South Asian Buddhism 9. The Place of Historical Nepal in the History of South Asian Religions 10. The Rise of Vaiṣṇava Devotion in North India: On the Origins of a Mughal Bhakti Sensibility 11. Nāth Saṃpradāya and the Formation of Haṭha Yoga Practices in India 12. Aurangzeb and Islam in India: 50 Years of Mughal Realpolitik 13. The Territorialisation of Sikh Pasts Part II Contemporary South Asian Religions: Religious pluralism 14. Dalits and religion: Anti-caste Movements in India 15. The Betwixt and Between Religious Imaginary of Lāldās: Neither Here nor There 16. Conversion and Christian Relations with Non-Christians in South Asia 17. Science Sanskritised: How Modern Science Became a Handmaiden of Hindu Nationalism 18. Religion and Society in Pakistan: From Pīr’s Domination to Individual Connected Piety 19. Religion and Society in Bangladesh: Unpacking the Multilayered Relationships 20. Religion and Society in Sri Lanka 21. Religion and Secularism in Contemporary Nepal 22. The Transformation of Female Monastic Education in Contemporary Bhutan: If You Build Them, They Will Come 23. Regressing for Progress: Maldives Embraces a Salafi Future 24. Festivals in South Asia: Celebrations of Local Communities 25. Indian Religions in the U.S. 26. The Global Manifestation of the Hindu Guru Phenomenon
