Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Table of Contents
- Foreword
- Note on Transliterations
- Introduction
- 1 Current Research on Nāth Yogīs: Further Directions
- 2 Powerful Yogīs: The Successful Quest for Siddhis and Power
- 3 Kingly Corruption and Ascetic Sovereignty in the Telugu Account of the Nine Nāths
- 4 In Siddhis and State: Transformations of Power in Twentieth-Century Gorakhpur Temple Publications
- 5 The Search for the Jugi Caste in Pre-Colonial Bengal
- 6 Back When We Were Brahmins: Historical and Caste Critique Among Bengali Householder Nāths
- 7 Shades of Power: The Nāth Yogīs in Nepal
- 8 Yogī, Paṇḍit, and Rāṣṭra-Bhakta: Some Reconstructions of Yogī Naraharināth’s Religious Career
- 9 The Evocative Partnerships of a Monastic Nāth Temple in Contemporary Rajasthan
- 10 Towards a Nāth Re-Appropriation of Haṭha-Yoga
- Index
9 - The Evocative Partnerships of a Monastic NāthTemple in Contemporary Rajasthan
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 November 2022
- Frontmatter
- Table of Contents
- Foreword
- Note on Transliterations
- Introduction
- 1 Current Research on Nāth Yogīs: Further Directions
- 2 Powerful Yogīs: The Successful Quest for Siddhis and Power
- 3 Kingly Corruption and Ascetic Sovereignty in the Telugu Account of the Nine Nāths
- 4 In Siddhis and State: Transformations of Power in Twentieth-Century Gorakhpur Temple Publications
- 5 The Search for the Jugi Caste in Pre-Colonial Bengal
- 6 Back When We Were Brahmins: Historical and Caste Critique Among Bengali Householder Nāths
- 7 Shades of Power: The Nāth Yogīs in Nepal
- 8 Yogī, Paṇḍit, and Rāṣṭra-Bhakta: Some Reconstructions of Yogī Naraharināth’s Religious Career
- 9 The Evocative Partnerships of a Monastic Nāth Temple in Contemporary Rajasthan
- 10 Towards a Nāth Re-Appropriation of Haṭha-Yoga
- Index
Summary
Abstracts
Scholars have noted the ability of Hindu gurus tomobilize their disciples in political,humanitarian, and developmental projects. Drawingon ethnographic fieldwork in Gogameri, a ruralpilgrimage site in India that has long drawnreligiously diverse worshippers, this chapterexamines how Yogī Rupnāth, the influential abbotof a monastic pilgrimage temple, sought to asserta new sense of Hindu inheritance and affiliation,in part through charitable development. Itproposes that what ability the abbot had totrigger religious transformation derived from hiscollaborations with Hindu nationalist and stategovernment actors, and from the web of devotionaland socio-emotional ties among temple workers andvolunteers. Yet this ability was neverthelessconstrained by enduring historical andaffective-experiential dynamics among thepilgrimage public.
Keywords: pilgrimage, Rajasthan,sevā, Hindu nationalism, temple trust
The ritual landscape in Gogameri, a rural pilgrimagesite in Rajasthan, India, has changed dramaticallysince the turn of the twenty-first century. Many ofthe recent construction projects are clusteredaround one of the two ritual sites that have longdrawn religiously diverse pilgrims there: themausoleum (meṛī;literally, “mound”) of Gogājī, an oral-epic hero andsaintly deity whom many people now characterize asbearing relationships to both Hinduism and Islam.Religio-charitable trusts build and operate pilgrimhostels on land endowed to Gogājī's tomb, which ismanaged by the Rajasthan state government'sDepartment of Devasthan (royal temple endowments).One religio-charitable association that providesinfrastructure throughout the village is theGorakhtila Dhuna Trust, which also serves as thetemple board of Gogameri's other celebrated ritualsite: Gorakhtila, the “private” (nijī) monastic temple ofGorakhnāth, who is here remembered as Gogājī'sdivine guru. The Dhuna Trust is directed byGorakhtila's Abbot (Mahant), Balyogī Rupnāth, who was on abuilding spree when I knew him between 2008 and2013. By 2013, the trust had constructed schoolbuildings, a bus stop, toilet and bathing complexes,and a cow haven. All of these were built on publicland as part of a government-coordinated, buttrust-led effort to develop Gogameri into aworld-renowned destination for devout tourists. Totrustees, these infrastructural projects constitutedofferings of sevā(religio-charitable “service”) toGogājī, Gorakhnāth, and their devotees.
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- The Power of the Nath YogisYogic Charisma, Political Influence and SocialAuthority, pp. 249 - 280Publisher: Amsterdam University PressPrint publication year: 2022