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Book Reviews 643
The Lord as Guru Hindi Sants in North Indian Tradition By Daniel GoldOxford University Press 1987 256 pages NP
Curiously absent from this exhaustive study of the sants of North India is asimple definition of the term sont Perhaps the term is as elusive as the tradition that has arisen from it though Gold does present a minimalist characterization of the sants as Hindi poet-singers remembered from the fifteenthcentury and still visible today (3) he admits frankly that the sant tradition hasconsistently eluded definitive characterization (4) Moreover as Gold informsus scholars (primarily in India) have tended either to link the sants with thewell-known figure of the Hindu or Buddhist yogin or (as Westerners haveoften done) to view the sants as largely isolated phenomena on the Indian religious landscape two extremes that fail to elucidate the sants not only as a
coherent tradition but as one deeply rooted in a larger tradition notorious forits complex textures In The Lord as Guru Gold sets out to explore both theinward and the outward faces of the sont tradition approaching Indianreligiosity with a deep regard for what he terms its configurations of fociWhile this perception of Indian diversity is hardly novelmdashin the more familiar(and unfortunately overburdened) form of great and little its importancefor understanding the Indian tradition was established more than twenty yearsagomdashit is perhaps under-used for it tends to counter the scholars need to elicitdiscrete and thus easily digestible blocks of information In this quest to locatethe tradition of the sants on the diverse Indian religious landscape Gold
moves facilely through the intertwining circles of Vedic Buddhist Vaishnavayogic tantric Muslim and Sufi traditions perhaps too often paring down theircomplexity but revealing finally a detailed portrayal of the sants
Gold divides his exposition into three parts part I The Channels of Graceand Power in North Indian Religion explores several competing traditionswhich for numerous reasonsmdashtime locale structuremdashhighlight the place of thesants in the larger context of North Indian modes of religiosity part II TheLiving Holy Man and Continuing Tradition among the Sants focuses on thesants themselves exposing their history and continuing development and part
III The Holy Man in India and the Place of the Sants returnsmdashalbeit with amore precise understanding of the issuesmdashto the question of where the santsstand in the North Indian tradition This context which Gold begins to explorein part I is determined linguistically by the area in which the language of thecentral text of the sant tradition the sayings of the sants sant ham) theKhan boli dialect of Hindi is understoodmdashthat is Hindustan itself and bordering areas in Punjab and Maharashtramdashand temporally by the period in whichthe sants nourished the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries To highlight itsreligious parameters Gold first looks at North Indian ideas of guru and lineagemdashideas central to the sant traditionmdashdrawing from such diverse phenomena
as Rajput kin groups Sikh gurus and the Vaishnava sect known aspustimaumlrg (alineage or sampradaumlya originating with Vallabhacharya) Here Gold identifiesa common idiom of North Indian devotion and religious organization one
8112019 Review 1 of The Lord as Guru- Hindi Saints in the Northern Indian Traditionpdf
httpslidepdfcomreaderfullreview-1-of-the-lord-as-guru-hindi-saints-in-the-northern-indian-traditionpdf 24
6H Journal of the American Academy of Religion
that sees the vaned orders of the created universe as forming a continuoussubstantial whole (22) This continuous whole not only links (spintu-ally and politically) guru to disciple but guru and disciple to a larger traditionidentifiable as Vedic Hindu and so forth However at this point the sant tradi
tion begins to diverge from the general North Indian model for as Gold assertswhat charactenzes the sant is the ability to stand as an independent source ofthe divine requinng no other basis of legitimacy (e g Vedic Islamic etc )
Gold marshals evidence for this claim by contrasting three competingtraditions a sant tradition centenng on the Radhasoami holy man a pus-timaumlrgiya Vaishnava sect centered at an elaborate shnne m Nathdwara and atradition centered at a temple complex at Pushkar with the unusual distinctionof a mam temple dedicated to Brahma Golds discussion of these traditionshowever takes no unexpected turns showing us a continuum from the inde
pendence of the Radhasoami guru to the more fixed and predictable structures(e g set hours for temple worship caste affiliations among the worshippersetc ) found at the Nathdwara and Pushkar complexes The author concludesthat the Radhasoami tradition stressing the intenonty of spintual life provides for a more intense expenence for the devotee (41) whereas worship atthe Nathdwara shnne with its elaborate offenngs (mountains of food)reflects emphatically the wealth and status of the devotees This discussionhowever is flawed by the authors tone against the spontaneity (which Goldsimphstically identifies with a deep spmtuality) of the Radhasoamis Goldbarely masks his disdain for the matenahstic form of Nathdwara pustimdrgf
worship (later in the book Gold exhibits the same prejudice when he tells ushow one Radhasoami guru abandoned his inhentance to keep his public spintual authonty unsullied by accusations of matenal gam [104]) In factthroughout The Lord as Guru the author tends to adopt such simplisticmdashbordering on the stereotypicalmdashcharactenzations e g Vaishnavite worship is mvan-ably called sweet the yogic tradition is referred to as vinle the Buddhistdoctnne of anaumltmauml no-self is descnbed as a problem (while the Hindudoctnne of aumltmanbrahman is viewed as being couched in perfectly logicalterms) the Vedic hentage is depicted as a nearly overwhelming force (yet onethat Kabir would easily stnp of its potency)
Yet these minor annoyances really do not stand in the way of Golds thesiswhich emerges with greater clanty in part II the largest and arguably strongestsection of the book and part 111 Here we begin to see why the sants haveeluded other scholars For as Gold shows us the independent position of thesantsmdashsometimes expressed through their dension for established formsmdashdoesnot mean that the sants are not thoroughly Indie as they drew from but did notlimit themselves to vanous Hindu Buddhist and Muslim modes of religiosityGolds recognition of these two faces of the sant tradition allows him to highlight the fine distinctions between individual sants while clanfymg the links
that establish the sants as a unified tradition Thus for example Gold desenbesthe distinction between two sants Paltu and CharandasmdashIf Paltu tended toreduce the divine unity to the one Formless Lord who recognized no ntual
8112019 Review 1 of The Lord as Guru- Hindi Saints in the Northern Indian Traditionpdf
httpslidepdfcomreaderfullreview-1-of-the-lord-as-guru-hindi-saints-in-the-northern-indian-traditionpdf 34
Book Reviews 645
Charandas integrated aspects of Hindu ntual into a unity encompassing end-
less divine forms (75)mdashthat suggests two distinct paths (both decidedly
Hindu) to a common goal namely a mode of religiosity immediate yet deep in
mystery that charactenses the sants
Throughout The Lord as Guru Gold cites freely from the collected verses ofthe sants Golds translations capture precisely the nature of these verses that
are taken to be at once spontaneously inspired and directed toward particular
rhetoncal ends (118) The apparent conflict here is really that which lies at
the heart of the sant tradition constituted of lineages of independent holy men
the sants nonetheless stand deeply rooted in the North Indian tradition Gold
sharply elucidates the parameters of this tradition (at times employing a techni-
cal Hindi vocabulary that will certainly baffle generahsts) and so achieves suc-
cess where others have failed captunng the sants by showing us that in situ
elusiveness is their definitive charactenstic the living gurumdashwho containscontradictions but exists beyond them who lives in the world but remains
unbound by conventions (213)
Herman Tuli
Rutgers University
Sexual Archetypes East and West Ed by Bina Gupta Paragon House
1987 233 pages Ν Ρ
This anthology focuses our attention on the features of vanous religioustraditions both past and present that deal with the role of women as co983085cre-
ators of human history This work is actually part of the God The Contempo-rary Discussion senes This new addition to the senes deals with some pertinent
questions What role do religions play in shaping the status of women7 Are
there any liberating archetypes7 Do sex roles have an ontological status
7 Bina
Gupta selects and edits this work directs the South Asian Language and Area
Center and teaches as an associate professor of philosophy at the University of
Missoun at Columbia Her selection of eleven essays reflect a sincere desire to
balance the perspective by East and West
The book explores essays presented at the conference sponsored by the
New Ecumenical Research Association (New ERA) in Seoul Korea in 1984
entitled Is There a Divine Intention for Male983085Female Relations7 The New
ERA promotes interreligious cross983085cultural dialogue In the darkness of the
cnsis Western womens movements have had to deal with in the past decade
the essays dealing with contemporary Western religious questions may provide
more practical enlightenment
In the foreword Chnstopher J Lucas states that women need to construct a
history from which they can express a collective identity Like minonty groups
women would create mythical and real983085life heroes past injustices would berecorded and displayed and new sources of support would be investigated
8112019 Review 1 of The Lord as Guru- Hindi Saints in the Northern Indian Traditionpdf
httpslidepdfcomreaderfullreview-1-of-the-lord-as-guru-hindi-saints-in-the-northern-indian-traditionpdf 44
^ s
Copyright and Use
As an ATLAS user you may print download or send articles for individual use
according to fair use as defined by US and international copyright law and as
otherwise authorized under your respective ATLAS subscriber agreement
No content may be copied or emailed to multiple sites or publicly posted without the
copyright holder(s) express written permission Any use decompiling
reproduction or distribution of this journal in excess of fair use provisions may be a
violation of copyright law
This journal is made available to you through the ATLAS collection with permissionfrom the copyright holder(s) The copyright holder for an entire issue of a journal
typically is the journal owner who also may own the copyright in each article However
for certain articles the author of the article may maintain the copyright in the article
Please contact the copyright holder(s) to request permission to use an article or specificwork for any use not covered by the fair use provisions of the copyright laws or covered
by your respective ATLAS subscriber agreement For information regarding the
copyright holder(s) please refer to the copyright information in the journal if availableor contact ATLA to request contact information for the copyright holder(s)
About ATLAS
The ATLA Serials (ATLASreg) collection contains electronic versions of previously
published religion and theology journals reproduced with permission The ATLAS
collection is owned and managed by the American Theological Library Association(ATLA) and received initial funding from Lilly Endowment Inc
The design and final form of this electronic document is the property of the AmericanTheological Library Association
8112019 Review 1 of The Lord as Guru- Hindi Saints in the Northern Indian Traditionpdf
httpslidepdfcomreaderfullreview-1-of-the-lord-as-guru-hindi-saints-in-the-northern-indian-traditionpdf 24
6H Journal of the American Academy of Religion
that sees the vaned orders of the created universe as forming a continuoussubstantial whole (22) This continuous whole not only links (spintu-ally and politically) guru to disciple but guru and disciple to a larger traditionidentifiable as Vedic Hindu and so forth However at this point the sant tradi
tion begins to diverge from the general North Indian model for as Gold assertswhat charactenzes the sant is the ability to stand as an independent source ofthe divine requinng no other basis of legitimacy (e g Vedic Islamic etc )
Gold marshals evidence for this claim by contrasting three competingtraditions a sant tradition centenng on the Radhasoami holy man a pus-timaumlrgiya Vaishnava sect centered at an elaborate shnne m Nathdwara and atradition centered at a temple complex at Pushkar with the unusual distinctionof a mam temple dedicated to Brahma Golds discussion of these traditionshowever takes no unexpected turns showing us a continuum from the inde
pendence of the Radhasoami guru to the more fixed and predictable structures(e g set hours for temple worship caste affiliations among the worshippersetc ) found at the Nathdwara and Pushkar complexes The author concludesthat the Radhasoami tradition stressing the intenonty of spintual life provides for a more intense expenence for the devotee (41) whereas worship atthe Nathdwara shnne with its elaborate offenngs (mountains of food)reflects emphatically the wealth and status of the devotees This discussionhowever is flawed by the authors tone against the spontaneity (which Goldsimphstically identifies with a deep spmtuality) of the Radhasoamis Goldbarely masks his disdain for the matenahstic form of Nathdwara pustimdrgf
worship (later in the book Gold exhibits the same prejudice when he tells ushow one Radhasoami guru abandoned his inhentance to keep his public spintual authonty unsullied by accusations of matenal gam [104]) In factthroughout The Lord as Guru the author tends to adopt such simplisticmdashbordering on the stereotypicalmdashcharactenzations e g Vaishnavite worship is mvan-ably called sweet the yogic tradition is referred to as vinle the Buddhistdoctnne of anaumltmauml no-self is descnbed as a problem (while the Hindudoctnne of aumltmanbrahman is viewed as being couched in perfectly logicalterms) the Vedic hentage is depicted as a nearly overwhelming force (yet onethat Kabir would easily stnp of its potency)
Yet these minor annoyances really do not stand in the way of Golds thesiswhich emerges with greater clanty in part II the largest and arguably strongestsection of the book and part 111 Here we begin to see why the sants haveeluded other scholars For as Gold shows us the independent position of thesantsmdashsometimes expressed through their dension for established formsmdashdoesnot mean that the sants are not thoroughly Indie as they drew from but did notlimit themselves to vanous Hindu Buddhist and Muslim modes of religiosityGolds recognition of these two faces of the sant tradition allows him to highlight the fine distinctions between individual sants while clanfymg the links
that establish the sants as a unified tradition Thus for example Gold desenbesthe distinction between two sants Paltu and CharandasmdashIf Paltu tended toreduce the divine unity to the one Formless Lord who recognized no ntual
8112019 Review 1 of The Lord as Guru- Hindi Saints in the Northern Indian Traditionpdf
httpslidepdfcomreaderfullreview-1-of-the-lord-as-guru-hindi-saints-in-the-northern-indian-traditionpdf 34
Book Reviews 645
Charandas integrated aspects of Hindu ntual into a unity encompassing end-
less divine forms (75)mdashthat suggests two distinct paths (both decidedly
Hindu) to a common goal namely a mode of religiosity immediate yet deep in
mystery that charactenses the sants
Throughout The Lord as Guru Gold cites freely from the collected verses ofthe sants Golds translations capture precisely the nature of these verses that
are taken to be at once spontaneously inspired and directed toward particular
rhetoncal ends (118) The apparent conflict here is really that which lies at
the heart of the sant tradition constituted of lineages of independent holy men
the sants nonetheless stand deeply rooted in the North Indian tradition Gold
sharply elucidates the parameters of this tradition (at times employing a techni-
cal Hindi vocabulary that will certainly baffle generahsts) and so achieves suc-
cess where others have failed captunng the sants by showing us that in situ
elusiveness is their definitive charactenstic the living gurumdashwho containscontradictions but exists beyond them who lives in the world but remains
unbound by conventions (213)
Herman Tuli
Rutgers University
Sexual Archetypes East and West Ed by Bina Gupta Paragon House
1987 233 pages Ν Ρ
This anthology focuses our attention on the features of vanous religioustraditions both past and present that deal with the role of women as co983085cre-
ators of human history This work is actually part of the God The Contempo-rary Discussion senes This new addition to the senes deals with some pertinent
questions What role do religions play in shaping the status of women7 Are
there any liberating archetypes7 Do sex roles have an ontological status
7 Bina
Gupta selects and edits this work directs the South Asian Language and Area
Center and teaches as an associate professor of philosophy at the University of
Missoun at Columbia Her selection of eleven essays reflect a sincere desire to
balance the perspective by East and West
The book explores essays presented at the conference sponsored by the
New Ecumenical Research Association (New ERA) in Seoul Korea in 1984
entitled Is There a Divine Intention for Male983085Female Relations7 The New
ERA promotes interreligious cross983085cultural dialogue In the darkness of the
cnsis Western womens movements have had to deal with in the past decade
the essays dealing with contemporary Western religious questions may provide
more practical enlightenment
In the foreword Chnstopher J Lucas states that women need to construct a
history from which they can express a collective identity Like minonty groups
women would create mythical and real983085life heroes past injustices would berecorded and displayed and new sources of support would be investigated
8112019 Review 1 of The Lord as Guru- Hindi Saints in the Northern Indian Traditionpdf
httpslidepdfcomreaderfullreview-1-of-the-lord-as-guru-hindi-saints-in-the-northern-indian-traditionpdf 44
^ s
Copyright and Use
As an ATLAS user you may print download or send articles for individual use
according to fair use as defined by US and international copyright law and as
otherwise authorized under your respective ATLAS subscriber agreement
No content may be copied or emailed to multiple sites or publicly posted without the
copyright holder(s) express written permission Any use decompiling
reproduction or distribution of this journal in excess of fair use provisions may be a
violation of copyright law
This journal is made available to you through the ATLAS collection with permissionfrom the copyright holder(s) The copyright holder for an entire issue of a journal
typically is the journal owner who also may own the copyright in each article However
for certain articles the author of the article may maintain the copyright in the article
Please contact the copyright holder(s) to request permission to use an article or specificwork for any use not covered by the fair use provisions of the copyright laws or covered
by your respective ATLAS subscriber agreement For information regarding the
copyright holder(s) please refer to the copyright information in the journal if availableor contact ATLA to request contact information for the copyright holder(s)
About ATLAS
The ATLA Serials (ATLASreg) collection contains electronic versions of previously
published religion and theology journals reproduced with permission The ATLAS
collection is owned and managed by the American Theological Library Association(ATLA) and received initial funding from Lilly Endowment Inc
The design and final form of this electronic document is the property of the AmericanTheological Library Association
8112019 Review 1 of The Lord as Guru- Hindi Saints in the Northern Indian Traditionpdf
httpslidepdfcomreaderfullreview-1-of-the-lord-as-guru-hindi-saints-in-the-northern-indian-traditionpdf 34
Book Reviews 645
Charandas integrated aspects of Hindu ntual into a unity encompassing end-
less divine forms (75)mdashthat suggests two distinct paths (both decidedly
Hindu) to a common goal namely a mode of religiosity immediate yet deep in
mystery that charactenses the sants
Throughout The Lord as Guru Gold cites freely from the collected verses ofthe sants Golds translations capture precisely the nature of these verses that
are taken to be at once spontaneously inspired and directed toward particular
rhetoncal ends (118) The apparent conflict here is really that which lies at
the heart of the sant tradition constituted of lineages of independent holy men
the sants nonetheless stand deeply rooted in the North Indian tradition Gold
sharply elucidates the parameters of this tradition (at times employing a techni-
cal Hindi vocabulary that will certainly baffle generahsts) and so achieves suc-
cess where others have failed captunng the sants by showing us that in situ
elusiveness is their definitive charactenstic the living gurumdashwho containscontradictions but exists beyond them who lives in the world but remains
unbound by conventions (213)
Herman Tuli
Rutgers University
Sexual Archetypes East and West Ed by Bina Gupta Paragon House
1987 233 pages Ν Ρ
This anthology focuses our attention on the features of vanous religioustraditions both past and present that deal with the role of women as co983085cre-
ators of human history This work is actually part of the God The Contempo-rary Discussion senes This new addition to the senes deals with some pertinent
questions What role do religions play in shaping the status of women7 Are
there any liberating archetypes7 Do sex roles have an ontological status
7 Bina
Gupta selects and edits this work directs the South Asian Language and Area
Center and teaches as an associate professor of philosophy at the University of
Missoun at Columbia Her selection of eleven essays reflect a sincere desire to
balance the perspective by East and West
The book explores essays presented at the conference sponsored by the
New Ecumenical Research Association (New ERA) in Seoul Korea in 1984
entitled Is There a Divine Intention for Male983085Female Relations7 The New
ERA promotes interreligious cross983085cultural dialogue In the darkness of the
cnsis Western womens movements have had to deal with in the past decade
the essays dealing with contemporary Western religious questions may provide
more practical enlightenment
In the foreword Chnstopher J Lucas states that women need to construct a
history from which they can express a collective identity Like minonty groups
women would create mythical and real983085life heroes past injustices would berecorded and displayed and new sources of support would be investigated
8112019 Review 1 of The Lord as Guru- Hindi Saints in the Northern Indian Traditionpdf
httpslidepdfcomreaderfullreview-1-of-the-lord-as-guru-hindi-saints-in-the-northern-indian-traditionpdf 44
^ s
Copyright and Use
As an ATLAS user you may print download or send articles for individual use
according to fair use as defined by US and international copyright law and as
otherwise authorized under your respective ATLAS subscriber agreement
No content may be copied or emailed to multiple sites or publicly posted without the
copyright holder(s) express written permission Any use decompiling
reproduction or distribution of this journal in excess of fair use provisions may be a
violation of copyright law
This journal is made available to you through the ATLAS collection with permissionfrom the copyright holder(s) The copyright holder for an entire issue of a journal
typically is the journal owner who also may own the copyright in each article However
for certain articles the author of the article may maintain the copyright in the article
Please contact the copyright holder(s) to request permission to use an article or specificwork for any use not covered by the fair use provisions of the copyright laws or covered
by your respective ATLAS subscriber agreement For information regarding the
copyright holder(s) please refer to the copyright information in the journal if availableor contact ATLA to request contact information for the copyright holder(s)
About ATLAS
The ATLA Serials (ATLASreg) collection contains electronic versions of previously
published religion and theology journals reproduced with permission The ATLAS
collection is owned and managed by the American Theological Library Association(ATLA) and received initial funding from Lilly Endowment Inc
The design and final form of this electronic document is the property of the AmericanTheological Library Association
8112019 Review 1 of The Lord as Guru- Hindi Saints in the Northern Indian Traditionpdf
httpslidepdfcomreaderfullreview-1-of-the-lord-as-guru-hindi-saints-in-the-northern-indian-traditionpdf 44
^ s
Copyright and Use
As an ATLAS user you may print download or send articles for individual use
according to fair use as defined by US and international copyright law and as
otherwise authorized under your respective ATLAS subscriber agreement
No content may be copied or emailed to multiple sites or publicly posted without the
copyright holder(s) express written permission Any use decompiling
reproduction or distribution of this journal in excess of fair use provisions may be a
violation of copyright law
This journal is made available to you through the ATLAS collection with permissionfrom the copyright holder(s) The copyright holder for an entire issue of a journal
typically is the journal owner who also may own the copyright in each article However
for certain articles the author of the article may maintain the copyright in the article
Please contact the copyright holder(s) to request permission to use an article or specificwork for any use not covered by the fair use provisions of the copyright laws or covered
by your respective ATLAS subscriber agreement For information regarding the
copyright holder(s) please refer to the copyright information in the journal if availableor contact ATLA to request contact information for the copyright holder(s)
About ATLAS
The ATLA Serials (ATLASreg) collection contains electronic versions of previously
published religion and theology journals reproduced with permission The ATLAS
collection is owned and managed by the American Theological Library Association(ATLA) and received initial funding from Lilly Endowment Inc
The design and final form of this electronic document is the property of the AmericanTheological Library Association
