scholarly journals Modern Transformations of sādhanā as Art, Study, and Awareness: Religious Experience and Hindu Tantric Practice

Religions ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (4) ◽  
pp. 259
Author(s):  
Jeffrey C. Ruff
Keyword(s):  
Religious Experience ◽  
Artistic Expression ◽  
Direct Transmission ◽  
Direct Experience ◽  
Kundalini Yoga ◽  
The Awakening ◽  
Cultural Experiences ◽  
Tantric Practice

“My first raising of the kuṇḍalinī was hearing Ma [her teacher] speak about art.” The experience of the awakening of śakti within practitioners in contemporary cultures occurs both in traditional religious settings and within novel circumstances. Traditional situations include direct transmission from a guru (śaktipāta), self-awakening through the practice of kuṇḍalinī-yoga or haṭhayoga, and direct acts of grace (anugraha) from the goddess or god. There are also novel expressions in hybrid religious-cultural experiences wherein artists, dancers, and musicians describe their arts explicitly in terms of faith/devotion (śraddhā, bhakti, etc.) and practice (sādhanā). They also describe direct experience of grace from the goddess or describe their ostensibly secular teachers as gurus. In contemporary experience, art becomes sādhanā and sādhanā becomes art. Creativity and artistic expression work as modern transformations of traditional religious experience. This development, while moving away from traditional ritual and practice, does have recognizable grounding within many tantric traditions, especially among the high tantra of the Kashmiri Śaiva exegetes.

scholarly journals Religious Experience, Hindu Pluralism, and Hope: Anubhava in the Tradition of Sri Ramakrishna

Religions ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 210 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffery Long
Keyword(s):  
Religious Experience ◽  
Ultimate Reality ◽  
John Hick ◽  
Direct Experience ◽  
William Alston ◽  
Religious Traditions ◽  
Modern Period ◽  
Religious Subject ◽  
Pluralistic Approach ◽  
Swami Vivekananda

The pluralistic turn in modern Hindu thought corresponds with the rise of an emphasis on direct experience of divine realities in this tradition. Both pluralism and a focus on experience have precedents in premodern Hindu traditions, but have become especially prominent in modern Hinduism. The paradigmatic example in the modern period of a religious subject embarking upon a pluralistic quest for direct experience of ultimate reality as mediated through multiple religious traditions is the nineteenth century Bengali sage, Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa (1836–1886), whose most famous disciple, Swami Vivekananda (1863–1902) played a prominent role in the promotion of the idea of Hinduism as largely defined by a religious pluralism paired with an emphasis on direct experience. The focus in the teachings of Sri Ramakrishna and Swami Vivekananda on Brahman as a universal reality available, at least in principle, to being experienced by anyone, and interpreted using the categories of the experiencing subject’s religion or culture, gives rise to a corresponding pluralism: a move towards seeing many religions and philosophies as conducive to the experience of a shared ultimate reality. This paper will analyze the theme of experience in the thought of these two figures, and other figures who are representative of this broad trend in modern Hindu thought, as well as in conversation with recent academic philosophers and theorists of religious experience, John Hick and William Alston. It will also argue that aspects of Hinduism, such as pluralism and an emphasis on direct experience, that are often termed as ‘Neo-Vedantic’ or ‘Neo-Hindu’ are not simply modern constructs, as these terms seem to suggest, but are reflective of much older trends in Hindu thought that become central themes in the thought of key Hindu figures in the modern period. Finally, it shall be argued that a pluralistic approach to the diversity of religions, and of worldviews more generally, is to be commended as an approach more conducive to human survival than the current global proliferation of ethno-nationalisms.

scholarly journals As metáforas e o cinema de animação: uma análise do filme Meow!

2006 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 44
Author(s):  
Maurício Silva Gino ◽  
Ronaldo Luiz Nagem ◽  
José Tavares de Barros
Keyword(s):  
Structured Interview ◽  
Artistic Expression ◽  
Political Position ◽  
Theoretical Support ◽  
Cultural Experiences ◽  
The World

<p><strong>Resumo</strong>: Este artigo tem por objetivo apresentar as intenções e os significados atribuídos por Marcos Magalhães às metáforas presentes no filme Meow!Por meio de entrevista semi- estruturada, registraram-se as intenções e os significados atribuídos pelo produtor para cada cena ou personagem. Os resultados foram analisados e discutidos tendo como suporte teórico as proposições de Lakoff &amp; Johnson(1), dentre outros. A conclusão a que se chega é que o autor seleciona alguns aspectos de nossas experiências culturais, ao mesmo tempo em que simplesmente desconsidera outros, o que faz do seu filme o veículo de uma realidade metafórica. Nesse sentido, a metáfora apresenta-se como um recurso de fundamental importância para a expressão artística de Marcos Magalhães que, por meio do filme, expõe sua visão de mundo e seus posicionamentos político e ideológico.</p><p><strong>Abstract</strong>: This article aims at presenting intentions and meanings attributed by Marcos Magalhães to the Meow! film. Through a semi-structured interview, the intentions and meanings attributed by the producer, to each scene or character, had been registered. The results had been analyzed and discussed having as theoretical support the proposals of Lakoff &amp; Johnson (2002), amongst others. The conclusion is that the author selects some aspects of our cultural experiences, and at the same time do not consider others, so, this makes the film a vehicle for a metaphoric reality. In this sense, the metaphor is presented as a resource of extreme importance for the artistic expression of Marcos Magalhães, which through the film, shows his vision of the world and his ideological political position.</p><p><strong>Keywords</strong>: metaphors; analogies; cinematographic animation.</p>

The Kadampa: A Formative Movement of Tibetan Buddhism

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ulrike Roesler
Keyword(s):  
Tibetan Buddhism ◽  
The Tibetan Plateau ◽  
The Awakening ◽  
15Th Century ◽  
The Mind ◽  
Central Tibet ◽  
The Buddha ◽  
Mind Training ◽  
Common Understanding ◽  
Tantric Practice

The Bka’ gdams pa (pronounced “Kadampa”) emerged as a distinct tradition of Tibetan Buddhism in the 11th century ce. The most common understanding of the name in Tibetan sources is that this tradition taught the complete word of the Buddha (bka’) as explained in the instructions (gdams) of the Indian teacher Dīpaṃkaraśrījñāna (982–1054). This is sometimes specified as referring to his instructions on the graded path (lam rim) toward Buddhahood that were later adopted and propagated by the Dge lugs pa (pronounced “Gelugpa”) school, beginning with Tsong kha pa’s (1357–1419) influential Lam rim chen mo. It is commonly assumed that during the 15th century, the Bka’ gdams pa were absorbed into Tsong kha pa’s reform movement of the “new Bka’ gdams pa” (bka’ gdams gsar ma), later known as the Dge lugs pa, but further research is needed on this issue. Dīpaṃkaraśrījñāna, also known by his Indian honorific title Atiśa[ya] or Adhīśa, was invited to western Tibet by its rulers and arrived there in 1042. At the request of King Byang chub ’od (984–1078), he composed his famous “Lamp on the Path to Awakening” (Bo-dhi-pathapradīpa; Tib. Byang chub lam sgron), which became an important model for Tibetan works on the graded path to awakening. He then accepted an invitation to central Tibet where he spent the rest of his life. He passed away in Snye thang near Lhasa in 1054. Several of Atiśa’s Tibetan students played an important role in the development of Buddhism on the Tibetan plateau. However, it is his student ’Brom ston Rgyal ba’i ’byung gnas (pronounced “Dromtön Gyelway Jungnay,” 1004–1064) who is traditionally regarded as the founding father of the Tibetan Bka’ gdams pa lineage since his students became instrumental in spreading the Bka’ gdams pa teachings in central Tibet. In addition to the lam rim, they became famous for their instructions on “mental purification” or “mind training” (blo sbyong, pronounced “Lojong”), which is meant to free the mind from attachment to the ego and generate the attitude of the “awakening mind” (Skt. bodhicitta). Lam rim and blo sbyong became highly popular doctrinal and didactic genres and have had an impact on Tibetan Buddhism far beyond the Bka’ gdams pa and Dge lugs pa traditions. The Bka’ gdams pa are often perceived as a tradition with an emphasis on monasticism and Mahāyāna ethics, rather than on yogic and tantric practice. However, it should be kept in mind that Dīpaṃkaraśrījñāna himself had grown up in the tantric traditions of Bengal. His work on the stages of the path to awakening includes instructions on tantra, but states that tantric practice may not contradict the vows taken (thus excluding antinomian practices for monastics). The early Tibetan Bka’ gdams pa masters take the same stance and promote the idea that Pāramitānaya (i.e., non-tantric Mahāyāna Buddhism) and tantra have the same validity and lead to the same goal, thus trying to strike a balance between the two approaches.

Application of Lattice Imaging Techniques to Amorphous Films

1975 ◽  
Vol 33 ◽  
pp. 8-9
Author(s):  
S. R. Herd ◽  
P. Chaudhari
Keyword(s):  
Nearest Neighbor ◽  
Random Network ◽  
Imaging Techniques ◽  
Network Models ◽  
Accurate Method ◽  
Direct Transmission ◽  
Lattice Imaging ◽  
Transmission Electron ◽  
Lattice Planes ◽  
Nearest Neighbor Distances

Electron diffraction and direct transmission have been used extensively to study the local atomic arrangement in amorphous solids and in particular Ge. Nearest neighbor distances had been calculated from E.D. profiles and the results have been interpreted in terms of the microcrystalline or the random network models. Direct transmission electron microscopy appears the most direct and accurate method to resolve this issue since the spacial resolution of the better instruments are of the order of 3Å. In particular the tilted beam interference method is used regularly to show fringes corresponding to 1.5 to 3Å lattice planes in crystals as resolution tests.

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