VAIKUṆṬHA: ON EARTH AS IT IS IN HEAVEN
AUG 6- AUG 7 2020
JNANAPRAVAHA, MUMBAI
This two-day conference in India will consider the concept of heaven—Vaikuṇṭha—through the lens of texts, performance and the visual arts of the Śrīvaisṇava community. As with several other Hindu theistic traditions, Śrīvaiṣṇavism closely associates ideas of heaven or hell with those of salvation. Through a systematic theology building on a range of scriptural and devotional works spanning nearly 2000 years (vedic, epic, purāṇic, and post-puraṇic), Śrīvaiṣṇavaism has conceived of salvation as an entry into Viṣṇu’s dwelling—depicted as a paradisical cityscape, Vaikuṇṭha – where the benefits of opulence, proximity, community and infinite bliss can be experienced for eternity, in all their totality. There is a long textual tradition of the depiction of Vaikuṇṭha from Sanskrit mythic sources to the ecstatic Tamil poetry of the Divyaprabandham to the praise-poems and esoteric secret literature of the tradition’s most important teachers. Yet, the history of Śrīvaiṣṇavism is not just the textual Sanskrit and Tamil traditions. The practices and performances of living communities throughout the Indian subcontinent’s southern regions (present-day Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Andhra and Karnataka) has shown that Vaikuṇṭha was both in the heavens and on earth. For instance, it finds expression in the idea of the temple-city of Śrīraṅgam as an eternal earthly Vaikuṇṭha (Bhūlokavaikuṇṭha). In other cases, it is evoked at specific festivals, when Vaikuṇṭha is temporarily manifested on earth, or presented as an aspirational place in murals that adorn temple walls and ceilings. This symposium seeks to examine the genealogies and instantiation of Vaikuṇṭha as a place on heaven and on earth within the context of the history of the Śrīvaiṣṇava community.
This symposium brings together an international group of scholars, who work in several different disciplines (Art History, Architectural History, Epigraphy, Literature, Philosophy, Religion, Theology and Ritual Studies) and in a variety of languages, (Sanskrit, Tamil, Telugu and Manipravala most prominently). We will also invite scholars based in India to participate as respondents and in a general roundtable.