ROYAL BUDDHIST FESTIVALS IN PREMODERN NEPAL: SOCIO-POLITICAL SYMBOLISM AND RELIGIOUS IDENTITY
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Abstract
The article focuses on the social and political symbolism of Buddhist royal festivals in traditional Nepal and the ideas they carried. The study analyzes the history of identities of various social groups in pre-modern Nepal, as well as a number of aspects of state ideology. It is emphasized that the socio-religious situation in pre-modern and partly early modern Nepal was influenced by the phenomena of dualism in the foundations of state ideology, which probably stemmed from the coexistence of two great traditions (Buddhism and Hinduism). Thus, the king for the subjects is both the ideal Hindu monarch Rajadhiraja and the Buddhist universal ruler Chakravartin. Both Hinduism and Buddhism “offered” their own versions of the ideological base of monarchical power, which were often intertwined (in a syncretic way).
The author relies, in particular, on M. Blok’s theory of “rebounding violence”, which is useful in the study of “ritual grammar” of socially oriented ritual. The study of socially oriented rituals and festivals in the Nepalese context, such as the royal Buddhist festivals Samyak Mahadana, Karunamaya (Avalokiteshvara) rathjatra, helps to deconstruct pre-modern political and social ideas by analyzing the symbolism of these festivals. The author concludes that, in addition to strengthening royal power and ideology, this type of festival was aimed at affirming the religious identity of the participants and “helping” to reestablish the hierarchy and postulate its pro-monarchical nature. This was another force of pre-modern “national” integration through rituals. Another side of that process concerns Samyak: that festival strengthens Buddhist identity (with no strong Hindu “parallel” association of the festival and its religious, social and political ideas) and socio-religious boundaries of the Buddhist groups.
How to Cite
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Ideology, monarchy, Nepal, royal Buddhist festivals, sangha, social and religious identity
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Tuladhar-Douglas Will (2006), Remaking Buddhism for Medieval Nepal: The Fifteenth-century Reformation of Newar Buddhism, Routledge, New York. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203007334
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