Tamil Nadu - Others   

Workshop to discuss the earliest Agama of Saivism

Staff Reporter

The event to be held from January 2 to 13 will focus on Nisvasatattvasamhita

PUDUCHERRY : The Ecole Francaise de Extreme - Orient (EFEO), French School of Asian Studies in Puducherry, will be organising an international workshop on "Early Saivism: The testimony of the Nisvasatattvasamhita" from January 2 to 13.

According to Dominic Goodall, head of the centre in Puducherry, the workshop will mainly focus on the Nisvasatattvasamhita, one of the earliest Agamas of Saivism that has survived.

"The Nisvâsatattvasamhitâ, a fundamental Tantra of the Saiva Siddhânta, is an enormous, unpublished text of great antiquity that contains information about the early history of the Saiva religion. The work is in many respects very different from the other ancient Tantras of the Saiva Siddhânta and is, therefore, quite difficult to interpret", said Professor Dominic Goodall.

Nisvâsatattvasamhitâ may be the earliest scripture of Tantric Saivism and it is a source of major importance both for the early history of Tantrism and for more archaic forms of Saivism followed by Pâsupata groups. It is mentioned in 10th century inscriptions in Cambodia.

"It is a compendium of Saiva mantras and Saiva thought in general and it survives in an early ninth century Nepali manuscript. The text has evidence of Saivism in the whole of the Indian sub-continent at that time," he added.

Scholars from Japan, England, Europe and the U.S. will discuss this agama in depth.

Discussions focussing on finalising the text of three of the five major sections on the Tantra will be held. These sections, called `sûtras', appear to be semi-independent Tantras in their own right: they teach different mantra systems and the longest of them, Guhyasûtra, appears to be referred to as an independent work in Cambodian inscriptions.

Lectures on different aspects of the text or some aspects of early Tantric religion

will be given. Possible subjects include magic rituals; peculiarities of early Tantric language, Tantric ontology; early Tantric cosmography, developments in Tantric worship, Pâsupata religion, relations between Buddhist and Saiva Tantra.

On the inaugural day of the seminar, a concert by Carnatic vocalist T. M. Krishna will be organised.

The concert will be held from 6.30 p.m. to 9 p.m. on January 2 in the library hall of the EFEO, at 19, Dumas Street.

Nagai R. Sriram on the violin, Tiruvarur Bhaktavatsalam on the mridangam and Tiruvarur R. Krishnamurthi on the kanjira will accompany him.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section

Workshop to discuss the earliest Agama of Saivism
Traders' interests will be protected, says Minister
"Encourage small entrepreneurs"
Coast Guard to help ISRO recover satellite
Two killed in road accident
Houses given to the tsunami-hit
Village on Yercaud Hills wants better healthcare
Training
Policeman attacked during raid
Residents stage demonstration
10-day camp

Copyright © 2006, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu