Contributions

  • Case, Margaret H. - Contributor

Publication

2008 - Oxford University Press, New York, New York (State)

Language

English

Word Count

165,000 words, Guess

Page Count

660 pages

Identifiers

and 4 more

Classifications

  • DDC294.5/35095482
  • LCCBL1243.76.K3562 V355 2008
  • LCCBL1243.76.K3562V355

Description

"The book is a finely detailed examination of a virtually unstudied Tamil Hindu temple, the Vaikuntha Perumal (ca. 770 C.E.). Hudson offers a sustained reading of the temple as a coherent, organized, minutely conceptualized mandala. Its iconography and structure can be understood in the light of a ten-stanza poem by the Alvar poet Tirumangai, and of the Bhagavata Purana and other major religious texts, even as it in turn illuminates the meanings of those texts." "Hudson takes the reader step by step on a tour of the temple, telling the stories suggested by each of the 56 sculpted panels and showing how their relationship to one another brings out layers of meaning. He correlates the stories with stages in the spiritual growthof the king through the complex rituals that formed a crucial dimension of the religion. The result is a tapestry of interpretation that brings to life the richness of spiritual understanding embodied in the temple."--Jacket.

Subjects

Topics

CultTemplesHistoryReligionVaishnavismKrishna (Hindu deity)India, social life and customs

Places

IndiaKānchipuram Region

People

Nandivarman II King of the Pallavas (fl. 732-796)

Other Editions

  • The body of God: an emperor's palace for Krishna in eighth-century KanchipuramOxford University Press2008-01-01

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