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Glossary
Sanskrit terms, clearly defined. Search ignores accents and spelling variants, and matches the English, the Devanagari, or the definition.
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aanआण A Hindī and Avadhi word for an oath or sworn word, and for a proclamation. The Hindī Śabdasāgara glosses it by duhāī and derives it from āṇi, a limit or boundary. The retroflex spelling is far rarer in print than the ordinary dental one. aartiआरती The ritual offering of light, in which lit lamps are circled before a deity or sacred river; the Ganga aarti at Varanasi is among the most famous. abhaya mudraअभयमुद्रा The gesture of fearlessness: the raised hand, palm outward and fingers up, meaning 'be not afraid' (from a-bhaya, no fear). One of the most widespread mudra forms on a murti, and the reader's key to a standing image. abhicharaअभिचार Hostile or aggressive ritual, sorcery aimed at harming, subjugating or destroying a target; older than tantra, with roots in the Atharvaveda. The tradition itself ringfenced it as dangerous and karmically costly. abhinayaअभिनय Expression or 'carrying toward' the audience in classical dance and drama; its four modes are angika (body, including the mudra of the hands), vachika (word), aharya (costume) and sattvika (involuntary feeling). abhiniveshaअभिनिवेश The clinging to life and fear of death; the fifth and most instinctive of the kleshas. abhishekaअभिषेक The ritual bathing or anointing of a murti or a person with water, milk and other substances; the act of consecration in puja and in diksha. abhivadanaअभिवादन The formal Vedic salutation offered to an elder, in which the younger person announces themselves and bows, often touching the elder's feet. The Manusmriti (2.120-121) describes it: the vital breaths of the young rise to greet an approaching elder and are settled by the salutation, and habitual reverence increases long life, righteousness, fame and strength. abhyasaअभ्यास Steady, sustained practice maintained over a long time; with vairagya, one of the two means by which the Yoga Sutras say the mind is stilled. abugida A type of writing system, also called an alphasyllabary, in which each consonant carries a built-in vowel that is altered by added marks; the Indian scripts are abugidas. acharaआचार Established custom and right conduct; in practice one of the working sources of dharma, often overriding the letter of the law-books. acharyaआचार्य A teacher or preceptor, especially a guru qualified to give diksha and to expound a sampradaya's teaching; the title borne by the heads of the great mathas. achyutaअच्युत The 'unfallen' or 'never-slipping', one who never falls from his own nature; among the most beloved names of Vishnu, appearing twice in the Vishnu Sahasranama, the name a devotee reaches for in fear. adharmaअधर्म The absence or opposite of dharma: disorder, unrighteousness; a principle, not a personified Devil. adhikamasaअधिकमास An intercalary, or extra, masa inserted to keep the lunar year in step with the solar year; one of the corrections the panchanga makes to keep the tithi aligned with the seasons. adhvaryuअध्वर्यु The priest of the Yajurveda who carries out the physical acts of the sacrifice and murmurs its prose formulas (yajus). adhyasaअध्यास Superimposition: laying one thing over another and taking the two for one, as when a coiled rope is seen as a snake. Shankara opens his Brahma Sutra commentary by naming this as our basic error. adi-guruआदिगुरु The first or primordial teacher, at the head of every lineage of transmission. Dakshinamurti, Shiva as the silent guru, is honoured as the adi-guru of the knowledge traditions; the Advaita lineages trace their descent of teachers back through named human masters to this form, and beyond it to Shiva. adi-parashaktiआदिपराशक्ति The primordial supreme power; in Shaktism, the Goddess as the ultimate reality, of whom all gods and goddesses are aspects. adikaviआदिकवि 'The first poet'; the title given to Valmiki as the composer of the first poem. adikavyaआदिकाव्य 'The first poem'; the epithet of the Valmiki Ramayana, held by the tradition to be the first composition in the shloka verse form. Adityaआदित्य One of the twelve Adityas, the sovereign, solar sons of the goddess Aditi, one for each month of the year; the luminous, law-keeping class among the thirty-three gods, headed in the Veda by Varuna and Mitra. adrishtaअदृष्ट The unseen; in Nyaya-Vaisheshika the unseen moral force of merit and demerit, administered by Ishvara. adstrate In historical linguistics, the influence of a neighbouring language on another without either displacing the other. Witzel argues the Dravidian element in the Rigveda indicates an adstrate rather than a substratum. advaitaअद्वैत Non-dualism; the school of Vedanta systematised by Shankara, holding that atman and brahman are one undivided reality and that all plurality is appearance (maya). agamaआगम A class of revealed, often Tantric scriptures governing temple ritual, deity worship, and practice; the Shaiva schools each draw on their own Agamas. agamiआगामि The karma being generated by one's present actions, to bear fruit in the future. Aghoraअघोर 'Not terrible.' The tantric principle that to realised awareness nothing is finally fearful or polluting, since nothing is other than the divine; the vision that meets the cremation ground and the forbidden without recoil. Aghoriअघोरी An ascetic of the Aghor tradition, a Śaiva cremation-ground path that worships Shiva in his Aghora (“non-terrible”) aspect and seeks to transcend duality by embracing what society deems impure. Agni The Vedic fire-god, the divine priest who carries offerings to the gods through the sacrificial flame; invoked in the first verse of the Rigveda. agniअग्नि In Ayurveda, the 'digestive fire' - the transformative capacity that cooks food into tissue. Weak or erratic agni is held to be the origin of ama, the undigested residue that underlies disease. aham brahmasmiअहं ब्रह्मास्मि "I am Brahman," a mahavakya from the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad (1.4.10). It declares that the innermost self is not separate from the absolute, the realisation at the heart of Advaita Vedanta. ahamkaraअहंकार The 'I-maker': the function of the inner instrument (antahkarana) that adds the sense of 'I' and 'mine' to experience, generating the feeling of being a separate doer and owner. One of the four functions of the mind in Vedanta and a key principle in Samkhya. ahimsaअहिंसा Non-harming; the first and foremost of the yamas, the ethical restraints of yoga. ajapaअजप "Unrepeated repetition" (ajapa-japa); japa that continues on its own, riding the breath in and out, heard rather than performed. ajapa-japaअजपजप The 'unrepeated repetition': the mantra (soham/hamsa) said to recite itself in the breath without effort; the ajapa-gayatri. ajativadaअजातिवाद Gaudapada's doctrine of non-origination: that nothing is ever, in the deepest sense, truly born or destroyed, because the changing world never really arises out of the changeless one. ajnaआज्ञा The "command" centre between the brows. Two petals, the seat of the subtle mind, seed-syllable Om. akam The 'interior' genre of Sangam poetry, treating love and the inner life. akarshanaआकर्षण Attraction; the drawing of a person or power toward oneself. In some lists it replaces vidveshana among the six acts of tantric magic, keeping the number fixed while the membership shifts. akashaआकाश Ether or space, the subtlest of the five elements, associated in the chakra system with the throat centre (vishuddha) and with sound. akhandarthaअखण्डार्थ The 'partless meaning': the principle by which several words with different connotations point to one indivisible reality. Sat, chit and ananda have distinct meanings yet name one seamless Brahman, as 'morning star' and 'evening star' both name Venus. akharaअखाड़ा A militant ascetic or monastic order; the akharas organize and lead the processional bathing at the Kumbh Mela. aksharaअक्षर The imperishable; a term the Upanishads use for the unchanging absolute, as in Yajnavalkya's teaching to Gargi. Literally 'that which does not perish,' it also means a syllable. akshauhiniअक्षौहिणी A complete army division of chariots, elephants, cavalry and infantry in fixed proportion; eighteen akshauhinis fought at Kurukshetra, eleven for the Kauravas and seven for the Pandavas. Akshaya Tritiya The imperishable third, the third tithi of the waxing fortnight of Vaishakha, an auspicious day in the panchanga on which merit and ventures begun are believed never to diminish. Alvar One of the twelve Tamil Vaishnava poet-saints, 'those immersed in God', whose hymns to Vishnu make up the Nalayira Divya Prabandham. alvarsआऴ्वार् The twelve Tamil poet-saints of Vishnu (c. 6th-9th c. CE) whose emotional devotion is widely held to have shaped the Bhagavata Purana. amaआम In Ayurveda, the undigested residue left when agni, the digestive fire, is weak or erratic. It is held to be sticky, to block the channels of the body, and to lie at the root of a great many disorders. amalakaआमलक The ribbed, disc-shaped crowning stone of a Nagara temple tower, beneath the pot finial. amatraअमात्र The soundless or measureless fourth part of Om, beyond the three sounds A, U and M; the silence identified with turiya, pure awareness. amavasya The new-moon tithi, the dark night that closes the waning paksha; a day of shraddha for the ancestors in the lunar reckoning of the panchanga. amnayaआम्नाय A line of scriptural transmission; the four amnaya mathas are the cardinal monasteries traditionally founded by Adi Shankara. amritaअमृत The nectar of immortality, churned from the ocean of milk in the samudra-manthana. amsaअंश A part or portion; in Vishishtadvaita, the soul as a real, eternal part of Brahman. anadiअनादि 'Beginningless'; without origin in time, said of the cycle of rebirth and, in the tradition, of the Veda itself. anahataअनाहत The heart chakra. Twelve petals, element air, seed-syllable Yam. Its name means "unstruck." anandaआनन्द Bliss. In the Taittiriya Upanishad the innermost sheath is the anandamaya kosha, and bliss is one of the qualities the tradition associates with brahman (sat-chit-ananda). ananda-tandavaआनन्दताण्डव The 'dance of bliss', the cosmic dance of Shiva as Nataraja performed in the golden hall at Chidambaram, enacting creation, preservation, dissolution, concealment, and grace. anandamayaआनन्दमय The self made of bliss, the innermost of the five sheaths in the Taittiriya Upanishad; whether it is Brahman itself or its last sheath is a classic dispute between Shankara and the plain reading of the text. anantaअनन्त 'The endless'; the cosmic serpent, also called Shesha, on whose coils Vishnu reclines on the cosmic ocean between the dissolution and remaking of the worlds. anarthakaअनर्थक 'Meaningless' or 'purposeless'; the charge that Kautsa, in Yaska's Nirukta, laid against the Vedic mantras and that Yaska set out to refute. anattaअनत्ता Not-self; the Buddhist teaching that there is no permanent, enduring self, which distinguishes Buddhist karma from the Hindu atman. angaअङ्ग A limb or member; the eight angas are the eight limbs of Patanjali's yoga. anirvachaniyaअनिर्वचनीय 'Indescribable' or indefinable: the logical status Advaita Vedanta gives to maya and the world, which is neither wholly real (it vanishes with knowledge) nor wholly unreal (it is universally experienced), and so cannot be categorised as either. anjali mudraअञ्जलि मुद्रा The mudra of joined palms held at the heart, the bodily form of namaste and of reverence in greeting, in puja and before a murti. anmil-akharअनमिल आखर Ill-matched letters, the phrase in which Tulsīdās grants a charge against śābara syllables. Anmil is the negative of mil, to meet or to join, so the phrase reads as a verdict on assortment; the standard Hindī commentary construes it four ways. annaअन्न Food. In the Taittiriya Upanishad the outermost sheath, the annamaya kosha, is the physical body, said to be 'made of food.' annamayaअन्नमय The self made of food, the outermost of the five sheaths (kosha) in the Taittiriya Upanishad, that is, the physical body. annapurnaअन्नपूर्णा Parvati in her form as the goddess 'full of food', who nourishes all beings; her great temple stands in Kashi, where tradition says even Shiva receives his meal from her hand. anritaअनृत Literally 'not-rta': the opposite of the cosmic order, meaning falsehood, disorder and the lie. In the Vedic worldview, untruth is both a moral failing and a small tear in the fabric of the cosmos; truth (satya) is alignment with rta. Antah-shauchaअन्तःशौच Inner purity, the purity of consciousness, as distinct from shaucha, the outer purity of substances and contacts; in Tantra the inner is held to be decisive. antahkaranaअन्तःकरण The 'inner instrument': the mind considered as the internal organ of knowing and acting, as opposed to the outer instruments (the senses). Vedanta analyses it into four functions, manas, buddhi, ahamkara and chitta, and holds it to be an instrument the Self uses, not the Self itself. antaralaअन्तराल The vestibule of a Hindu temple, the short transitional passage linking the pillared hall (mandapa) to the inner sanctum (garbhagriha). antarangaअन्तरङ्ग The inner limbs, the last three (dharana, dhyana, samadhi) practised inwardly, as against the outer five. antarayaअन्तराय The obstacles that scatter the mind in yoga, named by Patanjali (illness, doubt, laziness, distraction and others); the repetition of Om is prescribed to dissolve them. antarvahini Flowing within or beneath; the tradition that the Sarasvati continues underground and surfaces unseen at the Triveni Sangam. antaryagaअन्तर्याग Internal worship: the offering performed inwardly, in the body and the subtle centres, rather than with external materials. Central to the Samaya stream of Srividya. antaryaminअन्तर्यामिन् The 'inner controller': God dwelling within each being as its innermost witness and guide, a name for the Paramatman. Central to Ramanuja's theology, in which the Lord indwells and directs all souls and matter. antyeshtiअन्त्येष्टि The 'last sacrifice'; the Hindu funeral and cremation rites that mark the final samskara, or life-passage rite, of a person's life. anubandhaअनुबन्ध In Panini's grammar, a marker sound (also called 'it') attached to a form so that it can be referenced by the rules, but not pronounced in the finished word; its use is governed by paribhasha. anugrahaअनुग्रह Grace, the revealing or self-disclosure of the divine. In Kashmir Shaivism it is the fifth of Shiva's five acts (panchakritya) - creation, maintenance, dissolution, concealment, and grace - and is the deepest meaning of shaktipat, the moment the divine turns toward a soul and begins to lift its own veil. anukramaniअनुक्रमणी A traditional index to a Vedic text, listing for each hymn its seer, its deity and its metre. anumanaअनुमान Inference: knowledge of what is unseen from what is seen, governed by a pervasion (vyapti) such as 'where there is smoke there is fire'. Anushasana Parvaअनुशासन पर्व The 'Book of Instruction', the thirteenth book of the Mahabharata, in which the dying Bhishma teaches Yudhishthira on duty, kingship and release. The Vishnu Sahasranama sits within it, at about its 149th section. anushtubhअनुष्टुभ् The metre of the epic shloka: four lines (padas) of eight syllables each. anusvaraअनुस्वार The nasal resonance ('m' hum) written as a dot (bindu) that closes a syllable, especially a bija; read in Tantra as the union of Shiva and Shakti. anuvakaअनुवाक A subsection or lesson within a chapter of a Vedic text, used to divide the Taittiriya Upanishad. anuvrittiअनुवृत्ति In Panini's grammar, the 'carrying forward' of a word or condition stated in one rule into the rules that follow, without restating it; a convention read alongside the paribhasha. apabhramshaअपभ्रंश The literary register standing below Prākṛt in the descending order Sanskrit, Prakrit, Apabhraṃśa that the Vimalaprabhā uses for the languages of doctrine. Daṇḍin calls the speech of the Ābhīras and the like apabhraṃśa in poetry. apad-dharmaआपद्-धर्म The dharma of distress: rules for what becomes permissible in an emergency, when ordinary duty cannot be kept. Treated at length in the Mahabharata's Shanti Parva and in the law-books, it shows dharma bending to extremity. apamrityuअपमृत्यु Untimely, violent or accidental death, death before its season; the Mahamrityunjaya is chanted for protection from it. apanaअपान The downward-moving vital air, one of the five pranas, governing exhalation and elimination. In yoga its union with the upward-moving prana at the navel is said to kindle the inner fire and rouse the kundalini. aparaअपर The lower or 'non-supreme' level of the graded triad of reality and speech (para, parapara, apara) in the Trika scheme. apara vidyaअपरा विद्या The lower knowledge in the Mundaka Upanishad, comprising the four Vedas and their six ancillary sciences, set below para vidya, the knowledge of Brahman. aparigrahaअपरिग्रह Non-grasping, freedom from possessiveness; one of the yamas. Aparnaअपर्णा 'She who took not even a leaf' - the name earned by Parvati in the Kumarasambhava when her austerities grew so severe that she gave up even the fallen leaves she had been eating. apasअप्स् Water, the element associated with the second centre (svadhishthana) and with the sense of taste, shown in the texts as a white crescent. Apasmaraअपस्मार The dwarf who personifies ignorance and forgetfulness, shown crushed beneath the foot of Shiva. Nataraja dances upon him in the ring of fire; Dakshinamurti merely rests a foot on him, ignorance held down while the silent teaching does its work. Also called Muyalaka in the Tamil tradition. apauruseyaअपौरुषेय Authorless, not of human (or divine) composition: Mimamsa's doctrine that the Veda is eternal and uncomposed, and so free of error. apaurusheyaअपौरुषेय 'Not of human origin': the doctrine that the Vedas are authorless and beginningless, heard by the seers rather than composed by them. apohaअपोह The Buddhist 'exclusion' theory of meaning: a word such as 'cow' denotes not a real universal but the exclusion of everything that is not a cow ('not-non-cow'). Nyaya rejected it in defence of real universals. aprthak-siddhiअपृथक्सिद्धि 'Incapability of separate existence', the key relation in Ramanuja's Vishishtadvaita by which souls and matter, though real and distinct, cannot exist apart from Brahman: they are inseparable modes (prakara) or the body of God, dependent on him as a body is on its self. apsaraअप्सरा A celestial nymph and dancer, born from the churning of the ocean by deva and asura together; a heavenly performer, and in myth the divine beauty sent to break the tapas of dangerously powerful sages. apurvaअपूर्व The unseen potency generated by a correctly performed yajna that links the act to its later fruit as karma does, without need of a deity. Aranyakaआरण्यक The 'forest book': the layer of the Veda, meant for the forest-dweller, that turns from ritual mechanics toward inner meaning, leading into the Upanishads. Arcaअर्चा That which is worshipped; the worship-image. In Vaishnava theology the arca or archavatara is the image-descent, the form in which the Lord makes himself most accessible to devotees. archanaअर्चना A form of worship in which a priest recites the names of a deity one by one, each prefixed with Om and followed by namah, offering a flower or leaf at every name, so a hymn of names becomes a sequence of offerings. Ardhanarishvaraअर्धनारीश्वर The form of Shiva that is half male and half female, united with the Goddess down one side; the presiding form at the throat centre (vishuddha) in the Sat-chakra-nirupana. arghyaअर्घ्य An offering of water, poured from cupped hands toward a deity; classically offered to the rising sun at dawn as part of sandhya-vandana. arishadvargaअरिषड्वर्ग The 'six inner enemies' of the mind: kāma (desire), krodha (anger), lobha (greed), moha (delusion), mada (pride) and mātsarya (envy); the real 'demons' to be conquered. arkaअर्क The sun, a name of Surya; the root of 'Konark' (kona, corner, plus arka, sun). arthaअर्थ Prosperity, wealth and worldly security; one of the four aims of life (purusharthas), held to be a proper good in its place. Arya Samaj The reform movement founded by Dayananda Saraswati in 1875, calling for a return to the Vedas alone and practising shuddhi. asanaआसन A steady, comfortable posture; the third limb of yoga, in Patanjali a seated posture for meditation. ashadhaआषाढ Ashadha is the fourth lunar month, roughly June–July. It holds the Jagannath Ratha Yatra and Guru Purnima, and opens the four-month Chaturmasya. ashauchaअशौच The state of ritual impurity caused by a birth or a death in the family (death-impurity is also called sutaka). It spreads to the close kin, who are suspended from puja and temple entry for a set period after the antyeshti, classically ten to thirteen days, after which purificatory rites restore normal religious life. ashirvadaआशीर्वाद A blessing bestowed by an elder, teacher, or holy person, usually with a hand laid on the head of the one who bows. Classic forms include 'ayushman bhava' ('may you live long') and 'saubhagyavati bhava' (to a married woman). It is the return half of the charan sparsh exchange: humility offered up, blessing sent back down. ashramaआश्रम A stage of life in the classical scheme: student (brahmacharya), householder (grihastha), forest-dweller (vanaprastha) and renunciate (sannyasa). ashta-lakshmiअष्टलक्ष्मी The eight Lakshmis: eight forms of abundance, including monetary, agrarian, spiritual, intellectual, courage-giving and primordial wealth. ashtangaअष्टाङ्ग 'Eight-limbed'; Patanjali's eightfold path of yoga, from ethical restraints to absorption. ashvamedhaअश्वमेध The royal horse sacrifice, grandest of the solemn Vedic rites, often invoked as a measure of merit. ashvinaआश्विन Ashvina is the seventh lunar month, roughly September–October. It carries Sharad Navaratri, Durga Puja, and Dussehra (Vijayadashami). asmitaअस्मिता Egoism; the false identification of the self with mind and body; the second of the five kleshas. asteyaअस्तेय Non-stealing; one of the yamas. astikaआस्तिक Orthodox: of a school that accepts the authority of the Vedas. It does not imply belief in God; Samkhya and Mimamsa are astika yet non-theistic. astraअस्त्र A divine weapon of the epics, invoked, launched and withdrawn by mantra; a god-given supernatural energy (e.g. the Brahmāstra), not a physical machine. asuraअसुर In the oldest Veda an honorific ('lord, mighty one') applied to high gods; later the term for the devas' rivals. Asuras are the gods' kin, not evil incarnate, and are often devout. atithiअतिथि A guest; the word that governs the householder's ancient duty to welcome whoever arrives, and the term by which a deity is received in puja. atithi devo bhavaअतिथि देवो भव 'Treat the guest as God' - a line from the Taittiriya Upanishad's graduation address (1.11.2), which in the same breath tells the student to treat mother, father and teacher as God (matru/pitru/acharya devo bhava). The scriptural root of Hindu reverence for elders, teachers and guests. atmanआत्मन् The self or innermost spirit. In the Gita it is deathless and cannot be harmed, cut, burned, wetted, or dried; the body dies but the atman does not. aumॐ An expanded spelling of OM written to show its three constituent sounds, A, U and M, whose analysis is the subject of the Mandukya Upanishad. autpattikaऔत्पत्तिक Innate or original; in Mimamsa, the doctrine that the bond between a word and its meaning is autpattika, naturally given rather than humanly conventional, used to argue the Veda is eternal. avadhiअवधी The spoken tongue of the eastern Gangetic plain and the language of Tulsīdās's Rāmcaritmānas; the poem's opening invocation defends composing the life of Rāma in it, in a literary culture that reserved authority for Sanskrit. avadhutaअवधूत The 'cast-off one': a liberated ascetic who has shed all convention, caste and social role, living beyond ordinary rules and beyond even the formal order of sannyasa. avahanaआवाहन The invocation; the opening act of puja that calls the deity to be present in the image. avaranaआवरण In Advaita Vedanta, the 'veiling' power of maya: the power that conceals the real, hiding Brahman from view, as dim light hides a rope. It works together with vikshepa, the projecting power. avataraअवतार A 'descent': the act by which Vishnu, or God, takes tangible form in the world to restore dharma. The classic statement is Bhagavad Gita 4.7-8, 'age after age.' avidyaअविद्या Nescience, the root ignorance in each of us that mistakes the not-Self for the Self. It is the misperception Advaita says liberating knowledge removes. avimuktaअविमुक्त 'The never-forsaken'; an ancient sacred name for Kashi (Varanasi) as the place Shiva vows never to leave. The Jabala Upanishad locates Avimukta both in the city and within the body of the meditator. avyanga The sacred girdle worn by the Maga Brahmins, the priesthood associated with Sun-worship in India. Its Avestan cognate, and the comparison with the Zoroastrian kusti, are part of a genuinely disputed case for an Iranian layer in Indian Sun-worship. Awadhiअवधी An Eastern Hindi vernacular of the Gangetic plain; the language Tulsidas chose for the Ramcharitmanas and the Hanuman Chalisa so ordinary people could understand them. ayadi-shadvarga The six proportional formulas of the Shilpa texts to which a building's measurements must conform, as the talamana governs the proportions of a murti. ayam atma brahmaअयम् आत्मा ब्रह्म "This self is Brahman," the great saying (mahavakya) of the Mandukya Upanishad, drawn from the Atharva Veda. ayana One of the sun's two half-year courses, the northward uttarayana or the southward dakshinayana. ayanamshaअयनांश The angular offset between the sidereal zodiac (fixed to the stars, used in Indian jyotisha) and the tropical zodiac (fixed to the equinox, used in the West). It now stands at roughly twenty-four degrees, and it is why an Indian chart and a Western chart give different rashi. ayudhaआयुध An attribute or weapon held in a devata's hand, such as the shankha, the discus or the trishula; the primary identifier of who a murti represents. ayudha-purushaआयुधपुरुष A 'weapon-person', a deity's personified weapon, worshipped in its own right and able to take human form. Chief among Vishnu's is the discus Sudarshana; others include the mace Kaumodaki and the conch Panchajanya. ayurvedaआयुर्वेद The 'science of life' - the classical Indian system of medicine, traditionally reckoned an upaveda of the Atharvaveda. Built on the theory of the three doshas and organised into eight branches, it shares its materia medica and its rejuvenative wing (rasayana) with the alchemical tradition. ayusआयुस् Life, lifespan - the first half of the word Ayurveda. Charaka defines it as the conjunction of body, senses, mind and self, which is why the medicine that bears its name does not stop at the body.
B
bahiryagaबहिर्याग External worship: ritual performed with physical offerings before an image or yantra, as distinct from antaryaga, internal worship. baiga One of the local names, beside gunia and disari, under which the village ritual specialist's work is done in central India. The Chhattisgarh statute defines that office by function rather than by title, so a baiga stands inside its definition of an ojhā. baliबलि A sacrificial offering made to a devata; at some temples it includes animal sacrifice, and it is distinct from the naivedya returned to worshippers as prasada. bali-pithaबलिपीठ The offering altar of a temple, usually lotus-shaped, set on the main axis near the flagstaff, where ritual offerings (bali) are placed. bandhaबन्ध A lock: a muscular contraction (root, abdominal or throat) used in Hatha Yoga to seal and direct the life-force (prana). bhadrapadaभाद्रपद Bhadrapada is the sixth lunar month, roughly August–September, holding Ganesh Chaturthi and Krishna Janmashtami. Bhagavanभगवान् The fully personal, supreme and beloved God of devotion. From bhaga (divine attribute); the Vishnu Purana (6.5.74) defines Bhagavan as the one who possesses in fullness the six divine attributes: lordship, power, fame, wealth, knowledge and dispassion. bhairavaभैरव A fierce form of Shiva, the guardian who destroys fear and the ego. Worshipped especially in tantric and Shakta traditions, and as Kala Bhairava, the lord of time and protector of sacred cities such as Kashi. Bhairaviभैरवी The Goddess as the consort and power (Shakti) of Bhairava; in the Vijnana Bhairava Tantra she is the questioner who asks Bhairava for the essence of ultimate reality. Also one of the ten Mahavidyas. bhairavi yatanaभैरवी यातना 'Bhairava's torment', the belief that at the moment of death in Kashi the residue of one's karma is burned away in a single searing instant administered by Kalabhairava, before liberation is granted. bhaktiभक्ति Loving devotion to a personal deity, usually one's ishta-devata, and the devotional movements that made it central to Hindu practice, carried by puja and by the sampradaya. bhakti-yogaभक्तियोग The path of loving devotion to a personal God, one of the Bhagavad Gita's ways to liberation. Bharadvajaभरद्वाज An ancient Vedic sage; the Vaimanika Shastra, a 20th-century text, is falsely attributed to him as author. bhashyaभाष्य A formal commentary on an authoritative text. Each major Vedanta teacher wrote a bhashya on the Gita and read it through his own system. bhasmaभस्म 'Ash' - in rasa-shastra, a fine calcined powder of a metal or mineral (e.g. abhraka/mica, loha/iron) rendered non-toxic and bioavailable through repeated incineration (puta). Also the sacred ash worn by Shaiva devotees, marking the reduction of all things to their ground. bhavaभाव In devotion, the emotional mode or relationship a devotee holds toward the chosen deity. The bhakti tradition names five primary bhavas: shanta (serene), dasya (servant), sakhya (friend), vatsalya (parental) and madhurya (the lover's). bhogaभोग Experience; the pleasure and pain a life brings, one of the three things (with birth and lifespan) fixed by prarabdha karma (Yoga Sutra 2.13). Bhringiभृङ्गी A skeletal, three-legged sage and gana devoted to Shiva alone, who refused to honour the Goddess and tried to circumambulate the god by himself. Parvati merged with Shiva as Ardhanarishvara so the two could not be divided, a warning against separating Shiva from Shakti. bhrumadhyaभ्रूमध्य The point at the centre of the brow, between and just above the eyebrows, the site of the ajna chakra (the 'third eye'). It is the spot on which meditation is often told to focus the gaze, and the place the bindi marks. bhuktiभुक्ति Worldly enjoyment or power; in Tantra it is sought alongside liberation (mukti), rather than renounced. bhumanभूमन् The infinite or plenary fullness that Sanatkumara teaches Narada to seek beyond all finite knowledge in the Chandogya Upanishad. bhumija A Nagara spire covered with a lattice of miniature spirelets in vertical and horizontal rows. bhumisparshaभूमिस्पर्शमुद्रा The earth-touching gesture, chiefly Buddhist: the right hand reaching down over the knee to touch the ground, the Buddha at his awakening calling the earth to witness; a mudra as widely recognised as the abhaya. bhupuraभूपुर The outermost square enclosure of the Sri Yantra, with its three lines and gates; the 'earth-stretch' that frames the figure. bhurja-patraभूर्जपत्र The prepared bark of the Himalayan birch, used as a writing surface in the north and especially in Kashmir, written on with pen and ink. bhutaभूत A spirit or ghost (the word also means 'that which has become', a being or element). Shiva presides over the bhutas as Bhutanatha, 'lord of spirits'; in coastal Karnataka they are honoured in the living bhuta kola worship. bhuta shuddhiभूतशुद्धि Purification of the elements: a preparatory tantric rite in which the worshipper symbolically dissolves the body into its five elements and rebuilds it as a fit vessel, so that only the divine remains to worship the divine. bijaबीज "Seed." The single-syllable seed-mantra associated with a chakra or a deity, used inside the larger ritual of visualization rather than on its own. bija-ankuraबीजाङ्कुर The seed-and-sprout analogy: the beginningless mutual production of karma and birth, each arising from the other without a first term. binduबिन्दु The point; the central dot of the Sri Yantra and, in metaphysics, the concentrated source from which manifestation unfolds. Brahmāब्रह्मा The creator god of the Trimūrti, depicted with four heads and seated on a lotus, consort of Sarasvatī; despite his cosmic role he is very rarely worshipped. Distinct from the neuter Brahman, the Absolute. brahma-sthanaब्रह्मस्थान The central square of a temple's site-plan grid, regarded as the seat of the formless absolute, over which the garbhagriha stands and through which the brahmasutra runs. brahmacharyaब्रह्मचर्य The first of the four ashramas, the stage of the celibate student of the Veda; by extension, disciplined continence. brahmahatyaब्रह्महत्या The killing of a brahmin, held in the tradition to be the gravest of sins; in the Kashi myth Bhairava incurs it by beheading Brahma and is released from it only on entering Kashi. brahmanब्रह्मन् In the Upanishads and Vedanta, the absolute: the unchanging ground and totality of all that exists, from which the worlds arise and into which they return. It is distinct from Brahma the creator-god and from the brahmana priestly class. Brahmanaब्राह्मण The prose layer of each Veda that explains the rituals and their meaning. (Distinct from Brahman, the absolute, and from a brahmin, a member of the priestly class.) brahmāṇḍaब्रह्माण्ड The 'egg of Brahma': the cosmos as a single vast egg, issuing from and returning into brahman across the measures of the kalpa. brahmarandhraब्रह्मरन्ध्र The 'aperture of Brahman' at the crown of the head, the highest and most auspicious exit of the vital breath from the body. In the cremation rite the chief mourner cracks the burning skull (kapala kriya) to open this door, releasing the departed's subtle self on its upward way. brahmasthanब्रह्मस्थान The central square of the Vastu-Purusha-Mandala, the still point of the plan, kept open as the seat of Brahma. brahmasthanaब्रह्मस्थान The central squares of the vastu-purusha-mandala, the seat of Brahma and the position of the temple sanctum. Brahmāstraब्रह्मास्त्र The weapon of Brahmā, most terrible of the divine astras; its gravest form, the Brahmaśira, figures in the Mahābhārata's Sauptika Parva. brahmasutraब्रह्मसूत्र The central axis of a temple, the invisible line running from the doorway through the heart of the building to the devata in the garbhagriha, laid along the chosen direction of orientation beneath the vimana. Brahmiब्राह्मी The earliest deciphered Indian script, known from the edicts of Ashoka in the third century BCE; the ancestor of nearly all the scripts of South and Southeast Asia, devanagari among them. Brahminब्राह्मण The first of the four varnas: the class of priests, teachers, and keepers of sacred learning and ritual. In the classical ideal the Brahmin's duty is study, teaching, and the guarding of knowledge, though in lived society Brahmin status became hereditary. Brahmo Samaj The reformist, monotheist society founded by Raja Ram Mohan Roy in Calcutta in 1828, drawing on the Upanishads and open to reason. Buddhiबुद्धि The discerning intellect, the faculty of judgment and decision. In the Katha Upanishad's chariot image, buddhi is the charioteer who must govern the mind and the senses to reach the goal.
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camatkaraचमत्कार The flash of aesthetic wonder or astonishment in which rasa is relished. For Abhinavagupta it is the taste of one's own emotion made impersonal and luminous, held in a repose (vishranti) of consciousness resting in itself. campuचम्पू A composition that moves between prose and verse. Uddyotanasūri's Kuvalayamālā, the Prakrit romance in which a śābara-vidyā is named, is one. cetanaचेतना Intention or volition; in Buddhism the locus of karma, as in the Buddha's saying that intention is what he calls karma. chaitraचैत्र Chaitra is the first month of the Hindu lunar year, falling roughly in March–April. It opens with Chaitra Navaratri and Rama Navami, and with the new-year festivals of Ugadi and Gudi Padwa. chakraचक्र A centre of the subtle body, visualised as a lotus on the central channel, through which the coiled power (kundalini) is said to rise; the word means wheel or disc. chamundaचामुण्डा A fierce form of the Goddess, the name Kali earns by slaying the demons Chanda and Munda in the Devi Mahatmya. chanchalaचञ्चला The fickle or restless one: an epithet of Lakshmi as fortune that will not sit still, fleeing greed and settling where dharma holds. chandasछन्दस् Metre; the metrical form of a Vedic verse, and by extension a name for the metrical Veda itself. chandravamshaचन्द्रवंश The Lunar dynasty, the royal line descended from Chandra through Budha and Pururavas, to which the Kurus and Pandavas of the Mahabharata belong. char dhamचार धाम The four abodes: a pilgrimage to four holy sites at the cardinal ends of India, Badrinath, Dwarka, Puri, and Rameshwaram, traditionally linked to Shankara. Completing all four is among the most revered of Hindu pilgrimages. charan-dhuliचरणधूलि The 'dust of the feet' of a holy person, guru, or revered elder, regarded as sacred and blessing-bearing. It is gathered and touched to one's own head, an extension of the logic of charan sparsh: the feet are where reverence is offered and blessing collects. Charvakaचार्वाक The materialist and skeptical school of classical Indian philosophy, also called Lokayata. It held that matter is the only reality, that consciousness arises from the body and ends at death, and that there is no soul, rebirth, or karma; it accepted perception as the one reliable source of knowledge. chatuh-sampradayaचतुःसम्प्रदाय The four Vaishnava sampradayas: Sri, Brahma, Rudra and Kumara, the four lineages held to carry authorized devotion to Vishnu. chaturvargaचतुर्वर्ग The 'group of four': the four aims of human life, dharma, artha, kama and moksha. It is the classical fourfold scheme, formed by adding moksha (liberation) to the older worldly trivarga of three. chaturvarnyaचातुर्वर्ण्य The fourfold order of varnas, grounded in the Bhagavad Gita (4.13) in guna and karma, quality and action, rather than birth. chaupaiचौपाई A quatrain: a verse of four rhyming lines, the metre that carries the body of the Hanuman Chalisa (chalisa = forty chaupais). Chhath The four-day eastern festival of austere riverbank worship of the sun god, Surya. chhayaछाया 'Shadow'; the shadow-double of Sanjna left to keep Surya's house when she fled his heat, and the mother of Shani. chin mudraचिन्मुद्रा The seal of consciousness, the same gesture as the jnana mudra: the tip of the index finger curved to touch the tip of the thumb, the other three fingers held free. The thumb is read as Brahman, the index as the individual self (jiva) that bends back to rejoin it, and the three free fingers as the impurities, or the three states of waking, dream and deep sleep, left behind. It is the gesture held by Dakshinamurti. chiranjiviचिरंजीवि A deathless one: a being granted immortality, such as Hanuman, held to remain present in the world through the ages. chitचित् Consciousness, awareness, the knowing light; the second term of sat-chit-ananda. In Vedanta, chit is Brahman as self-luminous consciousness (svayam-prakasha): the awareness by which all is known, which is itself never an object. chit-sabhaचित्सभा The 'Hall of Consciousness' at the Chidambaram temple, the gold-roofed inner sanctum where Shiva dances as Nataraja and where the formless space-deity is enshrined. Chitraguptaचित्रगुप्त The celestial scribe who records every being's deeds for the court of Yama; the Kashi Khanda holds that within Kashi his ledger is suspended and Kalabhairava keeps the account instead. chittaचित्त The mind-field: thought, memory, and ego taken together. In Patanjali's yoga, it is the churning apparatus whose movements yoga aims to still. chitta vritti nirodhaचित्तवृत्तिनिरोध The stilling of the turnings of the mind; Patanjali's definition of yoga (Yoga Sutras 1.2). Chitta is the mind-stuff, vritti its fluctuations or modifications, and nirodha their cessation. Chola The imperial Tamil dynasty (c. 9th to 13th century) that built the great temple civilisation of the south, raised the towering vimana, and perfected the bronze image of which the Nataraja is the masterpiece. codanaचोदना Vedic injunction or command. For Mimamsa, dharma is known only through codana, not through perception or reason.
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daityaदैत्य A class of asuras descended from the sage Kashyapa and his wife Diti; Hiranyakashipu, Hiranyaksha and Bali are daityas. The Manusmriti (12.48) places the daityas in the highest of its three states of being, alongside ascetics and brahmins. daivaदैव Fate or destiny; in the Yoga Vasistha understood as the self-effort (purushartha) of past lives returning as circumstance. daivi vak 'The speech of the gods', a traditional epithet for Sanskrit. It is a claim about the status and origin of the language as revealed sound, distinct from any claim about descent from or to other languages. dakshinacharaदक्षिणाचार The 'right-hand' path of tantra, which keeps to Vedic norms of purity and treats the transgressive elements symbolically. Dakshinamurtiदक्षिणामूर्ति Shiva as the guru, the teacher: a young figure seated under a banyan, facing south, teaching aged sages through silence, one foot on the dwarf of ignorance and a hand raised in the chin mudra. Honoured as the adi-guru, the first teacher. The subject of Adi Shankara's Dakshinamurti Stotra and the minor Dakshinamurti Upanishad, which read the image as a statement of Advaita, the oneness of the self and the absolute. dakshinayana The sun's southward course, the complementary half of the year to uttarayana. Dalitदलित 'Broken' or 'oppressed'; the self-chosen name of communities historically stigmatised as 'untouchable' and placed outside the four varnas. The term, associated with B.R. Ambedkar and the anti-caste movement, asserts dignity and resistance. Untouchability was abolished by Article 17 of the Constitution of India (1950). damaruडमरु A small hourglass-shaped hand drum carried by Shiva, especially in his dancing forms; its beat is read as the first sound from which creation issues. danaदान Giving, charity; a generator of merit (punya) that may be dedicated to another, including the dead. danavaदानव A class of asuras descended from the sage Kashyapa and his wife Danu, sister of Diti and Aditi. Danavas and daityas are cousin lines of the same family, set against the devas, who are Kashyapa's sons by Aditi. dargah The shrine-tomb of a Sufi saint, often a shared site of veneration visited by Hindus and Muslims alike. darshanदर्शन 'Seeing'; in devotion, the act of beholding and being beheld by the devata in the murti, the heart of temple worship and the act for which the garbhagriha is approached. darshanaदर्शन A 'view' or philosophical school; one of the six classical systems (shad-darshana) of Hindu thought. (Distinct from darshan, the sight of the deity.) daruदारु Sacred wood, especially the neem from which the images of Jagannath are carved; the deity is called Daru Brahma. dashaदशा A planetary period in Indian astrology - a span of life assigned to the rulership of a particular graha. The Vimshottari dasha, running 120 years, is the most widely used system. dasha-lakshanaदशलक्षण The 'ten marks', the Bhagavata Purana's expanded definition of a Purana, enlarging the older five marks (pancha-lakshana). dasha-mudraदशमुद्रा The ten secret hand-seals of Srividya, offered to the Goddess in Sri Chakra worship: nine for the nine enclosures of the chakra and a tenth of consent. The Lalita Sahasranama calls the Goddess Dasha-mudra-samaradhya, 'she who is worshipped by the ten mudras.' dashavataraदशावतार The ten principal descents of Vishnu, from Matsya the fish to the future Kalki. The list stabilized late and the texts preserve variant sets. dashopanishadदशोपनिषद् 'The ten Upanishads,' the core set on which the commentator Shankara wrote, which fixed the principal Upanishadic canon. dasyaदास्य The devotion of a servant: love of God expressed as humble, selfless service, of which Hanuman is the supreme example. desha-kalaदेश-काल 'Place and time': the pairing invoked before a rite to fix where and when it is performed, drawn from the panchanga. deul The Odia word for the temple tower over the sanctum, the eastern counterpart of the vimana, standing above the garbhagriha. Devaदेव A 'shining one,' a god or celestial being. The Vedas speak of thirty-three devas, the powers governing nature, life, and cosmic order. In later Hindu thought the devas are forms or ministers of the one ultimate reality rather than independent absolutes; Buddhism keeps devas too, but treats them as still bound within samsara. deva-yoniदेवयोनि 'Of divine birth', the classical Sanskrit category for the classes of demigods and semi-divine beings; the Amarakosha lists ten: vidyadhara, apsaras, yaksha, rakshasa, gandharva, kinnara, pisacha, guhyaka, siddha and bhuta. devadasiदेवदासी Literally 'servant of God': a woman dedicated to temple service, trained in music and dance. In the Chola period the devadasis were a respected, land-endowed institution central to temple ritual and the arts; the system decayed in later centuries, was condemned in the colonial era, and was formally abolished around the time of independence. Devadattaदेवदत्त 'God-given,' the swift white horse that Kalki rides in the Bhagavata Purana. devalayaदेवालय 'Abode of the deity'; a Hindu temple. Devanagariदेवनागरी The script in which Sanskrit and Hindi are most often written and printed today; its name means 'of the city of the gods.' Descended from brahmi, it became the standard for printed Sanskrit only in the print era. devataदेवता A deity; the divine power to whom a Vedic hymn is addressed. Devayanaदेवयान 'The path of the gods,' the bright afterlife road described in the Panchagni Vidya of the Chandogya Upanishad. Those devoted to knowledge and truth travel it through fire, day, and the sun toward Brahman, and do not return to rebirth. devi-mahatmyaदेवीमाहात्म्य The 'Glory of the Goddess', a 700-verse text in the Markandeya Purana, the founding scripture of Goddess worship (Shaktism); also called the Durga Saptashati or Chandi. dhamधाम An 'abode' or seat of the divine; a major pilgrimage centre, as in the Char Dham. dharanaधारणा Concentration, the holding of attention on a single point; the sixth limb of ashtanga yoga, following pratyahara and opening into dhyana. dharmaधर्म Duty, righteousness, and the moral and cosmic order that holds the world together; right action in keeping with one's place and the larger order. dharma-sutraधर्मसूत्र The oldest stratum of texts on law and conduct, terse and in mixed prose and verse, embedded in particular Vedic schools; the seed from which the Dharmashastra grew. dharmachakra mudraधर्मचक्रमुद्रा The 'wheel-turning' gesture: both hands before the chest, thumb and forefinger joined, marking the Buddha's first teaching; a mudra ranked with the abhaya and the bhumisparsha. dharmashastraधर्मशास्त्र The class of metrical smriti treatises on dharma, duty and law that grew out of the older Dharma-sutras; its most famous member is the Manusmriti. dhatuधातु A verbal root, the kernel of action from which words are formed; in Yaska's Nirukta, the basis from which a word's meaning is derived. dhenu mudraधेनुमुद्रा The 'cow' gesture of worship, also called surabhi mudra: the interlaced fingers imitate the udder of Kamadhenu, held over water or milk with a mantra to sanctify it into amrita (the amritikarana or 'nectarizing' step). dhimmi A protected non-Muslim subject under Islamic governance, with defined rights and the obligation of the jizya. dhupaधूप Incense offered to the deity, one of the sensory services of puja. dhvaja-stambhaध्वजस्तम्भ The flagstaff that stands before the sanctum of a temple, on the axis between the gopuram and the garbhagriha. dhvaniध्वनि 'Suggestion, resonance'; in Sanskrit poetics the doctrine, cemented by Abhinavagupta's Locana commentary, that the highest life of poetry lies in what it suggests rather than what it states. dhyanaध्यान Meditation, the unbroken flow of attention that follows from dharana, the seventh limb. dhyana mudraध्यानमुद्रा The meditation seal: both hands resting open in the lap, one cupped in the other, palms up. The pose of the meditating Buddha, the Jain Tirthankaras, and Vishnu shown as a yogi. dikpalaदिक्पाल A guardian deity of one of the directions (Indra in the east, Yama in the south, and so on). dikshaदीक्षा Initiation; the rite by which a teacher transmits a mantra and the authority to practise it. Tantra distinguishes several kinds, from formal ritual initiation to initiation by a look, word, or touch. dikshitar The hereditary community of priests who alone perform the worship at the Chidambaram Nataraja temple in Tamil Nadu. dipaदीप The lamp offered to the deity; the light service within puja. Divodasaदिवोदास In the Kashi Khanda, the faultless righteous king whom Shiva installed to rule Kashi after withdrawing from it; his just reign frames the Puranic myth of how the gods came to fill the city. divyaदिव्य The 'divine'; in tantra the highest temperament of practitioner, for whom worship is wholly internal and spontaneous. divyāstraदिव्यास्त्र A 'divine weapon' of the epics, a class of mantra-invoked celestial arms granted by the gods to great warriors. Diwali The festival of lights, kept over five days around the new moon of Kartika, with many regional origins. dohaदोहा A rhyming couplet of two lines; two dohas open the Hanuman Chalisa and one closes it. Domडोम The community that by hereditary right tends the cremation grounds of Kashi and keeps custody of the sacred fire from which every pyre is lit; its head is called the Dom Raja. doshaदोष In Ayurveda, one of the functional principles whose balance is health and whose disturbance is disease. Charaka counts five: three of the body (vata, pitta, kapha) and two of the mind (rajas and tamas). drashtaद्रष्टृ A seer; one who perceives (from drish, to see) the Vedic hymns. The rishi is a mantra-drashta, who 'sees' the revelation rather than composing it. dravidaद्राविड The southern style of Hindu temple architecture, with its pyramidal tower (vimana) rising in stacked storeys and its great gateway-pyramids (gopurams); the form of the major Tamil temples. It stands beside the northern Nagara and the hybrid Vesara. dravyaद्रव्य Substance: in Vaisheshika, the category of things that bear qualities; the nine include the elements, ether, time, space, self and mind. duhaiदुहाई A Hindī word for crying out in a name: public proclamation, the cry for help that calls on someone powerful enough to intervene, and, in a third dictionary sense, an oath or swearing. It is the commonest recurring marker of the printed Śābara compilations. dukkata In the Pali Vinaya, the lightest grade of monastic offence, cleared by acknowledgement or confession. The Cullavagga attaches it to putting the Buddha's teaching into the elevated brahminical register. Durga Puja The eastern Indian form of Navaratri, focused on great clay images of Durga slaying Mahishasura. durga-saptashatiदुर्गासप्तशती 'The seven hundred verses on Durga'; another name for the Devi Mahatmya, reflecting its roughly 700 verses, recited especially at Navaratri. dvaitaद्वैत Dualism; the school of Vedanta founded by Madhva, holding that the individual self and brahman (God) are eternally distinct, the self real but dependent on God. dvaitadvaitaद्वैताद्वैत Dualistic non-dualism: Nimbarka's Vedanta, holding the soul to be both different from and non-different from Brahman. dvapara-yugaद्वापरयुग The third world-age, of further moral decline, ending (in tradition) with the Mahabharata war and Krishna's departure. dvarapalaद्वारपाल A door-guardian: the great armed figures placed in pairs to flank the thresholds and gateways of a temple, guarding the passage through the gopuram toward the garbhagriha. dveshaद्वेष Aversion; the recoil from pain; the fourth of the five kleshas. dvija Literally 'twice-born'. A man of the brahmana, kshatriya or vaishya varna who has undergone the upanayana initiation, which the Dharmashastra texts treat as a second birth and as the gateway to Vedic study.
E
Ekadashi The eleventh lunar day of each fortnight, observed twice a month as a day of fasting and devotion, especially to Vishnu. ekajati Literally 'once-born'. The Dharmashastra term for one who does not undergo the upanayana and so, in those texts, is not admitted to Vedic study. Manu applies it to the shudra, placing him outside the three twice-born varnas. exogamy The rule requiring marriage outside one's own kin-group. In Hinduism the gotra is exogamous: because two people of the same gotra claim a common ancestor, they may not marry and must seek a spouse of a different gotra. Clan exogamy is a near-universal human institution.
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gadaगदा The mace, one of Vishnu's four emblems (named Kaumodaki), read as the power of strength and intellect. Ganapatiगणपति 'Lord of the ganas', a title first of Shiva, master of the host, and then of his elephant-headed son Ganesha, whom Shiva appoints commander over the multitude and who is invoked at the start of every undertaking. Ganapatyaगाणपत्य The devotional stream that worships Ganesha as the supreme reality, Brahman in elephant-headed form; one of the principal sectarian traditions, with sub-branches including the left-hand Ucchishta-Ganapatyas. gandharvaगन्धर्व A male celestial musician of Indra's court; in the Vedas, an older mysterious being who guards the sacred soma and hidden knowledge. The gandharva-vivaha, or love-match marriage, is named after them. Ganesh Chaturthi The festival of Ganesha, kept with clay images installed, worshipped for up to ten days, and immersed in water. Gangaगंगा The most sacred river of Hinduism, personified as a goddess who descends from heaven to earth. Bathing in the Ganga is held to purify, and immersing the ash and bone of the cremated (asthi-visarjan) in her waters is believed to aid the departed toward release. garbha-nyasaगर्भन्यास The rite of depositing a consecrated casket in the foundation of a temple before building, planting the seed of the garbhagriha that will rise above it. garbhagrihaगर्भगृह The 'womb-house', the innermost sanctum of a Hindu temple where the principal deity's image is enshrined. Garudaगरुड The great eagle, king of birds, mount (vahana) of Vishnu and sworn enemy of the nagas (serpents); his birth and the winning of his mother's freedom open the Mahabharata's first book. Garuda Puranaगरुड पुराण A Vaishnava Purana cast as a dialogue between Vishnu and his mount Garuda. Its Preta Khanda is the classical Hindu manual of death: the journey of the soul after dying and the rites (the ten days, the pinda offerings) the living perform to settle the departed among the ancestors. garuda-tantraगारुड The canonical stream of tantric scripture concerned with snakebite, poison and venom-cure, named for Garuḍa, the eagle enemy of serpents. In the list the Pratiṣṭhālakṣaṇasārasamuccaya gives, items seven and eight of that column are Śābaram and Kālaśābaram. Gauriगौरी 'The fair one' - a benign form and common name of Parvati, worshipped in the Gauri puja and the Mangala Gauri vrata, and invoked especially in vows concerning marriage and the household. gavakshaगवाक्ष The 'cow's eye': the horseshoe-arch motif, derived from an early window form, that covers the surface of a vimana or a deul. gayatriगायत्री A Vedic metre of twenty-four syllables, in three lines of eight; also the name of the most famous verse composed in it, the Gayatri mantra to Savitr. ghana-pathaघनपाठ The 'dense' recitation, the most complex of the eight woven modes of Vedic chanting, in which small groups of words are braided forwards and backwards in a fixed intricate pattern. Mastering it earns the honorific Ghanapathi. ghatघाट A flight of stone steps descending to a river or tank; in Varanasi, the long riverfront stairs along the Ganga used for bathing, worship, and cremation. girivalam Circumambulation of a sacred hill, most famously Arunachala at Tiruvannamalai; pradakshina performed at the scale of a mountain rather than a shrine. gopiगोपी The cowherd women of Vraja whose love for Krishna, expressed in the raslila dance, the Bhagavata frames as the soul's longing for God. gopuramगोपुरम् The towering gateway rising over an entrance in the enclosure wall of a South Indian temple, later dwarfing the vimana that stands over the garbhagriha itself. gotraगोत्र Lineage or clan, traced from a founding sage and declared by a student entering Vedic study, as in the story of Satyakama Jabala. govardhanaगोवर्धन The hill that Krishna lifted on one finger for seven days to shelter the people of Vraja from Indra's storm (Bhagavata Purana, book 10). govindaगोविन्द A name of Vishnu and of Krishna, the finder and protector of cows; the divine invoked in the refrain of Bhaja Govindam. grahaग्रह 'Seizer' - one of the nine bodies of Indian astrology. The navagraha are not nine planets: two are the sun and moon, two (Rahu and Ketu) are the mathematical nodes of the moon's orbit, and the earth is not among them. graha-shantiग्रहशान्ति The 'pacification of the planets': the family of remedies (fire-rites, mantra, fasting, charity, gems, temple worship) offered to answer a planetary affliction, understood as disciplines that mature one's own karma. grahanaग्रहण An eclipse; read in the tradition as Rahu or Ketu 'seizing' (grah) the Sun or Moon, the demon swallowing the light. grama-devataग्रामदेवता The guardian deity of a village or locality, who protects the ground its people live on. Often a goddess. Distinct from the family deity (kula-devata) and the personally chosen ishta-devata. Granthaग्रन्थ A southern Indian script developed to write Sanskrit, especially in the Tamil country; descended like devanagari from brahmi, though the word grantha also means simply 'book' or 'text.' granthiग्रन्थि A knot or obstruction on the central channel (sushumna): the Brahma, Vishnu and Rudra granthis, which the rising kundalini must pierce. grhasthaगृहस्थ The householder; one in the stage of married family life that follows brahmacharya in the classical scheme of ashramas, and the setting in which much of Srividya is in fact transmitted and practised. grihya-sutraगृह्यसूत्र The class of Kalpa-sutra that governs the domestic rites and life-cycle samskaras performed at the single household fire. gunaगुण One of the three strands or qualities of nature in Samkhya: sattva (clarity), rajas (activity) and tamas (inertia); the three and a half coils of kundalini are sometimes read as the gunas. gunasगुण The three strands or qualities of nature: sattva (clarity, goodness), rajas (energy, craving), and tamas (inertia, darkness). The Gita analyses them in its later chapters. gunatitaगुणातीत 'Gone beyond the gunas': one who has transcended the three qualities of nature (sattva, rajas and tamas). In the Bhagavad Gita (14.22-25), the gunatita is untroubled by the rising and falling of the gunas, equal in pleasure and pain, resting in the witnessing self rather than being moved by nature's moods. guruगुरु A spiritual teacher who has realised what they teach and transmits it within a living line. The word is read as gu, darkness, and ru, its remover: the one who leads from the unreal to the real. More than an instructor, the guru gives initiation (diksha) and stands at the head of the guru-shishya parampara, the chain by which a teaching is handed down. Guru Purnima The full-moon festival honouring the guru and the sage Vyasa, beginning the monsoon retreat. guru-shishyaगुरुशिष्य The teacher-disciple relationship, the heart of every sampradaya, through which teaching is transmitted in person, usually sealed by initiation (diksha). gurumandalaगुरुमण्डल The circle of gurus; the assembled lineage of teachers invoked and honoured at the start of worship.
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hadiहादि The school of Srividya whose mantra begins with the syllable ha, traced to Lopamudra; one of the main mantra traditions alongside kadi and sadi. Haimavatiहैमवती 'Daughter of Himavat', the snow-mountain - an epithet of Parvati, and the name under which she appears in the Kena Upanishad as the goddess who reveals Brahman to Indra. hamsaहंस The swan or wild goose, mount of Saraswati, said to separate milk from water: the emblem of viveka, discernment of true from false. Hanuman Chalisaहनुमान चालीसा A forty-three-verse devotional hymn to Hanuman in Awadhi, ascribed to Tulsidas; very probably the most-recited prayer in the Hindu world. harivamsaहरिवंश 'The lineage of Hari (Vishnu)'; an appendix to the Mahabharata, some twelve thousand verses on the genealogy and life of Krishna. hastaहस्त The hand, and by extension a hand-gesture of classical Indian dance. The hastas divide into single-hand (asamyuta) and combined-hand (samyuta) forms, codified in the Natya Shastra and the Abhinaya Darpana; one shape carries many meanings by context (viniyoga). hathaहठ Force or effort: the name of the yoga that works on body and breath; symbolically read as ha (sun) and tha (moon), the union of the solar and lunar energies. hatha yogaहठयोग The “yoga of force”: the physical-subtle discipline of posture, breath-control and inner seals, carried above all by the Nāth yogis, aimed at raising kuṇḍalinī and perfecting the body. henotheism The worship of one deity as supreme without denying the reality of others; a term popularised by Max Müller for the Vedic way of addressing one god at a time as the highest. Herambaहेरम्ब A protective form of Ganesha, usually five-faced and riding a lion, who grants fearlessness and shelters the weak; one of the deity's principal tantric forms. Hiraṇyagarbhaहिरण्यगर्भ 'The golden womb' or golden embryo (Rigveda 10.121) from which the cosmos is born; a Vedic creator image later identified with Brahmā. Holi The spring festival of colour, falling on the purnima of Phalguna and preceded by the Holika Dahan bonfire. homaहोम A fire oblation; the burnt offering poured into consecrated fire, the surviving form of Vedic sacrifice within later Hindu practice. horaहोरा An astrological 'hour' or division of the rashi; a loanword from the Greek hora, and a mark of the yavana origin of horoscopic jyotisha in India. hotarहोतृ The priest of the Rigveda who recites the invocations and calls the gods to the offering; one of the principal priests of the Vedic sacrifice. hrimह्रीं A primary bija, or seed-syllable, often called the maya bija. In tantric worship it carries the power of the Goddess, especially Bhuvaneshvari and the Devi of Sri Vidya, and is held to contain her living presence in a single sound. hundiहुण्डी The temple donation pot; at Tirupati it is the chief source of the temple's great wealth.
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iccha-shaktiइच्छाशक्ति The power of will; the first of the three powers of consciousness (will, knowledge, action) in Shaiva and Shakta metaphysics. idaइडा The subtle channel running on the left, associated with the cooling, lunar current of breath and energy; one of the three principal nadis with pingala and sushumna. ilakkanam The Tamil word for grammar, naturalised from the Sanskrit lakshana. Zvelebil uses its appearance in the Tolkappiyam to date that work, since the relevant sense of lakshana enters with Patanjali. Indo-Persian The composite courtly culture, fusing Persian and Indian elements in language, painting, music, and architecture, that flowered under the Delhi Sultanate and the Mughals. Indra The warrior-king of the Vedic gods, slayer of the serpent Vritra and releaser of the waters; the most-hymned deity of the Rigveda. indriyaइन्द्रिय A sense faculty; the powers of perception and action that pratyahara withdraws from their objects. interpolation In textual scholarship, material added to a text after an earlier stage of its composition; detected through manuscript comparison, metre, style or doctrinal discontinuity, and often carried unremarked in the vulgate. ishanaईशान The north-east, ruled by a form of Shiva; the most auspicious of the intermediate directions on the Vastu-Purusha-Mandala. ishta-devataइष्टदेवता One's chosen or cherished personal deity, the particular form of the divine a devotee holds dearest, without denying the others; the focus of bhakti and the devata a mantra most often names. Ishvaraईश्वर God as personal Lord. Krishna discloses himself as Ishvara in the course of the dialogue, speaking not as a wise charioteer but as the divine. ishvara-pranidhanaईश्वरप्रणिधान Devotion and surrender to the Lord; one of the niyamas and, for Patanjali, a direct means to absorption. itihasaइतिहास 'Thus it was': the category of the great epics, the Ramayana and Mahabharata, remembered as history rather than invented tale.
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jaduजादू Magic, in Hindī and Urdu. In the vernacular print trade the word ran to stage conjuring and card tricks as readily as to occult remedy, a distinction the English word magic collapses and the Indian vocabulary keeps. jagamohana The assembly hall of an Odia temple, standing before the deul as the mandapa does before a southern sanctum. jagannathजगन्नाथ Lord of the Universe, a form of Vishnu-Krishna worshipped at Puri in Odisha in a distinctive wooden image. His annual Ratha Yatra, when the deities ride great chariots through the streets, is among the largest festivals in India. jagarana A religious all-night vigil, central to the observance of Maha Shivaratri. jagatiजगती A Vedic metre of forty-eight syllables, in four lines of twelve. jagratजाग्रत् The waking state of consciousness, aware of external objects; the first of the four states analysed in the Mandukya Upanishad, mapped to the sound A of OM. Jambudvīpaजम्बुद्वीप The central island-continent of the Puranic earth-plane, named for its jambu (rose-apple) tree; India, Bhārata, lies on its southern edge. Janakaजनक The philosopher-king of Mithila (Videha), celebrated in the Upanishads as a royal sage and, in the Ashtavakra Gita, the disciple who attains realisation almost at once. Janmashtami The festival of Krishna's midnight birth, on the eighth of the dark fortnight of Bhadrapada. japaजप The repetition of a mantra, silently or murmured, counted on a rosary; the core of mantra practice. jata-pathaजटापाठ The 'woven' recitation, in which each pair of Vedic words is repeated forward and backward in a fixed braid, a memory-discipline that locked the word order. jatakaजातक Horoscopic, or natal, astrology: the casting of a horoscope from the heavens at birth. It developed in the early centuries of the Common Era under Greek influence and is distinct from the older calendrical jyotisha. jatiजाति 'Birth-group'; the thousands of endogamous communities that make up caste as actually lived, distinct from the textual fourfold varna. jayaजय 'Victory'; the name the Mahabharata gives an early, smaller form of itself, in the traditional scheme by which it grew from Jaya to Bharata to Mahabharata. jhar-phunk Sweeping and blowing, the folk healer's physical gesture over a patient. The Chhattisgarh Act of 2005 names it among the means by which an ojhā claims to cure, and penalises it only where it is performed on someone already named a witch. Jivaजीव The individual living self, the embodied soul that experiences and acts. The schools of Vedanta differ on its status: for Advaita it is finally identical with Brahman, for Vishishtadvaita it is a real part and body of the Lord, for Dvaita it is eternally distinct from and dependent on him. jivanmuktiजीवन्मुक्ति Liberation attained while still alive, strongly affirmed in Advaita Vedanta: the knower is free now and simply lives out the body's remaining momentum. jivatmanजीवात्मन् The individual self or living soul, said in the chakra texts to dwell at the heart centre (anahata) like the steady flame of a lamp in a windless place. jizya A tax historically levied on non-Muslim subjects under Islamic rule in lieu of military service; abolished by Akbar in 1564 and reimposed by Aurangzeb in 1679. jnanaज्ञान Liberating knowledge: the direct realization that the Self has always been Brahman. In Advaita this, not ritual action, is what frees. jnana mudraज्ञानमुद्रा The seal of knowledge, also called chin mudra: thumb-tip and forefinger-tip joined in a circle, the other three fingers open, read as the union of the individual self (jiva) with the absolute (Brahman). The gesture of Dakshinamurti; also named vyakhyana ('exposition'). jnana-bhandaraज्ञानभण्डार A 'treasury of knowledge': a manuscript library, especially the Jain repositories that preserved very old palm-leaf manuscripts. jnana-kandaज्ञानकाण्ड The 'knowledge portion' of the Veda, the Upanishads, concerned with liberating knowledge of the Self, as distinct from the karma-kanda. jnana-shaktiज्ञानशक्ति The power of knowledge; the second of the three powers of consciousness, standing between iccha-shakti and kriya-shakti as aspects of shakti. jnana-yogaज्ञानयोग The path of knowledge: liberation through the direct realization of the self's true nature. jyeshthaज्येष्ठ Jyeshtha is the third lunar month, roughly May–June, marked by Ganga Dussehra and the waterless fast of Nirjala Ekadashi. jyotirlingaज्योतिर्लिङ्ग A 'lingam of light'; twelve special shrines revered as sites where Shiva appeared as an infinite column of light. jyotishaज्योतिष The Vedanga of astronomy and timekeeping. In its oldest form, the Vedanga Jyotisha, it is a ritual calendar for fixing the times of sacrifices; the later horoscopic astrology (jataka) is a separate and much later development.
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kaal sarp doshaकालसर्प दोष A modern astrological 'affliction' in which all seven classical planets fall between Rahu and Ketu; not found in any classical jyotisha text and rejected by scholars such as K. N. Rao as a twentieth-century popularization. kadiकादि The school of Srividya whose mantra begins with the syllable ka, traced to Manmatha/Kamaraja; one of the main mantra traditions alongside hadi and sadi. kaivalyaकैवल्य 'Isolation'; in the Yoga and Samkhya systems, liberation understood as the disentangling of pure consciousness (purusha) from matter (prakriti). kala Time, both as duration and as the cosmic devouring power personified in Mahakala. Kalabhairavaकालभैरव The fierce form of Shiva who guards Kashi and settles its karmic accounts; called the Kotwal or magistrate of the city, a vernacular name for the Sanskrit role of Kshetrapala, guardian of the sacred ground. kalachakra The wheel of time, the cyclical conception of time in Sanatana Dharma. kalashaकलश The pot-shaped finial crowning the vimana of a temple; also the sacred pot filled with water and used in puja. kali-yugaकलियुग The fourth and present world-age, the age of strife and decline, traditionally reckoned to have begun in 3102 BCE; the last of the four yugas, which begin with satya-yuga. Kalikulaकालीकुल The 'family of Kali', the stream of Shakta Tantra that treats Kali as the supreme Goddess and root of the Mahavidyas. Paired with the Srikula. kalkiकल्कि The tenth and future avatar of Vishnu, the rider on a white horse who will appear at the end of the Kali Yuga to end it and renew the age. kalpaकल्प A cosmic aeon, a single day of Brahma, an immense span comprising a thousand cycles of the four yugas. kalpavasaकल्पवास The month-long austere riverside residence kept by pilgrims (kalpavasis), especially at Prayag during the Kumbh Mela. kamaकाम Desire; in Srividya the creative will at the root of manifestation, personified as Kama and present in the kamaraja segment of the mantra. kandaकन्द The bulb low in the pelvis, near the perineum, from which the body's 72,000 nadis are said to spring. kapalaकपाल A skull, and specifically the skull-bowl carried by Kapalika and Aghori ascetics, used as a begging bowl and drinking cup; the emblem from which the Kapalika 'skull-bearers' take their name. Kapalikaकापालिक The “skull-bearer”: a medieval Śaiva ascetic of the Mahāvrata, carrying a skull-bowl in imitation of Shiva’s penance; the documented antecedent of the modern Aghorīs. kaphaकफ The bodily dosha of earth and water, the principle of structure and cohesion: tissue, lubrication, stability, and the substance that holds a body together, balancing vata and pitta. karakaकारक A 'significator': in jyotisha, the life-matter each graha stands for (Sun for the soul and father, Moon for the mind and mother, Saturn for longevity and labour, and so on). karana-shariraकारणशरीर The causal body, subtlest of the three bodies. It is the seed-layer of latent tendencies and accumulated karma from which the gross and subtle bodies grow. karmaकर्म Action, and the principle that actions bear fruit. In the ritual Veda it is the sacrificial act (the karma-kanda); in later thought it is the moral law by which deeds shape future experience. karma-kandaकर्मकाण्ड The 'action portion' of the Veda, the hymns and ritual texts concerned with sacrifice and its rewards, as distinct from the jnana-kanda. karma-pudgalaकर्मपुद्गल In Jainism, the subtle material particles of karma that cling to the soul and are shed by austerity (nirjara). karma-yogaकर्मयोग The path of selfless action: acting without attachment to the fruits, one of the Bhagavad Gita's ways to liberation. karmaphalaकर्मफल The fruit or result of an action: the consequence that karma brings to the one who acted. karmashayaकर्माशय The deposit or store of karma lodged in the mind, which ripens into birth, lifespan and experience (Yoga Sutra 2.12). kartikaकार्तिक Kartika is the eighth lunar month, roughly October–November, the month of Diwali, Govardhan Puja, and the sacred bathing of Kartik Purnima. kartikeyaकार्त्तिकेय 'Son of the Krittikas', a name of Murugan/Skanda, the warrior-son of Shiva nursed by the six star-maidens of the Pleiades. Kashiकाशी The oldest and most sacred name of Varanasi (Banaras), 'the City of Light', from the root kash, 'to shine'; the holiest city of Hindu India and the city of Shiva, where death is held to grant liberation. kataka mudraकटकमुद्रा A loosely curled hand leaving a small hole through the fist, so that a real flower or garland can be slipped through it. The characteristic hand of the goddesses in bronze and stone; also a hand-gesture in classical dance (katakamukha). kathaकथा 'Story'; the public recitation and exposition of a sacred text, especially a Purana, by a reciter before an audience. kaulaकौल The Kaula stream of tantra, centred on the kula (the family of deities and energies), often employing the five m's; in Srividya, the external/embodied path contrasted with Samaya. ketuकेतु The descending lunar node, the headless body of the demon Svarbhanu; a 'shadow planet' of detachment, loss and spiritual liberation. khadgamalaखड्गमाला The 'garland of the sword,' a Srividya litany that names in order the deities and powers of the enclosures of the Sri Yantra, used in worship. Kharosthiखरोष्ठी An early script of the Indian northwest, written right to left, used alongside Brahmi in Ashoka's time and extinct by about the third century CE. khechari mudraखेचरीमुद्रा The tongue-seal of hatha yoga ('moving in the sky'): the tongue turned back to close the passage at the roof of the mouth, preserving the subtle nectar (amrita) said to drip from the head. Exalted above all seals and famously extreme; nabho mudra is its gentle substitute. khyatiख्याति 'Apprehension'; a theory of what the mind grasps in error. The schools differ sharply (Nyaya's *anyatha-khyati*, Prabhakara's *akhyati*, Advaita's *anirvachaniya-khyati*), and each theory encodes a whole metaphysics. kilanaकीलन The pinning or locking of a mantra. In the Sanskrit sources kīlita names a defect in how a formula's syllables are arranged, and kīlana is an act a practitioner performs; the doctrine that Śiva locked every mantra in the Kali age belongs to Hindī commentary. kinnaraकिन्नर A half-human, half-animal celestial being (part horse, or in later traditions part bird), a musician like the apsara and an emblem of devoted, faithful love. Paired with the kimpurushas. kleshaक्लेश An affliction; in the Yoga Sutras the five (avidya, asmita, raga, dvesha, abhinivesha) that are the root of bondage and of karma. koshaकोश A sheath or covering. The Taittiriya Upanishad describes the self as wrapped in five koshas, from the outer body of food inward to the sheath of bliss. kotwalकोतवाल A city's chief magistrate or police officer, a Persian administrative term; used in Kashi for Kalabhairava, the guardian to whom the pilgrim reports, translating the older Sanskrit role of kshetrapala. kovil The Tamil word for a temple, used of the great foundations of the Chola country. Kramaक्रम 'Sequence'; a fierce Kali-centred stream of Kashmir's non-dual Shaivism concerned with the phased unfolding of consciousness, one of the traditions Abhinavagupta absorbed into his synthesis. krama-pathaक्रमपाठ The 'step' recitation, in which Vedic words are chanted in overlapping pairs (ab, bc, cd), one of the permuted recitations that guarded the text's order. kraunchaक्रौञ्च A curlew or heron; the bird whose killing by a hunter moved Valmiki to utter the first verse of poetry. kridaक्रीडा Play, sport, a game; a near-synonym of lila used in the texts for the free, motiveless activity attributed to the divine in creation. kripaकृपा Grace; the compassion of God, which the devotional (bhakti) schools hold can override accumulated karma. krishna paksha The dark paksha of the lunar month, when the moon wanes from purnima to amavasya; the counterpart of the shukla-paksha. krishna-karmaकृष्णकर्म Black, or harmful, karma that yields painful fruit (Yoga Sutra 4.7). krittikasकृत्तिका The six star-maidens of the Pleiades who nursed the infant Murugan, giving him six faces and the name Kartikeya. kriya-shaktiक्रियाशक्ति The power of action; the third of the three powers of consciousness, following iccha-shakti and jnana-shakti as aspects of shakti. kriyamanaक्रियमाण Karma being generated now by present action, also called agami; the portion of karma still open to choice. Kshatriyaक्षत्रिय The second varna: the class of rulers, warriors, and administrators, charged with protection, justice, and governance. Kings and the epic heroes are Kshatriyas; the Bhagavad Gita is spoken to the Kshatriya Arjuna about his duty in war. Kshemarajaक्षेमराज Abhinavagupta's direct disciple and the great populariser of Kashmir Shaivism, author of the concise Pratyabhijnahridaya, the 'heart of recognition'. kshetraक्षेत्र A sacred field or precinct; a holy site, often a tirtha, understood as ground set apart. kshetrapalaक्षेत्रपाल The guardian deity of a sacred site or 'field'; at Kashi this role belongs to Kalabhairava, popularly called the Kotwal, the city magistrate. Kuberaकुबेर The pot-bellied lord of wealth, king of the yakshas, and guardian of the northern direction; master of the treasure-city Alaka and one of the guardians of the directions (dikpalas). kudavolaiகுடவோலை The 'pot-ticket' method of village-assembly selection recorded in the Chola Uttaramerur inscriptions: candidates' names were written on palm-leaf tickets, placed in a pot, and drawn out by a child to choose the governing committees by lot, one of the earliest documented electoral procedures. kulaकुल 'Family, clan, totality' - in Kaula Tantra, the whole manifest cosmos understood as the 'family' of Shakti, and the fellowship of initiates. Paired with its opposite akula (Shiva, the transcendent), kula names immanent power; their union is the non-dual reality the tradition worships. kula-devataकुलदेवता The tutelary deity of a family or clan line, worshipped at weddings and the great turnings of a household and inherited across generations. Distinct from the ishta-devata, the individually chosen deity. Kumbh Mela A mass pilgrimage and bathing festival held in rotation at four river tirtha sites, timed by jyotisha from the positions of Jupiter, the sun and the moon; the greatest of the mela gatherings. kumbhaकुम्भ A pot or pitcher; the pot of nectar (amrita) that gives the Kumbh Mela its name. kumbhakaकुम्भक Breath-retention, the holding of the breath; the operative core of classical and Hatha pranayama. kumkumकुंकुम The red or maroon powder, classically made from turmeric and slaked lime, used to make the traditional bindi and applied in worship. Its red colour signifies auspiciousness and Shakti, the feminine power; a kumkum bindi has long marked a married woman. kundaliniकुण्डलिनी The coiled power, pictured as a serpent energy resting at the base of the spine, which the practitioner awakens to rise through the subtle centres to union with Shiva. kutaकूट A 'peak' or segment; one of the three parts (vagbhava, kamaraja, shakti) into which the panchadashi mantra is divided.
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laghuलघु A 'light', or short, syllable of one matra; one of the two units from which a metre is built, paired with the heavy syllable. Lakshanaलक्षणा 'Implication, indication.' A mode of meaning in which, when a sentence's literal sense is impossible, one keeps what the words can jointly point to and sets aside what blocks it. Advaita reads tat tvam asi by bhaga-tyaga-lakshana, dropping the contradictory features of 'that' and 'thou' to reach the identical consciousness they both name. Lalitaललिता Lalita Tripurasundari, the supreme goddess of the Sri Vidya tradition, worshipped through the Sri Yantra and the Lalita Sahasranama. latina A Nagara temple spire of a single curvilinear tower. layaलय 'Dissolution' or 'absorption' - the merging of one level of reality back into its source. In laya yoga and in bhuta-shuddhi, the practitioner dissolves the grosser elements successively into the subtler, retracing creation in reverse until only pure consciousness remains. lilaलीला Divine play; the doctrine that the Absolute creates and acts not out of need or for any purpose but in free, spontaneous, purposeless play. Stated in Brahma Sutra 2.1.33 (lokavat tu lila-kaivalyam), it answers why a complete reality, lacking nothing, would create at all: as the overflow of its own bliss, the way a king who wants for nothing still plays a game. lingaलिङ्ग The aniconic emblem of Shiva, an upright form set in a base, worshipped as the sign of the formless absolute rather than as a literal object. Linga-shariraलिङ्गशरीर The 'subtle body,' also called sukshma-sharira, which carries the impressions, tendencies, and karmic residues of past lives from one birth to the next. Distinct from the perishable physical body, it is the vehicle on which successive lives are strung in Samkhya and Vedanta analysis. lingamलिङ्ग The aniconic emblem of Shiva, a smooth pillar rising from a base; linga means 'mark' or 'sign', here the sign of a formless Shiva. lingodbhava Shiva's manifestation as an infinite pillar of light whose top and bottom Brahma and Vishnu could not find. lokaलोक A world, plane, or realm of existence; in Hindu cosmology as much a state reached by karma as a physical place. The fourteen lokas run seven above the earth and seven below. lokapalaलोकपाल A 'world-protector' or guardian of a direction; the eight (or ten) dikpalas who hold the quarters of space: Indra (E), Agni (SE), Yama (S), Nirriti (SW), Varuna (W), Vayu (NW), Kubera (N), Ishana (NE), with Brahma above and Vishnu below. Lokayataलोकायत 'The view found in the world,' the older name for the Charvaka school of Indian materialism. The term points to its this-worldly focus: reality is what can be perceived here, and the proper aims of life are worldly rather than otherworldly.
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madhu-vidyaमधुविद्या The 'honey doctrine' of the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad (2.5), in which each thing is declared the honey, the concentrated essence, of every other, and all are bound together in one immortal Self. madhyamaमध्यमा The 'intermediate' level of speech: inward, mental speech, differentiated into words but not yet voiced, standing between pashyanti and vaikhari on the descent from para. madyaमद्य Wine; the first of the five m's (panchamakara) of Kaula ritual, understood literally in left-hand practice and symbolically in others. maghaमाघ Magha is the eleventh lunar month, roughly January–February. It carries Vasant Panchami and the great Magha bathing at Prayag, the setting of the Kumbh Mela. Maha Shivaratri The Great Night of Shiva, kept by vigil and fast on the fourteenth of the dark fortnight in late winter. maha yagnaमहायज्ञ The great sacrifices enjoined daily on the householder, traditionally five (pancha mahayajna): to the gods (deva), to the seers through study, to the ancestors (pitri), to other living beings (bhuta), and to fellow humans as guests (atithi). The Grihya Sutras frame ordinary life as a continual round of giving. Mahabharataमहाभारत The vast Sanskrit epic of the Bharata dynasty, often called the longest poem in the world. The Bhagavad Gita is a passage within it, in the sixth book. Mahadeviमहादेवी The great Goddess: the one supreme feminine reality of whom Durga, Kali, Lakshmi, Saraswati and the local goddesses are read as forms. Mahakala Shiva as Great Time, the power that devours all things and is also their measure. mahamayaमहामाया 'Great illusion'; a name of the Goddess as the cosmic power that both binds beings to the world and releases them, central to the Devi Mahatmya. Mahamrityunjayaमहामृत्युञ्जय The 'great death-conquering' mantra, the Tryambakam verse (Rigveda 7.59.12), recited for protection and release; addressed to Tryambaka, identified with Rudra-Shiva. Mahapuranaमहापुराण One of the eighteen 'great' Puranas, the principal compendia of cosmology, genealogy, and the deeds of the gods. mahasiddhaमहासिद्ध A great perfected one, an adept of the tantric Siddha traditions; both the Haṭhayogapradīpikā roll and the Tibetan list of eighty-four carry a Śābara. Dasgupta holds eighty-four to be a mystical number, so a place on such a list is evidence about the list. mahasmashanaमहाश्मशान 'The great cremation ground'; an epithet of Kashi (Varanasi) and of its chief burning-ground, expressing the city's role as the place of sacred death and liberation. mahatमहत् 'The great one'; in Samkhya the first evolute of *prakriti*, cosmic intellect (also called *buddhi*), from which *ahamkara* arises. mahatmyaमाहात्म्य A greatness text: a Puranic passage praising the glory of a deity, a place, or a shrine. mahavakyaमहावाक्य A 'great utterance': one of the short Upanishadic sentences (e.g. tat tvam asi, aham brahmasmi) the later tradition took to condense the identity of Atman and Brahman. Mahavidyaमहाविद्या The ten 'great wisdom' goddesses, from radiant Tripurasundari to fierce Kali and the headless Chinnamasta, read as a spectrum of the one Goddess. mahavrataमहाव्रत The great vow: Patanjali's term for the yamas, binding in every circumstance regardless of birth, place, time or condition. mahayagaमहायाग The 'great worship,' an elaborate full form of Srividya ritual, standing to ordinary puja as a great yajna stands to a daily rite. mahayugaमहायुग A 'great age', one full cycle of the four yugas, totalling 4,320,000 years; a thousand mahayugas make a kalpa. Mahishasuraमहिषासुर The buffalo demon slain by the Goddess in the Devi Mahatmya, the central myth re-enacted every autumn at Durga Puja. maithunaमैथुन Ritual union; the fifth of the five m's (panchamakara). In left-hand Kaula practice it is enacted; in Samaya practice it is internalised as the union of Shiva and Shakti within. Makar Sankranti The festival of the sun's entry into Capricorn around 14 January, marking the start of uttarayana; one of the few solar-fixed Hindu festivals. malaमाला A rosary for counting japa, standardly 108 beads plus a larger meru or guru bead, which is turned back from rather than crossed. Malinivijayottaraमालिनीविजयोत्तर The tantra Abhinavagupta privileged as the root scriptural authority for his Trika synthesis in the Tantraloka. mamsaमांस Meat; the second of the five m's (panchamakara) of Kaula ritual. manasमनस् The mind, the faculty of thought, sensation and intention. In the Taittiriya Upanishad's sheaths it is the manomaya kosha, the layer of ordinary mental activity. manasaमानस Mental, silent mantra repetition, the sound turned over in the mind with the lips still. Held the highest of the three forms of japa, though the commentator Medhatithi reads that ranking as figurative praise. manasa-tirthaमानसतीर्थ The 'tirtha of the mind': the teaching that the true crossing-place is inward, so that purity of mind outweighs bathing at any physical site. mandalaमण्डल A 'circle': a sacred diagram used as a map of the cosmos and a focus for ritual and meditation, especially in Tantra. The same word also names a book or division of the Rigveda, which has ten such mandalas (books 2 to 7 are the oldest layer). mandapaमण्डप A pillared hall standing before the temple sanctum, for assembly and ritual, crossed on the way from the prakara to the garbhagriha. mandirमन्दिर A Hindu temple, built around the inner sanctum (garbhagriha) that houses the deity's image. mandiraमन्दिर A Hindu temple; the common term, mandir. mandukaमाण्डूक The sixty-four-square (8x8) form of the vastu-purusha-mandala, traditionally associated with temples. mangal doshaमंगल दोष The 'Manglik' condition: Mars placed in certain houses of a chart, held in matchmaking tradition to stress a marriage. An old astrological seed grown into a modern social institution. Manikarnikaमणिकर्णिका The principal and most sacred cremation ground of Kashi, on the Ganga; its name means 'jewel of the earring', and the tradition reads it as the navel where creation and dissolution meet. manipuraमणिपूर The navel chakra, the "city of jewels." Ten petals, element fire, seed-syllable Ram. manomayaमनोमय The self made of mind, the third of the five sheaths in the Taittiriya Upanishad. mansabdar An officer holding a numerical rank (mansab) in the Mughal imperial service, which fixed his pay and the cavalry he maintained. Many mansabdars were Hindu, especially Rajputs, and Aurangzeb employed more Hindu mansabdars than any Mughal emperor before him. mantraमन्त्र A sacred sound-formula held to be the phonic form of a devata; from man (to think) + tra (instrument), glossed 'that which protects the one who contemplates it'. Its shortest form is the bija, and its repetition is japa. mantra-chaitanyaमन्त्रचैतन्य The 'awakening' of a mantra: the doctrine that an uninitiated or unawakened mantra is inert, and must be enlivened through initiation and practice. mantra-devataमन्त्रदेवता The doctrine that the mantra is the deity in sound-form: the mantra and the deity are one reality, not a name and the thing it names. mantramargaमन्त्रमार्ग 'The way of mantras'; the mainstream Tantric path of the Shaiva tradition. Mantrapitha The Seat of the Mantras, the class of Bhairava tantras named for its masculine mantra-deities, and in the surviving literature a category carried by a single major early text, the Svacchandatantra. That text nowhere claims the seat for itself; the assignment is made for it by the Jayadrathayāmala, by Kṣemarāja, and by the colophons of its Nepalese manuscripts. mantroddharaमन्त्रोद्धार The coded 'extraction' of a mantra from the Tantric texts, deliberately scrambled so it cannot be read off the page by the uninitiated. manuमनु The progenitor-ruler of a manvantara; the present age is that of the seventh Manu, Vaivasvata. manvantaraमन्वन्तर The vast age presided over by a single Manu; fourteen manvantaras make up one day of Brahma. maranaमारण Killing; the deadliest of the six acts of tantric magic, the rite of destruction aimed at a life. The Mimamsa philosophers ruled the equivalent Vedic killing-rite effective yet forbidden; read inwardly, marana is the killing of the ego. margaमार्ग A 'path' or 'road' to liberation. The tradition names three principal margas to moksha, matched to different temperaments: karma-marga (action), bhakti-marga (devotion) and jnana-marga (knowledge); a fourth, raja-marga (meditation), is sometimes added. margashirshaमार्गशीर्ष Margashirsha is the ninth lunar month, roughly November–December, holding Gita Jayanti; the Gita calls itself the best of months. marjanaमार्जन The sprinkling of water for purification before worship, a preliminary act in puja as abhisheka is a fuller one. maryada-purushottamaमर्यादा पुरुषोत्तम The supreme person who keeps the boundaries: Rama as the perfect upholder of dharma, ideal son, husband and king. masa A lunar month; the twelve run from Chaitra through Phalguna, each named for the star near which its full moon falls. mathaमठ A Hindu monastery or monastic establishment, headed by an acharya and anchoring a sampradaya; often a centre for the copying and custody of manuscripts, and a home for those in sannyasa. matraमात्रा A prosodic unit of time, the duration of one short syllable; the basic measure of length in metre, counted over the akshara rather than the varna. matrikaमातृका The 'little mothers'; the letters of the Sanskrit alphabet regarded as goddesses and as the sonic matrix of reality, installed on the body in matrika-nyasa. matsyaमत्स्य Fish; the third of the five m's (panchamakara) of Kaula ritual. maunaमौन Silence, especially as a spiritual discipline and, in the case of Dakshinamurti, as the highest teaching itself. The para-vidya, the higher knowledge of the self, is held to be untransmittable in words; the guru's silence is its form. Shankara's Stotra: the guru's exposition is silence, and the disciples' doubts are cut. mayaमाया The creative power that brings forth the world of appearances; in Advaita, the cosmic illusion that veils the one reality (brahman). mayinमायिन् The wielder of maya, the 'magician': in the Svetasvatara Upanishad, the Great Lord (Ishvara) who spreads forth the world through the power of maya, of which prakriti (nature) is the display. megha-varnaमेघवर्ण 'Cloud-coloured'; the colour of a dark rain-cloud, the dominant scriptural image for the complexion of Krishna and Vishnu (also megha-shyama, 'dark as a cloud'). melaमेला A fair or gathering, especially a religious assembly such as the Kumbh Mela. Meruमेरु The golden world-axis mountain at the centre of Jambudvīpa, around which the Puranic earth-plane and its ring-continents are arranged. Shared with Buddhist and Jain cosmology. mithyaमिथ्या Dependently real: real as an appearance, the way a reflection or a dream is real, but not independently or ultimately real in the way Brahman is. mlecchaम्लेच्छ In the classical texts, a person outside Vedic and aryavarta order; a 'barbarian' or outsider, historically applied to foreign peoples and invaders. modakaमोदक A sweet dumpling, classically a steamed rice-flour shell of coconut and jaggery, offered to Ganesha as his favoured food and shared as prasada. mohaमोह Delusion: the confusion that mistakes the impermanent for the permanent and binds the soul to samsara. The hammer of the hymn Moha Mudgara is aimed at it. mokku The vow of tonsure, the offering of one's hair, made by pilgrims at Tirupati. mokshaमोक्ष Liberation, release from samsara, the cycle of birth and death; the highest goal in most Hindu traditions. Mrityunjayaमृत्युंजय 'Conqueror of death', an epithet of Shiva; also the name of the Vedic Mahamrityunjaya mantra (Rigveda 7.59.12), recited for healing and protection against untimely death. mudraमुद्रा A seal or gesture. The word first means a signet, stamp or lock, and names four things: the hand-poses of deity images (abhaya, varada, jnana), the hand-gestures of classical dance, the gestures of ritual worship, and the whole-body seals of hatha yoga. A fifth, unrelated sense is parched grain, the fourth 'M' of the panchamakara. muhurtaमुहूर्त An auspicious moment, and the branch of Jyotisha that elects one - fixing the time to marry, to build, to travel or to begin. It is the most widely practised part of the tradition, far outrunning belief in prediction. mukhyaमुख्य "Principal" or "chief"; the conventional label for the ten principal Upanishads, though the Muktika text that lists them calls them simply the ten (dashopanishad), never mukhya. muktiमुक्ति 'Release'; liberation from the cycle of rebirth, a synonym of moksha. mukti bhavanमुक्तिभवन A 'house of liberation' in Kashi where the dying lodge with their families in their last days, in the hope of dying within the city and attaining moksha. muktikaमुक्तिक The late Upanishad in which Rama enumerates 108 Upanishads to Hanuman; it is the source of the conventional count of 108. mula-prakritiमूलप्रकृति 'Root nature': the primordial creative substance of the cosmos, identified in Shakta theology with the Great Goddess herself. muladharaमूलाधार The "root support," the base chakra at the perineum. A four-petalled lotus, element earth, seed-syllable Lam. mumukshuमुमुक्षु One who longs for liberation (moksha); in Kashi, especially the seeker who comes to the city to ripen toward a good death or to awaken to liberation while still living. mundamalaमुण्डमाला A garland of severed heads or skulls worn by fierce goddesses such as Kali, often numbering fifty or fifty-one for the letters of the Sanskrit alphabet. murariमुरारि The foe of the demon Mura, a name of Krishna and Vishnu, invoked in devotional appeal. murtiमूर्ति The sacred image or form of a devata, consecrated so that the divine is held to be present in it for worship; the focus of puja and the object of darshan.
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nadaनाद Sound or vibration understood as a cosmic principle, the subtle resonance from which audible sound and, in the tradition's reading, the world unfold; the ground of shabda and of the mantra. Nada-Brahmanनादब्रह्म Sound as the Absolute: the doctrine, carried above all by the medieval musicologists, that ultimate reality is at root sonic, so that music and sacred sound are a form of worship and a path to the divine. The musical face of Shabda-Brahman, the Word as the Absolute. nadiनाडी A channel of the subtle body through which vital energy flows; the three principal ones are ida, pingala, and sushumna. nadopasanaनादोपासना The 'worship of sound': the contemplative practice of attending to nada, the inner resonance, until it is heard as the ground of shabda and of the mantra. nagaनाग A serpent-being, part human and part cobra, dwelling in water and the underworld realm of Patala and guarding treasure and the sources of water. The greatest nagas are Shesha (Vishnu's couch) and Vasuki (the churning-rope). Nagara The North Indian temple style marked by a curvilinear tower, the shikhara; its early structural form emerges in the Gupta period. nairghrinyaनैर्घृण्य Cruelty; the charge, answered by the doctrine of beginningless karma, that God is unkind in the world's suffering. naivedyaनैवेद्य Food offered to the deity during puja, which after being accepted is returned to the worshippers as prasada. nakshatra A lunar mansion, one of the twenty-seven divisions of the sky through which the moon passes in its monthly circuit; with the tithi, a foundation of jyotisha and of the panchanga. Nalayira Divya Prabandham The 'Four Thousand' Tamil verses of the Alvars, compiled around the tenth century and revered as the Tamil Veda. namaनाम The (divine) Name; in nama-bhakti the Name and the Named are held to be one, so that chanting the Name is being in the deity's presence. nama-japaनामजप The repetition of a divine name; japa performed on the nama itself rather than on a longer mantra, and the characteristic practice of much bhakti. nama-smaranaनामस्मरण Remembrance of the divine Name: the loving repetition and recollection of God's name as a practice of devotion, close kin to japa. namaskarनमस्कार A salutation, a bowing or prostration in reverence; in Surya Namaskar, the act of bowing to the sun. Nandiनन्दी Shiva's bull, his mount (vahana), gatekeeper, chief of the ganas and, in the southern Shaiva traditions, a guru who transmits his teaching. The seated Nandi faces every Shiva sanctum, and devotees whisper their prayers into his ear for him to carry to the god. Narakaनरक The hellish realms, where the fruits of cruel or evil deeds are suffered. Like svarga, naraka is temporary in the Hindu view: it is a place of purgation and payment rather than eternal damnation, after which the soul takes rebirth. Only moksha lies outside this cycle. Narayanaनारायण A name of the cosmic person who rests on the serpent Shesha on the waters between cycles of creation, identified with Vishnu. narikelaनारिकेल The coconut, and the coconut palm; a Sanskrit word most likely borrowed from the Dravidian languages of the south, reflecting the fruit's coastal, post-Vedic entry into North Indian ritual. nastikaनास्तिक Heterodox: of a system that rejects the authority of the Vedas, such as Charvaka, Buddhism and Jainism. natarajaनटराज The Lord of the Dance: Shiva shown dancing within a ring of flame, holding drum and fire, enacting the creation and dissolution of the cosmos. Nathनाथ “Lord”; the honorific of the Nāth yogis, an order of Śaiva ascetics identified with haṭha yoga and the pursuit of an immortal, perfected body. natyavedaनाट्यवेद The "fifth Veda" of drama. The Natyashastra tells that Brahma made it from the other four Vedas (recitation from the Rig, song from the Sama, gesture from the Yajus, rasa from the Atharva) and, unlike the Vedas, opened it to everyone, of every caste and gender. nava-vidha bhaktiनवधा भक्ति The nine forms of devotion listed in the Bhagavata Purana (7.5.23) and spoken by Prahlada: hearing (shravana), chanting (kirtana), remembering (smarana), serving the feet (pada-sevana), worship (archana), praise (vandana), servitude (dasya), friendship (sakhya) and self-surrender (atma-nivedana). navadurgaनवदुर्गा The nine forms of Durga, one honoured on each night of Navaratri, from Shailaputri to Siddhidatri. navagrahaनवग्रह The 'nine grahas' or planetary powers (Surya, Chandra, Mangala, Budha, Brihaspati, Shukra, Shani and the lunar nodes Rahu and Ketu), cosmic officers who administer time, fortune and karma. Most temples have a Navagraha shrine. Navaratri The festival of the nine nights of the Goddess, celebrating her victory over the buffalo-demon Mahishasura. navavaranaनवावरण The nine enclosures (avaranas) of the Sri Yantra, worshipped in sequence inward to the central point; the navavarana puja is the core Srividya rite. Nayanar One of the sixty-three Tamil Shaiva poet-saints of the bhakti age, whose hymns to Shiva form the Tevaram and Tirumurai. Nayanarsநாயன்மார் The sixty-three Tamil poet-saints devoted to Shiva (6th-9th c.), whose passionate vernacular hymns (collected in the Tevaram) helped launch the bhakti movement in the south. Their Vaishnava counterparts were the Alvars. nazarनज़र The 'evil eye', the harm believed to come from another's envious or ill-wishing gaze. A black dot placed on unmarried girls and small children, and other marks and amulets, are used to ward it off. Neelakanthaनीलकण्ठ 'Blue-throated'; Shiva, who drank the halahala poison at the churning of the ocean and held it in his throat, which turned blue. neo-Vedanta The modern, reform-era reinterpretation of Vedanta, universalist and partly shaped by Western thought, running from Ram Mohan Roy through Vivekananda. neti netiनेति नेति "Not so, not so." The Upanishadic method of pointing at Brahman by negating every description, since the absolute is never one of the objects it could be named among. nidhiनिधि A treasure; the nava nidhi are the nine treasures. In the Hanuman Chalisa, Hanuman grants 'the eight siddhis and nine nidhis' by Sita's boon. Nigamaनिगम The Vedic revelation, paired with the Agama; also a Tantra revealed in the reverse direction, the Goddess teaching and Shiva questioning. nilaनील Dark-blue, blue-black, or dark; a colour term covering a broad dark band from black through blue-black, distinct from the modern sky-blue. nilakanthaनीलकण्ठ 'The blue-throated one,' an epithet of Shiva, whose throat turned blue from holding the halahala poison at the churning of the ocean; a localized blueness distinct from the whole-body dark complexion of Krishna and Vishnu. nirayaनिरय A hell, one of the punitive states in which the fruit of grave karma is exhausted before rebirth resumes. nirbijaनिर्बीज 'Seedless' absorption (samadhi), resting on no supporting object. nirgunaनिर्गुण "Without qualities." Nirguna Brahman is the absolute beyond every description, the divine without form, attribute, or image. nirguna Brahmanनिर्गुण ब्रह्म Brahman without qualities or form: the Absolute as it is in itself, beyond all name, attribute and conception, the ground behind every deity and every form. The counterpart to saguna Brahman. nirjaraनिर्जरा In Jainism, the wearing away or shedding of accumulated karmic matter through austerity, a path to liberation. nirmalyaनिर्माल्य The leftovers of an act of worship: the flowers, water and food already offered to a deity. In the Agamic Shaiva systems a designated figure, Chanda or Chandesha, receives them and forgives the worshipper's mistakes. nirodhaनिरोध Restraint, stilling, or cessation, specifically of the mind's fluctuations. The key word in the foundational definition yogash chitta-vritti-nirodhah. niruktaनिरुक्त Etymology; one of the six Vedangas, the discipline that explains the meaning and derivation of Vedic words. nirutti A Pali term for a way of expressing or naming something. Its sense in the Cullavagga phrase sakaya niruttiya is disputed: it may mean each learner's own dialect, or the Buddha's own idiom, and scholars remain divided. nirvanaनिर्वाण 'Blowing out'; the term for liberation in Buddhism (which does not affirm a permanent self), used more loosely in Hindu and Jain settings. nirvikalpakaनिर्विकल्पक Indeterminate perception, the bare, pre-verbal grasp of an object before it is judged to be a thing of a kind. Contrast *savikalpaka*. nishadaनिषाद A forest tribesman or hunter; in the Ramayana's origin story, the hunter whose killing of a krauncha bird provokes Valmiki's first shloka. nishkama karmaनिष्काम कर्म Desireless action; renouncing the craving for the fruit of action rather than renouncing the action itself. The inner key of karma yoga, taught at 2.47. nitya-suriनित्यसूरि An 'eternal wise one', one of the permanent, never-fallen attendants of Vishnu in his heaven Vaikuntha, such as Ananta, Garuda and Vishvaksena; the settled, exalted counterpart of Shiva's wild host. nityasनित्या The Nitya goddesses, a set of fifteen (with Lalita as the sixteenth) identified with the lunar days (tithis) and worshipped in Srividya. niyamaनियम Observances or personal disciplines (such as purity and contentment), the second of the eight limbs. niyatiनियति Destiny or fixed fate; the doctrine of the Ajivika school that all events are predetermined and that effort changes nothing. The karma traditions defined themselves against it. nyasaन्यास The ritual 'placing' of mantras and deities upon parts of the body by touch and utterance, consecrating the practitioner's body as the deity's before worship.
O
ojasओजस् The final refined essence of the bodily tissues in Ayurveda - the subtle substance held to underlie vitality, immunity and lustre. Its depletion is read as the ground of illness. ojhaओझा The village ritual specialist, defined in Indian statute as a person who claims power to control, cure or treat a witch or the witch-afflicted. In the case files he more often confirms a witch accusation than starts one, and the naming licenses violence. Omॐ The primordial sound-syllable, the pranava, treated by the Upanishads as the audible form of Brahman; chanted at the start of mantras and prayers.
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pada-pathaपदपाठ The 'word-by-word' recitation of a Vedic text, with every word isolated in its underlying form; one of the methods that preserved the Veda exactly. padarthaपदार्थ A category of reality. Vaisheshika lists six (substance, quality, action, universal, particular, inherence), later seven with absence. paddhatiपद्धति A ritual manual that sets out how a rite is actually to be performed, compiled from scripture rather than revealed in its own right. Bhoja's Siddhantasarapaddhati and the Somashambhupaddhati are the standard Shaiva examples. padmaपद्म The lotus; emblem of purity unstained by its surroundings and of detachment, and the seat and birthplace of deities; also the inward lotus of the heart. padukaपादुका The 'sandals' of the guru; the venerated seat of the teacher and lineage, invoked in worship as the point of contact with the transmission. Painted Grey Ware An Iron Age pottery style of the Ganga-Yamuna plain (c. 1200 to 600 BCE), proposed as a possible material correlate of the later Vedic period, though the equation is contested. paksha A fortnight, one half of a lunar month: the bright (shukla) half when the moon waxes or the dark (krishna) half when it wanes. Panch Parameshthiपञ्चपरमेष्ठिन् In Jainism, the five supreme beings worthy of reverence (Arihant, Siddha, Acharya, Upadhyaya, Sadhu), whose initial sounds are contracted to form the syllable Aum. pancha-bhedaपञ्चभेद The five eternal differences of Madhva's Dvaita: between God and soul, God and matter, soul and soul, soul and matter, and one material thing and another. pancha-bhutaपञ्चभूत The five great elements of which the material world is composed: earth (prithvi), water (ap), fire (agni), air (vayu), and ether or space (akasha). pancha-koshaपञ्चकोश The five nested sheaths of the self described in the Taittiriya Upanishad (food, breath, mind, discernment, bliss). Each is a layer to be seen through on the way to the Self. pancha-lakshanaपञ्चलक्षण The 'five characteristics' classically said to define a Purana: creation, dissolution, genealogy of gods and sages, the cosmic ages of the Manus, and royal dynasties. pancha-maha-yajna The five great daily offerings prescribed for the grhastha: to the gods, the ancestors, all beings, fellow humans and the seers; the domestic form of the yajna. pancha-mahabhutaपञ्च महाभूत The five great elements from which the physical world and the body are composed: earth (prithvi), water (ap), fire (agni/tejas), air (vayu) and space or ether (akasha). At death the body is understood to return to these five sources, a dissolution that cremation completes quickly. pancha-mahayajnaपञ्चमहायज्ञ The five great daily sacrifices of the householder: to the gods, the ancestors, other beings, fellow humans, and the sages through study. Set out for the householder in the Manusmriti (3.69-71). pancha-makaraपञ्चमकार The 'five Ms' of left-hand Tantra - madya (wine), mamsa (meat), matsya (fish), mudra (parched grain) and maithuna (union). Taken literally by the vira (heroic) path and symbolically or substituted by others, they are ritual means of transcending duality, hedged by strict initiation and discipline. pancha-rinaपञ्चऋण The five debts a person is born owing: to the sages, the gods, the ancestors, fellow humans, and all creatures (the pancha-maha-yajna tradition; Shatapatha Brahmana 11.5.6, Manusmriti 3.70). panchadashiपञ्चदशी The fifteen-syllable root mantra of Srividya (panchadashi vidya), composed of three segments (kutas). Panchagni Vidyaपञ्चाग्निविद्या 'The knowledge of the five fires,' a teaching in the Chandogya Upanishad (5.3-10) that describes the journey of the self through a cosmic cycle and sets out the two afterlife paths, the devayana and the pitryana. One of the oldest detailed accounts of rebirth in Hindu scripture. panchagni-vidyaपञ्चाग्निविद्या The doctrine of the five fires: the Upanishadic teaching (Chandogya 5) of the soul's passage after death through five cosmic stages to rebirth. panchakarmaपञ्चकर्म The 'five actions' - Ayurveda's programme of purificatory therapies. Charaka and Sushruta do not agree on what the five are: Sushruta, characteristically for a surgeon, includes bloodletting. panchakroshiपञ्चक्रोशी The great circumambulatory pilgrimage route that encircles the sacred zone of Kashi, about five krosha in radius, lined with shrines. Panchaksharaपञ्चाक्षर The five-syllable Shaiva mantra Namah Shivaya ('homage to Shiva'), often recited with Om; rooted in the Shri Rudram of the Yajurveda. panchamakaraपञ्चमकार The 'five m's' of Kaula tantric ritual: madya (wine), mamsa (meat), matsya (fish), mudra (parched grain), and maithuna (union). In left-hand practice they are used literally; in right-hand and Samaya practice they are taken symbolically or internally. panchangपञ्चाङ्ग The Hindu almanac, setting out the lunar calendar, auspicious times and festival dates; a staple of cheap religious printing. panchanga The Hindu almanac, named for its five limbs: tithi, vara, nakshatra, yoga, and karana, which together fix the date and quality of each day. Pancharatraपाञ्चरात्र The Vaishnava Agama, the tantric scriptural tradition whose texts are called Samhitas and which governs much of Vishnu temple worship. Panchatirthiपञ्चतीर्थी The five sacred fords of Kashi bathed in order by the pilgrim: Asi, Dashashwamedh, Manikarnika, Panchganga and Adi Keshava, mapped onto the body of the cosmic Lord. panchayatanaपञ्चायतन The five-shrine arrangement of household worship, in which Shiva, Vishnu, Devi, Surya and Ganapati are honoured together, one of them placed at the centre and the other four around it. It is a Smarta domestic convention rather than a classification of scripture, so a deity's presence in it says nothing about whether that deity's canon survives. panchayatana pujaपञ्चायतन पूजा The Smarta rite of worshipping five deities together as equal forms of one Brahman: Ganesha, Devi, Shiva, Vishnu and Surya, arranged in a quincunx, with one placed at the centre as the worshipper's chosen form. Traditionally attributed to Adi Shankara. papa-purushaपापपुरुष The 'man of sin' - in the tantric rite of bhuta-shuddhi, the personified body of accumulated sin visualised within the practitioner, then dried by wind, burned by fire and its ashes washed away, so that a purified body can be built for worship. paraपर The supreme level; the highest of the graded levels of speech and reality (para, parapara, apara) in the Trika and Srividya schemes. para vidyaपरा विद्या The higher knowledge, by which the imperishable Brahman is known, distinguished in the Mundaka Upanishad from apara vidya, the lower knowledge of the Vedas and their sciences. paramanuपरमाणु The atom of Vaisheshika: the indivisible, eternal, partless unit from which material things are built up. paramarthikaपारमार्थिक The absolute level of reality: Brahman alone, the only thing real without qualification. paramasaura A royal epithet meaning wholly devoted to the Sun, formed like paramamaheshvara for Shiva and paramavaishnava for Vishnu. Such titles in inscriptions are among the few direct traces of royal patronage of the Saura tradition. paramashayika The eighty-one-square (9x9) form of the vastu-purusha-mandala, traditionally associated with dwellings. Paramatmanपरमात्मन् The 'supreme Self': God as the indweller in every heart, the inner witness and controller (antaryamin). The same one reality met inwardly rather than as the distant creator or the beloved Lord; the Bhagavad Gita 18.61 places the Lord in the heart of all beings. paramparaपरम्परा An unbroken succession: the line of guru and disciple through which a sampradaya is transmitted, one after another, back to its founder or to God. paraparaपरापर The intermediate, 'supreme-and-non-supreme' level between the supreme (para) and the lower (apara) in the Trika scheme of reality and speech. paribhashaपरिभाषा A meta-rule: a rule that governs how the other rules of a grammar are to be interpreted and applied, including the resolution of conflicts between them and the reading of an anubandha. parivara-devataपरिवार देवता A 'retinue deity', one of the subsidiary deities given smaller shrines arranged around a temple's main sanctum, representing the presiding god's family, attendants and guardians. Also called avarana-devata. parvaपर्वन् A 'book' or major division of the Mahabharata, which is arranged in eighteen parvas. parvanपर्वन् A major book or division of the Mahabharata, which is composed of eighteen parvans. Parvatiपार्वती 'She of the mountain' - daughter of Himavat, consort of Shiva, mother of Ganesha and Kartikeya, and the Shakti through whom Shiva acts. She first appears in the Kena Upanishad as Uma Haimavati, the one who reveals Brahman to the gods. pashaपाश 'The bond': the threefold fetter of anava, karma and maya that binds the soul, cut by diksha and grace in the Shaiva Siddhanta. pashchimaपश्चिम West; also behind, the back, or the last. The counterpart of purva, naming both the western direction and what lies behind. pashuपशु 'The beast': the bound individual soul in the Shaiva Siddhanta, fettered until released by grace and initiation. pashyantiपश्यन्ती The 'seeing' or visionary level of speech, the Word still undivided, below the transcendent para and above the mental madhyama. Patalaपाताल The subterranean realm below the earth in Hindu cosmology, a world of jewelled serpent-palaces, home of the nagas and other beings of the deep. pathaपाठ A mode of Vedic recitation. The three natural modes are samhita (continuous), pada (word by word) and krama (overlapping pairs); the eight 'woven' modes (vikritis), including jata and ghana, recite the words in elaborate forward-and-backward permutations to guard the exact sequence. patiपति 'The Lord': Shiva as the free and perfect reality in the Shaiva Siddhanta triad of pati, pashu and pasha. pauranikaपौराणिक A reciter and expounder of the Puranas; the traditional performer of katha. paushaपौष Pausha is the tenth lunar month, roughly December–January, the deep of winter, closing near the sun's turn at Makar Sankranti. pavanaputraपवनपुत्र Son of the wind: an epithet of Hanuman, child of the wind-god Vayu (also Maruti, Anjaneya). peethaपीठ A 'seat'; a seat of the Goddess (a Shakti Peetha) or, more broadly, a seat of spiritual authority. phala-shrutiफलश्रुति The 'statement of the fruit'; the closing passage of a hymn or rite that declares what its recitation is said to accomplish. The Vishnu Sahasranama's phala-shruti promises the four aims of life and, finally, release from rebirth. phaladataफलदाता The giver of fruit: God (Ishvara) as the dispenser of the results of action according to each soul's own karma. phalgunaफाल्गुन Phalguna is the twelfth and final lunar month, roughly February–March, closing the year with Maha Shivaratri and Holi. phuroफुरो A verb form from the vernacular root phur, to come true, to be fulfilled, to take effect, optative or imperative in force, so that let it come true is the nearest plain English. The Hindī Śabdasāgara derives the family from Sanskrit sphuraṇa. pindaपिण्ड A rice-ball offered to the dead in the shraddha rites; over the year after a death the pindas are believed to build the departed a new subtle body, transforming the restless preta into a settled ancestor (pitr). pinda daanपिण्डदान The offering of pinda, balls of cooked rice and barley, to the dead; in the days after a death the daily pinda is held to build a new subtle body for the departed, carrying it from a restless preta to a settled ancestor. pingalaपिङ्गला The subtle channel running on the right, associated with the heating, solar current of breath and energy; one of the three principal nadis with ida and sushumna. pisachaपिशाच A low, malevolent flesh-eating fiend of the cremation ground, associated with impurity and darkness; one of the feared shadow-classes ranked below the rakshasa and the asura. pithaपीठ A seat. The word carries two distinct senses in tantric literature and they are easy to confuse. In sacred geography it is a named site, Jālandhara among them, reckoned a seat of the Goddess and given a presiding deity or siddha; those lists are unstable across recensions. In the classification of scripture it is instead a class of tantras, the Bhairava corpus being divided into the seats of Vidyā, Mantra, Mudrā and Maṇḍala. pitrपितृ A 'father' or departed ancestor; through the completed shraddha rites the newly dead (preta) is carried into the settled state of a pitr, honoured among the ancestors. Pitriपितृ An ancestor; the honoured forebears remembered and offered to across generations. Through shraddha rites the newly dead pass from the unsettled preta state into the settled community of the pitris, who are fed and revered, especially during the annual ancestral period. pitri-rinaपितृऋण The debt to the ancestors, discharged through progeny and the shraddha rite; the primary of the three or five debts. pitru doshaपितृ दोष An astrological reading of ancestral debt or wrong off an afflicted chart; a later overlay on the genuinely ancient Vedic doctrine of the debt owed to the ancestors (pitru-rina). Pitryanaपितृयाण 'The path of the ancestors,' the afterlife road in the Panchagni Vidya for those who lived good but worldly lives of rites and works. It leads through smoke, night, and the moon, where the soul dwells for a time before descending again into a new birth. pittaपित्त The bodily dosha of fire, the principle of transformation: digestion, metabolism, body heat, and the processing of what is taken in, standing between vata and kapha. plutaप्लुत The prolated or three-mora elongation of a vowel in Sanskrit recitation; the syllable Om is drawn out in this extended form rather than clipped like ordinary speech. Pongal The four-day Tamil harvest festival kept at Makar Sankranti, named for the rice-and-milk dish boiled until it overflows. pothiपोथी The traditional Indian book format: oblong loose leaves, often pierced for a binding cord and held between wooden boards, a shape inherited from the long palm leaf. prabhamandalaप्रभामण्डल The arch or disc of light shown behind the head or body of a devata in iconography, a mark of divinity on a murti. prachiप्राची A Sanskrit word for the east, from prak (first), meaning the direction where the sun first moves; the foremost, forward direction, and a synonym of purva. pradakshinaप्रदक्षिणा Circumambulation of a shrine or murti, keeping it on one's right; the body's way of honouring the sacred by orbiting it, walked around the garbhagriha as an act of puja. Prajāpatiप्रजापति 'Lord of creatures,' the creator figure of the Brāhmaṇa texts, whose creative role is inherited by the later god Brahmā. prajnaप्राज्ञ In the Mandukya Upanishad, the deep-sleep state, the third quarter of the Self, an undivided mass of consciousness; distinct from turiya, the silent fourth. prajnanaप्रज्ञान Consciousness or knowing; in the Aitareya Upanishad's great saying prajnanam brahma, consciousness itself is identified with brahman. prajnanam brahmaप्रज्ञानं ब्रह्म "Consciousness is Brahman," the great saying (mahavakya) of the Aitareya Upanishad, drawn from the Rig Veda. prajnaparadhaप्रज्ञापराध 'The crime against wisdom' - Charaka's deepest account of why people fall ill: knowing perfectly well what is good for you, and doing otherwise anyway. Not fate, and not germs, but a failure of the judgement. prakaraप्राकार An enclosure wall surrounding a temple, characteristic of South Indian complexes, pierced by the gopuram and enclosing the garbhagriha within. prakaranaप्रकरण A chapter, section or self-contained treatise; the Ashtavakra Gita is arranged in twenty such prakaranas, each on one facet of the single teaching. Prakashaप्रकाश 'Light, shining.' In Kashmir Shaivism, the self-luminous light of consciousness that reveals all things, identified with Shiva; paired with vimarsha, its self-awareness. prakritप्राकृत The vernacular literary register beneath Sanskrit, which the Nāṭyaśāstra assigns on stage to characters other than kings. The Sanskrit lexicons define śābara separately as a low form of it, the sort spoken by mountaineers. prakritiप्रकृति Primordial nature or matter, everything that can be observed, including the mind and emotions, which Samkhya counts as subtle matter rather than consciousness. pralayaप्रलय Dissolution; the periodic unmaking of the worlds at the close of a kalpa, whether at the end of a day of Brahma (naimittika) or of his whole life (prakritika), after the manvantara cycles have run. pramanaप्रमाण A valid means of knowledge. Nyaya accepts four: perception, inference, comparison and verbal testimony. pranaप्राण The vital breath or life-force; in the Taittiriya sheaths the pranamaya kosha, and in yoga the energy moved through the subtle channels. prana-pratishthaप्राणप्रतिष्ठा 'Establishing the life-breath'; the rite that installs the deity's living presence in a consecrated image (murti). pranamaप्रणाम A respectful bow or obeisance offered to elders, teachers, the divine, or holy people. It ranges from joined palms and a bow of the head to touching the feet (charan sparsh) to full prostration (sashtanga pranama). The scripted Vedic form of the salutation to an elder is called abhivadana. pranamayaप्राणमय The self made of breath, the second of the five sheaths in the Taittiriya Upanishad, the vital energy that animates the body. pranavaप्रणव The sacred syllable Om, which Patanjali calls the word that expresses Ishvara. pranayamaप्राणायाम Regulation and extension of the breath, the fourth limb of ashtanga yoga. prapathakaप्रपाठक A major division or "reading" of a Vedic text; the Chandogya Upanishad is arranged in eight prapathakas. prapattiप्रपत्ति Complete self-surrender to God's grace; the path to liberation emphasised in Vishishtadvaita. prarabdhaप्रारब्ध The portion of accumulated karma that is now being lived out in the present life. prasadप्रसाद Food or substance offered to a deity and returned to devotees as grace (prasada). prasadaप्रासाद In temple architecture, a name for the temple itself as the 'residence' or palace of the deity; Varahamihira's Brihat Samhita uses it as the standard Sanskrit word for a temple. prashasti A formal Sanskrit eulogy or panegyric, often inscribed in brahmi or its descendants; the Allahabad pillar inscription of Samudragupta is the classic example. prashnaप्रश्न 'Question' - horary astrology, in which a chart is cast for the moment a question is asked rather than for a birth. Not to be confused with the Prashna Upanishad. prastaraप्रस्तार In prosody, the systematic 'spreading out' or enumeration of every possible metrical pattern of a given length, set out by Pingala. prasthana-trayaप्रस्थानत्रयी The three foundations of Vedanta: the Upanishads, the Brahma Sutra, and the Bhagavad Gita. prasthanatrayiप्रस्थानत्रयी The 'three sources' of Vedanta on which every school must comment: the Upanishads, the Brahma Sutras, and the Bhagavad Gita. pratibhasikaप्रातिभासिक The merely apparent level of reality: the snake seen in the rope, the silver in the shell, the things of a dream, real while they last and then corrected by a truer seeing. Below the vyavaharika, and furthest from the paramarthika. Pratimaप्रतिमा An image or likeness, in the sense of a reflection; one of the words for a sacred form (alongside murti, vigraha and arca). It names the image as a likeness through which the formless is approached. pratisargaप्रतिसर्ग Secondary creation; the periodic dissolution and re-creation of the world, the second of a Purana's five marks. pratyabhijnaप्रत्यभिज्ञा 'Recognition'; the Kashmir Shaiva school holding that liberation is the sudden recognition that one's own self is already Shiva. pratyaharaप्रत्याहार Withdrawal of the senses from their objects, the fifth limb, turning attention inward in preparation for concentration. pratyakshaप्रत्यक्ष Perception: direct knowledge through the contact of the senses with their objects; the first of the pramanas. pratyaksha devataप्रत्यक्ष देवता The 'visible' or perceptible deity, the divine one can see directly; a traditional characterisation of Surya, the sun, the one god present to the eye. pravaraप्रवर The list of ancestral rishis, usually one, three, or five, attached to a gotra and recited in rituals such as the wedding sankalpa to specify a lineage precisely. Families may share a gotra but differ in pravara; a shared pravara can, in strict practice, also bar a marriage. prayagप्रयाग The confluence (sangam) of the Ganga, the Yamuna, and the unseen Sarasvati at Prayagraj; one of the holiest pilgrimage sites and a principal seat of the Kumbh Mela. prayaschittaप्रायश्चित्त Ritual expiation; prescribed acts of penance in the Dharmashastra by which the karmic weight of a fault may be reduced. prayashchittaप्रायश्चित्त Penance or expiation; the rites and disciplines prescribed in the Dharmashastra to atone for a transgression. Pretaप्रेत The restless, in-between state of the newly dead, before the departed is settled into its next condition. Funeral and shraddha rites help move the deceased from the vulnerable preta state to the honoured state of a pitri, an ancestor. preyasप्रेयस् The pleasant, the gratifying, contrasted with shreyas, the good, in the Katha Upanishad (1.2). Choosing preyas out of craving is, in Yama's teaching to Nachiketa, to miss the higher goal. prithviपृथ्वी Earth, the densest of the five elements, associated with the root centre (muladhara) and with the sense of smell. puja Devotional worship of a devata before a consecrated murti, through offerings of flower, lamp, food and water; the characteristic mode of classical and modern Hindu worship, and the ordinary occasion of darshan. pulli The dot written above a Tamil consonant letter to mark it as a bare consonant without an inherent vowel. Iravatham Mahadevan argued from its use that the Tolkappiyam can be no earlier than the second century CE. punarjanmaपुनर्जन्म Rebirth; the taking of a new body after death, driven by karma. punyaपुण्य Spiritual merit, accrued through puja, pilgrimage to a tirtha, charity and right action, and reckoned within the working of karma. purakaपूरक Inhalation, the filling of the breath; one of the three phases of pranayama with rechaka and kumbhaka. puram The 'exterior' genre of Sangam poetry, treating war, kingship, and public ethics. puranaपुराण 'Ancient, of old'; a class of Hindu smriti texts narrating cosmogony, genealogy, myth, ritual and devotion, paired with the epics as itihasa-purana. Puranas The vast popular scriptures of myth, cosmology, genealogy and devotion, substantially composed in the Gupta and early-medieval centuries. They are classed as smriti rather than shruti, and stand beside the itihasa as the people's scripture. purascharanaपुरश्चरण The preparatory discipline of repeating a mantra a fixed large number of times, with attendant rites, to make it 'awake' before it is used in worship. purnaपूर्ण Full, whole, complete, lacking nothing. In Vedanta, Brahman is purna, and because it lacks nothing its very nature is bliss (ananda); sorrow and craving arise only from lack. purnabhishekaपूर्णाभिषेक The 'full anointing'; the complete consecration, an abhisheka beyond ordinary diksha, that admits a practitioner to the highest grade of Srividya practice. One so consecrated is purnabhishikta. purnima The full moon tithi, closing the waxing paksha; broadly auspicious and the date of many festivals, as amavasya is of many rites. purushaपुरुष In Samkhya and yoga, pure consciousness, the silent witness; that which is aware but is never itself an object. Purusha Suktaपुरुषसूक्त A hymn of the Rigveda (10.90) describing creation as the sacrifice of a cosmic being, Purusha, from whose mouth, arms, thighs, and feet the four varnas arise. It is the earliest scriptural source for the fourfold social model and belongs to the late strata of the Rigveda. purushakaraपुरुषकार Mediation or recommendation: in Sri Vaishnavism, Lakshmi's role as the compassionate intercessor who commends the soul to Vishnu. purusharthaपुरुषार्थ The legitimate aims of human life: dharma (right living), artha (prosperity), kama (pleasure) and moksha (liberation). Purushottamaपुरुषोत्तम The 'Supreme Person': in the Bhagavad Gita (15.16-18), the highest reality who is other than both the perishable and the imperishable selves, the Paramatman who enters and upholds the worlds. purvaपूर्व East; also before, prior, or in front. In Sanskrit the same word names the east and the front, so to face east is to face forward, and it is along this direction that a temple's brahmasutra is most often laid. pushkariniपुष्करिणी The sacred temple tank or stepped reservoir where pilgrims bathe before entering; the texts treat a water source as the first requirement of a temple site, and it makes the temple a tirtha in miniature. Pushpaka Vimanaपुष्पक विमान The 'flower-car,' the celestial flying chariot of the Ramayana; Kubera's craft, seized by Ravana and later flown by Rama and Sita from Lanka to Ayodhya. pustakaपुस्तक A book or manuscript; the Sanskrit word that gives the later term pothi.
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ragaराग Attachment or craving for pleasure; the third of the five kleshas. rahoyagaरहोयाग 'Secret worship'; the concealed, internal mode of Srividya practice transmitted only to those who have received diksha, as against the outward mahayaga. rahuराहु The ascending lunar node, the severed immortal head of the demon Svarbhanu; a 'shadow planet' of insatiable appetite, obsession and eclipse. rajasरजस् One of the three gunas: the quality of activity, passion, energy, movement and desire. When rajas predominates, there is drive, ambition and restlessness. It is the engine of action, but the Bhagavad Gita says it binds the soul through craving and attachment to the fruits of action. rakshasaराक्षस A class of demonic 'night-wanderers' who disturb the yajna; a category of beings in the epics ranked with the asura and against the deva, and not a single cosmic Devil. raktabijaरक्तबीज A demon in the Devi Mahatmya, each drop of whose spilled blood became a new demon, until the Goddess as Kali drank the blood before it could fall. rama-rajyaरामराज्य The reign of Rama: the ideal of perfectly just, prosperous and dharmic rule, invoked as a model of good government. Ramakrishna Mission The service-and-teaching order founded by Swami Vivekananda in 1897, named for his guru Ramakrishna, paired with the monastic Ramakrishna Math. rasaरस Literally 'taste' or 'essence'; the distilled emotional flavour a work of art evokes in classical Indian aesthetics. In devotional theology, notably Rupa Goswami's, rasa is the savour of loving relationship with God, devotion ripened into the relishing of the divine play (lila) from within, in one of the settled moods (bhavas). rasa-lilaरासलीला The circular night-dance of divine love between Krishna and the cowherd women (gopis), narrated in the tenth book of the Bhagavata Purana. rasa-shastraरसशास्त्र The Indian alchemical science of mercury (rasa) and metals - the systematic tradition of purifying, 'killing' and fixing mercury, minerals and metals into medicines (bhasmas) and, in its highest aim, into agents of bodily immortality. It bridges Tantra, Ayurveda and metallurgy. rasabhasaरसाभास The "semblance of rasa": a flavour gone wrong, an emotion aimed at an improper object or pitched in the wrong key (desire for another's spouse, say, or a one-sided love), which the trained connoisseur registers as a false note. The theory that aesthetic taste, like a scripture, can be counterfeited. rasayanaरसायन The 'path of rasa (essence/mercury)' - in Ayurveda, the branch devoted to rejuvenation, longevity and vitality; in the tantric-alchemical world, the science of transmuting body and metal alike toward a deathless state. One of the eight classical divisions of Ayurveda. rashiराशि A sign of the zodiac - one of the twelve thirty-degree divisions of the ecliptic. The rashis enter Indian astronomy with Hellenistic contact; they are absent from the Vedanga Jyotisha. Ratha Saptamiरथसप्तमी The seventh day of the bright fortnight of Magha, kept as Surya's turning or 'birthday', when devotees bathe at dawn and offer water to the sun. Ratha Yatra The chariot festival of Jagannath at Puri, when the deities leave the temple on three great chariots. recension A distinct branch or version of a text's tradition, such as the Northern and Southern recensions of the Mahabharata. rechakaरेचक Exhalation, the emptying of the breath; one of the three phases of pranayama with puraka and kumbhaka. rikऋच् A verse of praise, the basic unit of the Rigveda, whose name joins rik with veda. rinaऋण Debt; in the Veda the structural debts a person is born owing, to the sages, the gods and the ancestors, and the root of runanubandha. rina-trayaऋणत्रय The three debts a person is born owing, named in the Taittiriya Samhita: to the gods, repaid by sacrifice; to the sages, by study; and to the ancestors, by continuing the line and performing their rites. rinanubandhaऋणानुबन्ध See runanubandha: the karmic debt-bond carried between souls across births, from rina (debt) and anubandha (binding sequel). rishiऋषि A seer: one who, in the tradition, perceived the eternal Vedic sound rather than composing it. ritaऋत The Vedic principle of cosmic order: the truth-in-action by which the universe holds together rather than falling into chaos. It runs at once through the physical cosmos, the ritual, and the moral life; its opposite is anrita, and it is the direct ancestor of the later idea of dharma. Also written rta. ritam The Vedic principle of cosmic order, the true running of things, from which descend the words for season (ritu) and right conduct (dharma). rtaऋत The Vedic principle of cosmic order: the truth-in-action by which the universe holds together rather than falling into chaos. It runs at once through the physical cosmos, the ritual, and the moral life; its opposite is anrita, and it is the direct ancestor of the later idea of dharma. Rudraरुद्र The fierce Vedic god of storm and the wild, the 'howler', received in later tradition as a form and name of Shiva; the Mahamrityunjaya verse is addressed to him. rudrakshaरुद्राक्ष The dried seed of the Elaeocarpus tree, strung as a rosary in Shaiva practice; the name is read as Rudra's eye or Rudra's tear. runanubandhaऋणानुबन्ध The karmic debt-bond between souls: the idea that the people in one's life are bound by debts (rina) carried from past births, dissolving when the account is settled. Also spelled rinanubandha.
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sabijaसबीज 'With seed' absorption (samadhi), still resting on an object. Sadashivaसदाशिव The supreme, five-faced form of Shiva in the Shaiva Agamas, from whose faces the revealed scriptures are said to issue. saddarshanaषड्दर्शन The six orthodox schools of Hindu philosophy: Nyaya, Vaisheshika, Samkhya, Yoga, Purva Mimamsa and Vedanta. sade satiसाढ़ेसाती The 'seven and a half' years during which Saturn transits the sign before, the sign of, and the sign after a person's natal Moon; held in jyotisha to be a testing period of discipline and the ripening of karma. sadhakaसाधक A practitioner - one who undertakes sadhana, a disciplined spiritual practice, toward a defined goal (siddhi or liberation). In Tantra the sadhaka is the initiated aspirant who performs the rites, as distinct from the ordinary worshipper. sadhanaसाधना Disciplined spiritual practice undertaken to reach a goal; in Tantra, the structured worship of a deity through mantra, visualization and ritual, received from a guru. sadharanikaranaसाधारणीकरण "Universalisation": the de-personalising of emotion in aesthetic experience, first named by Bhatta Nayaka. On stage a grief is stripped of its owner and becomes grief as such, belonging to no one, so it can be tasted without being suffered. This is why weeping in a theatre does not wound. sadiसादि A school of Srividya whose mantra begins with the syllable sa, less widespread than the kadi and hadi traditions. sagunaसगुण "With qualities." Saguna Brahman is the same one reality approached as a personal God (Ishvara) with form, the absolute made approachable in a shape the senses and heart can reach. saguna Brahmanसगुण ब्रह्म Brahman, the Absolute, conceived with qualities and form: the one Reality turned toward the worshipper as a personal God who can be named, loved and addressed. The supreme deity of each stream of Hinduism is understood as saguna Brahman. sahasranamaसहस्रनाम A 'thousand names'; a hymn that praises a deity by reciting a thousand of their names, as in the Lalita Sahasranama central to Srividya. sahasraraसहस्रार The thousand-petalled lotus at the crown, where the ascending kundalini meets Shiva. The goal of the ascent in this system. sahridayaसहृदय "One who has a heart": the sensitive, cultivated spectator or reader capable of tasting rasa. For Abhinavagupta, aesthetic sensitivity (sahridayata) and spiritual sensibility are one capacity; the person who lacks it he calls ahridaya, heartless. sakama-karmaसकामकर्म Action performed with desire for its fruit, which binds; distinguished in the Gita from action offered without attachment, and the reason karma continues to accumulate. sakshiसाक्षी The witness; the sun as the all-seeing eye of the world that watches every deed, and, in Vedanta, a name for the witness-consciousness that observes all thought within. sakshinसाक्षिन् The witness: the atman as the unchanging observer of all experience, distinct from body and mind, untouched by what maya presents to it. samadhiसमाधि Absorption, the eighth and final limb of ashtanga yoga: the state in which the mind becomes wholly one with its object and, at its summit, rests in pure awareness. samanसामन् A melody or chant; the sung verse that gives the Samaveda its name. Samanadhikaranyaसामानाधिकरण्य 'Coordinate predication.' A rule of Sanskrit interpretation in which two different terms refer to one and the same locus through different aspects, as in 'the blue lotus.' Ramanuja uses it to read tat tvam asi: 'that' and 'thou' name the one Lord as world-cause and as inner Self, preserving both oneness and distinction. samavayaसमवाय Inherence: in Vaisheshika, the inseparable relation binding a quality to its substance, or a whole to its parts. samayaसमय In Srividya, the internal 'right' worship in which the goddess is adored within the subtle body (associated with Lakshmidhara's Samaya school), as distinct from the external Kaula path. Samhitaसंहिता The 'collection': the oldest layer of each Veda, the core body of hymns or ritual formulas. samketa Convention or agreement. In Nyaya, the relation between a word and its meaning is samketa, established by usage, against the Mimamsa position that the relation is eternal and not of human making. samkhyaसांख्य One of the six classical darshanas, the dualist system of purusha and prakriti whose metaphysics underlies Patanjali's yoga. sampradayaसम्प्रदाय A lineage of transmission: the chain of guru and disciple, entered through diksha, by which a tradition's teaching and authority are handed down. Its unbroken succession is its parampara. samsaraसंसार The cycle of birth, death and rebirth through which the self passes until liberation (moksha). samskaraसंस्कार A life-cycle rite of passage, such as birth, initiation, marriage or the funerary rites; the domestic samskaras are governed by the Grihya-sutras. samudra manthanसमुद्रमन्थन The churning of the cosmic ocean by gods and demons in search of the nectar of immortality, from which Lakshmi and many treasures arose. samudra manthana The churning of the ocean of milk by the gods and demons to obtain amrita, the nectar of immortality. samvaraसंवर In Jainism, the stopping of fresh karmic influx through restraint and ahimsa, halting the accumulation of karma. samvatsara A year in the Hindu calendar, named within a sixty-year cycle and reckoned in the panchanga from the masa and the tithi. samyamaसंयम The combined practice of concentration, meditation and absorption (dharana, dhyana, samadhi) upon a single object. samyuktaksharaसंयुक्ताक्षर A conjunct: two or more consonants joined into a single ligature with no vowel between them, a characteristic feature of Indian scripts and the reason Devanagari type was hard to cast. sanchitaसञ्चित The accumulated store of past karma not yet experienced. sandhiसन्धि The euphonic combination of sounds where words meet in Sanskrit; mastery of sandhi is central to reciting and analysing the Veda. sandhya Worship at the junctions of the day, dawn, noon, and dusk, including the recitation of the Gayatri. sangamसङ्गम A confluence of rivers, held especially sacred, such as the Triveni Sangam at Prayagraj. sanjivani vidyaसंजीवनी विद्या The knowledge that revives the dead, possessed by Shukra (Venus), teacher of the asuras; the reason the demons could be slain in battle and yet keep returning. sankalpaसंकल्प A resolve or formed intention, the vow stated before a Hindu ritual (naming the time, place, and purpose) and the short positive resolution planted in yoga nidra. An act of aligned will, not a demand on the world. Sankat Mochanसंकटमोचन 'Reliever of distress', a title of Hanuman; also the Varanasi temple traditionally founded by Tulsidas. The Chalisa is recited above all for the protection this title names. sankirtanaसङ्कीर्तन The communal singing or chanting of the divine names (nama-sankirtana), central to bhakti traditions such as Chaitanya's Gaudiya Vaishnavism; also called kirtan. sankranti The moment the sun enters a new sign of the zodiac; Makar Sankranti, the entry into Capricorn, is the most celebrated. sannyasaसंन्यास Renunciation; the formal giving up of household life for the pursuit of liberation. A sannyasi is one who has taken it. sannyasiसंन्यासी A renunciant who has entered sannyasa, the fourth and final stage of life, formally giving up home, possessions and social ties to seek liberation. Having 'died' to the world in a living funeral rite, a sannyasi is traditionally not cremated but buried or immersed in meditation posture. sannyasin A renunciant who has taken monastic vows (sannyasa); Vivekananda's status as a wandering monk. sant A poet-saint of the North Indian devotional tradition, drawing on both bhakti and Sufi currents, often beyond formal Hindu and Muslim boundaries; Kabir and Guru Nanak are examples. santoshaसन्तोष Contentment; one of the niyamas. sapindaसपिण्ड Close blood kin, reckoned on both the father's and mother's side out to a set number of generations, who share pinda (ancestral rice-offerings). Marriage between sapinda relatives is forbidden by the Dharmashastra and, unlike same-gotra marriage, is prohibited by the Hindu Marriage Act of 1955. sapindikaranaसपिण्डीकरण The rite, performed about the eleventh or twelfth day after death, by which the pinda of the newly dead is merged with those of the earlier ancestors, formally admitting the preta into the company of the pitris. Sapta Puriसप्तपुरी The seven sacred cities held to grant liberation: Ayodhya, Mathura, Maya (Haridwar), Kashi, Kanchi, Avantika (Ujjain) and Dvaraka. sapta-sindhu The 'seven rivers' of the Rigvedic homeland in the northwest of the subcontinent; the riverine heartland of the Vedic people. saptarishiसप्तर्षि The seven great sages, identified with the stars of the Great Bear (Ursa Major); mind-born sons of Brahma and keepers of dharma, re-appointed in each cosmic age (manvantara). sargaसर्ग Primary creation, the emergence of the cosmos; the first of the five marks (pancha-lakshana) of a Purana. sarpa-satraसर्पसत्र The 'snake sacrifice' of King Janamejaya, the setting at which the Mahabharata is recited by Vaishampayana in the epic's frame story. satसत् Being, existence, reality, that which truly is; related to satya, truth. In Vedanta, sat is the first term of sat-chit-ananda: the pure being that never ceases and never changes, on which all passing things depend for their existence. sat-chit-anandaसच्चिदानन्द 'Being-consciousness-bliss'; a later Vedantic formula describing the nature of Brahman. sat-vidyaसद्विद्या The teaching of Being in the sixth chapter of the Chandogya Upanishad, where Uddalaka Aruni shows his son Shvetaketu that all things arise from a single Being (sat), concluding with tat tvam asi. sati The practice of a widow's self-immolation on her husband's funeral pyre at his antyeshti, outlawed in Bengal in 1829 after a campaign led by Ram Mohan Roy. satkaryavadaसत्कार्यवाद The doctrine, central to Samkhya, that the effect pre-exists in its cause; creation is the manifestation of what was latent, not production from nothing. satsangaसत्सङ्ग The company of the good and the wise: keeping the society of the sincere and the realised, held to be the first rung toward non-attachment and liberation. sattvaसत्त्व One of the three gunas: the quality of purity, light, clarity, harmony and knowledge. When sattva predominates in the mind or in nature, there is calm, lucidity and goodness. It is the finest of the three, yet the Bhagavad Gita holds that even sattva binds the soul, through attachment to happiness and knowledge. sattvika-bhavaसात्त्विकभाव The involuntary bodily signs of feeling (trembling, tears, horripilation, change of voice) which cannot be feigned; the sattvika mode of abhinaya, and the surest evidence of genuine emotion. satyaसत्य Truthfulness; one of the yamas. satya-yugaसत्ययुग The first and best world-age, also called Krita Yuga, the age of truth when order is whole; the longest of the four yugas. Satyarth Prakash The Light of Truth, Dayananda Saraswati's principal Hindi treatise (1875), setting out the Arya Samaj's return-to-the-Vedas reform. satyasya satyamसत्यस्य सत्यम् "The real of the real," a name for Brahman given in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad after the method of neti neti. saubhagyaसौभाग्य Auspiciousness, good fortune and flourishing; the boon classically associated with Srividya, the worship of the goddess as shakti, and the name of one of its streams. savikalpakaसविकल्पक Determinate perception, the perception of an object as a thing of a certain kind ('this is a cow'), grasping the individual together with its real universal. Contrast *nirvikalpaka*. savitrसवितृ The Sun considered as the impeller, the one who sets things in motion; the deity addressed by the Gayatri (RV 3.62.10). setuसेतु A bridge or causeway; in the Ramayana, the stone-and-timber bridge built by Nala for Rama's army to cross to Lanka (Rama Setu, Adam's Bridge). sevakaसेवक A servant of the deity; the Gajapati kings of Puri rule as the 'first servant' of Jagannath. shabaraशाबर Primarily a register: a grade of rough, non-Sanskritic speech, so that mantras called śābara are mantras in barbarian tongue. The ethnic sense, the Śabara forest people, is a separate load later conflated with it; the derivation stays contested. shabdaशब्द Word or sound; as a means of valid knowledge, the reliable testimony (*apta-vachana*) of a trustworthy authority, which for the orthodox schools includes the Veda. shabda-brahmanशब्दब्रह्मन् Sound as the absolute; Brahman approached as, or through, sound. The conviction that the right sounds touch ultimate reality rather than merely labeling things. Shailaputriशैलपुत्री 'Daughter of the mountain' - the first of the nine forms of the Goddess worshipped across Navaratri, invoked on the opening night, and identified with Parvati. shaivaशैव Of the stream of Hinduism that worships Shiva as the supreme reality. Shaiva Siddhantaशैवसिद्धान्त The dualist, ritual-centred mainstream of tantric Shaivism, whose scriptural canon is the 28 Shaiva Agamas and whose theology turns on pati, pashu and pasha. Shaivismशैवसम्प्रदाय The stream of Hinduism that worships Shiva as the supreme reality, with its own Agamas, theologies from dualist Shaiva Siddhanta to non-dual Kashmir Shaivism, temples and saints. shakhaशाखा A 'branch': a recension or school of transmission of a Veda. Many shakhas once existed; most are now lost. Shaktaशाक्त Pertaining to Shakti; the tradition that worships the Goddess as the supreme reality and the active power of the divine. Shakta pithaशाक्तपीठ A 'seat' of the Goddess: a sacred site where, in the myth, a part of Sati's body fell when her corpse was scattered. Kamakhya in Assam is among the most important. Shaktiशक्ति Power, energy: the active, creative power of the divine, conceived as feminine and personified as the Goddess. Without Shakti, the tradition says, even Shiva is inert. shaktipatशक्तिपात The 'descent of power' - the transmission of awakened spiritual energy from a guru to a disciple, held to rouse the disciple's dormant kundalini. Given by touch, word, glance or will, it is understood in Kashmir Shaivism as anugraha (grace) and graded by intensity into nine degrees. Shaktismशाक्तसम्प्रदाय The stream of Hinduism that worships the Goddess, Shakti, as the supreme reality rather than a consort, articulated in the Devi Mahatmya and the Shakta tantras. shaligramaशालग्राम A naturally occurring fossil stone from the Gandaki river, worshipped as a self-manifest (svayambhu) form of Vishnu; needs no consecration. shalya-tantraशल्यतन्त्र Surgery - one of the eight limbs of Ayurveda, and the domain of the Sushruta Samhita. The name means 'the science of the arrow', an archaeology in a word: the discipline began on battlefields, extracting what had been shot into men. Shambhalaशम्भल The village where Kalki is prophesied to be born; in the Buddhist Kalachakra Tantra it is a hidden northern kingdom ruled by a line of Kalki kings. shambhavi mudraशाम्भवीमुद्रा A meditative seal: the gaze fixed toward the brow while the attention turns inward, aimed at the thought-free state the texts call unmani, the 'no-mind'. Named for Shambhu (Shiva). shanaishcharaशनैश्चर 'The slow-goer', the standard name of Shani (Saturn), the slowest-moving of the visible planets, taking about two and a half years to cross each sign. shandilya-vidyaशाण्डिल्यविद्या The meditation attributed to the sage Shandilya in the Chandogya Upanishad (3.14): "all this is Brahman," and the Self within the heart is that Brahman. shaniशनि Saturn among the Navagraha; the slow, cold, dark planet, son of Surya and Chhaya and elder brother of Yama, revered as the just judge who delivers the exact fruit of a person's karma. shankhaशङ्ख The conch, one of Vishnu's four emblems (named Panchajanya); its blast is the auspicious sound of beginning, read as kin to Om. shankuशङ्कु The gnomon, the upright rod whose shadow gives direction and time; the basic instrument of jyotisha and of temple orientation. shanta-rasaशान्तरस The ninth rasa, the flavour of peace, whose underlying emotion is shama (tranquillity) or nirveda (dispassion) and whose end is moksha. Defended by Abhinavagupta as the deepest of the rasas and likened to the string on which the other jewels are strung; the taste into which every other flavour finally resolves. shantiशान्ति Peace; the word repeated three times (shantih shantih shantih) to close a mantra or recitation and quiet the three orders of obstacle, within, around and beyond. sharanagatiशरणागति Taking refuge; total loving surrender to God's grace. In Sri Vaishnavism, the path of *prapatti* taught by Ramanuja, open to all. sharira-shaririशरीरशरीरि The 'body and its possessor' relation; Ramanuja's model of the souls and the world as the body of God. sharira-sharirinशरीरशरीरि Body and embodied self: Ramanuja's teaching that souls and matter are the real 'body' of Brahman, who is their indwelling self, distinct yet inseparable. shastraशास्त्र A treatise, or the systematic body of teaching on a subject, as in dharmashastra on law and duty or shilpashastra on craft. The word marks an ordered discipline with rules, as distinct from revelation itself. shastrarthaशास्त्रार्थ 'The meaning of the scriptures'; the tradition of formal public debate in which scholars or schools contended over a point of doctrine until one position prevailed. Kashi was its supreme arena. shatasahasriशतसाहस्री The 'hundred-thousand-verse' form: the traditional measure of the complete Mahabharata. shatka A hexad, a division of six. Used of the four great sections into which the Jayadrathayāmala is divided, each numbering some six thousand verses; the first ṣaṭka, the Śiraścheda, carries that tantra's classification of the scriptural seats. shatkarmaषट्कर्म The six cleansings of Hatha Yoga (such as neti, dhauti, nauli) that purify the body's passages before deeper practice. The same word also names a completely separate set of six: the six acts of tantric magic (shanti, vashya, stambhana, vidveshana, uchchatana, marana), treated in the article The Shatkarma. shauchaशौच Purity, inner and outer cleanliness; one of the niyamas. shava-sadhanaशवसाधना A tantric rite of the left-hand (vamachara) path performed while seated upon a corpse; in its interior sense the corpse is a mirror of the practitioner's own body and ego, and the discipline aims at conquering the fear of death and the reflex of disgust. shekhari A Nagara spire whose central tower is clustered with subsidiary half-spires. Sheshaशेष The remainder or remnant; what is left when all else is accounted for. Distinct in tone from the polluting ucchishta, it names the residual as the irreducible ground, as in Ananta-Shesha, the cosmic serpent of endless remainder. shikharaशिखर The tower over a temple sanctum; in Nagara (North Indian) style the whole curvilinear tower, in Dravida style only its domed crown. shikshaशिक्षा The Vedanga of phonetics: the science of correct articulation, pitch accent and duration of Vedic sounds; one of the earliest systematic treatments of speech sounds anywhere. shlokaश्लोक The anushtubh couplet of four eight-syllable feet, the standard verse of the Sanskrit epics; in the Ramayana it is born from the sage's shoka, grief. shmashanaश्मशान The cremation ground, the archetypal site of fierce-goddess Tantric practice, where death is confronted directly as a means to liberation. shodashiषोडशी The sixteen-syllable mantra of Srividya, the panchadashi extended by a secret final syllable; also a name of the goddess. shodashopacharaषोडशोपचार The sixteen-service form of puja, the most complete common ordering of offerings made to a deity. From shodasha (sixteen) and upachara (service). shokaशोक Grief; the emotion that, in the Ramayana's account of its own origin, poured out of Valmiki as the first shloka, the pun shoka-into-shloka marking the birth of poetry. Shraddhaश्रद्धा Faith, in the sense of earnest trust and seriousness rather than mere belief; the settled confidence that lets a person commit wholly to a guru's teaching, and the ground on which bhakti rests. (Distinct from the rite for the departed.) shrautaश्रौत Pertaining to shruti; the solemn, public Vedic rites prescribed by the revealed texts, as distinct from domestic or tantric ritual. shrauta-sutraश्रौतसूत्र The class of Kalpa-sutra that lays out the great solemn Vedic sacrifices, the shrauta rites requiring the three sacred fires. shravanaश्रावण Shravana is the fifth lunar month, roughly July–August, sacred to Shiva. It carries Raksha Bandhan and Nag Panchami, and Mondays in it are kept as fasts. shreyasश्रेयस् The good, the truly beneficial, set against preyas, the merely pleasant, in the Katha Upanishad (1.2). The wise discern the two and choose shreyas; the foolish chase preyas and miss the end. shriश्री Auspiciousness, radiance, flourishing and well-being; the quality personified as the goddess Shri-Lakshmi, of which material wealth is the outer layer. shrotriya A brahmin learned in the Veda, one who has studied a recension and can recite it. The Natyashastra assigns Sanskrit on stage to shrotriyas, alongside sages and Buddhist monks. shrutiश्रुति 'That which is heard': the revealed, authorless Veda, the highest category of Hindu scripture, including the Samhitas, Brahmanas, Aranyakas, and Upanishads. shuddhadvaitaशुद्धाद्वैत Pure non-dualism: the Vedanta of Vallabha, in which the world is a real manifestation of Brahman and not illusory. shuddhi Purification; the Arya Samaj rite of reconversion, reclaiming into the Hindu fold those who had converted to other faiths. shudraशूद्र The fourth of the four varnas in the classical social scheme, charged in the law-books with serving the other three; the texts' treatment of the shudra is among their most contested matter. shukanasaशुकनास 'Parrot's beak'; the ornamental projection over the sanctum doorway, springing from the base of the tower above the vestibule of a Hindu temple. shukla paksha The bright paksha of the lunar month, when the moon waxes from amavasya to purnima. shukla-karmaशुक्लकर्म White, or wholesome, karma that yields pleasant fruit (Yoga Sutra 4.7). shulba-sutraशुल्बसूत्र The class of Kalpa-sutra giving the geometry of altar construction; shulba means 'cord', the measuring line of the altar-builder. They contain the earliest extant verbal statement of the so-called Pythagorean theorem. shunyaशून्य Zero, or the void; used by Pingala as a marker within his enumeration of metres, one of the earliest appearances of zero as a symbol. shyamaश्याम Dark, dusky, blue-black; the standard word for the complexion of Krishna and Rama. The epithet shyama-sundara, 'the dark and beautiful one,' is common for Krishna. shyenaश्येन The 'hawk' sacrifice, a Vedic rite performed to kill an enemy. The Mimamsa verdict on it, that it is effective yet must not be performed, is the tradition's oldest argument that a means can work and still be forbidden. siddhaसिद्ध A “perfected one”; an adept who has attained spiritual power (siddhi) or the perfected body, as in the eighty-four Siddhas of the Nāth and tantric traditions. siddhiसिद्धि An attainment or yogic power; in Tantra, often a power gained through practice. sindoorसिंदूर The red vermilion powder a married Hindu woman traditionally wears in the parting of her hair, a mark of her married status and of auspiciousness. It is close kin to the red kumkum bindi worn at the brow. skandaस्कन्द A name of Murugan/Kartikeya, the war-god and general of the gods, born of Shiva's fiery seed to slay the demon Taraka/Surapadma. skandhaस्कन्ध A 'book' or canto; the Bhagavata Purana is arranged in twelve skandhas. smartaस्मार्त Of the Smarta tradition, which honours several principal deities together as forms of one brahman, associated with the five-deity (panchayatana) worship. smritiस्मृति 'That which is remembered': the body of texts of human authorship (epics, Puranas, Dharmashastras, the Gita), ranked below shruti and deriving its authority from it. sohamसोऽहम् 'I am That': the breath-mantra heard on the in-breath, identifying the individual self with the absolute; reversed it is hamsa, 'the swan'. somaसोम The sacred plant of Vedic ritual and the pressed juice offered in the great sacrifices, also deified as a god. Spandaस्पन्द 'Vibration, throb.' In Kashmir Shaivism, the subtle pulse by which the one consciousness stirs within itself and appears as a world without ceasing to be one. sphotaस्फोट Bhartrihari's theory that the meaning of a word bursts forth as an indivisible whole, grasped in a single flash, rather than being assembled from a sequence of varna; the meaning-bearing aspect of shabda. Sri Chakraश्रीचक्र The Sri Yantra: the diagram of nine interlocking triangles radiating from a central point, the aniconic form of Tripura Sundari and the central figure of Sri Vidya. Sri Vidyaश्रीविद्या The esoteric Shakta tradition of the benign goddess Tripurasundari, centred on her mantra and the Srichakra; the heart of the Srikula stream. Srichakraश्रीचक्र The great yantra of Sri Vidya, nine interlocking triangles radiating from a central point or bindu, a diagram of the goddess and the cosmos. Srikulaश्रीकुल The 'family of Sri', the stream of Shakta Tantra centred on Tripura Sundari and Sri Vidya, which treats her as the supreme Goddess. Paired with the Kalikula. sriphalaश्रीफल 'Sacred fruit,' from shri (splendour, or the goddess of fortune) and phala (fruit). In the classical lexicons the name belongs first to the bilva (bael) fruit sacred to Shiva, and it was extended to the coconut as a pure gift fit to offer a deity. srotasस्रोतस् A stream or current of revelation. Shaiva scripture divides itself into five srotas said to issue from the five faces of Sadashiva; the classification is internal to the Shaiva canon and has no Saura member. stambhanaस्तम्भन The power of stilling, stunning or paralysing; one of the six acts of tantric magic, the special domain of the Mahavidya Bagalamukhi. Inwardly, the arresting of restless speech and mind. stemma The 'family tree' of manuscripts, showing which copies descend from which, used to reconstruct an earlier text in a critical edition. sthalaस्थल A sacred place or shrine-site; as in the Pancha Bhuta Sthalam, the 'five element places', or sthala-purana, the legend of a sacred site. sthala-puranaस्थलपुराण A 'site Purana'; a local text telling the sacred legend of a particular temple or holy place, very numerous especially in South India. sthapatiस्थपति The master temple architect who designs and directs construction according to the shastras. sthayi-bhavaस्थायिभाव The stable or durable underlying emotion that a rasa is the perfected, tasted form of. Bharata names eight (love, mirth, grief, anger, energy, fear, disgust, wonder); each is the permanent mood that lives latent in every heart and is drawn out by a performance into its corresponding flavour. sthula-shariraस्थूलशरीर The gross physical body, the coarsest of the three bodies in Vedanta. It is the frame that eats, breathes, and dies. stotraस्तोत्र A hymn of praise to a deity; the Hanuman Chalisa is a stotra rather than a mantra in the technical sense. substratum In historical linguistics, the traces left in a language by an earlier language whose speakers shifted to it. Structural features, rather than vocabulary alone, are the usual evidence, since structure travels only under sustained contact. sudarshana chakraसुदर्शन Vishnu's discus, the spinning wheel of fire; his chief weapon, read as the wheel of time and the restless mind. Sufi A practitioner of Islamic mysticism; in India the Sufi orders became major channels of devotional culture and of the meeting between Islam and Hindu bhakti. sukshma shariraसूक्ष्म शरीर The subtle body, woven of breath, mind and the channels, distinct from the gross physical body (sthula sharira) and the causal body (karana sharira); the chakras belong to it. sulh-i-kul Peace with all; the Mughal emperor Akbar's principle of universal civility and toleration across faiths. suprabhatamसुप्रभातम् A 'good dawn' hymn sung to wake a devata at the opening of the temple day; a stotra genre of which the Venkatesha Suprabhatam is the most famous. Suryaसूर्य The sun, and the sun god; among the oldest deities of the Veda, the visible god (pratyaksha devata), the eye of the world, and the one saluted in Surya Namaskar. suryavamshaसूर्यवंश The Solar dynasty, the royal line descended from Surya through Manu and Ikshvaku, to which Rama belongs. sushumnaसुषुम्ना The central channel along the spinal axis, through which prana and the awakened kundalini are said to rise. sushuptiसुषुप्ति Deep dreamless sleep, awareness without objects; the third of the four states in the Mandukya Upanishad, mapped to the sound M of OM. sutaसूत A bard of the charioteer-storyteller caste; the suta reciters were the oral transmitters of the epics, and the Mahabharata frames itself as told by the suta Ugrashravas. sutraसूत्र A maximally compressed aphoristic statement, and the terse compositional style in which the Vedangas and much early Sanskrit learning were composed. sva-dharmaस्वधर्म One's own duty, proper to one's nature and station, which the Bhagavad Gita ranks above performing another's duty well. svabhavaस्वभाव Inherent nature; one of the rival causes of things weighed in Svetashvatara Upanishad 1.2. svadhishthanaस्वाधिष्ठान The second chakra, at the root of the genitals. Six petals, element water, seed-syllable Vam. svadhyayaस्वाध्याय Self-study and the study of sacred texts; one of the niyamas. svapnaस्वप्न The dream state, aware of inner impressions; the second of the four states in the Mandukya Upanishad, mapped to the sound U of OM. svaraस्वर Pitch accent in Vedic recitation, traditionally of three kinds: udatta (raised), anudatta (lowered) and svarita (a gliding combination of the two). svarbhanuस्वर्भानु The demon who drank the nectar of immortality in disguise and was beheaded by Vishnu; his immortal head became Rahu and his body Ketu, the two eclipse-nodes. Svargaस्वर्ग The heavenly realms, where good karma is rewarded with delight. In Hindu cosmology svarga is real but temporary: once the store of merit is spent, the soul returns to rebirth. The Bhagavad Gita says those who reach heaven return to the mortal world when their merit is exhausted. svasthaस्वस्थ 'Established in oneself' - the Ayurvedic word for health. Sushruta's definition (Sutrasthana 15.41) requires balanced doshas, agni and tissues, and ends with a mind, senses and self that are content. svatah-pramanyaस्वतःप्रामाण्य The Mimamsa doctrine that a cognition is valid in and of itself, true until and unless it is defeated, rather than needing any external certification. svatantraस्वतन्त्र 'Independent', in Madhva's Dvaita, the defining attribute of God (Vishnu), who alone exists in his own right; everything else is paratantra ('dependent'), deriving its being and nature wholly from him. Svatantryaस्वातन्त्र्य 'Absolute freedom, autonomy.' The master concept of Kashmir Shaivism: consciousness (Shiva) depends on nothing and is bound by nothing, and by its own freedom it appears as the entire universe without ceasing to be one. The world is the play of this freedom, not a fall or an illusion. svayambhuस्वयम्भू Self-manifest, self-arisen; said of an image or linga held by the tradition to have appeared on its own rather than been carved and installed. svayamprakashaस्वयंप्रकाश 'Self-luminous': the Vedantic description of consciousness (chit) as the light by which everything is known but which is itself never lit by another light and never becomes an object, because it is always the knower. swastikaस्वस्तिक An ancient auspicious symbol named from svasti, well-being; drawn at thresholds and beginnings for good fortune. Entirely distinct from the later Nazi Hakenkreuz.
T
tad ekamतदेकम् "That One"; the impersonal singular principle that, in the Nasadiya Sukta (Rigveda 10.129), breathed windless by its own power before being, non-being, and the gods. Often read forward as a seed of the non-dual Brahman. tadbhava Literally 'arisen from that'. A word of Sanskrit origin assimilated to the sound patterns of the borrowing language, as against a tatsama, which is taken over unchanged. taijasaतैजस In the Mandukya Upanishad, the dreaming state, the second quarter of the Self, cognisant of inner impressions. tala-patraतालपत्र The prepared palm leaf used as a writing surface, dominant in southern and eastern India, where text was incised with a stylus and then darkened with soot. talamanaतालमान A system of proportional measurement keyed to the tala, a face- or palm-length, used especially for a murti, as the ayadi-shadvarga governs a building. tamalaतमाल A dark-barked tree, used in poetry as a stock simile for Krishna's dark complexion, notably in Jayadeva's Gita Govinda. tamasतमस् One of the three gunas: the quality of inertia, heaviness, darkness, dullness and delusion. When tamas predominates, there is sleep, sloth and confusion; but it is also the principle of rest, stability and form. It binds the soul, the Bhagavad Gita says, through heedlessness, laziness and sleep. tandavaताण्डव The vigorous cosmic dance of Shiva; the Ananda Tandava, the dance of bliss, is the pose of the Nataraja bronze. tanmatraतन्मात्र A subtle sense-element corresponding to an element: smell, taste, sight, touch and sound, mapped onto the lower five chakras in the classical system. tantraतन्त्र A major stream of revealed scripture and practice, the Tantras and Agamas, that treats the whole world as the play of one divine consciousness. From tan (to weave, stretch, extend) plus the instrumental suffix -tra, 'that which extends [knowledge]'; the word names both the body of texts and the esoteric path of mantra, yantra and initiation they set out. tantra-mantra The trade and colloquial label for magical ritual: the name of a numbered department in a Bombay press catalogue, a word many Hindus now use to dismiss what they deny is Tantra, and a term written into Indian anti-witchcraft statutes. Tantralokaतन्त्रालोक 'Light on the tantras'; Abhinavagupta's encyclopedic synthesis of the Trika in 37 chapters, the central work of the non-dual Shaivism of Kashmir, preserved for us largely by Jayaratha's commentary. tapasतपस् Austerity, disciplined and sometimes ascetic effort; one of the niyamas. tarakaतारक The 'ferryboat' or crossing mantra that Shiva is said to whisper to the dying at Kashi, carrying the soul across the ocean of rebirth (from the root tṛ, 'to cross'); the tradition fixes its saving function, while its exact wording varies, most often given as the name of Rama and sometimes as Om. taraka-mantraतारकमन्त्र The 'ferryboat' or crossing-over mantra that, by tradition, Shiva whispers into the ear of those who die in Kashi, carrying the soul across the ocean of rebirth to liberation. taratamyaतारतम्य 'Gradation', the doctrine, distinctive of Madhva's Dvaita, that souls are eternally graded in a hierarchy of intrinsic capacity and worth, a ranking that persists even in liberation (where each soul enjoys bliss according to its nature). tarpanaतर्पण A libation; the offering of liquid to satisfy a deity, ancestor, or the powers of a yantra. tat tvam asiतत्त्वमसि "That thou art," one of the four great sayings (mahavakyas) of Vedanta. It comes from the Chandogya Upanishad (6.8.7), where the sage Uddalaka repeats it to his son Shvetaketu, teaching that the self within (atman) is one with the ultimate reality (Brahman). tatsama Literally 'same as that'. A Sanskrit word taken over into another Indian language unchanged in form. Contrasted with tadbhava. The pair describes borrowing, which is a different relationship from descent. tattvaतत्त्व A principle or category of reality; in Samkhya, one of the twenty-five constituents of existence. tattva-jnanaतत्त्वज्ञान True knowledge of reality as it is; in Nyaya the knowledge that destroys false cognition and, with it, the chain of suffering, yielding release (*apavarga*). tejasतेजस् Radiant energy or splendour; in the Devi Mahatmya, the combined energy of the gods that fuses into the goddess Durga. Tevaramதேவாரம் The body of Tamil devotional hymns to Shiva composed by the Nayanar saints Appar, Sambandar and Sundarar (7th-9th c.). Recovered and compiled under Chola patronage, it became the core of the Tirumurai, the Tamil Shaiva canon, honoured as the 'Tamil Veda'. Theyyamതെയ്യം A living ritual performance of northern Kerala in which a costumed, painted performer becomes possessed by a deity, hero or deified ancestor and is worshipped as that being, giving blessings and answering questions in the god's own voice, the divine retinue embodied rather than merely described. tikaटीका A commentary on a root text, lighter than a full bhashya; the named ṭīkā tradition on the Rāmcaritmānas is collated verse by verse in Mānas-pīyūṣa. In the bazaar-press editions a tika is a Hindi commentary printed under the Devanagari of the original. tikakaraटीकाकार The author of a tika, a commentator. The Hindi tikakaras of the Banaras and Bombay presses, among them Jvalaprasad Mishra and Baladevaprasad Mishra, were trained in Sanskrit and wrote for readers who were not. tilakaतिलक A devotional and sectarian mark worn on the forehead at the brow, in bhasma, sandalwood or red powder, marking the wearer's sampradaya and devotion. tinai The landscape convention of Sangam Tamil poetry, in which five ecological zones, the mountain, forest, farmland, seashore and wasteland, each carry a fixed emotional register, so that naming a place also names a state of feeling. tirthaतीर्थ A 'crossing-place', a sacred site (often a river or shrine) where pilgrimage (tirtha-yatra) is made. Tirthankaraतीर्थंकर In Jainism, a 'ford-maker', a supreme enlightened teacher who shows the way across the ocean of rebirth; two of the twenty-four tirthankaras of this age are held to have been born in Kashi. Tirumurai The twelve-book canon of Tamil Shaiva devotional literature, gathering the hymns of the Nayanars. tithiतिथि A lunar day, one thirtieth of a synodic lunar month; the basic unit of the Hindu lunar calendar, reckoned in the panchanga alongside the nakshatra and the paksha. Tolkappiyam The oldest extant Tamil grammar and treatise on poetics, the foundation of classical Tamil literary culture. trailokyaत्रैलोक्य The three worlds of the older Vedic scheme: earth, mid-air, and heaven, named by the three vyāhṛtis bhūr, bhuvaḥ, svaḥ. Later expanded into the fourteen lokas. Traiyambaka-homaत्र्यम्बकहोम The Vedic rite of offering cakes to Rudra the Tryambaka (Yajurveda), in which the verse now known as the Mahamrityunjaya Mantra is embedded. treta-yugaत्रेतायुग The second world-age, in which dharma has begun to decline from its wholeness in the Satya Yuga. trichaतृच A group of three Rigvedic verses treated as a single liturgical unit. The Sun's tricha is Rigveda 1.50.11 to 13. tridashaत्रिदश 'The thirty', a common designation for the gods as a collective, derived from the classical count of thirty-three (eight Vasus, eleven Rudras, twelve Adityas, and two more). trideviत्रिदेवी The three great goddesses: Saraswati (knowledge), Lakshmi (wealth) and Parvati (power), feminine counterparts of the Trimurti. trigunasत्रिगुण The three gunas taken together: sattva, rajas and tamas, the three fundamental qualities that make up all of material nature (prakriti) in Samkhya and the Bhagavad Gita. trikaत्रिक The 'triad'; the non-dual Shaiva tradition of Kashmir, named for its threefold structures (Shiva-Shakti-soul, and the three goddesses Para, Parapara, Apara). Trikonaत्रिकोण The triangle of tantric geometry; the downward triangle signifies Shakti and the source-womb of manifestation, and interlocked with its upward opposite it figures the union of Shiva and Shakti. trimuniत्रिमुनि The 'three sages' of Sanskrit grammar, Panini, Katyayana and Patanjali, whose sutra, varttika and bhashya together form the authority of the tradition. trimurtiत्रिमूर्ति The triad of Brahma the creator, Vishnu the preserver, and Shiva the destroyer; a later schematization that is not found in the Vedas. tripundraत्रिपुण्ड्र The three horizontal lines of sacred ash worn across the forehead by Shaivas, carrying layered meanings (the three fires, gunas, or syllables of Om). Tripuraत्रिपुर The mythic 'triple city' of the asuras (three flying fortresses of gold, silver and iron), destroyed by Shiva (Tripurantaka) with a single arrow. tripura sundariत्रिपुरसुन्दरी The Beautiful Goddess of the Three Cities, also called Lalita or Rajarajeshvari; the supreme deity of the Sri Vidya tradition, worshipped through the Sri Yantra and the Lalita Sahasranama. She is counted among the ten Mahavidyas. trishtubhत्रिष्टुभ् A Vedic metre of forty-four syllables, in four lines of eleven; the single most frequent metre in the Rigveda. trishulaत्रिशूल The trident, Shiva's chief weapon, read in the tradition as the three strands of nature or the three cosmic functions. Tristhaliत्रिस्थली The 'three places', Prayag, Kashi and Gaya, the classic pilgrimage circuit for the rites of the dead; tradition assigns Gaya to redeem the ancestors, Prayag for merit, and Kashi for liberation. trivargaत्रिवर्ग The 'group of three': the three worldly aims of human life, dharma, artha and kama. It is the older scheme that the fourth aim, moksha, was later added to, making the chaturvarga. Triveni Sangam The confluence at Prayagraj of the Ganga, the Yamuna, and the invisible Sarasvati; a major pilgrimage and bathing site. trivikramaत्रिविक्रम 'He of the three strides'; Vishnu as the dwarf Vamana who crossed the three worlds in three steps. The name carries the Vamana avatar into the Vishnu Sahasranama. Tryambakaत्र्यम्बक 'The three-eyed' (or, in the older Vedic sense, 'three-mothered') one; an epithet of Rudra, later Shiva, the deity addressed in the Mahamrityunjaya Mantra. turiyaतुरीय "The fourth"; the awareness beyond waking, dream, and dreamless deep sleep, identified in the Mandukya Upanishad with the silence after A-U-M. turushka Sanskrit for 'Turk', the term medieval Hindu inscriptions most often used for the Muslim armies and rulers arriving from the northwest, identifying them by ethnicity rather than by religion. The historian B.D. Chattopadhyaya cites it as evidence that early medieval Hindus saw the newcomers as one more foreign people, not as a single religious enemy.
U
ucchishtaउच्छिष्ट Leftover or ritually 'polluted' food, normally taboo; deliberately offered to the Mahavidya Matangi as a teaching that the sacred is found beyond purity boundaries. uchchatanaउच्चाटन Eradication or uprooting; one of the six acts of tantric magic, the driving of a person away from their place. Counted among the destructive 'black' acts the texts restrict. udgatarउद्गातृ The priest of the Samaveda who sings the chants (saman) during the Vedic sacrifice. udgithaउद्गीथ The loud, high chant of the udgatr priest of the Samaveda, identified with Om; the 'essence of essences' in the Chandogya Upanishad. Umaउमा A name of Parvati, and the name under which she first appears in Sanskrit literature - as Uma Haimavati in the Kena Upanishad, where she teaches the gods that their victory was Brahman's and not their own. unmaniउन्मनी The thought-free, 'no-mind' state of absorption aimed at by shambhavi and the other laya seals of hatha yoga; a synonym of manonmani. upadhiउपाधि A limiting adjunct; in Advaita, the conditions that make the one Self appear as many separate selves. upamanaउपमान Comparison or analogy; the Nyaya means of valid knowledge by which an unfamiliar thing is identified from a likeness previously described. upamshuउपांशु Whispered or muttered mantra repetition, pitched so low that no one beside the practitioner can make it out. upanayanaउपनयन The initiation rite at which a boy receives the sacred thread and begins Vedic study, one of the central life-cycle samskaras. upanishadउपनिषद् The closing layer of the Veda, the texts of knowledge (jnana-kanda) on which Vedanta is built. The word is popularly read as 'sitting down near' a teacher; Olivelle argues its oldest sense is a hidden connection, and Shankara read it as the knowledge that destroys ignorance. upapuranaउपपुराण A 'lesser Purana'; the secondary Puranas, traditionally eighteen, beside the eighteen great Mahapuranas. upayaउपाय 'Means' or method to liberation. Non-dual Kashmir Shaivism grades the means to the capacity of the aspirant: anupaya (the means-less, sudden recognition), shambhavopaya (through pure awareness/will), shaktopaya (through energy, thought and mantra) and anavopaya (through breath, body and concentration). Most of the Vijnana Bhairava's techniques are shakta and anava means. urdhva-pundraऊर्ध्वपुण्ड्र The vertical U- or Y-shaped forehead mark worn by Vaishnavas, usually in sandalwood or pale clay. urushringaउरुशृङ्ग A subsidiary half-spire engaged against the main shikhara of a Nagara temple. urvarukaउर्वारुक A ripe cucumber or gourd that falls from its stalk of its own accord; the image at the heart of the Mahamrityunjaya Mantra for an un-clinging release from death. utkilanaउत्कीलन The unpinning or unlocking of a mantra, named as the counterpart of its having been pinned. In the Purāṇic passages reached, the word is scoped to one particular named formula rather than to mantra as such. utsava-murtiउत्सवमूर्ति The 'festival image': the portable (usually bronze) form of a temple deity, carried out of the sanctum in procession during festivals, as distinct from the fixed stone image (mula-murti) in the shrine. The Chola lost-wax bronzes, including the Nataraja, are the supreme examples. uttaravahiniउत्तरवाहिनी 'North-flowing'; the auspicious stretch where the Ganga, which crosses the plains flowing broadly eastward, bends back toward the north along the Kashi waterfront. uttarayana The sun's northward course, the auspicious half of the year, ritually begun at Makar Sankranti.
V
vacaवाचा Speech, the spoken word, utterance. The Hindī form stays inside the Sanskrit range of vāc, the oldest and most sacrally loaded noun for saying that the tradition has, and it recurs densely across the printed Śābara compilations. vachanaವಚನ A form of short, pithy free-verse devotional poem in Kannada, composed by the 12th-century Virashaiva (Lingayat) saints such as Basava and Akka Mahadevi, often sharply critical of temple ritual and caste. vahanaवाहन The animal mount of a deity (Nandi the bull for Shiva, Garuda for Vishnu, the lion for Durga), which both identifies and characterises the god. Vaikhanasaवैखानस The older, Vedic-affiliated Vaishnava temple tradition, entered by birth and using only Vedic mantras; the counterpart and rival to the Pancharatra. vaikhariवैखरी Mantra repetition spoken aloud, the audible level of japa that can be heard from across a room. Also called vachika. Vaikunthaवैकुण्ठ The eternal, luminous heaven of Vishnu, home of his never-fallen attendants (the nitya-suris) and, in Sri Vaishnava theology, the 'eternal domain' (nitya-vibhuti) of the Lord's presence. vairagyaवैराग्य Dispassion, the loosening of craving for objects seen and unseen; with abhyasa, one of the two pillars of practice in the Yoga Sutras. vaishakhaवैशाख Vaishakha is the second lunar month, roughly April–May. It carries Akshaya Tritiya, Buddha Purnima, and Narasimha Jayanti. vaishamyaवैषम्य Partiality or inequality; the charge, answered in Brahma Sutra 2.1.34, that God is unfair in creating a world of unequal fortunes. vaishnavaवैष्णव Of the stream of Hinduism that worships Vishnu, and his forms such as Rama and Krishna, as the supreme reality. Vaishnavismवैष्णवसम्प्रदाय The stream of Hinduism that worships Vishnu and his avatars, chiefly Rama and Krishna, centred on bhakti and shaped by the Alvars and the acharyas. vaishvanaraवैश्वानर In the Mandukya Upanishad, the waking state, the first of the four quarters of the Self, cognisant of the outer world. Vaishyaवैश्य The third varna: the class of farmers, herders, artisans, and traders, responsible for producing and circulating wealth. Together with Brahmins and Kshatriyas, Vaishyas are counted among the 'twice-born' varnas in the classical scheme. vakवाच् Speech, the spoken word, voice. In the Rigveda she is a goddess, Vak, who speaks in the first person in the Devi Sukta (RV 10.125). valliवल्ली "Creeper"; the name for a chapter or section in the Taittiriya and Katha Upanishads, as in Shiksha Valli and Ananda Valli. vamacharaवामाचार The 'left-hand' path of tantra, which uses the five m's (panchamakara) literally in ritual. vamshaवंश Genealogy; the lines of descent of gods and sages, the third of a Purana's five marks. vamshanucharitaवंशानुचरित The genealogies and deeds of the royal dynasties (solar and lunar), the fifth of a Purana's five marks. vanaprasthaवानप्रस्थ The third of the four ashramas, the stage of the forest-dweller who withdraws from household life toward renunciation. vanaraवानर A forest being pictured as a monkey; the vanaras, led by Sugriva and Hanuman, are Rama's allies in the war against Ravana. varada mudraवरदमुद्रा The gesture of boon-giving and charity (dana): the downturned hand, palm outward and fingers pointing to the earth. On a standing deity it commonly pairs with abhaya, the lower left hand giving the boon while the lower right removes fear. Varkariवारकरी The devotional tradition of Maharashtra centred on the god Vithoba of Pandharpur, whose pilgrim-devotees walk to his shrine; its poet-saints include Jnaneshwar, Namdev, Eknath and Tukaram. varnaवर्ण The fourfold ordering of society in the classical texts (Brahmana, Kshatriya, Vaishya, Shudra); an idealised scheme distinct from lived caste (jati) and much contested. Varna-sankaraवर्णसंकर 'The mixing or confusion of varnas.' In the Bhagavad Gita, Arjuna fears that war will cause varna-sankara and social breakdown. The term is central to debates over whether classical texts endorse a rigid hereditary order or merely assume the society of their time. varnamalaवर्णमाला The 'garland of sounds': the ordered inventory of the speech-sounds of Sanskrit, each varna an akshara arranged by the place and manner of its articulation. varttikaवार्त्तिक A critical note that corrects, supplements or refines a grammatical rule; the genre of Katyayana's commentary on Panini, standing between the rule and the fuller bhashya. Varuna The Vedic guardian of rita, the cosmic order, and of the waters; prominent in the early Veda and fading in later layers. vasanaवासना A latent tendency or drive formed from the accumulation of past impressions (samskaras), inclining a person toward certain desires and acts. vasant-panchamiवसन्त पञ्चमी Saraswati's chief festival in late winter, the traditional day for a child's first writing of letters (vidyarambha). vashatkaraवषट्कार The ritual exclamation vashat, uttered as an oblation is given into the fire, the sound that releases the offering to the gods. As the third name of the Vishnu Sahasranama it identifies the sacred utterance itself with God. vashikaranवशीकरण Subjugation; one of the six acts (shatkarma), the bending of another's will to one's own. Classed within the tradition as lower and dangerous magic; the modern 'vashikaran specialist' trade that sells it as love magic is largely commercial fraud. vastu-purusha-mandalaवास्तुपुरुषमण्डल The gridded 'cosmic man' diagram that underlies the ground plan of a Hindu temple. Vasuवसु One of the eight Vasus, the Vedic class of elemental deities (of earth, water, fire, wind, sky, sun, moon and stars); one of the three great classes that make up the thirty-three gods. Vasudevaवासुदेव Krishna as son of Vasudeva, and an early name under which his worship is attested, as on the Heliodorus pillar of c. 113 BCE. Vasukiवासुकि A great serpent-king (naga), used by the gods and demons as the rope wound around Mount Mandara in the churning of the ocean of milk. Often depicted coiled around Shiva's neck. vataवात The bodily dosha of air and space, the principle of movement: breath and prana, circulation, nerve impulse, elimination. Its disturbance is classically read as the root of the widest range of disorders. vayuवायु "Wind." One of the five functional currents of prana in the body: prana, apana, samana, udana, and vyana, each with its own direction and work. vedangaवेदाङ्ग The six 'limbs of the Veda', auxiliary sciences that preserve and apply it: Shiksha (phonetics), Chandas (metre), Vyakarana (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Kalpa (ritual) and Jyotisha (astronomy/timekeeping). Vedanta The end of the Veda; the family of philosophies based on the Upanishads, Brahma Sutras, and Bhagavad Gita, central to modern presentations of Hinduism. vediवेदि The sacrificial altar or marked-out ritual ground; the precise shapes and areas of the vedi are the subject of the Shulba-sutras. velவேல் The leaf-bladed divine spear of Murugan, given by Parvati; his central emblem, read as piercing divine knowledge that destroys ignorance. vesaraवेसर A hybrid style of Hindu temple architecture that blends the northern Nagara and southern Dravida forms. It flourished in the Deccan under the Chalukyas and Hoysalas, marked by star-shaped plans and intricately layered towers. vetalaवेताल A spirit that animates a corpse, a haunter of the cremation ground ranked with the pisacha and the rakshasa; the narrator of the Vetala-panchavimshati. vibhashaविभाषा One of the rough dialects of the classical stage. The Nāṭyaśāstra at 17.49 lists seven of them by the peoples they belong to, the Śabara speech among them, and Dvivedī reads the list as one of literary registers a poet or dramatist may write in. vibhavaविभाव The determinants in the rasa-sutra: the causes set on the stage, the characters, setting and situation that would, in life, stir an emotion. With the anubhavas (consequents) and vyabhicari-bhavas (transient states), the vibhavas combine to bring forth rasa. vibhutiविभूति Sacred ash, also called bhasma, smeared on the body in Shaiva practice; associated with the cremation ground and with what remains after the fire of dissolution. videhamuktiविदेहमुक्ति Liberation completed at the death of the body, when the liberated soul reaches its final state. vidritiविदृति The suture or cleft at the crown of the skull through which, in the Aitareya Upanishad, the Self enters the human being it has created. vidveshanaविद्वेषण The sowing of enmity; one of the six acts of tantric magic, setting friends or allies against one another. One of the destructive 'black' acts the tradition warns against. vidyaविद्या Knowledge; in tantra specifically the mantra-form of the goddess, the sonic body through which she is known and worshipped (as in Srividya, 'the auspicious knowledge'). vidyadharaविद्याधर A 'holder of vidya (knowledge or magic)', a sky-faring supernatural being who possesses magical powers and wisdom, prominent in later Sanskrit story-literature. Vidyapitha The Seat of the Vidyās, one class of the Bhairava tantras, named for the feminine vidyā-goddesses whose cults its scriptures carry. It is the transgressive, Kāpālika-associated stratum, and both the Brahmayāmala and the Jayadrathayāmala place themselves in it in their colophons. Most of the tantras preserved in Nepal that affiliate themselves to a seat belong to this one. vidyarambhaविद्यारम्भ The beginning of learning: the rite in which a young child traces their first letters, often on Vasant Panchami, under the goddess Saraswati. Vighneshaविघ्नेश 'Lord of obstacles': Ganesha as the deity who both places and removes obstacles, invoked first before any undertaking. Vigrahaविग्रह A form or body of a deity used for worship; the consecrated image understood as a form the divine graciously takes so that it can be served and approached. A near-synonym of murti and pratima. Vijayadashamiविजयदशमी The tenth day after Navaratri's nine nights, also called Dussehra: the Goddess's victory over Mahishasura in the east and south, Rama's victory over Ravana in the north. vijnanaविज्ञान Discerning intelligence or understanding. In the Taittiriya Upanishad the vijnanamaya kosha is the sheath of intellect, lying inward of the mind. vijnanamayaविज्ञानमय The self made of understanding or discernment, the fourth of the five sheaths in the Taittiriya Upanishad. vikshepaविक्षेप In Advaita Vedanta, the 'projecting' power of maya: the power that throws up the apparent world in place of the concealed real, as a snake is projected onto a veiled rope. It works together with avarana, the veiling power. vimanaविमान A 'well-measured mansion.' In myth, a flying palace or celestial chariot of the gods (e.g. the Pushpaka); in South Indian temple architecture, the pyramidal tower raised over the sanctum. vimarshaविमर्श The self-aware, reflective power of consciousness by which it knows itself; paired with prakasha, the light of consciousness, in Kashmir Shaiva and Srividya metaphysics. vimshottari dashaविंशोत्तरी दशा The principal system of planetary periods (dasha) in jyotisha, dividing an ideal 120-year lifespan among the nine grahas in a fixed order, the period at birth set by the Moon's nakshatra. Vinasana The vanishing; the place in the desert where the Mahabharata says the Sarasvati sank into the sand. Vinayakaविनायक An older name for Ganesha; in the earliest texts, a class of malevolent obstacle-causing spirits who had to be propitiated. viniyogaविनियोग The 'application' of a dance-gesture: the list of context-dependent meanings a single hasta or mudra can carry, so that one hand-shape may be a cloud, a forest, a river or a blessing depending on the sentence of abhinaya around it. vinyasaविन्यास 'To place in a special, ordered way'; the linking of breath to movement, systematised by Krishnamacharya, that turned the held postures of hatha yoga into a flow. viraवीर The 'hero'; in tantra the temperament of practitioner able to use the transgressive rites directly, between the bound pashu and the realised divya. Virabhadraवीरभद्र A fierce gana born from Shiva's wrath after the death of Sati, who leads the host to destroy the sacrifice of Daksha and behead him. Virabhadra is the divine retinue as the instrument of Shiva's terrible justice. viramaविराम The mark that cancels the inherent vowel of a consonant in devanagari and its sister scripts, so that the akshara stands as a bare varna. viryaवीर्य Energy or vigour; one of the qualities the Yoga Sutras name as carrying a practitioner toward samadhi. visarjanaविसर्जन The formal farewell that closes a puja, respectfully dismissing the invited presence of the deity. vishadaविषाद Despondency or dejection. Arjuna's collapse in chapter 1, which gives the chapter its name, Arjuna-vishada-yoga. visheshaविशेष 'Particularity'; in Vaisheshika, the category of ultimate individuators that distinguish otherwise identical eternal atoms and souls. The school takes its very name from it. vishishtadvaitaविशिष्टाद्वैत Qualified non-dualism; the school of Vedanta founded by Ramanuja, in which selves and matter are real and form the body of brahman, distinct from yet inseparable from it. vishuddhaविशुद्ध The throat chakra. Sixteen petals, element ether, seed-syllable Ham. Its name means "pure." Vishvaksenaविष्वक्सेन The commander-in-chief of Vishnu's forces and chief of his attendants; the Vaishnava counterpart of Ganesha, worshipped first in Pancharatra and Sri Vaishnava ritual as the remover of obstacles to worship. vishvarupaविश्वरूप Krishna's cosmic universal form, revealed to Arjuna in the eleventh chapter of the Bhagavad Gita, in which all worlds and beings are seen within the one God. Vishwanathविश्वनाथ 'Lord of All', Shiva as the central deity of Kashi, enshrined as one of the twelve Jyotirlingas; the Kashi Vishwanath temple is the heart of the city's sacred geography. vitarka mudraवितर्कमुद्रा The gesture of teaching and debate, chiefly Buddhist: a raised hand with thumb and forefinger touching to form a circle, the unbroken wheel of doctrine. A near cousin of jnana and dharmachakra mudra. Vivartaविवर्त 'Apparent transformation.' In Advaita Vedanta, the world is a vivarta of Brahman: a real-seeming appearance that does not alter the underlying reality, the way a rope appears as a snake. Contrasted with parinama, real transformation, the model favoured by Samkhya and by Vishishtadvaita. vivekaविवेक Discernment; the capacity to distinguish the real from the unreal, brahman from maya, the eternal from the passing, prized with vairagya as a qualification for the path to moksha. vrata A religious vow, usually involving a fast, undertaken for a fixed time and tied to a tithi or deity; the basic unit of devotional time. Vrindavanaवृन्दावन The cowherd country on the Yamuna where the Bhagavata Purana sets Krishna's childhood and youth. vrittiवृत्ति A fluctuation, wave, or turning of the mind. The Yoga Sutras define yoga as the stilling (nirodha) of these vrittis. vulgate The commonly received, widely printed version of a text, as distinct from a scholarly critical edition reconstructed from manuscripts, in which an interpolation can be identified and set aside. vyahritiव्याहृति The three sacred 'utterances' bhur, bhuvah, svah (earth, mid-air, heaven), prefixed with Om to the Gayatri mantra. vyakaranaव्याकरण The Vedanga of grammar, the analysis of language; its supreme monument is Panini's Ashtadhyayi. vyaptiव्याप्ति Invariable pervasion, the universal rule (such as 'wherever there is smoke there is fire') on which a valid Nyaya inference depends. Establishing it securely was one of the great labours of Indian logic. vyavaharikaव्यावहारिक The empirical or transactional level of reality: the ordinary shared world, fully real for all practical purposes though not ultimately real, and so distinguished from the paramarthika. vyuhaव्यूह In the Pancharatra, the fourfold self-emanation of the supreme Vasudeva into Samkarshana, Pradyumna and Aniruddha.
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Yadavaयादव The clan of Krishna, descended from Yadu; their self-destruction at Prabhasa and the submergence of Dvaraka close the Mahabharata's account of Krishna. yadrcchaयदृच्छा Chance, the accidental; one of the rival explanations of our lot weighed in Svetashvatara Upanishad 1.2. yajnaयज्ञ The Vedic sacrifice or fire-offering; in the Brahmana texts, the ritual engine held to keep the cosmos in order. yajusयजुस् A sacrificial formula, usually in prose; the basic unit of the Yajurveda. yakshaयक्ष An ancient nature-spirit of the earth, trees and hidden wealth; an ambivalent being, benevolent guardian of treasure yet potentially dangerous. Their king is Kubera. Yakshas are the subject of India's earliest monumental stone sculpture. yamaयम Ethical restraints (such as non-violence and truthfulness), the first of the eight limbs of Patanjali's yoga. yantraयन्त्र A geometric ritual diagram in which a deity is held to be present, such as the Sri Yantra of Tripurasundari. yatraयात्रा Pilgrimage; a journey to sacred places, such as the circuit of the twelve jyotirlingas. yavanaयवन 'Greek' or 'Ionian'; the term by which Sanskrit sources named the Greeks, preserved in the title Yavanajataka, and a marker of the Greek debt in Indian jyotisha alongside the loanword hora. yoginiयोगिनी A class of fierce, powerful female deities central to some Tantric, especially Kaula, traditions. yojanaयोजन A traditional unit of distance, variously reckoned from roughly five to fifteen kilometres; its lack of a fixed length undercuts attempts to read exact measurements into verses like the Chalisa's line on the sun. yoniयोनि The womb or female generative organ; at Kamakhya the Goddess is worshipped as a yoni-shaped cleft in the rock. yugaयुग A world-age; the four yugas (Krita/Satya, Treta, Dvapara, Kali) of declining length and virtue make up one mahayuga. yuga-dharmaयुग-धर्म The dharma proper to a given cosmic age. The tradition holds that the duties suited to one yuga differ from those of another (Manusmriti 1.85), one of the ways dharma is treated as varying with time rather than being a single fixed code. yujयुज् The Sanskrit verbal root meaning "to yoke, to join, to harness." It is the source of the word yoga and is cognate with the English word "yoke."