CONTEMPORARY ANTHROPOLOGY OF RELIGION Living Mantra Mantra, Deity, and Visionary Experience Today MANI RAO Contemporary Anthropology of Religion Series Editors Don Seeman Department of Religion Emory University Atlanta, GA, USA Tulasi Srinivas Department of Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies Emerson College Boston, MA, USA Contemporary Anthropology of Religion is the offcial book series of the Society for the Anthropology of Religion, a section of the American Anthropological Association. Books in the series explore a variety of issues relating to current theoretical or comparative issues in the study of religion. These include the relation between religion and the body, social memory, gender, ethnoreligious violence, globalization, moder- nity, and multiculturalism, among others. Recent historical events have suggested that religion plays a central role in the contemporary world, and Contemporary Anthropology of Religion provides a crucial forum for the expansion of our understanding of religion globally. More information about this series at http://www.palgrave.com/gp/series/14916 Mani Rao Living Mantra Mantra, Deity, and Visionary Experience Today Mani Rao Bengaluru, Karnataka, India Contemporary Anthropology of Religion ISBN 978-3-319-96390-7 ISBN 978-3-319-96391-4 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-96391-4 Library of Congress Control Number: 2018948808 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2019 This work is subject to copyright. 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Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affliations. Cover image: © Dinodia Photos/Alamy Stock Photo This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland Satyam Sai Jai Shivam Sai Jai Sundaram Sai Jai Acknowledgements Mantra-practitioners constitute this book. They entrusted me with n arratives of their experiences and engaged with me over questions, spec- ulations and fndings. There were also practitioners who gave me clues and pointed me in the right direction, even if they declined to be for- mally interviewed; and there were many people who told me about some- one who knew someone with the phone number of someone else whom I really, really ought to meet. I am deeply grateful to every informant on this journey. The research for this book was done for a PhD in Religious Studies at Duke University. I was fortunate to have Leela Prasad as the chair of my dissertation committee—her informed understanding of the subject and responsiveness during critical moments of my feldwork ena- bled the realization of this project. My preliminary advisor at Emory and Duke was Laurie L. Patton whose courses in vedic studies stood me in good stead even as my research took a different direction. Dissertation committee members Srinivas Aravamudan (1962–2016), David Morgan, Velcheru Narayana Rao and Hwansoo Kim helped expand my hori- zons with insights from their own areas of specialization. Hwansoo Kim’s response convinced me to include some auto-ethnography in the book version; he also suggested the title “Living Mantra” for this book. Bhavani Adimoolan painstakingly listened to hours of recordings and drafted a number of transcripts. A dissertation-to-book workshop at the Madison South Asia Conference was both timely and useful, and I espe- cially thank faculty and editorial advisor Joyce Fleuckiger at this workshop for engaging with my work and for her feedback. A number of people vii viii ACKNowLEDGEMENTS helped steer this book toward publication at Palgrave Macmillan—in particular, the series co-editor Tulasi Srinivas, who introduced me to her co-editor Don Seeman and the Contemporary Anthropology of Religion series, the Palgrave Macmillan editor Mary Al-Sayed and the editorial assistant team, and the anonymous reviewers whose comments led to clarifcations and a more rigorous book. As I plodded through academic hoops and requirements, it was the presence of other scholars and a shared intellectual life that gave me solace. A number of cohorts and senior colleagues shared their own research and writing with me, especially Antoinette de Napoli, Luke whitmore, Gil Ben-Herut, Yasmine Singh, Carter Higgins, Alex McKinley, Yael Lazar and Torang Asadi. Many friends inspired, sup- ported and encouraged me over this time. In Iowa, conversations with Frederick M. Smith shaped my interest in a Religious Studies Ph.D., and Jan Myers and Nataša Ďurovičová persuaded me of its value. Subhasree Raghavan, Amit Bararia and Subbarayudu Kameswara kept an eye on me as I traveled on feldwork. Discussions with Subasree Krishnaswamy, Rahul Soni, Shinie Antony and Madhavi Mahadevan helped me reassess the potential readership for this book. Karuna Sivasailam was my frst reader—she read an early draft of my dissertation, and later, the manu- script for the book benefted from her responses. My parents bore my absences and travels bravely these last several years. My brother Madhu’s persistent question, “what was it you said you were researching?” was more valuable to me than he may ever realize. My husband, John Nemo Bancroft, aka Jaideva, came along for the adventure, moving cities and countries and creating his own thoughtful participation. Finally, practitioners who shared with me their experience, prac- tice and knowledge of mantra, arranged like in an aksharamala (sylla- bary mantra): Akella Venkatalakshmi; Anuradha Beempavu; Apparao D. V. (Appaji); Arul Murugan P.; Aruna Nandagopal; Arup Kumar; Aspi B. Mistry; Avadhanulu R. V. S. S.; Babu, G. Y. N.; Basavaraj (Prema Chaitanya); Bhagyalata Pataskar; Chirravuri Sreerama Sarma; Donald S. McKenna; Geetha Lakshmi K.; Gopichand Balla; Janice Craig; Karthiyayini Sugumaran; Krovi Parthasarathy; Madhavananda Saraswati; Maheshwari M.; Mani Prasanna Y. N. S. S.; Manikya Somayaji; Mantha Vasudeva Sastry (Swami Vasudevananda); Maunish Vyas; Maureshwar Ghaisas; Monisha Sen; Nachiketananda Puri; Narasimhan M. A.; Narendra Kapre; Neel Kulkarni; Potturi Venkateswara Rao; Prahlada Sastry N. (Amritanandanatha Saraswati); Prayaga Dhanalakshmi; ACKNowLEDGEMENTS ix Prema Reddy; Ramya Yogini; Sandhya Rani; Satpurkar V. V.; Sheela; Siddheswarananda Bharati; Sivananda Puri; Subbarao Kompella (Karunamaya); Tadepalle Balakrishna Sarma; Tadepalle Lakshmidhara Somayajulu; Usha R. Balakrishnan; Usha Rajagopalan; Vadlamudi Venkateswara Rao; Vasundhara Reddy; Vedatmananda Saraswati; Veda Vidyananda Giri; Vidyasagar Sarma G. V. L. N.; Vivek Shastri Godbole; and Yadnyeshwar Ranganath Selukar—thank you, Namaste! contents Part I Preparation 1 Introduction 3 1.1 Seeds 3 1.2 Homing In: Andhra-Telangana 5 1.3 Overview 8 References 12 2 A Mountain of Scholarship 13 2.1 Early Indian Concepts 13 2.2 Modern Scholarship 17 References 23 3 Crossing Over 27 3.1 Positioning 27 3.2 Navigating Subjectivity 31 3.3 Practice for Theory 34 3.4 Unbracketing Experience 39 References 46 4 Are There Revelations Today? 51 4.1 “Possible” 51 4.2 Who Is a Rishi? 52 xi