Kashmir and Śaivism in and Around the Late Eighth Century

Abstract

This talk will present an overview of the history of Kashmir in and around the period in question, which is attentive to the political and religious landscape of the day and in particular as is relevant to understanding the links between Tibet and Kashmir.  It will feature an outline of the forms of Śaivism present in Kashmir at that time, to be set in relation to the Vaiṣṇava and Buddhist traditions active there in the same period.  Doing so will serve to establish evidence for the contemporaneous imagination within Śaivism of Uḍḍiyāna and tantric practices related to the same, inasmuch as they can be recovered from this period of history.    It is hoped this will serve better to chart the influences of Kashmiri religious traditions on those of Tibet around the time of the life of Padmasambhava.

About the Speaker

John Nemec is Professor of Indian Religious Studies at the University of Virginia.  His research centers on Indian religions and South Asian intellectual, religious, and cultural history, particularly the philosophy and religious and narrative literatures of the Kashmir Valley of the ninth to twelfth centuries. He is the author of three volumes, all from Oxford University Press: The Ubiquitous Śiva: Somānanda’s Śivadṛṣṭi and His Tantric Interlocutors; a sequel volume II by the same title; and Brahmins and Kings: Royal Counsel in the Sanskrit Narrative Literatures. He has two more books in preparation, which will lead up to his major project for the coming five years, an intellectual and cultural history of Kashmir.