Indian Asceticism: Power, Violence, and Play

Religion & Spirituality

Olson, Carl

Hinduism

Oxford University Press

Throughout the history of Indian religions, the ascetic figure is most closely identified with power. A by-product of the ascetic path, power is displayed in the ability to fly, walk on water or through dense objects, read minds, discern the former lives of others, see into the future, harm others, or simply levitate one's body. These tales give rise to questions about how power and violence are related to the phenomenon of play. Indian Asceticism focuses on the powers exhibited by ascetics of India from ancient to modern time. Carl Olson discusses the erotic, the demonic, the comic, and the miraculous forms of play and their connections to power and violence. He focuses on Hinduism, but evidence is also presented from Buddhism and Jainism, suggesting that the subject matter of this book pervades India's major indigenous religious traditions. The book includes a look at the extent to which findings in cognitive science can add to our understanding of these various powers; Olson argues that violence is built into the practice of the ascetic. Indian Asceticism culminates with an attempt to rethink the nature of power in a way that does justice to the literary evidence from Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain sources.

This work presents a dialogue between classical and contemporary Indian and postmodern thinkers. Juxtaposing the diverse perspectives of Indian philosophers and philosophies, including Buddhism, Sankara, and Radhakrishnan, and western postmodern thinkers such as Lacan and Derrida, Olson addresses topics such as desire, suffering, the self, and identity.

Indian Philosophers and Postmodern Thinkers: Dialogues on the Margins of Culture

Politics & Social Sciences

Philosophy

Carl Olson offers a compelling and provocative argument against the application of postmodern thought to religious studies, showing how such radically skeptical thinking undermines, subverts, and distorts the study of religion.Religious studies is a newly and artificially constructed field for the scholarly study of religious narratives, thoughts, actions, and phenomena. It is an ongoing experiment with various types of methodological approaches to the study of religion, which is itself a human construct with limited cross-cultural application. Without a commonly agreed-upon method for the study of its subject, religious studies is characterized by the use of multiple methods, which tend to be adopted based on the latest trends in the field. Most recently, notes Olson, these trends have been dominated by postmodern thought. Because the discipline of religious studies is a product of the European Enlightenment with its values and representational mode of thinking, he argues, it is challenged and even threatened by postmodern thought, which calls into question many of its values, basic presuppositions, and convictions.After reviewing the many fads and fashions of religious studies, Olson examines various postmodern positions related to the study of religion, including those of Georges Bataille, Jacques Derrida, Marcel Mauss, Michel Foucault, and Edward W. Said. Olson contrasts the thought of more traditional history of religions scholars Mircea Eliade and Wendy Doniger with selected postmodern thinkers on the topics of hermeneutics, comparison, and difference. The Allure of Decadent Thinking concludes by exploring the postmodern challenges to such accepted concepts of religion and considers the long-term implications of a scholar's adoption of postmodern methods. Regardless of whether they are transformed by postmodern thought, Olson suggests, all methods and concepts should be subject to pragmatic review.

The Allure of Decadent Thinking: Religious Studies and the Challenge of Postmodernism

Religious Studies

Religious Studies: The Key Concepts is an accessible, A-Z resource, defining and explaining key terms and ideas central to the study of religion. Exploring broad and recurring themes which are applicable in both eastern and western religions, cross-cultural examples are provided for each term to give a comprehensive overview of the subject. Subjects covered include:  afterlife comparative religion festivals ethics gender monotheism world religions modernity pilgrimage theism secularization   With cross referencing and further reading provided throughout, this book provides an inclusive map of the discipline, and is an essential reference for all students, academics and researchers.

Religious Studies: The Key Concepts (Routledge Key Guides)

Sociology

Routledge

Religious Studies: The Key Concepts is an accessible, A-Z resource, defining and explaining key terms and ideas central to the study of religion. Exploring broad and recurring themes which are applicable in both eastern and western religions, cross-cultural examples are provided for each term to give a comprehensive overview of the subject. Subjects covered include: <ul>
<li>afterlife</li> <li>comparative religion</li> <li>festivals</li> <li>ethics</li> <li>gender</li> <li>monotheism</li> <li>world religions</li> <li>modernity</li> <li>pilgrimage</li> <li>theism</li> <li>secularization</li> </ul> With cross referencing and further reading provided throughout, this book provides an inclusive map of the discipline, and is an essential reference for all students, academics and researchers.

Religious Ways of Experiencing Life: A Global and Narrative Approach

Religious Ways of Experiencing Life: A Global and Narrative Approach surveys world religions, using the narratives and discourses of each tradition to describe it in its own terms. Carl Olson examines each tradition’s practices, teachings, material culture, roles of women, and path to salvation, as well as the experiences of its followers. The exploration of lived experience draws out and emphasizes the plural nature of religious traditions. The volume includes chapters on all current major world religions, as well as material on ancient religions of the Mediterranean, indigenous North American and African spiritual traditions, and New Age and new religious movements. Featuring timelines and suggestions for further reading, this text will be of interest to undergraduate students seeking a broad introduction to World Religion or Lived Religion.

This anthology provides students with a useful collection of theoretical essays concerning the nature of religion and the methodological means by which scholars analytically approach the subject. Organized in a point/counterpoint fashion, this volume will foster in-class discussion and the honing of a student's own critical perspectives.

Theory and Method in the Study of Religion: A Selection of Critical Readings

Cengage Learning'

This book intends to elicit different religious reactions by discovering that rock music embodies many religious messages and themes if critics take the time to listen to the lyrics. The book tries to discern what the various religious themes mean in classical rock music and what they reflect about religious notions in American popular culture.

An Introduction to Religion and Religious Themes in Rock Music

Edwin Mellen Pr

Zen and the Art of Postmodern Philosophy: Two Paths of Liberation from the Representational Mode of Thinking

Carl Olson is Professor of Religious Studies at Allegheny College in Pennsylvania. His previous books include The Indian Renouncer and Postmodern Poison: A Cross-Cultural Encounter and The Theology and Philosophy of Eliade: A Search for the Centre. This book examines and compares the philosophical positions of various postmodern thinkers and Zen Buddhist philosophers on: language and play; modes of thinking; skepticism and doubt; self and other; time and death; nihilism and metaphysics; and the conception of the end of philosophy. The Zen thinkers dealt with are Dogen and Nishitani, and the Western thinkers are Derrida, Lacan, Heidegger, Lyotard, Foucault, Deleuze and Guatarri, Kristeva, and Levinas. Although each share similar notions concerning the shortcomings of representational thinking, major differences still exist. By clarifying these differences, Olson counters the tendency to overtly assert or covertly imply that postmodern and Zen philosophies are moving in the same direction. Some postmodern thinkers and Zen Buddhist philosophers share common philosophical ground with regard to a mutual philosophical attack and attempt to overcome the perceived shortcomings of the representational mode of thinking that conceives of the mind like a mirror and assumes a correspondence between appearance and reality that is supported by a metaphysical structure.

State Univ of New York Pr

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Books by Olson, Carl

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Olson, Carl. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Indian Asceticism: Power, Violence, and Play

Indian Asceticism: Power, Violence, and Play

Indian Philosophers and Postmodern Thinkers: Dialogues on the Margins of Culture

The Allure of Decadent Thinking: Religious Studies and the Challenge of Postmodernism

Religious Studies: The Key Concepts (Routledge Key Guides)

Religious Studies: The Key Concepts (Routledge Key Guides)

Religious Ways of Experiencing Life: A Global and Narrative Approach

Theory and Method in the Study of Religion: A Selection of Critical Readings

An Introduction to Religion and Religious Themes in Rock Music

Zen and the Art of Postmodern Philosophy: Two Paths of Liberation from the Representational Mode of Thinking