This week’s faculty seminar will feature presentation by Dr. Rinku Lamba, Associate Professor, Social Science, NLSIU on ‘Kabir: Within Bhakti and Without?’

Abstract

Many prominent anti-colonial Indian thinkers recalled the phenomenon of bhakti as relevant for constructions and imaginations of political community. Among the pantheon of recalled poet-saints is Kabir (15C) who even today is known for the “confident” and “passionate” way in which he was “ever at odds with the world around him, always ready to fling the dart of criticism in the direction of established religion.” (Hawley and Jeurgensmeyer 2004 35)

Much reception of Kabir closely associates him with bhakti, which in turn is known to offer conceptual space for a critique of caste hierarchies and also for its equivocal stance on questions of democratic power.  However, a closer perusal of Kabir’s verses reveals their preoccupation with the themes of persuasion and judgment, and these are themes that demand reckoning with Kabir’s thought alongside but also outside of the frames of bhakti.  Such attention to these themes, in conjunction with a focus on other features of Kabir’s perspective – such as the individualism he expresses and/through his stance on religion – can illuminate significant aspects of the cultures of secularity and democracy in India.