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THE MANY FACES OF A HIMALAYAN
GODDESS
Haḍimbā, Her Devotees, and Religion in Rapid Change
Ehud Halperin
The Many Faces of a Himalayan Goddess
Haḍimbā, Her Devotees, and Religion in Rapid Change
EHUD HALPERIN
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Halperin, Ehud, author.
Title: The many faces of a Himalayan goddess : Haḍimbā, her devotees, and religion in rapid change / Ehud Halperin.
Description: Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, [2019] | Significant revision of author’s thesis (doctoral—Columbia University, 2012, titled Haḍimbā becoming herself : a Himalayan goddess in change. | Includes bibliographical references and index. |
Summary: “This book offers a portrait of Haḍimbā, a primary village goddess in the Kullu Valley of the West Indian Himalayan state of Himachal Pradesh, a rural area known as the Land of God. Drawing on diverse ethnographic and textual materials The Many Faces of a Himalayan Goddess is rich with myths and tales, accounts of dramatic rituals and festivals, and descriptions of everyday life in the celebrated but remote Kullu Valley. The book portrays the goddess in varying contexts that radiate outward from her temple to local, regional, national, and indeed global spheres. The result is an important contribution to the study of Indian village goddesses, lived Hinduism, Himalayan Hinduism, and the rapidly growing field of religion and ecology”—Provided by publisher.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019002173 | ISBN 9780190913588 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780190913595 (updf) | ISBN 9780190913601 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Haḍimbā (Hindu mythological character) | Hindu goddesses—India— Himachal Pradesh. | Himachal Pradesh (India)—Religious life and customs.
Classification: LCC BL1138.4.H53 H35 2019 | DDC 294.5/2114—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019002173
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Printed by Integrated Books International, United States of America
To all those agents, human and other, who have helped me along the way
List of Illustrations ix
Acknowledgments
Introduction: In Search of a Viewpoint
Chapter 1. Getting There: The Land of the Gods
Chapter 2. Assembling the Ritual Core: Haḍimbā as a Complex Agent
Chapter 3. Narrating the Local Web of Associations: The Goddess of Many Faces
Chapter 4. Encountering Epic India: Haḍimbā and the Mahabharata 119
Chapter 5. Negotiating National Hinduism: The Controversy over Blood Sacrifice
Chapter 6. Confronting the Global: Haḍimbā and Climate Change
What is Haḍimbā Devī?
Illustrations
1.1. Kullu Valley. A view from the north, 2010. 15
1.2. Map of Himachal Pradesh, administrative divisions. 19
1.3. Kullu Valley’s major locations, towns, villages, and rivers. 21
2.1. Children playing with a mock rath, Old Manali, 2009. 55
2.2. Raths interacting in a village festival, Banarah, 2009. 64
3.1. Haḍimbā’s temple, Dhungri, 2011. 86
3.2. Haḍimbā’s palanquin visiting the king’s palace during the Dasahra festival, 2009. 111
4.1. Ghatotkaca’s tree shrine, Dhungri, 2009. 132
5.1. Cooking for the public feast held after the buffalo sacrifice, Dhungri, 2011. 176
5.2. Devotees waiting for the communal meal during the buffalo sacrifice, Dhungri, 2011. 184
6.1. Gurs of several local devtās during consultation, Dhungri, 2011. 217
Acknowledgments
This book draws on research I first conducted while at Columbia University, and my first thanks go to those there whose guidance and support have been offered abundantly from the very start. I owe the biggest debt to John Stratton Hawley, whose involvement and dedication exceeded my greatest expectations. Jack’s thorough reading of my work, his numerous elaborate comments, and his thoughtful suggestions on how to better frame and develop various aspects of my research have been a blessing. His legendary commitment to his students, which continued long after my graduation, provided a reassurance that is rarely encountered in an academic setting. Special thanks also to Rachel Fell McDermott, who helped me navigate the vast waters of goddess studies and whose kind support and encouragement gave me confidence about what I do. I am grateful to Mary McGee, who helped me to define the broad questions and sensibilities that have continued to shape my research and who remained involved in my project even after relocating from Columbia. For challenging my conceptions of “lived religion” and pressing me to think deeply about the broad implications of my research, I am thankful to Courtney Bender. Similarly, Katherine Pratt Ewing’s insightful comments on my work helped me to contextualize more broadly and to recognize the greater implications of my arguments. I owe special thanks to Gary Tubb, whose interest in my study of the goddess Haḍimbā provided the opportunity to pursue it in graduate school and beyond. In the same spirit, I wish to thank my teachers in Israel—Shlomo Biderman, David Shulman, and Yigal Bronner—who introduced me to the scholarly study of India and guided and supported my early steps in the academy.
Throughout the years, I have received endless support, thoughtful advice, and stimulating comments from many colleagues and friends to whom I am greatly indebted. William Sax, whose scholarship has inspired me ever since I became interested in Himalayan religion, has set an ideal I have tried to follow as both a fieldworker and a writer. Bo, as he is known, provided compelling and invaluable comments on this manuscript, for which I am grateful. James Lochtefeld offered helpful insights into my research, which helped me advance my questions and better frame my findings. David Haberman, in a certain significant exchange, asked me questions about divine presence that motivated me to further develop this perspective in this book. Frederick Smith invited me to a panel in Madison, which led to several fruitful conversations and yielded helpful advice
on different parts of this work. Vasudha Narayanan supported my work in various venues from very early on and was always interested in hearing about Haḍimbā and conversing about my findings whenever we met. Special thanks go to Jon Keune for his long-term friendship, for the ongoing exchanges about my work, and for the twelve-hour car ride during which we had an extremely stimulating conversation that helped me identify the strengths of my research and its potential contribution to the study of Indian goddesses, Hinduism, and religion more broadly. Luke Whitmore has also been a great conversation partner, who read and commented on the manuscript and provided useful advice on how to frame and advance my thoughts. I would also like to thank the following colleagues for the fruitful exchanges we had throughout the years: Amy Allocco, Andrea Marion Pinkney, Brian Pennington, Caleb Simmons, Daniela Berti (who kindly shared unpublished materials which were extremely relevant to my work on sacrifice), Drew Thomases, Erez Joskovitch, Gil Ben Herut, Hadas Weiss, Hamsa Stainton, Isabelle Clark-Decès (who tragically and very unexpectedly passed away in 2017), Joel Bordeaux, Joel Lee, Joyce Flueckiger, Oded Abt, and Patton Burchett.
In the Department of East Asian Studies at Tel Aviv University, where I have taught and worked in recent years, I am grateful in particular to the following friends and scholars: Asaf Goldschmidt for his friendship, unwavering support, and substantial guidance and for making sure I stayed the course—without his backing and mentorship I would not be where I am now; Meir Shahar for offering guidance at several crucial moments and motivating me to advance in the process that finally led to the publication of this book; Ori Sela, who has been my friend and colleague since we first met in a backpackers’ restaurant in Thailand more than two decades ago and without whose help at several critical junctures this book may have never come to light; Rafi Peled, for being a good friend and a brilliant conversation partner on everything related to India and who was always enthusiastic to hear and comment on my research and help out with matters relating to Sanskrit and ritual; Roy Tzohar, whose academic path ran very close to mine, even if usually one step ahead, for his perceptive advice on navigating academic life. I also thank Arik Moran from Haifa University, with whom I have so many Himalayan interests in common, for sharing knowledge and materials about Pahari matters we both love. I am also indebted to Eviatar Shulman from the Hebrew University, who involved me in projects that have advanced my thinking on complex agency and yielded several invaluable new academic relationships. I am grateful to all my students, whose interest and questions motivated me to elucidate my thinking and make my arguments clearer and better structured. I especially thank Michal Erlich; conversing with her always reminds me how fascinating the study of Hinduism is.
In India, I would like to thank Laxman S. Thakur and Chetan Singh of the Department of History, Himachal Pradesh University (Simla), for facilitating
my affiliation with the department during my PhD research in India and for offering important advice in the initial stages of my fieldwork. Mahesh Sharma of Punjab University was a great conversation partner about Pahari culture and religion, for which I am grateful. I am, of course, immensely grateful for the generosity and hospitality of the people of Old Manali and Dhungri villages of the Kullu Valley. It is because of their collaboration and assistance that my research project was realized. I greatly thank Tekram and his family members— Shakuntala, Paramanand and Chandra, Neel and Nisha, and Manorma—who welcomed me in their home in the 1990s and have become a second family to me. I am grateful for the numerous hours of conversation, food, and recreation together; this has left a substantial mark not only on my academic work but on my life in general. I sincerely thank Haḍimbā’s priests of the Sharma family, Rohitram (head priest and administrator), Lalchand, and Jitram, and their sons and relatives—Raju, Ramesh, Raman, Rakesh, Chinulal, Shamlal, Shivkumar, Amit, Damodardas, Taparam—for making me feel most welcome in Haḍimbā’s temple, spending many hours answering my endless questions, and generously sharing information about so many aspects of Haḍimbā’s worship. I also thank Tirthram (Haḍimbā’s administrator, who has sadly passed away), who was most welcoming and allowed me access to the rituals performed in Old Manali.
Special thanks also go to several individuals who provided a wealth of information and became good friends along the way. Parasram, with whom I spent hours watching the goats graze as we talked about everyday stuff; Amarnath, who was always happy to see me and made sure I was informed about everything going on in association with Haḍimbā; Chaman, who became a close companion and opened many doors for me, was never tired of my questions, and ensured that my social life among Manali’s youth thrived (often in the company of his close friends Pankaj, Sanju, and Amit, whose contribution to my research was always refreshing); and Gopal, who lent me a motorbike, challenged my thinking on every subject, and taught me how to “figure things out as they come.” Among the many other individuals with whom I hung out on an almost daily basis and who provided the raw material for this research, I would like to especially thank the following: Ramuram, Lotram, Neel P. K. (Pankaj Kumar), Dunichand, Hiralal, Tarachand, Kimi, Sunita, Dulheram, Jog Raj, Anup, Guptram, Sukharam, Meher Singh (Singu), Thakur, Hukamram, Beluram, Tuleram, Puran, Govind, Rakesh Thakur, Kamalram (Kamlu), Haridas, Boderam, Khubram, Lotram, Ramnath, Murli, Sheshram (Sisu), Shivdial, Raju, Mano, Simpi Mehta, Anthony, Shay, Swati, Khimraj, Prem, Dushyant Sharma, and Amar Varma. I am in great debt to them all. Last, but not least, I thank the Joshi family—Sheshram, Vidya, Shital, Dikshant, and Shalini—with whom I resided for more than two years. Their hospitality, support, and ongoing sharing of information on all aspects of family and village life proved invaluable. Of the Joshi family I particularly miss Shalini, who
died of heart failure in 2010 when she was only fourteen. She was a unique friend and my most talented Pahari teacher.
Several institutions and organizations provided generous financial and logistic support for various stages of my research. Columbia University’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and Department of Religion collaboratively provided two summer travel grants to India. The American Institute for Indian Studies (AIIS) supported two periods of language study in Jaipur and granted me a junior fellowship that funded substantial time in the field. I particularly want to thank Elise Auerbach (AIIS Chicago) and Purnima Mehta (AIIS Delhi) for logistic and bureaucratic support that was crucial in enabling me to conduct significant parts of my field research. I thank also the American Academy of Religion (Selva J. Raj Endowed International Dissertation Research Fellowship); Columbia University’s Institute of Religion, Culture and Public Life (Graduate Research Fellowship); and the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation (Charlotte W. Newcombe Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship in Religion and Ethics) for grants that supported my research. I am grateful for funding given by the Israeli Science Foundation (grant no. 1205/15), which has supported travels to the field and other aspects of my research since 2015, and to Hanadiv Humanities Initiative, whose funding supported several stages of the editing and preparation of this manuscript.
At Oxford University Press, I would like to thank Robert Yelle, the editor of this series, for being the first to endorse my manuscript and for his attentiveness in the early stages of the process; Cynthia Read, for her great encouragement, support, and efforts in making this publication come to light; and Salma Ismaiel and Aishwarya Krishnamoorthy, for taking care of all the administrative aspects and for ongoing help in the process. Before the manuscript went to OUP, it was read and edited carefully by Gilly Nadel, whose comments, corrections, and insights were always illuminating and on the mark. I am grateful for her part in the process, as well as to Rachel Sur, who contributed in a similar manner to earlier versions of my work.
This whole journey could not have been possible without the support of my family, to whom I cannot adequately express my gratitude. From the bottom of my heart I thank my parents, Bracha and Yossi Halperin, who share my love for India and who continuously encouraged me to pursue my academic quest while providing emotional and, when necessary, material support. Deepest thanks go to my brothers, Yuval Halperin and Yoav Halperin, for their encouragement and support throughout the years. To Yoav, I am grateful for his reading large sections of this book and for providing very insightful comments. And I express my undying gratitude to my wife and life companion, Rotem Geva, who has labored endlessly over my writings, offered numerous insights and ideas, and dedicated hours and days to discussing my project while simultaneously pursuing
her own research. I thank Rotem for pondering the nature of it all with me. Without her, it would not be worth it. I also lovingly thank our daughter, Noya, who grew up together with this book and who was a great listener to the tales of the Mahabharata. Noya has always demanded that I continue to expand my command of epic and Puranic stories so that I could share them with her on a regular basis, for which I am grateful.
Finally, I am particularly grateful for all that I have received from studying Haḍimbā, the complex agent who is the main protagonist of this book, and from her people, who have been central to my life in so many ways. I thank them sincerely and dedicate this book to all of them and ask their forgiveness for any mistakes I may have made along the way. Of course, any faults or errors found in this work are wholly my own responsibility.
Chapter 2 contains a revised version of my article “A Vehicle for Agency: Rath Rituals and the Construction of Himalayan Devtas as Complex Agents,” which appeared in the European Bulletin of Himalayan Research 48 (2016): 5–42. Chapter 6 is a slightly revised version of my article “Winds of Change: Religion and Climate in the Western Himalayas,” which appeared in the Journal of the American Academy of Religion 85.1 (2017): 64–111. Chapters 1, 3, and 5 contain a few paragraphs from my article “Is the Goddess Haḍimbā Tantric? Negotiating Power in a Western Himalayan Sacrificial Arena,” which appeared in the International Journal of Hindu Studies 23.2 (2019):195–212. All are reprinted here with the kind permission of the EBHR, Springer, and Oxford University Press.
A Word on Transliteration
For ease of reading by an international audience, I refrain from using diacritics as much as possible. Thus, for example, names of people (e.g., Tekram), places (e.g., Simla), festivals (e.g., Dasahra), and goddess and gods (e.g., Sharbari, Shiva), are neither spelled with diacritics nor italicized. One major exception here is the spelling of Haḍimbā, who is the protagonist of this book and whose name, I felt, should be spelled accurately and in accordance with how it sounds. Names of classical texts (e.g., Mahabharata) and concepts (e.g., Vaishnavism), which are typically familiar to a general audience, appear without diacritics but are italicized. Names of famous characters from such texts, which in many publications are spelled with a concluding vowel so as to reflect their Sanskritic pronunciation (e.g., Arjuna), are spelled here with this vowel omitted in order to stay closer to how the name is pronounced by Hindi speakers (e.g., Arjun).
I use both diacritics and italics for terms in Hindi (e.g., śakti) and Pahari (e.g., mohrā), names of local deities (e.g., nāg devtā) and castes (e.g., lohār), and titles of less familiar texts (e.g., Vaṃśāvalī), which are less likely to be known to a general readership. I do this in order to give interested readers a better grasp of how these terms sound in common use.
It is also worth noting that, in translating conversations that were originally held in either Hindi or Pahari, I underline English expressions that were used by the speakers themselves (e.g., “People today are very busy, they have no time.”).
The Many Faces of a Himalayan Goddess
Introduction
In Search of a Viewpoint
A few weeks after arriving in Manali in the spring of 2009 to study the goddess Haḍimbā, I learned that a grand buffalo sacrifice was to be offered to her in several weeks. I was quite enthusiastic about this opportunity to explore such a major event in the goddess’s ritual repertoire and decided to dedicate the intervening weeks to gathering as much information as possible about it. I spent hours every day in Haḍimbā’s temple in conversation with her priests; I talked to devotees of different ages, castes, and genders; and I meticulously wrote everything down in my field diary. I was very excited, both academically and personally. Never in my life had I participated in something remotely like what people promised the grand sacrifice would be.
Devotees revealed that the buffalo usually arrives in the village only a few days before the event, during which time it is fed and tended by several villagers who are in charge of this task. On the day of the sacrifice the animal is taken to the temple ground, where thousands of people from around the area gather, bringing with them sacred objects that represent their respective village gods. The police are also present, making sure that everything proceeds according to plan and that order is maintained. Haḍimbā’s gur (medium), devotees promised, gets into an especially intense trance and sticks out his tongue just like the goddess Kali. I also learned that the sacrifice is named aṭhārah bali (eighteenfold sacrifice), since, aside from the buffalo, other offerings are also given to the goddess, such as sheep, a pig, a water crab, coconuts, and a pumpkin. At the time, I could barely imagine what this elaborate ritual would look like. Devotees pumped up my excitement, promising a huge thrill and an intense performance. I was so preoccupied with the approaching event and so emotionally invested in it that I even dreamed about it at night. In these dreams I would find myself standing in the middle of Haḍimbā’s temple ground, directly facing the buffalo. Behind the animal, the sacrificer would lift a huge sword as the crowd around him cheered frantically. It felt like a scene from some Hollywood production of a grand biblical tale. And I was there, in the middle of it all, perfectly positioned to take it all in.
Then a foreign tourist in his late twenties asked me some questions that made me reconsider my position. “So the buffalo just stands there,” he asked, “waiting
to be sacrificed?” No, I clarified, the buffalo must be tied with long ropes and pulled by twenty to thirty men. The man’s eyes lit up. “Oh man. This is crazy. I can’t imagine it. A wild buffalo tied down by dozens of men holding ropes before it is sacrificed to a goddess. Unbelievable. Say, will you hold the ropes too?”
I had never thought about this possibility, and now it was as if the question had pulled me physically into the arena. This tourist made me realize how profoundly embodied the undertaking would be and forced me to think about my own bodily presence. This was a ritual ground, not a theater performance, and I would be part of it. Where would I position myself? How close would I be to the center of the action? What should I do during the event? Would I, in fact, hold the ropes? I could feel the cords rubbing against my hands. “I don’t know,” I answered. “That’s a very good question. I don’t think so. But we’ll see.” We left it at that. In hindsight, I should have paid more attention to this conversation.
Before I continue, some background is in order. The temple of the goddess Haḍimbā, the center of her cult, is located near the town of Manali in the upper part of the Kullu Valley of the West Indian Himalayan state of Himachal Pradesh. A mountainous, rural area considered peripheral even in indigenous eyes—a traditional Sanskrit text calls it “the end of the (habitable) world” (Kulāntapīṭh)— the valley is home to an elaborate system of local deities, rituals, and beliefs. Its indigenous religious system has been shaped for centuries by encounters with regional and extraregional powers and ideas. These encounters have deepened and accelerated in recent years as the region has been integrated into the national highway system and, concomitantly, the world of modernity, capitalism, tourism, and mainstream Hindu values and ideals. The goddess Haḍimbā has been intimately involved with these processes for a long time.
I first learned about Haḍimbā when traveling in the region as a backpacker in 1995. Residing with a local family for several months as part of a rudimentary home-stay tourism that was developing in the area at the time, I learned that the goddess was one of the Kullu Valley’s most powerful and respected deities. Haḍimbā, family members told me, is a manifestation of Kali. She is also Hiḍimbā, a fierce forest demoness who appears in the Mahabharata. She regularly possesses her human medium and, through him, delivers messages and converses with her devotees. Like other deities in the region, she occasionally manifests in a rath a ritual vehicle carried on devotees’ shoulders—and is transported through the area to visit other village gods. I later learned that she is believed to control the weather and to manipulate it in times of drought and harsh rains. In short, while a relatively minor goddess in the scheme of Indian religion, unknown outside the Kullu Valley until quite recently, Haḍimbā was an important Himalayan village goddess who had never been comprehensively explored.
What would we gain from studying a goddess like Haḍimbā? Why is this peripheral village goddess, who has no substantial presence outside her region, noteworthy? Why should we dedicate time and effort to study a cult with only several thousand devotees?
First, Haḍimbā offers a comprehensive case study of a village goddess, the likes of which remain understudied despite their popularity and prevalence throughout India. The study of female divinities in general, and of Indian goddesses more specifically, has burgeoned since the 1970s, principally owing to new interest brought about by feminist scholarship and by area studies (McDermott 2005: 3607). This was an especially welcome development given that the worship of goddesses is more widespread in India than that of male deities because of their centrality in village settings. Publications on the subject began to appear in the mid-1980s, and new studies continue to draw extensive interest and readership (Dempsey 2006; Flueckiger 2013; McDermott 2011; Padma 2014). Whereas early publications in the field were mostly of a textual nature—studies of scriptures (Pintchman 1994) and feminine theologies (Kinsley 1986; Kinsley 1997)—ethnographic works have recently become more common. All of these studies, however, tend to focus on well-known female deities who have a pan-Indian (McDermott and Kripal 2003) or pan-regional (Erndl 1993; Caldwell 1999; Sax 1991) presence, elaborate and well-documented traditions (McDermott 2001), explicit theologies (Pintchman 1994), and systematic ritual traditions (Rodrigues 2003). Studies of more minor goddesses—whose worship is confined to one or a few villages and who retain their local identity and character even if they are identified, on some level, with major goddesses like Durga, Kali, or Mariamman—are much less common and usually limited to short articles (e.g., Padma 2014; Humes 1996). Book-length studies of such goddesses are almost nonexistent in recent scholarship. This study of the goddess Haḍimbā seeks to contribute to filling this gap.
Second, since Haḍimbā is a peripheral mountain goddess who has been in contact with the central Indian plains, she serves as a good example of Brahmanization and Sanskritization processes, by means of which indigenous deities, ritual systems, and beliefs have been reconfigured and integrated into a broader “Hindu” fold over centuries. Haḍimbā’s case is somewhat unusual in this regard, since the recent transformations she has undergone are rapid and quite intense. However, she is by no means alone in this, as other goddesses in India have also experienced such rapid transformations.1 Moreover, the rapidity of the change helps us to identify the essential elements of these processes, which have taken place all over India throughout history. And because in recent years Haḍimbā’s reach has grown beyond her immediate locality, she also illustrates
the historically complex process in which major goddesses of transregional scale have consolidated and become visible to Hindus as a whole.
Third, Haḍimbā’s location in the Himalaya makes her especially relevant to contemporary scholarly interest. From ancient times, Hindu tradition has held the Himalaya in great esteem. It is considered the abode of the great god Shiva, the place where legendary sages and ascetics performed practices of self-abnegation, and the location of celebrated mythical events. Yet the region is remote and hard to access, and as a result it has been a fertile ground for the development of unique traditions and ritual systems, many of which are a product of the ongoing encounter between indigenous faiths and the Hinduism of the plains. Whereas the central region of the Indian Himalaya—that of the modern Indian state of Uttarakhand—has already received some scholarly attention (Berreman 1993; Sax 1991, 2009; Taylor 2011), the West Himalayan region in general and the Kullu Valley in particular remain unjustly underexplored. A few recent contributions (Berti 2001; Elmore 2016; Hingorani 2013; Luchesi 2006) only begin to bring to light this stream of mountain Hinduism. My study of the Kullu-based cult of the goddess Haḍimbā sheds important light on our understanding of the religion and culture of the West Himalaya as well.
Fourth, Haḍimbā’s cult is a prime example of what could be termed “lived Hinduism,” a field of study that has been drawing much scholarly and public interest in recent years. The concept of lived religion, first forcefully articulated in the late 1990s (Hall 1997), turned attention away from official representatives of religious traditions—and their texts—to the thinking and practice of lay practitioners. Lived religion criticizes the hierarchizing distinction between canonical and popular religion by showing how official and lay theologies and practices combine and blend in the everyday lives of devotees. Similar sensitivities have been employed by Indologists, who have called for the study of “on the ground” (Narayanan 2000), “practical” (Fuller 1992), or “prosaic” (Grieve 2006) aspects of Indian religions. Several widely popular publications have appeared which, unlike the general run of earlier anthropological studies, attempt to situate local Hindu practices in a pan-Indian perspective without perpetuating the earlier Indological dependence on classical Sanskrit texts and elite Brahmanic viewpoints (e.g., Gold 2015; Haberman 2013; Lochtefeld 2010; Sax 2009). The cult of the goddess Haḍimbā serves as a perfect example of lived village Hinduism in contemporary India. As we will see, devotees contend with a host of issues: the place of religious practice in communities’ and individuals’ everyday lives; the effects of modernity, capitalism, and tourism on traditional faiths and practices; the implications on the ground of the politicization of Hinduism under the rule of the right-wing Hindu government; and the engagement of Hindus with global changes, including climatic and environmental challenges.
My commitment to studying the lived aspects of Haḍimbā’s cult has shaped much of my research interests and sensibilities, as well as the way I analyze and present my findings here. I take my cue from Vincent Crapanzano (1986), specifically his analysis of Goethe’s description of the Roman carnival, which begins around New Year and culminates on Ash Wednesday.2 Crapanzano criticizes Goethe for a number of shortcomings, but particularly for describing the carnival from an external, aloof position. For the sake of bringing order to the “madness” on the ground, he writes from an allegedly transcendent and omniscient perspective that is held by almost no one on the ground. Goethe, Crapanzano writes,
preserves his distance, an order-bestowing theatrical distance, and only occasionally does he identify with the spectators—not with the huge lively mass of sensuous beings, but with an elite who watch the crowd from their benches and chairs. . . . He does not phenomenologically or rhetorically assume the subjectivity of the participants. . . . Goethe is interested in display, the external, das Aussere, in what he can see—and not in the Innerlichkeit [inner meaning]3 of the participants. (66–67)
Goethe’s description, while comprehensive, detailed, and orderly, is dismissive of the experience of the participants themselves and thus offers a perspective which is no one’s but Goethe’s own.
The speciousness of an allegedly transcendent point of view is also effectively pointed to by Michel de Certeau (1984) in his oft-quoted The Practice of Everyday Life. In chapter 7 of this famous book, titled “Walking in the City,” de Certeau looks down at Manhattan from the 110th floor of the World Trade Center and reflects on the nature of space as experienced by the habitants of urban environments. The all-encompassing vision of the city revealed to those who look at it from above is, according to de Certeau, a fictional vision, one that doesn’t incorporate the real space in which the people “down there” live. The real space of the city is experienced, revealed, and thus also produced by those who walk its streets daily, who navigate its lanes, and who occupy its spaces in their everyday lives. The same is true, I argue, for the goddess Haḍimbā, whose reality should be sought in the myriad ways she manifests on the ground.
When preparing for my research in the Kullu Valley, I thought a lot about the scholar’s point of view. I was determined to tell the story of the goddess Haḍimbā and her cult from a perspective that would be loyal to that of her devotees. Instead of producing a narrative told from an allegedly all-knowing, bird’s-eye point of view, I hoped to account for how things were experienced, perceived, and understood on the ground. Furthermore, I hoped not only to document the
