Songs of Wisdom and Circles of Dance PDF Download

Author: Tazim R. Kassam
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 1438408412
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 452

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Book Description
Coursing though cultures and time, tuneful verse has given moving expression to the human longing for the divine. As poetry strung on sweet melodies, hymns bear testimony to the religious life of the devout, and to the inspiring teachings of minstrels and saints. Such is the ginan tradition of the Satpanth Isma'ilis, Indian successors of the Fatand Nizari Isma'ili sect of the Shi'ah Muslims. Traditionally recited during daily ritual prayers, ginans have been revered for generations among the Satpanth Isma'ilis as sacred compositions. This work offers for the first time an extensive translation of hymns attributed to the Isma'ili saint-composer, Pir Shams (ca. 13th century), who is at once one of the most pivotal and yet most enigmatic figures of this literary tradition. It also presents a cogent historical reconstruction of the beginnings of Satpanth Isma'ilism--a phase of Isma'ili history that has spanned over eight centuries.

Author: Tazim R. Kassam
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Islamic poetry, Indic
Languages : en
Pages : 402

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Book Description

Author: Tazim R. Kassam
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Islamic hymns
Languages : en
Pages : 804

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Book Description
"To date, the syncretic nature of Satpanth Isma'ilism has been viewed within a framework of conversion. Thus, generally, the ginan literature has been explained as the creative attempts of Isma'ili pirs (venerated teachers) to effect changes in religious orientation by conveying Nizari Isma'ili teachings through Hindu symbols and themes. However, an examination of the internal evidence in the ginans of Pir Shams--who belonged to the beginnings of Satpanth--in conjunction with events in Sind and the greater Isma'ili world at the time, has brought into focus crucial social and political factors that may also have instigated the formation of Satpanth Isma'ilism." --

Author: Aziz Esmail
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1136876537
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 248

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Book Description
The Ginans are religious lyrics which have long been a central part of the religious life of the Indian Mizari Ismaili community (known as Khojas), and continue to form their living poetic tradition. Aziz Esmail's translation is suggestive of the depth of religious thought, feeling and imagination out of which this poetry was born, and the lyrical beauty of the form in which this experience found a voice. The poetry of the Ginans illustrates an historically and culturally specific conception of the world, and of the norms peculiar to that culture, as well as a religious perception that forms a significant part of the religious experience of mankind. This volume will appeal both to specialists and more general readers, including Indologists, scholars of Islam in the Subcontinent, students of Comparative Religion, Comparative Literature, and those with an interest in mystical or devotional poetry.

Author: José Ignacio Cabezón
Publisher: Psychology Press
ISBN: 9780415970655
Category : Identity (Psychology)
Languages : en
Pages : 246

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Book Description
First Published in 2005. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Author: Shafique N. Virani
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198042590
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 322

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Book Description
"None of that people should be spared, not even the babe in its cradle." With these chilling words, the Mongol warlord Genghis Khan declared his intention to destroy the Ismailis, one of the most intellectually and politically significant Muslim communities of medieval Islamdom. The massacres that followed convinced observers that this powerful voice of Shi'i Islam had been forever silenced. Little was heard of these people for centuries, until their recent and dramatic emergence from obscurity. Today they exist as a dynamic and thriving community established in over twenty-five countries. Yet the interval between what appeared to have been their total annihilation, and their modern, seemingly phoenix-like renaissance, has remained shrouded in mystery. Drawing on an astonishing array of sources gathered from many countries around the globe, The Ismailis in the Middle Ages: A History of Survival, A Search for Salvation is a richly nuanced and compelling study of the murkiest portion of this era. In probing the period from the dark days when the Ismaili fortresses in Iran fell before the marauding Mongol hordes, to the emergence at Anjudan of the Ismaili Imams who provided a spiritual centre to a scattered community, this work explores the motivations, passions and presumptions of historical actors. With penetrating insight, Shafique N. Virani examines the rich esoteric thought that animated the Ismailis and enabled them to persevere. A work of remarkable erudition, this landmark book is essential reading for scholars of Islamic history and spirituality, Shi'ism and Iran. Both specialists and informed lay readers will take pleasure not only in its scholarly perception, but in its lively anecdotes, quotations of delightful poetry, and gripping narrative style. This is an extraordinary book of historical beauty and spiritual vision.

Author: David L Weddle
Publisher: NYU Press
ISBN: 0814794831
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 269

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Book Description
Despite the dominance of scientific explanation in the modern world, at the beginning of the twenty-first century faith in miracles remains strong, particularly in resurgent forms of traditional religion. In Miracles, David L. Weddle examines how five religious traditions—Hinduism, Judaism, Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam—understand miracles, considering how they express popular enthusiasm for wondrous tales, how they provoke official regulation because of their potential to disrupt authority, and how they are denied by critics within each tradition who regard belief in miracles as an illusory distraction from moral responsibility. In dynamic and accessible prose, Weddle shows us what miracles are, what they mean, and why, despite overwhelming scientific evidence, they are still significant today: belief in miracles sustains the hope that, if there is a reality that surpasses our ordinary lives, it is capable of exercising—from time to time—creative, liberating, enlightening, and healing power in our world.

Author: Laurie L. Patton
Publisher:
ISBN: 022667598X
Category : RELIGION
Languages : en
Pages : 341

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Book Description
"One afternoon, Laurie Patton, then chair of the religious studies department at her university, sat in her office collating death threats. A colleague had come under attack by members of the Hindu diaspora for a scholarly study that they judged offensive. A global petition demanded that the book be withdrawn, and threats against the author included explicit calls for his execution. This case is one of many in which the secular study of religion has scandalized-and been passionately refuted by-the very communities it had imagined itself embracing. Authors of seemingly arcane studies on subjects like the origins of the idea of Mother Earth or the sexual dynamics of mysticism have been targets of hate mail and topics of book-banning discussions. As a result, scholars of religion have struggled to describe their own work even to themselves. In this book, scholar and noted university administrator Laurie Patton looks at the cultural work of religious studies through scholars' clashes with religious communities, especially in the late 1980s and 90s. These kinds of controversies emerged with new frequency and passion during this period because of two conditions: 1) the rise of the multicultural politics of recognition, which changed the nature of debate in the public sphere and created the possibility for Patton calls "eruptive" public spaces; and 2) the emergence of the Internet, which changed the nature of readership. "Others" about whom scholars wrote to their colleagues were now also readers who could agree or condemn in public forums. These controversies were also fundamentally about something new: the very rights of secular, Western hermeneutics to interpret religions at all. Patton's book holds out hope that scholars can find a space for their work between the university and the communities they study. Their role, she suggests, is similar to that of the wise fool in many classical dramas and indeed in many religious traditions. Scholars of religion have multiple masters and must move between them while speaking a truth that not everyone may be interested in hearing"--

Author: Uche Onyebadi
Publisher: Vernon Press
ISBN: 1648895158
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 313

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Book Description
'Political Messaging in Music and Entertainment Spaces across the Globe' uniquely expands the frontiers of political communication by simultaneously focusing on content (political messaging) and platform (music and entertainment). As a compendium of valuable research work, it provides rich insights into the construction of political messages and their dissemination outside of the traditional and mainstream structural, process and behavioral research focus in the discipline. Researchers, teachers, students and other interested parties in political communication, political science, journalism and mass communication, sociology, music, languages, linguistics and the performing arts, communication studies, law and history, will find this book refreshingly handy in their inquiry. Furthermore, this book was conceptualized from a globalist purview and offers readers practical insights into how political messaging through music and entertainment spaces actually work across nation-states, regions and continents. Its authenticity is also further enhanced by the fact that most chapter contributors are scholars who are natives of their areas of study, and who painstakingly situate their work in appropriate historical contexts.

Author: David Kenneth Swinson
Publisher: Independently Published
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
This is an explanation of my journey from Church to finding Heaven. Through my path of Sweat Lodge to Bear Dance Ceremony People gathered around. The Wingmen smudged off the circle in and out. The drum sung loud with the pounding sticks. The Singers sang the Bear welcoming song. The Bear dancers filed into the circle. The songs entered the Bear dancer deep as it woke the Bear. The man was no longer a man, he was now moved by the Bear he carried. Around the fire in clockwise circles and some in spirals. After the song ended the Wingman would smudge and wing the man off with sage to bring him back from the depths of the Bear. Once the men were back into their bodies the next song pounded out of the drum. The Bears danced again around the fire. Taking on the spirit of the Bear dancing through the man. The man was no longer the man, the Bear used this body to dance. The tobacco line kept the ceremony contained within the circle. The community came from all over the world to watch and be healed. Then the path of service of the Sacred Medicines Going deeper that those we serve so we can be of service Entheogen = plants that generate god within