Click the star to add/remove an item to/from your individual schedule.
You need to be logged in to avail of this functionality.

Accepted Paper:

Truth, exchange and rivalry: constructions of Prannath's seventeenth century encounter with the call to prayer  
Jacqueline Suthren Hirst (University of Manchester)

Paper short abstract:

This paper will analyse the very varying constructions of Prannath’s apparent aural encounter with the Islamic call to prayer in 1674, in terms of truth claims, cultural exchange and rival identities, both contemporary and modern.

Paper long abstract:

In 1674, Prannath (1618-94), the leader of a mercantile sect influenced by Vallabha Krishnaite devotion, apparently heard a mullah give the call to prayer. According to the main hagiography of his life, the Bitak, it was then that he declared the inner meaning of that Arabic summons to the faithful (33.69-71). I look at this encounter between a holy man from a particular bhakti background and these words epitomising Islam to see how the event and its significance have been variously constructed in terms of truth claims, cultural exchange and rival identities. Analysing contemporary and modern accounts, I show how a contextualised focus on a single case can contribute to a nuanced understanding of shifts in the construction of 'religion' in pre-modern and modern South Asia.

Panel P23
Yogis, sufis, devotees: religious/literary encounters in pre-modern and modern South Asia
  Session 1