Olga Serbaeva describes how the Jayadrathayāmala envisaged magically discovered nidhi (treasure) as an integral part of its soteriological program. Tantric texts dedicate special chapters to the search for nidhi (treasures). The vision of hidden treasures is considered to be a siddhi (supernatural ability) that occurs after many thousand rounds of mantra repetition, and other rituals. Generally, nidhi is considered material treasures, i.e. gold, precious stones, and any other objects related to becoming wealthy. In JY, there is a strong link between nidhi and Kubera, and a particular form of Kālī, called Nidhīśvarī or Kuberajananī, from JY.4.54, once propitiated, bestows the treasures to the sādhakas. Another aspect, closer to the visionary nature of the experiences leading to finding treasures, shall allow us to bring in the JY materials on the altered states of consciousness, where the visionary switch happens in particular conditions after particular auditive and physical forerunning signs. We shall discover how nidhi fits among other consciousness-altering practices such as āveśa/svasthāveśa, khorika, prasena. The prescriptive JY shall be compared to the flowery Kathāsāritsāgara, a text recompiled by Somadeva in the late 11th century Kashmir, reusing some contemporary tantric references and materials. Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK: England & Wales; http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/uk/
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Olga Serbaeva describes how the Jayadrathayāmala envisaged magically discovered nidhi (treasure) as an integral part of its soteriological program. Tantric texts dedicate special chapters to the search for nidhi (treasures). The vision of hidden treasures is considered to be a siddhi (supernatural ability) that occurs after many thousand rounds of mantra repetition, and other rituals. Generally, nidhi is considered material treasures, i.e. gold, precious stones, and any other objects related to becoming wealthy. In JY, there is a strong link between nidhi and Kubera, and a particular form of Kālī, called Nidhīśvarī or Kuberajananī, from JY.4.54, once propitiated, bestows the treasures to the sādhakas. Another aspect, closer to the visionary nature of the experiences leading to finding treasures, shall allow us to bring in the JY materials on the altered states of consciousness, where the visionary switch happens in particular conditions after particular auditive and physical forerunning signs. We shall discover how nidhi fits among other consciousness-altering practices such as āveśa/svasthāveśa, khorika, prasena. The prescriptive JY shall be compared to the flowery Kathāsāritsāgara, a text recompiled by Somadeva in the late 11th century Kashmir, reusing some contemporary tantric references and materials. Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK: England & Wales; http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/uk/
Do they think money grows on trees? Yakṣas, nāgās and nidhis (Oxford Treasure Seminar Series)
Tibetan Graduate Studies Seminar
1 hour 3 minutes
11 months ago
Do they think money grows on trees? Yakṣas, nāgās and nidhis (Oxford Treasure Seminar Series)
John Guy looks at the embracing presence of gods of place in early Buddhist art. This talk begins with the premise that subcontinental ancient India was marked by the embracing presence of gods of place. The pervasiveness of local deities, as later codified in such texts as the Mahāmāyūri and the governing deities of the Uttarādhyayana Sūtra, point to their localized nature and named identities. The former lists them according to the place each presides as the tutelary deity, the latter by iconographic features. As we move into the first millennium, the constellation of pan-Indian deities coalesces around a defined pantheon, reducing the religious spaces occupied by these nature deities, and seemingly marginalizing those that survive. A question that has long vexed art historians of early historic South Asia is the relationship of image to text. The antiquity of texts describing - and presumed to be prescribing – the way images of deities are represented, broadly speaking, appear to postdate surviving imagery. In presenting a corpus of the earliest extant imagery from subcontinental India, we will examine the place of yakṣas, nāgās and nidhis in this shifting devotional landscape and their afterlife in a polytheistic system.
Tibetan Graduate Studies Seminar
Olga Serbaeva describes how the Jayadrathayāmala envisaged magically discovered nidhi (treasure) as an integral part of its soteriological program. Tantric texts dedicate special chapters to the search for nidhi (treasures). The vision of hidden treasures is considered to be a siddhi (supernatural ability) that occurs after many thousand rounds of mantra repetition, and other rituals. Generally, nidhi is considered material treasures, i.e. gold, precious stones, and any other objects related to becoming wealthy. In JY, there is a strong link between nidhi and Kubera, and a particular form of Kālī, called Nidhīśvarī or Kuberajananī, from JY.4.54, once propitiated, bestows the treasures to the sādhakas. Another aspect, closer to the visionary nature of the experiences leading to finding treasures, shall allow us to bring in the JY materials on the altered states of consciousness, where the visionary switch happens in particular conditions after particular auditive and physical forerunning signs. We shall discover how nidhi fits among other consciousness-altering practices such as āveśa/svasthāveśa, khorika, prasena. The prescriptive JY shall be compared to the flowery Kathāsāritsāgara, a text recompiled by Somadeva in the late 11th century Kashmir, reusing some contemporary tantric references and materials. Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK: England & Wales; http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/uk/
