10 Bhakti

Dr. Nivedita Rao

Introduction

Bhakti in pre-modern India has generally been seen as a distinct religious expression contesting Brahmanical superiority as well as Brahmin mediated worship. Bhakti proponents deny the value of sacrifices and ritualism and reliance on prescribed texts for salvation. It was also a denial of renunciation or ‘ascetic withdrawal in search of speculative knowledge of the divine’ [Schomer 1987:1]. Some rejected idol worship but nevertheless accepted the notion of a transcendent deity. Devotion was defined by ‘ecstatic abandonment’ and an intensely self-expressive mode of a loving relationship with a personally conceived supreme deity. Salvation from such a God was seen as prerogative of all, thus allowing for the entrance of members from the Shudra, Atishudra and women groups.

Thus ‘spiritual leadership shifted from the Brahmin priest knowledgeable about ritual and Sanskrit scriptures to the figure of the popular saint–poet who composed fervent songs of devotion in the regional vernacular’. [Schomer 1987:1] With time many of the bhakti followers organized themselves into communities [sampradayas or panths] having a distinct social ideology and doctrine with regard to the revealed status of the scriptures, role of the Brahmin, observance of the varnashrama dharma [rules and norms of caste society] and a defined role of women in sectarian institutions.

Bhakti therefore profoundly changed both the quality and structures of religious life in medieval India and even today forms a part of what can be called as the ‘living traditions’ both as performance and evocative quality of the compositions ‘giving present–day Hinduism its emotional texture, its spiritual and social values and its basic philosophical assumptions.’[Schomer1987:2] Over time these songs and other compositions have either been canonized and thus become part of the temple/matha ritual, or recited at important periods of the sects’ festivals and other occasions or performed during pilgrimages and other festive occasions.

This module is divided into three sections. The first section looks at the main areas of research in the field of bhakti studies. Section II examines the historical contexts of various bhakti traditions in India and section III looks at the issues of women and bhakti as well as the varieties of bhakti literatures.

Section I

Areas of research in bhakti studies

As an area of study it attracted first the Christian missionaries in the nineteenth century who saw in bhakti the beginnings of a monotheistic impulse within Hinduism. This was because as Krishna Sharma notes ‘this formulation can be traced back to the identification of the general term bhakti, first with Krishna bhakti and then with Vaishnavism as a whole’ [Sharma 1987: 8]. However its attraction for a later generation of historians and literary scholars were primarily in the area of its social content and ideological imperatives for the lower castes and women. Regarded as culture heroes [Mani 2005] the bhakti poets were considered after the decline of the Buddhism to have challenged Brahmanical religion. For feminist historians, bhakti afforded one of the few avenues of recovering voices/testimonies as well as literary knowledge associated with women bhakti poets. Bhakti also attracted attention from historians writing in post-communal India to look for a Hindu–Muslim dialogue within the broad syncretic traditions of bhakti. [Skyhawk 1992, Zelliot 1987] In the study of its literary texts bhakti opened up new debates on the beginnings of a vernacular literary culture, its counter position to the classical Sanskrit hegemonic culture as well as precursor to modern vernacular literature.

Max weber’s essay on the ‘Religion of Non–Privileged Classes published in 1922 was one of the earliest to note why their religion was different from that of the elite, dominant groups and located the reasons as those arising from the specific social, economic and political situations. Although much of what he propounded has been rejected his observations on diversity of religious attitudes of the non – privileged groups and their tendency towards congregational religion, and a religion of salvation and finally towards rational ethical religion holds true according to Lorenzen [2004] about nirgun bhakti traditions in north India even today.

Marxist historians and bhakti-

Marxist historians writing on the feudalism debate saw bhakti as an ideological apparatus of Hinduism in establishing a feudal agrarian order and a graded system of hierarchy in caste. The identification of the king with the principle deity of the temple, the similarities in architecture and rituals for both the king and deity are seen as legitimizing devices for the newly aryanised monarchies. Similarly in the language of complete surrender and loyalty to the deity is also seen a resemblance between the lord-serf and deity-devotee relationship as idealized and celebrated in the bhakti literature. For a detailed understanding of this debate see relevant works by D.D.   Kosambi (1970), R. S. Sharma (2003), and Kesavan Veluthat (1993). Thapar however counters this understanding of bhakti stating that such an overview was derived from the Bhagvad Gita which emphasized caste duties. [Thapar 2004] Later bhakti proponents have severely criticized both the nature of caste and Brahmanical superiority within this system.

Debates on Authorship

The debates on authorship as we understand it in the print culture of the twentieth century seem to be misleading when used in the context of premodern literatures. Hawley in writing about determining the authenticity of the compositions attributed to Kabir, Ravidas, Mira and Surdas also notes that it would be difficult to state that all of the songs were written by the same author. He suggests that instead of looking for the authenticity of the songs it would be better if one were to look for the ‘authority’ that the songs carried by way of the signature, the mudrika or the bhanita of the sant. Thus he notes that the ‘weight and meaning’ of the poet’s signature would in case of Mirabai appeal to those poems that implied importance to bhakti over the calling of home and family while in case of Ravidas the appeal to his signature would be made if the poem had a ‘strong vein of social protest. [Hawley 1988] Novetzke on the other hand proposes the concept of ‘corporate authorship’ stating that authorship functions in a tripartite way- the first is the author whose verses are recited within the kirtan and this is the genealogical author, the second the originator of the art form, the eponymous author and the third the kirtankars who are the principal transmitters of the tradition. [Novetzke 2008] Parita Mukta’s work ‘Upholding the Common Life: The Community of Mirabai’ [1994] shows how a community of Dalit women, peasants, and Muslims the subordinated classes of Saurashtra and Rajasthan coalesced around the songs of mirabai to protest against feudal privilege and caste norms as well as marital relationships. Thus her work brilliantly essays the formation of a ‘people’s Mira’, and even today songs are composed in her name.

Section II

Historical development of bhakti

Historically bhakti has been located in early medieval India, a period following the decline of the Guptas and the rise of regional kingdoms. Most of these states showed distinct regional, political, economic and socio-religious trends. Many developed into vast agricultural regions with the expansion of irrigation networks, resource bases and cultural sub regions. Concomitant with the growth of agrarian bases there seems to have been a peasantisation of tribes and their absorption into the dominant social order as caste categories. Such a society also underwent ideological and religious changes. Bhakti and the worship through bhakti of god as a lord located in a temple was the key ideological strand of the period. The shift of emphasis from sacrifice to puja i.e. from Vedic Brahmanism to Puranic Hinduism, integration of various local cults and deities as well as the influence of Sramanic religions [Buddhism and Jainism] especially the quality of compassion as espoused by the Bodhisattva all contributed to the emergence of varieties of bhakti in this period.

Tamil Bhakti

Between the sixth and the ninth centuries there emerged seventy five bhakti saints in Tamil Nadu belonging to the Shaiva and Vaishnava traditions of Puranic Hinduism. The twelve Alvar saints belonged to the Vaishnava tradition notable among them were Pey, Bhutam and Poigai along with Nammalvar, and Andal. Among the sixty three Nayanar saints were the most famous Appar, Sambandar and Sundarar who belonged to the Shaiva tradition. Both groups had saints that came from diverse social backgrounds and expressed themselves in songs of pain of separation and joy of union of their respective deity. This was a highly emotional, intense and ecstatic form of bhakti unknown to Brahmanical religion of this time and evoked loving devotion to a temple based deity.

The works of the Alvar saints have been collected as the Divya Prabandham and those of the Nayanars are called the Tirumurai. These collection were sung in the temples in a later period and were responsible in influencing later bhakti tradition in Vaishnavism [the author of the Bhagvad Purana, Ramanuja, and Madhvacharya] and in Shaivism [Virashaivism ]

To what extent were these considered as protest movements has been analysed by some scholars. Singh states that even though the leadership of this movement was elitist it helped to expand access to sacred spaces to lower castes, and women. While Champakalakshmi notes that Tamil bhakti did provide avenues of social acceptance and even mobility to lower castes but this happened only in the twelfth century. But its prominent dissent in idiom was to contest Vedic Brahmanism and the exclusiveness of Brahmins to divine grace and salvation. Similarly Tamil bhakti also had rivalry with Buddhism and Jainism which was not just ideological but also involved competition for royal patronage and donations of agricultural land [Champakalakshmi in Lorenzen 2004:157-157]

What happened to Tamil bhakti from the 11th -12th century?

Ramanuja, a Tamil Brahmin teaching in the Shrirangam temple in the eleventh century was according to Thapar an ‘effective bridge between the devotional movements and Brahmanical theology, attempting as he did to weave together the two divergent strands’ [Thapar 2004:401] According to Ramanuja who was countering Shankara, salvation was dependent purely on devotion, giving oneself up entirely to the deity, who was projected as loving and forgiving, as in the devotional cult [Thapar 2004:401] Ramanuja however felt that Shudras had the right to worship in the temples. His liberal measures to widen the social base of Shrivaishnavism involved the organisation of rituals and incorporation of non-brahmana [vellala] elements into Vaishnava worship, thus creating avenues of status enhancement for the artisanal groups, including weavers who were among the principal beneficiaries [Champakalakshmi 2004]

Madhavacharya, a thirteenth century theologian made further attempts to synthesize the ideas of bhakti with Brahmanical ideology. He however, unlike Ramanuja stated that the deity granted his grace for salvation only to the pure, which implied selection. [Thapar 2004] Madhvacharya’s mathas are manned only by Madhva Brahmins although entrance was opened to Shudras also.

On the other hand royal families from the ninth century onwards began building temples to Shiva and Vishnu following the sacred geography outlined in the Tevaram and the Divya Prabandham. Similarly they patronized the collection and organization of the Tamil hymns and established the ritual of hymn singing in temples. Images of Alvar and Nayanar hymnists were installed in many of the canonical temples [Champakalakshmi 1987] On the other hand Shaiva mathas also emerged as custodians of bhakti literature. Such mathas proliferated all over the Tamil country and received royal patronage, merchant endowments as well as donations from emerging trading and crafts organization. All these new economic groups of the non–Brahmana caste again turned to the temple for ritual ranking, by participation through gift giving and administrative function of the temple. It is important to remember that while Shudra families were accorded high ritual status in Srivaishnava temple Dalits were kept out of this arrangement. Shudra participation in temple activities lasted at least till the sixteenth century and some families did rise to high positions in the temple of Shrirangam till it was finally usurped by the Brahmins under the Vijayanagara rulers. [Lorenzen 2005]

More recently Vasudha Narayanan has looked at the renewed attempts by Dalit groups to reclaim their bhakti heritage. Her work looks at the Sri Nammalvar sabha, of Shrivaishnava Dalits established in 1881 by Parasurama Dasar which has built shrines to the twelve alvars. She notes that the Sri Vipranarayan, priest on the shrine not only wears the sacred thread but also chants from the Sanskrit Vedas and Upanishads as well as holds classes for the recitation of the Tamil Veda [the 4000 verses of the Alvars] For this community bhakti transcends Manu and all dharmic prescriptions. [Narayanan 2005]

Virsahaivism-

Founded in the second half of the twelfth century by a high caste Brahmin Basavanna who rejected the traditional temple cult, official priesthood, elaborate rituals as well as pilgrimages as well as the use of Sanskrit language. Numerous devotees met at the hall of spiritual experience called anubhava mantapa. Founded by Basavanna where discussions and spiritual discourses took place, later Allama Prabhu was made in charge. The only practice was that of wearing a linga around the neck as a mark of a non Brahmin form of worship. [Schouten 1995] Much of their early teaching questioned brahmanical teachings such as the theory of rebirth and the caste norms. They also encouraged certain social practices such as late post puberty marriages, remarriage of widows, intercaste marriages, burial instead of cremation and attacked Brahman landlordism. Their philosophy appealed most to the non-Brahmins and the lower castes. [Thapar 2004]

The Varkari tradition

The Varkari tradition as it was popularly known emerged with Jnandev and Namdev as the central figures as well as Changadev, the yogi turned sant, Parisa Bhagvat a Vaisnava Brahmin from Pandharpur, Visoba, a staunch Shaivite, Gora, a potter, Savata, a gardner, Narahari, the goldsmith, Sena, the barber, Joga, the oilman, Cokhamela, an untouchable, Janabai, the maid servant, Naga, the banker turned beggar, and Kanhopatra, the courtesan and two of the most prolific composers- Eknath the Brahmin from Paithan and Tukaram, the kunbi from Dehu. The Varkari tradition is centered on the worship of a local deity Vitthal consecrated in the temple at Pandharpur. The tradition revolves around the annual pilgrimage to Pandharpur on Ashadhi Ekadashi and the Kartikki Ekadashi, following a vegetarian diet, wearing the tulsi mala around the neck and devoting a life to singing of lord Vittala’s name and keeping the companionship of the saints. The devotee is not required to renounce his life and cult itself does not have a centralized organization, no hierarchy, no general councils, no credo, no sacraments. [Deleury 1960:4]. The majority of the varkaris are villagers, peasants, craftsmen and tradesmen. The sect is more like a large family with disciples being addressed as guru brother or sister. As Deleury notes ‘throughout their life the disciples maintain constant contact between themselves and often gather round their leader, making it a point to attend all bhajans and kirtans which the latter may give. This close connection between the members of the same group is strengthened by the fact that they are already connected by the family ties or at least caste or professional relationship.’ [Deleury 1960:5] For an insightful reading on Jnaneshvar and Tukaram see works by Jayant Lele [1987].

Some important poet saints of varkari tradition-

Namdev, a Shudra tailor organized a group of likeminded bhaktins into the varkari cult, travelled widely and was believed to have received ideas of bhakti from the south and was responsible for its spread to the north. His ideas spread rapidly into the north in the late fourteenth century and some of his verses were incorporated into the Holy Granth Sahib of the Sikhs. He was the most popular literary religious leader of the downtrodden. Novetzke’s work Religion and Public Memory: A Cultural History of Saint Namdev in India [2008] is an extensive work on Namdev’s literary and performative traditions.

Chokhamela, an untouchable along with his family spoke about the inhuman conditions like starvation, humiliation and helplessness forced on the untouchables. They quarrel with god not just because they were not allowed to enter his temple but also on the nature of caste. [Zelliot and Punekar 2005] Eknath the Brahmin in the sixteenth century was known both for his prolific literary compositions as well as his humane treatment and commensality with the Mahars of Paithan for which he was out-casted. Hugh van Skyhawk’s excellent work on the Eknathi Bhagvat shows how Eknath had to guise his experience of salvation derived from the Sufi tradition of ‘fana’ to make it more acceptable to Brahmin sensibility.

Tukaram was most revolutionary and vocal enemy of Brahmin orthodoxy, and was persecuted for this. He had to go through an ordeal for his revolutionary ideas and his works were thrown into the river. Sadanand More’s work Tukaram darshan in Marathi is an exhaustive study on the tradition of Tukaram as well its legacy carried forward by the Satyashodhak samaj.

Mahanubhav

The other bhakti tradition that evolved in Maharashtra in the thirteenth century was the Mahanubhava “those of the great experience”. The Mahanubhavas rejected caste and the worship of idols and refused to acknowledge the ritual and scriptural authority of the Brahmins, created an order of nuns and monks which is in existence even today. They are considered as a heterodox sect with belief in one god who has five incarnations [Krishna, Dattatreya, and three sect figures of Chakradhar, Govindaprabhu and Changadeva] Feldhaus’s works on the Mahnubhav Sutrapatha [1976] and her later work titled ‘The deeds of god in Riddhipur’ [1984] offers insights into the Mahanubhav religion and texts.

North Indian sant tradition-

In the fifteenth century bhakti religion as it emerged in North India and studied by bhakti scholars, was divided into nirgun and sagun forms based on the theological difference in the way the deity was conceptualized as an object of worship.

In the nirgun the deity remained unmanifest and non anthropomorphic. Nirgun sants included Namdev, Kabir, Raidas, Pipa, Guru Nanak, Dadu Dayal, Haridas Niranjani and sometimes also Gorakhnath. They do not believe in rebirth and karma and do not accept the tenets of the varnashrama order. Most of them came from lower castes, none are from the Brahmin caste. They completely reject theology, ritual practice and social ideology.

Sagun Bhakti -Within Vaishnava tradition although open to all castes ritual barrier was not really challenged and leadership remained mainly in hands of Brahmins. [Schomer 1987:8] In those bhakti movements which stress saguna aspects of god there was greater reliance on Brahmins and Sanskrit textual authority for sources to determine their attributes of personality, form and exploits. The sagun tradition includes Chaitanya, Vallabhacharya, Surdas, Mira, Tulsidas, and Narasi Mehta. They believe in transmigration and rebirth as well as the importance of the social order based on caste or the varnashrama dharma. Tulsidas in the sixteenth century promoted Ram bhakti while Surdas and Mira preached Krishna bhakti, in the east Chaitanya a Brahmin by birth established a full-fledged movement based on brahmanical principles.

The distinction between nirgun and sagun bhakti however as Hawley notes is unfounded in the bhakti poets themselves but becomes a part of organizational strategy in later sectarian anthologies. [Hawley 1995] This distinction only appears in the sectarian anthologies of bhakti poetry in Hindi produced in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Similarly A.K. Ramanujan has denied the usefulness of this distinction noting the tension between the lord as person and lord as principle thus ‘If he were entirely a person, he would not be divine, and if he were entirely a principle, a godhead, one could not make poems about him. [Dharwadekar 2004]

Kabir, a weaver from the Julaha community and a resident of Benaras, was a part of the sant tradition or nirguni bhakti. Kabir’s ideas were about finding god within ourselves and hence to replace exterior grace of god with mystical interior self-realization. Kabir’s ideology was used by the lower castes for a positive status and self-image and by tribals [Oraons] who are being assimilated into caste hierarchy and are trying to preserve their self-esteem. Kabir panthis permit divorce, remarriage of widows and divorcees, burial of the dead but prohibit meat eating, and liquor. Some rituals like the chauka have no equivalents in caste Hinduism.

Bhakti in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries-

By the eighteenth century there is a preponderance of sants among the members of the middle castes: those of traders and clean cultivators who identify themselves either as traders or warriors. [Gold 1987:62] Gold’s work on these minor but interesting sant figures and their paramparas of north India is indeed very interesting- He studies the sant tradition of Paltu sahib of Ayodhya who came from the baniya caste, Charandas who was a Dhusar bania from Rajasthan, and Saomiji from the Khatri community.

Sekhar Bandyopadhyay’s excellent ethnography of the Namasudras shows how the Matua sect in late nineteenth century Bengal opposed Brahmanical Hinduism and propagated ideas of equality and dignity thus cementing many lower caste communities marginalized by upper caste domination. Similarly the Satnam panth as studied by Saurabh Dube in his work shows how in the 1820s Chamars along with another hundred other lower castes of Chattisgarh were rallied into a sect and a caste that rejected caste Hinduism thus reconstituting untouchable status. Initiated by lower caste leaders, both these movements reworked tenets drawn from Hinduism as well as bhakti. From bhakti they borrowed ideas of a simple form of devotion and obliterated caste and gender distinctions. Both movements as their respective researchers note were movements of creating a new social identity and a sense of renewed self-respect denied to them by caste Hinduism.

Section III

Bhakti and women

Uma Chakravarty in her seminal article ‘The world of the Bhaktin in South Indian tradition’ [2006] states that the relationship of a woman to god is an important aspect of understanding gender relationship in any society. While the dominant Brahmanical tradition downplayed her role due to pollution taboos and limited ritual space, the rich tradition of bhakti was seized to reclaim lost spaces.In bhakti their struggle is with the family and family values and is often against marriage. Some of the bhaktins deny marriage at the outset like Antal, some walk out on their husbands like Dalayi, Mahadevi akka or like Karaikkalammai terrify her husband by miracles, still others wait to be widowed and then refuse to perform sati or follow Brahmanical practices for widowhood like Mira, Gauri and Kuruamma. They deny their widowhood because they believe that they were always married to god. As Chakravarty notes ‘the bhaktin uses her devotion as an armour and god as her supporter in her resistance against priest and the husband.’ [Chakravarti 2006:290]

In conceptualization about god, the bhaktin considers him to be equal or sometimes subservient, sometimes a close companion that she could confide in, and at other times a lover who understood female desires and needs. [Chakravarti 2006]

Studying the relationship of the bhaktin with her body, the dilemma is generally resolved either by denying sexuality and transcending it as in the case of Avvai and Karaikkal Ammaiyar do, or direct it towards the chosen god as lover or husband like Antal and the third is like Mahadevi Akka to confront female sexuality head on. She unlike any other adopts a radical measure and wanders about naked thus refusing to be circumscribed by the notions of vulnerability of the female body. [Chakravarti 2006:288-289]

Leela Mullati’s study ‘The Bhakti movement and the status of Women: A case study of Virashaivism’ is a multifaceted study on Virashaiva women wherein she notes that absence of pollution taboos, right to inheritance and equality in marriage are some of the benefits.

A.K.Ramanujan in his essay on Men, Women and Saints shows that male poet saints often used the feminine mode in their poetry and imagined themselves as female in relation to god. This was perhaps to give up maleness, become bisexual, whole and androgynous like their gods and in a male dominated society it served to abase and reverse oneself, rid oneself of machismo, and enter into a liminal confusion and to become open and receptive as a woman to god. [Dharwadekar 2004:293]

Bhakti literatures-

When the sants were writing or composing one must imagine them not from the leisured castes who were patronized by court or the monastery, but that they were hard working men and women from various occupations picking up themes from their common life and composing in an idiom that was locally available to them like lullabies, grind mill songs, boatman’s songs, cowherd songs etc. Thus their songs were often according to Gold unpolished, didactic, hybrid, sometimes esoteric and occasionally striking. At once yogic and devotional always popular at times iconoclastic [Gold 1987:213]

Within the Varkari tradition there is a variety of creative literary forms deployed in the expression of bhakti derived from a distinct oral style. These include the ovi, abhanga, pada, bhupali, gana, gavlan, and virhani, and the musical dramatic forms like bharuds, gondhal, lalit, and aratis. [Tulpule 1979] Kabir’s songs according to Hess appeals to a modern sensibility because of its simplicity and imagery. Termed as ‘rough rhetoric’, Kabir’s compositions are considered sometimes crude, sometimes direct. All of his contemporaries in the sant tradition talk about god, he talks about us [Hess 1983:9] As She notes ‘Kabir pounds away with questions, prods with riddles, stirs with challenges, shocks with insults, disorients with verbal feints’[Hess 1983:10] In the sant tradition there is a high degree of influence of nath/tantric/Sahajiya Buddhism vocabulary. The use of ulatbamsi or upside-down language is often taken recourse to especially by Kabir, such compositions are often absurd, paradoxical, crazy and impenetrable poems aimed at reversals and aimed at the transformation of consciousness. As Hess notes upside-down language should make one feel like a fool; that is its function. [Hess 1987] In a similar vein A. K. Ramanujan analyzing an Allama poem from the Virashaiva tradition comes to the conclusion that an Allama poem aims at the displacement of cultural categories, a derangement of your normal senses, mystification and that though structured like a riddle it is not one because ‘not a being able to answer is the answer, not having the language is the language; the clarity is in the mystery’. [Dharwadekar 2004:323]

Friedhelm Hardy’s work on ‘Viraha bhakti’ studies the mysticism of separation or viraha bhakti within the Tamil Bhakti tradition. He notes that though they borrowed heavily from local belief systems as well as the northern religion for literary aspiration they turned to the Sangam works especially the Akam or the love poems and skillfully transformed the earthly love for divine longing transposing the beloved into the deity and the lover into the devotee. But since this love was toward a god, unlike the Sangam poems union with the god was unthinkable hence the poets had to introduce the concept of love-in-separation, of a perennial longing.

There has been a renewed interest in hagiographies and translation of bhakti poems. Neelima Bhatt’s work in Narasinha Mehta, his hagiography, and compositions, Archana Venkatesan’s ‘The secret Garden’ on Antal’s poetry, and Indira Peterson’s study on the Tevaram, Karen Pechilis’s work ‘Interpreting Devotion: the poetry and legacy of a classical female bhakti saints of India’, Elaine Craddock’s ‘Siva’s Demon Devotee-Karaikkal Ammaiyar’ are some interesting works in this direction.

Bhakti theaters-

Bhakti from its inception was highly performative. Unlike the scriptures meant for recitation and contemplation, bhakti compositions had a collective performative and dramatic appeal. Tulsidas’s Ramcharitmanas is performed as Ramlila in most parts of rural and urban north India. [see works by Richard Schechner and Anuradha Kapur on Ramlila] Similarly in Maharashtra we have the Kirtan parampara is open to all castes and women and is more interactive than other kirtan traditions. [Novetzke 2013] The bharuds are highly entertaining form of bhakti theater involving disguises, music, dialogue, farce and so much more. Jacqueline Jones’ unpublished dissertation on the Varkari Pakhavaj players in the city of Pune is an interesting study on how bhakti is performed by the devout.

Reference Bibliography-

• Chakravarti, Uma., Everyday lives, Everyday Histories: Beyond the Kings and Brahmanas of ‘Ancient’ India, Tulika Books, New Delhi, 2006.
• Champakalakshmi, R., From Devotionand Dissent to Dominance: The Bhakti of the Tamil Alvars and Nayanars in David Lorenzen [ed] Religious Movements in South Asia, 600 – 1800 A.D, Oxford University Press. New Delhi, 2004.
• Deleury, G. A., The Cult of Vithoba. Deccan College Post Graduate and Research Institute. Pune 1994
• Dharwadekar, V., The Collected Essays of A. K. Ramanujan. Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 2004.
• Gold, D., The lord as Guru- Hindi Sants in North Indian Tradition, Oxford University Press. New York. 1987
• Habib, I., Kabir in Irfan Habib (ed) Religion in Indian History, Tulika Books, Delhi, 2007
• Hardy, Friedhelm., Virah-Bhakti: The Early History of Krishna Devotion in South India. OUP, New Delhi, 1983.
• Hawley, J. S., Author and Authorship in Bhakti Poetry of North India, in The Journal of Asian Studies, Vol.47, No.2. May 1988, pp 269-290
• Hawley, J.S., The nirgun/sagun Distinction in the Early Manuscript Anthologies of Hindu Devotion in Lorenzen [ed] Bhakti Religion In North India: Community Identity and Political Action, SUNY, USA,1995.
• Hess, L and Sukhdev Singh., The Bijak of kabir, Motilal Banarasidass, New Delhi, 1983.
• Israel, M. and Nikhil Wagle., (eds) Religion and society in Maharashtra, University of Toronto, Canada, 1987.
• Kesavan Veluthat, Political Structure of Early Medieval South India, Orient Longman, New Delhi, 1993.
• Kosambi, D. D., The culture and civilisation of ancient India in historical outline, Vikas, Delhi, 1970.
• Lele, J., Community, Discourse and Critique in Jnanesvar in Jayant Lele ed Tradition and Modernity in Bhakti Movement, E.J.Brill, Leiden, 1981.
• Lele, J., Jnaneshvar and Tukaram: An Exercise in Critical Hermeneutics in Milton Israel and Nikhil Wagle (eds) Religion and society in Maharashtra. University of Toronto, Canada, 1987.
• Lorenzen, D.N., Religious Movements in South Asia, 600 – 1800 A.D, Oxford University Press. New Delhi, 2004.
• Mani, B.R., Debrahmanising History: Dominance and Resistance in Indian Society, Manohar, New Delhi, 2005.
• Mukta, P., Upholding the common life- The community of Mirabai. Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 1994.
• Narayanan, V., life and lyrics of Tiruppan Alvar in Eleanor Zelliot and Rohini Mokashi-Punekar eds Untouchable Saints: An Indian Phonomenon, Manohar,New Delhi, 2005.
• Novetzke, C. L., Religion and Public Memory: A Cultural History of Saint Namdev in India, Columbia University Press, Columbia, 2008.
• Omvedt, G., Seeking Begumpura –The Social Vision of Anti-Caste Intellectuals, Navayana, Delhi, 2008.
• Rao, V. N. -‘Texts without Authors and Authors without Texts’, paper presented at the South Asian Conference, Madison, Wisconsin, 1983.
• Sardar, G. B., The Saint-Poets of Maharashtra: Their Impact on Society. Orient Longman. Bombay, 1969.
• Schomer, K. and W. H. McLeod. The Sants – Studies in a Devotional Tradition of India.
• Berkley Religious Studies Series; Motilal Banarasidass, Delhi, 1987.
• Schouten, J. P., The Revolution of the Mystics: On the Social Aspects of Virashaivism, Motilal Banarasidass, New Delhi, 1995
• Scott, J. Domination and the Arts of Resistance – Hidden Transcripts, Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 1990.
• Sharma, K., Bhakti and Bhakti Movement: A New Perspective: A Study in the History of Ideas. Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers, New Delhi, 1987
• Sharma. R.S., Early Medieval Indian Society: A Study in Feudalisation, Orient Blackswan, 2003.
• Skyhawk, H.V., Sufi Influence in the Eknathi-Bhagavat: Some Observations on the text and its Historical Context in Ronald Stuart McGregor (ed) South Asian Devotional Literature: Current Research, 1985-1988, Cambridge University Press, 1992
• Thapar, R., Early India: From the Origins to AD 1300. University of California Press, USA, 2004
• Tulpule,S.G., Classical Marathi Literature: From the Beginning to A.D. 1818. Otto Harrassowitz. Weisbaden, 1979
• Zelliot, E., Chokhamela and Eknath: Two Bhakti modes of Legitimacy for Modern Change in Jayant Lele edited Tradition and Modernity in Bhakti Movements, E.J.Brill, Netherlands, 1981.
• Zelliot, E.,(a) Eknath’s Bharuds: The Sant as Link between Cultures in Karine Schomer and W.H. McLeod edited The Sants – Studies in a Devotional Tradition of India. Berkley. Berkley Religious Studies Series; Delhi: Motilal Banarasidass. 1987.
• Zelliot, E., and Rohini Mokashi-Punekar [eds] Untouchable Saints: An Indian Phonomenon, Manohar,New Delhi, 2005.