The regional circumambulation of Janakpur. Seen in the light of Vaishnavite tradition1
Le pèlerinage en cercle dans la région de Janakpur à la lumière de la tradition viṣṇouite
p. 121-147
Résumés
The events surrounding the formation of a festival are analysed with a view to understanding both the innovatory role of the ascetic in Hindu society and how he sees himself in that role. The material concerns the regional circumambulation of Janakpur, a Vaishnavite pilgrimage centre in the eastern Tarāī of Nepal. The circumambulation, although ‘ set in motion ’ by Rāmāvat ascetics at the close of the 18th century, was thought by the ascetics to have been always and already there. The circumambulation route was always there in its hidden everpresent form and it was already there in that the route had manifested itself at the time of Rām and Sītā in the Tretā Age but had subsequently disappeared in the Kali Age. By starting up the festival on the lapsed route, the Rāmāvat ascetics understood the formation of the festival as the restoration of something ‘ old ’ rather than as the beginning of something ‘ new ’. The idea of the disappeared place, or the lapsed time, is a key narrative theme in Vaishnavite discourse and it serves not only as the basis of their self-perception as renovators rather than innovators but also as a means of structuring intra-sectarian and inter-sectarian daims.
Les événements qui entourent la formation d’une fête sont ici analysés pour faire saisir à la fois le rôle innovateur des ascètes dans la société hindoue et la manière dont ils perçoivent eux-mêmes ce rôle. L’exemple retenu est celui du périple qu’effectuent les ascètes Rāmāvat dans la région de Janakpur, un centre de pèlerinage visnouite situé dans la partie orientale du Terai népalais. Inauguré à la fin du xviiie siècle, ce pèlerinage en cercle aurait en fait existé depuis toujours sous une forme cachée et omniprésente. L’itinéraire se serait manifesté à l’âge tretā durant la vie de Rām et de Sītā avant de disparaître à l’époque du Kaliyuga. En établissant l’itinéraire de la nouvelle fête sur les traces d’une route disparue, les ascètes Ramavat la conçoivent plus comme une restauration que comme une fondation. L’idée du lieu caché et du temps écoulé est l’un des thèmes narratifs qui dominent le discours visnouite. Elle est à la fois le support sur lequel les ascètes bâtissent leur identité et le moyen qu’ils se donnent pour organiser leurs revendications à l’intérieur comme à l’extérieur de la secte.
Texte intégral


1Although world renouncers have been credited with being innovators in Indian religion (Dumont 1959), still the way in which such innovations are brought about and understood by the innovators themselves has received little attention frorn anthropologists. In part, this is due to the ahistorical character of recent structuralist and culturological approaches in which Hindu society has been analysed in terms of synchronic oppositional structures and ‘ culturally constituted meanings In part, however, this is also due to the unavailability of the facts. From the Hindu point of view ritual messages and enactments have an everpresent form which has been fixed in other modes and moments of time. This native ideology of stasis obscures certain temporal differences between the otherwise ‘ fixed ’ messages and enaetments as well as undercuts the potential meaning which such temporal differences might hâve. Given the static context of ritual enaetments, the only way of examining how innovations are brought about and understood in Indian religion is to consider different accounts of the same ritual or belief from various religious traditions and genres and, working at cross-purposes to these accounts, establish from this external perspective a chronology of differences (or what, from this perspective, might be called ‘ innovations ’). Having established this external account, one could then analyse how these differences are apprehended in the light of the narrative themes of specific religious traditions.
2In this paper I shall follow this line of approach in order to uncover the meaning of the events surrounding the formation of a regional circumambulatory festival, a ritual which serves not only to demarcate a universal configuration in time and space, but also to place the encircler in some relation to the universal encircled object1. My material cornes from Janakpurdhām, a Vaishnavite pilgrimage centre in the eastern Tarāī of Nepal only seven miles north of the Bihar frontier. The knowable history of Janakpurdhām dates from the turn of the eighteenth century when a number of Rāmāvat ascetics, travelling from central and western India, established monasteries at a village which they believed to be the site of ancient Janakpur. The spread of the nascent Vaishnavite cuit throughout the region may be measured by the fact that within one hundred years of their arrivai the Rāmāvat ascetics were able to organize a five day circumambulation of the region and some years later the five day circumambulation was transformed into a fifteen day event. At present the fifteen day pañca kośa circumambulation is one of the most important festivals of the ritual year at Janakpurdhâm, attracting annually ten thousand ascetics and householders from Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, and the eastern Tarāī of Nepal. In this paper I shall describe how the Vaishnavite ascetics brought about the regional circumambulation at Janakpurdhām and how they understood their innovatory role in the light of Vaishnavite tradition.
The universalization of the region surrounding Janakpurdhām
3The present-day town of Janakpurdhām, whose founding dates from an earlier period in the Kali Age, is said by ascetics to be built at the site of ancient Janakpur, capital of the Vaidehī dynasty which ruled Mithilā during the Satya, Tretā, and Dvāpar world-periods. It was in the twenty-third generation of the Vaidehī dynasty that King Janak (Sīrdhvaj) found the infant Sītā lying in a furrow and brought her back to his palace where he raised her as his daughter. When Sītā reached maidenhood, Rām Candra, the Crown Prince of Ayodhyā, travelled to Janakpur and gained the hand of Sītā in niarriage by stringing a great bow which many generations earlier Śiva had entrusted to the Vaidehī dynasty. The divine couple were married in Janakpur and then returned to Ayodhyā. The Vaidehī dynasty continued to rule Mithilā until the Dvāpar Age when a dispute broke out between the Kauravas and the Pāṇḍavas which engulfed the kingdoms of the Ganges basin in a terrible conflict. In the course of that war Janakpur was destroyed and the Vaidehī dynasty becarne extinct. What was not devastated in battle, was covered over by the jungle so that by the end of the Dvāpar Age the great city had disappeared without a trace.
4The story of Janakpur, as told by its ascetics, bards, and pandits, does not start up again until the early eighteenth century when several itinerant Rāmāvat ascetics, passing through the Tarāī lowlands of northern Mithilā (present-day Dhanuṣa District, Nepal), were blessed by Rām and Sītā with visions of Janakpur (see Burghart 1978).2 The place where these visions occurred was called Janakpurdhām, or the ‘ abode of Janakpur ’, for even though the ancient city of Janakpur had disappeared in the Dvāpar Age, the site of the city was still thought to be an everpresent abode (nityadhām) of Rām and Sītā. These celestial visions authenticated the existence of Janakpurdhām as a place where mankind may come into contact with Rām and Sītā in the Kali Age and by their divine grace be released from the snares of transient existence.
5Although these visions were of central importance to the Rāmāvat ascetics, they did not establish Janakpurdhām as a sacred centre within the region, for Janakpurdhām was only one of many such places in the Tarāī whose redemptive capacity had been similarly authenticated. Indeed, the available archaeological evidence, royal chronicles, and tenurial documents suggest not only that there were many other temple villages in the region but also that the Maithil-speaking people who inhabited the eastern Tarāī were particularly devoted to the worship of Śiva and Durgā, not Rām and Sītā. A number of villages, such as Śilānāth, Kalyāneśvar, and Girijāsthān, were identified with temples of Śiva and Durgā ; and elsewhere temple ruins, mounds, and place names, such as Kṣīreśvar, Rānīpaṭṭī, Duhabī, and Mithileśvar, testify to the long-standing importance of Saivism. The only evidence of a devotional Vaishnavite temple in the vicinity of Janakpurdhām prior to the eighteenth century is the Jānkī monastery at Sītāmarhī in the former Tirhut Sarkār which was endowed with land by King Narpati Siṃha Ṭhākur of Darbhaṃgā in the year 1600 (A. K. Dās 1975: 8). Politically the region was situated along the border separating the spheres of influence of the hill kings (Makvānpur and Gorkhā) and the plains kings (Darbhaṃgā and the East India Company). Relations between the hills and the plains were not always cordial and from the late seventeenth century the king of Makvānpur sought to stabilize the frentier by assigning revenue collecting rights over land just north of the Tirhut Sarkār to Sannyāsī ascetics of the Daśnāmī sect. Accordingly Saivite Sannyāsī monasteries were established at Jaleśvar, Jhojhīkataiya, and Itaravā. At the turn of the eighteenth century an additional Sannyāsī monastery was endowed by King Indra Vidhātā Sen with land in the ‘ janakpur maujā ’ (Laṃsāl and Bhaṭṭarāï 1974: 28-29). The endowment was in favour of Rām Candra and the usufructory rights were assigned to Caturbhuj Giri who, according to the oral tradition, discovered an image of Rām, his three brothers, and Sītā which had lain buried in the earth at Janakpurdhām ever since the collapse of ancient Janakpur in the Dvāpar Age (Nepālī 1962 : 99-102; Jhā n.d. : 2). The record of this land grant is the oldest information, presently available, concerning the existence of a place called Janakpurdhām. In sum, at the time when the early Rāmāvat ascetics saw that the village of Janakpurdhām was an everpresent abode of Rām and Sītā, they found themselves in a region sanctified by temples of Śiva and Durgā and at a village whose land was managed by Caturbhuj Giri, an ascetic of the rival Daśnāmī sect.
6Given the fact that ritual circumambulation demarcates a universal configuration of time and space then one might suspect that the regional circumambulation of Janakpur could not have occurred until the region itself had been universalized in such a way that its temples and shrines were seen to exist in relation to a centre, or more literally a zenith, situated at Janakpurdhām. That is to say, from the moment of the appearance of these visions of Janakpur, there was reason enough to encircle the individual places where these visions had occurred, but there was no reason to encircle the region as a whole until the region itself had been conceived in terms of a microcosm. Documentary evidence bears out this surmise in that the earliest record of the regional circumambulation of Janakpur dates from the late eighteenth century (J. R. Śaraṇ : 1961 : 442, 449), nearly one hundred years after the earliest evidence that the region surrounding Janakpurdhām had been universalized in the image of the cosmic city.3 An early depiction of the cosmic city of Janakpur may be found in the writings of Sūr Kiśor (1958), a Rāmānandī ascetic who travelled to Janakpurdhām from Jaipur around the turn of the eighteenth century and who by means of ‘ celestial vision ’ and ordinary searching perceived the cosmic form of Janakpurdhâm. I shall briefly sketch certain features of this cosmic city in relation to the two modes of perception by which Sūr Kiśor came to know it.
7The first mode entailed the use of celestial vision (divya dṛṣṭi) in order to behold the hidden (gupt) everpresent aspect of Janakpur. This notion may be explained, as it was explained to me by the Rāmānandīs themselves, in terms of the relation between fire and wood. In the same way that fire inheres in wood but does not become manifest (pragaṭ) until the wood is ablaze, so Sītā pervades all existence but is hidden from view unless one is able to perceive her in this unmanifested state. Being endowed with the faculty of celestial vision, Sur Kiśor beheld the presence of Sītā in the luminous form of the hidden Janakpur. According to his vision the hidden Janakpur is surrounded by twenty-four fragrant graves of ornamental trees (Kiśor 1958 : 5-7) beyond which loom eight lofty mountains resplendent in light (v. 35). The city itself is an impregnable seven-walled fortress entered on four sides by elaborate gateways adorned with countless gems (v. 32). The innermost and uppermost of these seven fortresses is the palace of King Janak, surrounded by the palaces of his brothers, the appartments of their wives, the living quarters of the royal priest Śatānand, and the meeting place of the ministers (vs. 38-47). Within the seventh fortress is an eighth palace in which the goddess Sītā lives as a child and which, for Sūr Kiśor, is the zenith of the universe encircled daily by the sun (v. 27). Sītā, however, is not only identified with the central terrestrial axis; she also encircles the cosmic city in that a moat surrounds the outer wall of the fortress. This moat is fed by water from the Kamalā river (v. 33) which Sūr Kiśor took to be the intrinsic form (svarūp) of Sītā. Indeed, the water of the Kamalā is likened to the love (prema) which, streaming from Sītā’s eyes, flows around the entire earth (v. 49) .
8Strictly speaking, Sūr Kisor could have been blessed by Sītā at any place and at any time with a celestial vision of her mysterious intrinsic form. In localizing the hidden everpresent Janakpur at Janakpurdhām, Sūr Kiśor resorted, therefore, not to celestial vision but to ordinary vision as lie searched (khojnā) for the disappeared (lupt) Janakpur among the shrines, forests, and rivers of northern Mithilā and identified these named places with the places seen in his celestial vision. The Kamalā river, fourteen miles to the east of Janakpurdhām, was thought to be materially the same, albeit less limpid, river which flowed down out of the Himalayas and along the eastern boundary of Janakpur in the Tretā Age (vs. 48-49) and the rock outcropping at a place called Dhanusa was understood as a material fragment of the Bow of Śiva which Rām broke at the time of his marriage with Sītā (v. 30). Sūr Kiśor also thought that the Saivite temples of the region dated from the Tretā Age and were the survivais of the ritual boundary of Janak’s city (v. 29) :
Within Vadrī forest shines Śilānāth Mahādeva served by gods, Gandharva, and Kinnar. In the middle of a Bel forest, where Kalyāṇeśvar dwells, there is a Garden of Destiny known for Girijā. In the pretty Naipathya forest Jaleśvar lives; and in Yugmapatra forest Kṣīreśvar has taken his abode. In the middle of a glorious Aśoka forest resides Narsirnha, worshipped by the venerable King of Mithilā, says Sūr Kiśor.
The temple of Śilānāth is situated on the Kamalā river fourteen miles southeast of Janakpurdhām. Kalayāṇeśvar and Jalésvar are situated ten miles south and Southwest of Janakpurdhām and Ksīreśvar lies twelve miles to the north. Sūr Kiśor understood these four temples of Śiva to lie in the east, south, west, and north quarters of the periphery of ancient Janakpur whose centre lies at the temple of Narsiṃha, the tutelary deity of the Vaidehī dynasty. Thus the conséquence of Sūr Kiśor’s search among the temples of eighteenth century Mithilâ was to integrate the local Saivite temples into a regional Vaishnavite cult. For Sūr Kiśor these hitherto autonomous places of Saivite worship were not autonomous, but instead were the last few remains of an otherwise lapsed city which had been covered over by the jungle of northern Mithilā. By making such a claim, the local Saivite cults were seen to lie on the periphery of the newly established Vaishnavite cult and this universal configuration of temples was then antedated to the pre-jungle period in the Satya, Tretā, and Dvāpar ages when Janakpur was a thriving city. The centering of Vaishnavism at Janakpurdhām entailed the decentering of Saivism; the ’ restoration ’ of Vaishnavism from another age created a discontinuity for Saivism in this age. Neither with regard to space or time were the existing Saivite temples excluded from Vaishnavism; rather they were decentered and historicized in the formation of a regional Vaishnavite cult.
The formation of the five day regional circumambulation of Janakpur
9The earliest record of the regional circumambulation of Janakpur is found in the Śrī Mithilā Māhātmyam, a Sanskrit text recording a celestial dialogue between two gods concerning the glory of Janakpurdhām. The dialogue took place in heaven at an unspecified moment of durational time some time after the Tretā Age and describes Janakpurdhām on earth as an evcrpresent abode of Rām and Sītā. The text is not complete but is said to be an extract of the Viṣṇu Purāna and, therefore, part of the puranic corpus which, in turn, is said to be the ‘ fifth Veda ’ or the ‘ fulfillment of the Vedas ’ and, therefore, valid for ail time. The heavenly context of the dialogue and the absence of an ‘ author ’ indicate that the compiler (s) of the Śrī Mithilâ Māhātmyam did not see their text to be dated or datable, but if one analyses the text at cross-purposes to its composition there is sufficient évidence to assign it to the eighteenth century and to note that it is of local origin.4 The text begins with Maitreya thanking Parāsar for his recital of the Ayodhyā Māhātmyam and asking that the glory of Mithilā and its relation to Ayodhyā be also recited. In the course of their celestial dialogue Parāsar (3.29-51) states that there are three circumambulatory routes of ancient Mithilā: the great route along the boundary of the kingdom, the middle route around the capital, and the ‘ within the house ’ (antargṛhī) route around the palace of Janak. Devotees should undertake these circumambulations during the months of Mārg (November-December), Māgh (January-February) Phālguṇa (February-March), or Vaiśākh (April-May) and in the course of the circumambulation householder pilgrims must undertake a vow to refrain from sexual intercourse and to shun falsehood and idle talk. According to Parāsar the middle circumambulation route, lasting only five days, is intended for those who do not have the strength to undertake the great circumambulation. The devotee of Ram and Sītā is instructed (3.38-39) to start at Kalyāneśvar and then halt for the night at Girijāsthān. The following four days he proceeds around Janakpur, keeping the city on his right side and stopping to worship Śiva at Jaleśvar, Ksīreśvar, and Dhanusa, before returning to Kalyāṇeśvar. Except for the substitution of Dhanusa for Silānāth in the eastern quarter, the route follows the circle of Saivite temples in Sūr Kiśor’s vision of the ritual boundary of Janakpur. The significance of these four temples in the Srī Mithilā Māhātmyam, however, differs from Sur Kiśor’s vision in that they are now seen to be the gates of the four cardinal directions at which Śiva defends the city of the Vaidehī kings. The territory enclosed by these four temples is auspicious (one encircles it with the auspicious right side of the body turned to the centre), pure (one performs one’s ablutions outside the area on the left side of the road), and powerful (the regional circumambulation of Janakpur is a ‘ destroyer of sins ’). Parāsar concludes with the warning that for those persons who break the vows and rules of the circumambulation hell is the outcome of their actions, but for those persons who complete the circumambulation, while worshipping Rām in a state of ritual purity, release from the transient world will corne at the end of their lifetime 3.42-43).
10Although it seems unlikely that the régional circumambulation of Janakpur could have been described prior to its enactment or at least the anticipation of its enactment, still if one bears in mind the celestial context of Śri Mithilā Māhātmyam, one can only conclude that the existence of the everpresent regional circumambulation was well-known in heaven from at least the Tretā Age onward. It was not necessarily known, however, on earth. Indeed, it was not until the Kali Age (or the eighteenth century in our reckoning) that the hagiographical literature crédits two local ascetics, Sītā Prasād and Sūr Dās, with having ‘ seen ’ and located the regional route. Sītā Prasād was initiated at Sītāmarhī and travelled to Citrakūt where he obtained a copy of the Śrī Mithilā Māhātmyam. Returning to Mithilā, Sītā Prasād visited Janakpurdhām and saw with his celestial vision the Well of Knowledge (gyān kūp) and other ’ hidden places ’. On the basis of the Śrī Mithilā Māhātmyam he is said to have ‘ brought to light ’ the regional circumambulation route of ancient Janakpur (J. R. Śaran 1961: 442). A rather similar story is recounted about Sūr Dās, a Rāmānandī ascetic who was initiated at Barāhi monastery and who later established a monastery at Piprā in Sītāmaṛhī District (J. R. Śaraṇ 1961: 449C-450C).
On the basis of the Mithilā Māhātmya, which Sūr Kiśor found, Sūr Dās located the circumambulation route around the capital of Mithilā. Going in a northeast direction, he saw a city of light and, with eyes wide open, was filled with understanding of that splendrous fort. The town, market, and parade ground extended before his eyes; he beheld the personal temple of the Vaidehī kings. Outside the city of light were clustered shady groves where he strolled between orchards of mango. With the appearance of the circumambulation route around the city his heart was filled with such devotion that he forgot his body and mind.
Having enjoyed the liberating experience of the circumambulation, Sūr Dās retired to Piprā monastery where he passed his final days in the service of Rām and Sītā (ibid.: 451 cd) :
Sūr Dās extolled the glory of the name and form of Rām, of his abode and play; he liked to serve other ascetics and did not live in illusory time. As his journey to the other world became imminent, he relinquished his body and mind and left for Rām’s celestial kingdom.
The liberating nature of Sūr Dās’ final journey ( “he relinquished his body and mind”) and of his earlier circumambulatory journey ( “he forgot his body and mind”) points to the identity of the heavenly and terrestrial seats of Rām and Sītā. Moreover, the liberating nature of the circumambulatory journey underscores the identity of Sītārām’s celestial abode at Janakpurdhām and their personal abode (nijadhām) in the heart (w) or soul (ātmā) of Sūr Dās. It was in the realization of this identity that Sūr Dās “forgot his body and mind”; or speaking more generally (and outside this specifically devotional context), one could say that in the realization of this identity the encirclement of the universe entails the universalization of the encircler.
11The hagiographies of Sītā Prasād and Sūr Dās confirm that the celestial dialogue of Maitreya and Parāsar – as recorded in the Śrī Mithilā Māhātmyam – played a key rôle in the location of the five day regional route, but not to the exclusion of the Vaishnavite ascetics who used the text in order to search for the lapsed route and to behold with their celestial vision the hidden route. In sum, the spatial themes of a disappeared place and a hidden place and the temporal themes of a lapsed time and an everpresent mode of time recur in the stories of Sītā Prasād and Sūr Dās. These accounts credit the Rāmāvat ascetics with having ‘ brought to light ’ the circumambulation but not with having established the regional circumambulation, for the circular route around Janakpur was already and always there.
12For some years after these original solitary ventures around Janakpur one can only assume that Vaishnavite ascetics on an individual, rather than collective, basis continued to encircle the hidden fortress of Janakpur, worshipping at the temples of Śiva which guarded the four gates of the celestial city. Although it is possible that some ascetics might have banded together to circumambulate the fortress, still there was no reason, intrinsic to the circumambulation itself, which would have led them to undertake the circumambulation collectively, for the fruits of circumambulation accrue to the ascetic individually. Moreover, an ascetic is often reluctant to follow behind another ascetic, for he takes pride in his autonomy and will acknowledge his own inferiority, as a matter of course, only with regard to his guru. The formation of a procession of ascetics, therefore, is no easy matter, requiring of its organizers a sense of protocol and of tact.5 Indeed, it was not until the early nineteenth century that the Rāmāvat ascetics in the vicinity of Janakpurdhām, acting under the leadership of Rām Dās Ācārī, let themselves be organized into a circumambulatory procession. Rām Dās Ācārī was a Rāmāvat ascetic of Brāhman birth who lived in a small hermitage at Sītā Kuṇḍ on the western boundary of Janakpurdhām. Sometime after 1830 Rām Dās Ācārī is said to have persuaded the local Rāmānandī ascetics to undertake the five day regional circumambulation in the form of a procession led by the revenue police, beating brass gongs and armed with bamboo lāṭhī, and followed by the regional and itinérant Vaishnavite ascetics, chanting the name of Sītārām. By virtue of his leadership in organizing this procession, the regional assembly of Vaishnavite ascetics recognized Rām Dās Ācārī to be the leader of the annual procession and upon his death, the assembly blessed his disciple Lāralī Śaran, a celibate Rāmānandī ascetic of Śūdra birth from Kacaurī village, as the leader of the procession.6 The right to lead the annual procession of ascetics and pilgrims has remained with the abbot of the Kacaurī hermitage to this day.
13The only sources of information concerning the role of Rām Dās Ācārī in the formation of the regional circumambulation are the memories of respected local ascetics and the tales of itinerant Vaishnavite bards (bhurā bhaṭṭ). Their oral accounts are fixed in the present and each has a slightly different story to tell, neither of which necessarily bears any verisimilitude with the founding of the regional circumambulatory procession. The respected ascetics of Janakpurdhām today are concerned to recount a pragmatic rather than auspicious reason for the formation of the procession. Although they would agree that the military character of the procession befit both the regalia of king Ram Candra as well as the act of encircling the hidden fortress of King Janak, they deny that the regalia provides a collective raison d’être for the otherwise individual act of pilgrimage. Instead they note that the unmarked route northeast from Jaleśvar to Kṣīreśvar and then south to Dhanusa and Kalyāṇśvar led through uninhabited tracts of forest. Solitary ascetics ran the risk of losing their way in the jungle and throughout the nineteenth century the ‘ five day circumambulation ’ was rarely completed in as many days. Moreover, there was no temple édifice at Ksīreśvar and Dhanusa so that an ascetic had literally to search for these shrines under an annual accumulation of rotting leaves. Without the assistance of other ascetics who knew the precise location of these shrines, one would not even know where to begin to look for them. Finally the fear of attack by tigers and wild boar discouraged solitary encirclements. The main reason for the military bearing of Rām Dās Ācārī’s procession is said to have been self-protection – the noise of the gongs frightened the wild animals and the lāthīs and swords defended the ascetics from natural predators.
14A different story is told by the Vaishnavite itinerant bards who visit the Sītā Kuṇḍ and Kacaurī hermitages annually and recite to the abbots the glory of their spiritual ancestry. In these recitations Sūr Kiśor, Sītā Prasād, and Sūr Dās are overlooked, and the details of Sītā Prasād’s life, as recorded in his nineteenth century hagiography, are incorporated into the life of Rām Dās Ācārī. At present it is Rām Dās Ācārī who is said to have brought back the Śri Mithilā Māhātmyam from Citrakūṭ and to have used this text in bringing the regional circumambulation to light. In this bardic account the jungle of the eastern Tarāī remains, but does not serve the pragmatic purpose of justifying the collective organization of ritually autonomous ascetics; rather it serves to establish a discontinuity in the history of the enactments of the circumambulation. By coalescing Sītā Prasād into Rām Dās Ācārī and by claiming that prior to the life of Rām Dās Ācārī the circumambulation route had been covered over by the jungle, Rām Dās Ācārī becomes not only the original leader of the Rāmāvat procession but also the person who ‘ set in motion ’ the regional circumambulation of Janakpur.
The formation of the fifteen day regional circumambulation of Janakpur
15Around the turn of the twentieth century the Vaishnavite ascetics of Janakpurdhām transformed the regional circumambulation from a five day event enacted by celibate ascetics to a fifteen day event celebrated by both celibate ascetics and lay devotees of Rām. Three Rāmānandī ascetics were especially influential in bringing about this transformation: Siddha Bābā, an aged ascetic from Sītāmaṛhī who is remembered to have been the inspiration behind the extension of the circumambulation (R. G. Dās n.d.; A. K. Dās 1974: 83) ; Vaidehī Śaraṇ, a pandit and ascetic from Janakpurdhām who wrote a pilgrimage guide to Janakpur and who travelled throughout Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, and the eastern Tarāī of Nepal speaking to prospective pilgrims about the glory of Janakpur ; and Premlatā, an itinerant Rāmānandī ascetic who was renowned throughout northern India for his ascetic discipline and spiritual devotion (see S. R. S. Śaraṇ 1951). Of these three ascetics Premlatā is remembered to have been the principal mobilizer of men and resources in the formation of the fifteen day festival. Premlatā, otherwise known as Siyā Lāl Śaraṇ, was born of Sanāṛhya Brāhmaṇ caste in Gvāliyar, underwent initiation at Ayodhyā, and made several journeys to Mithilā during the turn of the twentieth century, dividing his time between Siddha Bābā’s hermitage at Sītāmaṛhī and the Well of Knowledge at Janakpurdhām. The Well of Knowledge was not, in fact, a hermitage, but an open well located in a mango orchard beside which Premlatā and his disciples lived in makeshift bivouacs. They nourished themselves by ’ honey-making ’ (madhukarī), that is by collecting at mealtime a handful of cooked food from five celibate Rāmānandī monasteries in the vicinity; and they achieved renown by sitting in the orchard and chanting the name of Sītārām night and day, preventing themselves from collapsing in sleep by tying the ends of their long hair to the branches of the mango trees overhead. Premlatā wrote some thirty-three books on Vaishnavism (Siṃha 1957: 531) and initiated 950 celibate disciples into the Rāmānandī sect (S. R. S. Śaran 1951: 12-15). Some of these disciples, such as Rājendra Śaraṇ (n.d.), wrote pilgrimage guides and religious poetry about the sacred sites along the circumambulation route. By means of such pamphlets, poems, and speeches the news of the regional circumambulation was spread throughout northern Bihar and the eastern Tarāī of Nepal. In consequence, when Premlatā, together with his celibate disciples, turned up for the annual circumambulation, they were accompanied by more than one thousand lay disciples and devotees who, together with their guru, fell in behind the procession of ascetics led by the Abbot of the Kacaurī hermitage.7

16Premlatā and Vaidehī Śaraṇ not only succeeded in attracting householders to Janakpurdhām for the regional circumambulation, they also persuaded the regional assembly of Vaishnavite ascetics and the Abbot of the Kacaurī hermitage to extend the circumambulation from five to fifteen days by subdividing the number of nighthalts along the old circular route. In its revised form, which is also its present-day form, the circumambulation starts on the final day of the dark lunar fortnight of Phālguna (February-March), as the Abbot of the Kacaurī hermitage, together with his assistants, carries the image of Rām and Sītā in a palanquin from their village of Kacaurī to Janakpurdhām. After resting in Janakpurdhām at the Ratna Sāgar monastery, the meeting place of the regional assembly of Vaishnavite ascetics, the procession starts up again beholding the image of Sītā and Rām at the Jānkī and Rām monasteries and then proceeds three furlongs south to Hanumān Nagar, where a siddha image of Hanumān guards the entrance to the hidden and lapsed palace of Janakpur (Burghart 1978 : 261-262 ; 279-280). The devotees worship the image of the monkey god and camp overnight in the orchard of the Hanumān Nagar monastery before continuing the following day ten miles (pañc kośa) south to Kalyāṇeśvar.
17The circumambulation proper begins on this day as the devotees offer water and bel leaves to the Śiva liṅga and make a vow to Śiva to complete the encirclement of Janakpur. Once outside the temple the devotees write their name in mud on the wall (which they efface fourteen days later upon fulfillment of their pledge). On the morning of the second day of the bright lunar fortnight of Phālguṇa the procession leaves Kalyāṇeśvar and moves northwest to Girijāsthān where the devotees worship at the temple of Girijā. According to the Rām kathā. it was in the garden of this temple that Rām and Sītā, by chance, first beheld one another (T. Dās 1968: 227-236). On the third day the procession continues northward in the direction of Maṭihānī, stopping on the way to bathe at the confluence of the Yamunā and Virjā streams. The nearby village of Tulsīyāhi is said to be the place from where King Janak fetched leaves of the sacred basil (tolsī) plant for worship at Janakpur (Sahacarī 1931: 8). The procession then walks upstream along the Virjā until it cornes to the village of Maṭihānī, dominated by the fortress-like structure of the Rāmānandī monastery whose abbot is the Central Overseer of the Vaishnavite Sects within the Kingdom of Nepal. From the banks of the Virjā at Maṭihānī earth was taken to rub on the limbs of Sītā during the maṭkaur ceremony at the time of lier marriage with Rām (R. Śaran n.d.: 6). From Maṭihānī the procession continues on the fourth day to Jaleśvar where stands a stone liṅga partially submerged by subterranean water in a crypt about six feet below ground level. Within the city limits of ancient Janakpur are situated one hundred and eight ponds (by other accounts two hundred and eight ponds) which were dug in the Tretā Age so that gods and ṛṣis might bathe prior to beholding the marriage of Râm and Sītā. In the vicinity of Jaleśvar are the ponds in which Śukadeva, Dhruva, Garuḍa, and Parāsar bathed (Sahacarī 1931 : 9). On the fifth day the procession heads north to Maṛaī, a village which is said to be built at the site of a hut (maṃṛī) of a Domina who became ’ fair and beautiful ’ upon beholding the image of Rām Candra (Snehalatā cited in A. K. Dās 1974: 92), and the following day the procession continues north to the site of Dhruva’s hermitage at Dhruvakuṇḍ. From Dhruvakunṇḍ the procession turns northeast on the seventh day of the bright lunar fortnight of Phālguṇa and walks to Kañcanban. Kañcanban is a siddha woods, formerly made of gold, where Rām and Sītā sported in the Tretā Age (Y. P. Śaraṇ 1961a: 5 et seq.). Unfortunately in the Kali Age the earth of Kañcanban is only yellowish in colour, the gold having turned into baser substance due to the greed of mankind. On this day devotees, feeling the mood of Spring, toss red-coloured powder at one another. On the morning of the eight day the pilgrims continue northeast to the source of the Dūdhmatī river. In the Tretā Age Kāmdhenu, the celestial cow, created this ‘ river of milk ’ so that the infant Sītā in her palace at Janakpur would never go without milk. The river still flows in the Kali Age, although the milk has now turned to water and only those ascetics blessed with celestial vision can see that its hidden nature is still that of milk. Near the source of the Dūdhmatī is Kśīreśvar whom devotees worship with bel leaves and water. The ascetics and pilgrims then proceed to the village of Parvatā where they camp for the night. From Parvatā the devotees proceed the following day southeast through the jungle to Dhanusa where lies a rock outcropping which is thought to be a piece of the Bow of Śiva which Rām broke at the time of Sītā’s marriage. The other two pieces of this mighty Bow are, at present, in heaven and hell (R. Prasād 1930: 72). On the tenth day the ascetics and pilgrims walk three miles eastward to bathe in the Kamalā river, which possesses the intrinsic form (svarūp) of Sītā, then Southwest to the village of Satokhar where the seven ṛṣis used to live. Their hermitages have not survived to this day, but the seven ponds in which they bathed still remain on the outskirts of the village (Śarma n.d.: 16). The procession then continues south the following day to the Vimilā river, which possesses the form (rūp) of Sītā’s girlfriends. Many householder pilgrims (but few celibate ascetics) observe the ekādasī fast on this day. Some devotees camp on the banks of the Vimilā river; others at Harusāhā village from where they proceed Southwest the following day to Karuṇā. It was at Rām Sāgar in the village of Karunā that Viśvāmitra, while performing his evening devotions, blessed Ram’s love for Sītā (T. Dās 1968: 237). From Karuṇā the procession turns west on the thirteenth day to Viśaul, passing by way of Kalyāṇeśvar where the pilgrims efface their name written in mud on the outer wall of the Śiva temple. Viśaul is the site of Viśvāmitra’s hermitage where Rām and Lakṣmaṇ passed the night before going to the Parade Ground outside Janak’s palace for the Bow sacrifice (R. Prasād 1930 : 72). From Viśaul the pilgrims return to Janakpurdhām on the fourteenth day and on the fifteenth, the full moon day of Phālguṇa, the devotees together with nearly one hundred thousand local townsmen and peasants complete the inner ‘ within the house ’ circumambulation of the ancient palace of Janakpur.
18The ascetics of Janakpurdhām do not remember today any formal reason for the selection of the particular villages which became night halts on the fifteen day route. They simply claim that the old five day route had been inconvenient for ascetics and householders alike and that the local peasants and merchants sought to attract the procession to their village by providing for the physical needs of the pilgrims. This recollection is borne out by the evidence of the customary and legal arrangements which were made by an individual merchant at Jaleśvar, a landlord at Parvatā, a group of landlords at Dhruvakuṇḍ and Karuṇā, the village of Maṛāī acting throught its pañcāyat, and the abbots of the Rāmānandī monasteries at Hanumān Nagar, Maṭihānī, Kañcanban, Dhanusa, and Viśaul to supply every year enough food, firewood, and straw in alms to provide for the needs of all the devotees in the procession.8
19But even though present-day informants do not explain the formation of the fifteen day event in terms of its auspicious form, still the form of the route was soon legitimated in terms of the fact that these very villages had been visited by Rām and Sītā during the Tretā Age in the course of Rām’s occasional visits to his affinal home in Mithilā, or his Mithilā bihār. Since the early twentieth century the procession of ascetics and pilgrims has been called the Mithilā Bihārī procession and the devotees cluster around and trail behind the Mithilā Bihārī image of Rām and Sītā, taking themselves to be Sītā’s younger brothers and sisters and Rām to be their brother-in-law. The particular places where Rām sported with his wife and affines are known as ‘ places of play ’ (līlā sthal) and at these places the devotees express their love for Rām in terms of behaviour appropriate to their affinal sentiment. These places of play have both an everpresent and a historical connection with Rām and Sītā. In reviewing the ways in which these connections were established one may note both the presence of celestial vision as well as a logic of inference and corrélation. These celestial perceptions and logical relations include: the celestial vision of the ontological basis of forms (the Kamalā river is a svarūp of Sītā), etymological inferences from place names (mud from Maṭhānī was used in Sītā’s maṭkaur ceremony), textual inferences about the location of places (according to Tulsī Dās’ Rām kathā Viśvāmitra blessed Rām’s love for Sītā at Rām Sāgar in Karunā village), synchronization of legends (the previously named Garuda pond, in which Garuda bathed, had been dug at the time of Sītā’s marriage when the three hundred thirty-three million gods came to Janakpur to behold the celestial couple), historical interpretations of iconic resemblences (the golden-hued earth at Kañcanban used to be pure gold at the time of Rām and Sītā), auspicious numerical correspondences (the seven ponds of Satokhar were the bathing places of the seven rsis who were in attendence at Janak’s illustrious court), and auspicious topological correspondances (the Vimilā river, which runs parallel to the Kamalā, is the rūp of Sītā’s girlfriends). The integration of these villages into the Vaishnavite cult had, in most instances, begun long before the transformation of the regional circumambulation and was a consequence of the claims made by local Vaishnavite ascetics and Brāhmans that their village had been, and still was, a place of play (līlā sthal) of Rām and Sītā. In overlapping these places of play upon the old five day route, however, the idea of the encirclement of the fortress of Janakpur lost its significance. Present-day devotional ascetics explain the night halts as places where Rām and Sītā sported in the Tretā Age and which they revisit, together with the members of the Mithilā Bihārī procession, in the prēsent Kali Age. According to this explanation the four Saivite temples on the fifteen day route are no longer the gates of the ancient and everpresent Janakpur; rather they are places which one might as well worship for they lie on the route between the līlā sthal. In sum, pilgrims continue to encircle the celestial city of Janakpur along the old five day route, but the meaning of the fifteen day event is different from that of the previous five day circumambulation and in this shift of meaning the spatial dimension of the encirclement of a fortress has been overshadowed by the temporal dimension of accompanying Rām and Sītā to the places which they used to visit in the Tretā Age. The route of the two regional circumambulations, however, has remained the same and by virtue of the absence of any change in the route not only is the significance of the five day route lost but also is lost the perception of this loss.9
20By uncovering the past as a succession of present moments, the investigator can observe differences between these moments and write a history of changes. This mode of investigation, however, is uncharacteristic of the Vaishnavite bards and hagiographers at Janakpurdhām who have let the memory of the five day regional circumambulation fade from view. The itinerant bards, for example, ignore the five day event and antedate the formation of the fifteen day festival to the early nineteenth century by claiming that it was Rām Dās Ācārī who set he fifteen day regional circumambulation in motion. Alternatively one contemporary hagiographer has postdated the regional circumambulation to the early twentieth century. In his account of the life of Premlatā Siyā Rām Svarūp Śaran (1951) has resorted to the theme of the lapsed circumambulation in order to claim that his guru Premlatā was the founder of the re gional circumambulation. According to Śaraṇ (p. 72) the sites of ancient Janakpur had fallen into ruin and had nearly disappeared by the end of the nineteenth century: “what was to become of the circumambulation, passing as it did through jungle without any marked trail and in the absence of full support from saints and without spreading the word of its special importance to householders? It simply disappeared”. Śaraṇ then continues with his account of how Premlatā ‘ raised ’ the regional circumambulatory festival. In fact, there is no evidence that the five day circumambulation had ‘ disappeared ’ in the nineteenth century or that the Abbot of the Kacaurī Hermitage did not continue to lead the Mithilā Bihārī procession. By claiming that the circumambulation had lapsed, the hagiographer has established a discontinuity between the present and the recent past so that the work of Premlatā might be understood not as a difference with the recent past but as a similarity with the ancient past. One may further note that the jungle has the same function in the account of Premlatā’s role in the formation of the fifteen day festival as in the accounts of Rām Dās Ācārī’s formation of the five day event and in Sūr Kiśor’s organization of the four Saivite temples on the periphery of the ancient and everpresent Janakpur. In these accounts the jungle is not so much a place as a time. That is to say, it is the place where ’ nothing ever happens ’ and as such, provides the discontinuity between the disappeared place and the restored place, between the lapsed circumambulation and the revived circumambulation. In this way Premlatā’s organization of the fifteen day régional circumambulation is not seen as the creation of something ’ new ’ but as the restoration of something ‘ old ’.
Vaishnavite religions tradition in an intra-cultural field of relations
21This brief ethnohistorical account of the regional circumambulation of Janakpur lends support to Dumont’s (1959) observation concerning the innovatory role of the world renouncer in Indian religion (without necessarily confirming, however, that this role is performed solely by renouncers). Yet if we focus not only on the role of the Rāmānandī ascetic in bringing the circumambulation into existence but also in validating its structure then one must consider the way in which the Rāmānandīs resort to their celestial vision (divya dṛṣṭi) in order to perceive the hidden (gupt) circumambulation route around the everpresent Janakpur and to their ordinary searching (khojnā) in order to perceive the lapsed circumambulation route around the disappeared (lupt) Janakpur. As for the celestial mode of perception, the devotional Rāmānandīs acquire this faculty in the course of their secondary initiation (S. L. Śaraṇ 1945) in which the guru instructs the disciple in the intrinsic form (svarūp) of one’s soul and in which the disciple cornes to realize that this intrinsic form is the celestial witness of his body’s three coordinating states of selfhood (jāgrat, svapan, suṣupti). In the realization of his own inner nature the devotee can also perceive the intrinsic form of Sītārām and by means of the undivided and indivisible bond of devotion come into contact with his redeemer at this hidden level of celestial form (R. V. Śaraṇ n.d.: 8-10). In other words, the guru bestows upon his disciple not only the awareness of this hidden world but also the methodological knowledge by which the disciple is able to realize this hidden world. The Rāmānandīs are not alone among Indian religious traditions (sampradaya, paṃtha, etc.) to possess such a methodological character; hence one would expect that other religious traditions have used the idea of the ‘ hidden ’ centre as a means of universalizing the religious sites which are sacred to them. Indeed, the presence of the hidden everpresent pilgrimage centre, which can be perceived by celestial vision, has been reported in other Vaishnavite centres, such as Ayodhyā (Siṃha 1957: 272-326), Vṛndāvan (Vaudeville 1976; 1980), and Dvārakā (Nābhā Jī 1969: 499-500) as well as Saivite centres, such as Kāśī (Eck 1978; Parry 1982). Moreover, it is found in pilgrimage centres renowned for their Brāhmaṇs and organized largely by Brāhmaṇs, such as Kāśī, as well as centres, such as Janakpurdhām, which are organized by celibate ascetics to the Virtual exclusion of Brāhman pandas and tīrtha purohits. At such places one would also expect that the regional circumambulation routes are everpresent and valid for all world-periods. This, at least, is the case for Braj (Mītal 1966), Janakpur, and Kāśī (Vidyārthā et al 1979: 81-82).
22The idea of the disappeared place, which is perceived by searching for its signs in the present age, appears, however, to have a more limited range. Whereas ascetics and Brahmans may claim that a sacred place was consecrated by a unique and unrepeatable event in which a deity outside time intervened in the course of durational time, still not all sacred centres are thought to have been duly consecrated, then to have lapsed in time, only to be recovered again. In other words, not all religious traditions posit a break in the continuity of durational time. The idea of a disappeared centre has been reported for Vṛndāvan (Vaudeville 1976) and Janakpurdhām (Burghart 1978). It is interesting to note, however that, a perusal of the Brahmanical as well as anthropological literature on Kāśī has failed to turn up any evidence of the idea of a disappeared Kāśī, or of a disappeared circumambulation route around Kāśī. Virdyārthī et al (1979: 81 81), Upādhyāya (1966: 29-33), and Śāstrī (1961: 12) present certain legends concerning unique circumambulations taken in previous world-periods by Rām, Krṣṇa, and Maṇḍap which imply that the Kāśī circumambulation has had a long unbroken history. But in spite of these claims of antiquity, the evidence presented by Sherring (1968: 178-181) suggests that the regional circumambulation dates, like that of the other regional circumambulation routes of the Ganges basin, from roughly the eighteenth century.10 In considering the absence of any discontinuity in the ’ history ’ of the Kāsī circumambulation one need not grant undue credence to the facts recorded in the narratives of the religious tradition. Certainly the record of religious destruction at Banāras (Vidyārthī et al 1979: 309-312) is as great as that of Braj. Yet of these two circumambulations only the Braj yātrā has been interpreted in terms of a discontinuity (Mītal 1966 : 5-6). Moreover, the actual fact of Muslim attacks on Braj is not the reason for the ‘ history ’ of its disappearanee, for the Tarāī villages in the vicinity of Janakpurdhām were well to the north of most Muslim incursions and even on occasion served as a refuge for courtly Maithils fleeing the troops of the Sultan of Delhi (Thakur 1956 : 317, 320-321). Indeed, the disappearanee of Janakpur, together with its circumambulation route, is put at the hands of the Kauravas and Pāndavas in the Dvāpar Age, not at the hands of the Muslims in the Kali Age (Jhā n.d.: 2). In other words, if the events of the past were the reason for the ‘ history ’ of discontinuity then the Saivite pandits of Kāśī would have had more reason than the Vaishnavite ascetics of Janakpurdhām to claim that their circumambulation route had disappeared. The facts of the past, therefore, cannot explain the ’ history ’ of discontinuity. Until contrary evidence becomes available it seems more likely that the explanation lies with a narrative theme in Vaishnavite religious tradition.11 This theme of the disappeared place, or of the lapsed time, serves to structure both inter-sectarian daims (e.g. the Vaishnavite historicization of Saivism at Janakpurdhām) and intra-sectarian daims (e.g. who set in motion the regional circumambulation) and it operates in such a way that religious innovations can be understood not as something new but as something old. Or to rephrase Dumont in intra-cultural terms, the Vaishnavite ascetics may be innovators, but they see themselves as renovators.
Bibliographie
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Notes de bas de page
1 The connection between circumambulation and the encirclement of the universe is very ancient, remounting to at least the late Vedic period. In the rituals and epithets found in the codes of priestly practice there is evidence that the act of circumambulation was seen to encircle and encompass the universe (Ś. B. 2.6.2.15; 5.5.1), defend the universe from the evil spirits who roam the outerlying areas of darkness (Ś. B. 3.3.4.8), demarcate the boundary between the universe and the non-universe (Ś. B. 1.2.1.12), and identify the encircler with Brahman who sustains and pervades the universe (Ś. B. 1.9.3.15-16; 8.5.3.7). Given the late Vedic belief that the universe was brought into existence by sacrifice, it follows that the earliest recorded context of circumambulation was the sacrifice. The sacrificial arena was the prototypical model of the universe in which the sacrificer in relation to the sacrifice imitated the sun in relation to the universe. Given the perpetuation of this relation between circumambulation and the universe then a chronological record of encircled objects on the Indian subcontinent provides one with a record of the accretion of universal contexts in Indian religion. Some of these new universal contexts, such as Brāhmans, cows, and auspicious trees, may be found in the Brahmanical codes of conduct (Gautama 9.66 ; Manu 4.39), but of all these proto-Hindu contexts, the one which is particularly significant in Hindu sectarian traditions comes from early Buddhist sources. In the Mahāparinibhānasutta (5.7-8) the Buddha instructed Ānanda that following his demise the devout could corne into contact with the Buddha by visiting four different places with feelings of reverence: the places where the Buddha was born (Lumbini), attained enlightenment (Bodh Gayā), preached his first sermon (Sārnāth), and eventually passed away (Kuśanagar). Circumambulation of the reliquaries at these places was understood as an act of reverence to the abiding presence of the Buddha. Since the followers of the Buddha believed that their teacher had set the laws of the universe in motion, the connection between circumambulation and the universe was maintained, but the universe was now evident in particular named places which had been consecrated by unique and unrepeatable events in durational time rather than by the performance of sacrifice at any place and any time as a re-enactment of the prototypical generation and nourishment of the universe. This quasi-historical validation of a sacred place is especially characteristic of present-day Hindu pilgrimage centres, be they Vaishnavite or Saivite.
2 Ever since the sixteenth century the Vaishnavite ascetics of upper India who worshipped Ram traced their spiritual ancestry from Rāmānuja through Rāmānand and called themselves alternatively Rāmāvat, Rāmānujī, or Rāmānandī ascetics. Around the turn of the eighteenth century a dispute occurred within this religious tradition over whether the vow of celibacy was a pre-requisite of renunciation. Those who believed that only celibate ascetics were ‘ real ’ ascetics called themselves Rāmānandīs and retroactively eliminated Rāmānuja from their spiritual ancestry; and those who did not believe that celibacy was a pre-requisite called themselves Rāmānujīs and eliminated the name of Rāmānand from their spiritual ancestry. This dispute affected some of the Vaishnavite ascetics at Janakpurdhām in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. For example, one of the reasons which led Sūr Kiśor to quit the Galatā monastery near Jaipur and set out on his journey to Janakpurdhām was the Rāmānujī ‘capture’ of the Galatā abbotship (J. R. Śaran 1961: 166). The reluctance of Rāmānandīs to associate with ’ married ascetics ’ of the Rāmānujī tradition is also evidenced in a dispute concerning the leadership of the circumambulatory procession of Janakpur (see note 6). In this essay I have retained a sense of historical accuracy by referring to the early ascetics as being Rāmānandī or Rāmānujī only if there is evidence that they actually saw themselves as such. Otherwise I have used the term Rāmāvat to describe their sectarian affiliation.
3 This elaborate but conventional image may be found in the Puraṇas, e.g. Bhāgavata Purāṇa and Viṣṇudharmottara Purāṇa, and the māhātmya literature, e.g. the Kāśī Khaṇḍ of the Skanda Purāṇa. The image was used to universalize other pilgrimage centres in the G anges basin in the recent but pre-modern past, such as Ayodhyā (Siṃha 1957: 272-316) and Kāśī (Eck 1978).
4 I assume that the Sri Mithilā Māhātmyam dates from the eighteenth century because the text mentions the image of Rām, his three brothers, and Sītā found by Caturbhuj Giri at the turn of the eighteenth century and is mentioned, in turn, by Y. P. Śaraṇ (1961 b) in his hagiography of Vaishnavite ascetics written in the mid-nineteenth century. The compilers of the Sri Mithilā Māhātmyam were probably connected with the Rām monastery founded by Caturbhuj Giri as the text shifts the universal basis of Janakpurdhām from Sūr Kiśor’s conception, in which the goddess Sītā was identified with Brahman at the zénith of the universe, to a conception in which the universality of Janakpur was based on the marriage of Râm and Sītā. This marriage, which according to the text (8.9) took place at the centre of Janakpur, symbolizes the union of Ayodhyā and Mithilā, or male puruṣa and female prakṛti, Since Ram gave the image of himself, his three brothers, and Sītā to King Janak at the marriage maṇḍap, this makes the place where Caturbhuj Giri discovered the image – the present-day Rām monastery – not only the centre of Janakpur but also the centre of the universe. In spite of the probable local origin of this text it is interesting to note that the hagiographical accounts of the use of the Sri Mithilā Māhātmyam point to its non-local provenance, e.g., Sītā Prasād brought it from Citrakūṭ (J. R. Śaran 1961: 442) and Sūr Dās received it from Sūr Kiśor (v. 449) who, in turn, heard it from Hanumān, dressed in the form of priest (v. 107).
5 The difficulty in forming a procession of ascetics may be illustrated not only by the Rāmānandī reluctance to follow a Rāmānujī ascetic (see note 6) but also by the disputes over precedence at the Kumbh festival and by the evidence of the Braj yātrā in which different circumambulations are enacted by different religious traditions.
6 See BURGHART 1976 and 1983 for the structure and function of these regional assemblies, or more literally ‘ circles of Vaishnavite ascetics. The role of the Janakpurdhām assembly in approving and blessing the leadership of the procession is also apparent in the events following the death of Ram Dās Ācārī. Kuñj Bihārï Dās, a Rāmāvat (Rāmānujī) ascetic of Brāhman birth, acceded the abbotship of Sītā Kuṇḍ Hermitage and presumably began to lead the annual circumambulatory procession. In the course of his abbotship, however, he took a wife who gave birth to a son whom Kuñj Bihārī Dās subsequently initiated as his disciple. This practice appears to have been customary at that time among the Brāhman followers of Rāmānuja in the Ganges basin. The celibate Rāmāvat (Rāmā nandī) ascetics of Janakpurdhām, however, believed that their celibacy was the sine qua non of the unconditioned desireless of liberation, and they refused to be led on procession by a married ‘ desirous ’ Ramavat (Rāmānuji) ascetic. The regional assembly of ascetics, in which the Rāmā nandīs were overwhelmingly preponderant, conferred the leadership of the procession upon Lāṛalī Śaraṇ, another disciple of Rām Dās Ācārī who lived six miles east of Janakpurdhām at a hermitage in Kacaurī village. The significance of celibacy rather than caste status for the Rāmānandās at this time is evidenced by the fact that the celibate Rāmānandīs of Brāhmaṣ birth found no difficulty in walking behind Lāṛalī Śaraṇ who was a celibate ascetic of Śūdra birth.
7 Throughout the latter part of the nineteenth century there was a considerable northward migration of Maithil people from the districts along the north bank of the Ganges to the districts adjacent to Nepal. Also at this time the railway network in northern Bihar was established in which the Pupri (Janakpur Road) and later Jaynagar stations served as a railhead for Janakpurdhām. One cannot ignore these factors in accounting for the ability of Premlatā and Vaidehī Saran to attract householder pilgrims to the regional circumambulation of Janakpur.
8 The rewards of such piety accrue to the donor in heaven, according to the principle that whatever one gives to an ascetic in this life on earth awaits one’s eventual use in heaven. Rewards, however, also accrue to the benefactors on earth. The villagers of Maṛaī, for example, claim that ever since the circumambulatory procession adopted Maṛaī as a nighthalt, their village has no longer been damaged by the destructive fires which formerly destroyed their homes during the dry windy days of summer.
9 From this brief account of the transformation of the five day circumambulation into a fifteen day event it is obvious that there are different representations of this rather abstract act of encirclement and given the presence of these multiple representations, the problem is not simply to describe their meaning but to establish their salience in relation to specific religious traditions. It is for this reason that I have ignored the body symbolism of the régional circumambulation. The régional circumambulation is often called the pañc kośa circumambulation, for it occurs at a distance of five kośa (a kośa is slightly longer than two miles) from the centre of Janakpur. Another meaning of kośa, however, is sheath. The body is said to be composed of five sheaths (annamaya kośa, manomaya kośa, prāṇamaya kośa, vigyānamaya kośa, and ānandamaya kośa). According to this representation, therefore, the reason for the circumambulation at a radius of pañc kośa from the centre of Janakpur is that one is encircling the celestial body of Sītārām. Such bodily symbolism is implicit in the régional circumambulation, but there is no evidence that this représentation was salient for the Rāmāvat ascetics who inaugurated the regional circumambulation. Since the purpose of this essay is to examine the founding and enactment of a ritual in the light of a specifie religious tradition, I have ignored the representations which were not salient for the local ascetics of the Vaishnavite religious tradition.
10 The relatively recent founding of these routes appears to be linked with the weakening of imperial Mughal rule and the emergence of regional Saivite and Vaishnavite rulers who protected and supported the religious centres both within and beyond their realms. Mītal (1966: 5-6), observes that the Braj yātrā was inaugurated by Vallabhī, Gauṛiyā, and Nimbārkī ascetics at the turn of the seventeenth century. The route was subsequently closed by Aurangjeb but was re-opened in the mid-nineteenth century with the rise of the Rājpūts, Mararṭhas, and Jāts in western India. The circumambulation of Mount Kāmptanāth at Citrakūt was started up by the Vaishnavite ascetic Rām Dās Gūdar in the early eighteenth century (J. R. Saran 1961: 198) and the circular route was paved in 1725 by order of Chatrasāl’s wife, Queen Candra Kumvar (Drake-Brockmann 1909: 224). The regional circumambulation of Janakpur was started up by the Rāmāvat ascetics Sītā Prasād and Sūr Dās in the late eighteenth century (J. R. Śaran 1961: 442, 449) by which time the Vaishnavite ascetics at the base of the Himalayas had corne under the patronage of both the kings of Darbhaṃgā in the plains and the kings of Makvānpur and later Gorkhā (Nepāl) in the hills (Burghart 1978: 265-274). It is doubtful that the Rāmānandī circumambulation of Rām’s birthplace at Ayodhyā dates before 1754, the year in which Śujāuddaulā moved the capital of the Ayodhyā Sūbā from Ayodhyā to Faizābād (Simha 1957: 132-133) – Finally the pañc krośī circumambulation of Kāśī was started up in the eighteenth century (Sherring 1868 : 178-181 ; see also Kane 1973 : 4; 637), a period which corresponds not only with Safdar Jang’s recognition of Balvant Simha as the King of Banāras (Cohn 1962: 314) but also with the rise of the Marahathas whose Queen, Rānī Bhavanī, financed the improvement of the pañc krośī route (Sherring 1868: 175).
11 Unfortunately there is not enough comparative material to ascertain whether the idea of the disappeared place is an ascetic narrative theme or more specifically a Vaishnavite theme; indeed the material which is available suggests that both hypotheses could be true. For example, the māhātmya literature, which I assume here was written by Brāhmans, purports to be a record of a celestial dialogue which is valid for all durational time. Such literature bears neither date nor author and thus was not intended to be interpreted in terms of particular past, present, or future moments of time; rather it is uniformly valid for all durational time. The hagiographical literature written by ascetics, however, has an author and often the auspicious date of commencing and completing the text is noted at the end of the text. Insofar as the māhātmya is a Brahmanical genre and the hagiographies an ascetic genre, one could argue that the ascetics are concerned not only with uniform moments of all time but also with particular moments in durational time. Hence the theme of the disappeared place within durational time is more likely to occur in an ascetic rather than Brahmanical genre. However, other material suggests that the theme of the disappeared place is a Vaishnavite ascetic theme rather than, say, a Saivite ascetic theme. For example, it is interesting to note that whereas Saivites in the Himalayas incorporated the Buddha within Saivism by claiming that the Buddha was an everpresent form of Śiva, the Vaishnavites incorporated the Buddha by claiming that he was a lapsed incarnation of Viṣṇu. Although the idea of incarnation occurs in both Saivism and Vaishnavism, the idea of a succession of incarnations, and therefore of lapsed incarnations, is more readily identified with Vaishnavism. I offer these two arguments in a highly tentative manner, while awaiting the collection of further material.
Notes de fin
1 This article is based on fieldwork carried out at Janakpurdhām in 1973-1975 with a grant from the School of Oriental and African Studies and the Central Research Fund of the University of London. I am indebted, as ever, to Dr. Alexander Piatigorsky for many stimulating discussions on Indian religion and Dr. Jonathan Parry for letting me consult some of the pilgrimage literature he collected at Benaras.
Auteur
Le texte seul est utilisable sous licence Licence OpenEdition Books. Les autres éléments (illustrations, fichiers annexes importés) sont « Tous droits réservés », sauf mention contraire.
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