Religion in Arampur: devotionism
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A Hindu family annually does devotions at the tomb of a Muslim Sufi. Devotional behavior often transcends religious traditions because it frequently attracts a diversity of believers drawn to its variety of practices and beliefs. |
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In the Bhagavad Gita, the most popular Hindu text in Arampur and much of north India, the god incarnate Krishna explains how people come to him through action (karma), knowledge (jnana), and devotion (bhakti). But he reserves his greatest praise for the practitioner of devotion. Devotionism has played a crucial role in Indian religions. Devotees cast themselves as the slave, child, or lover of the deity to whom they focus their love. This has often meant stepping out of mainstream religious practices and beliefs with devotees borrowing the vocabulary of loving devotion from across a spectrum of traditions. Devotionism, therefore, has served as a dynamo among traditions, challenging their orthopraxies and orthodoxies while infusing them with new, often mystical, elements. Hindu sants and Muslim Sufis have particularly represented this dynamism. In the sixteenth century, the Sufi Miyan Mir of Lahore laid the foundation stone for the Sikh Golden Temple of Amritsar. In the fifteenth century, the Banaras poet Kabir ridiculed Hindus and Muslims alike for their concern for tradition as he exhorted his audience to love a deity who transcended all form. In Arampur, a number of Sufi tombs exist which draw diverse devotees. Some family members of two of the venerated local Sufis garner respect for the power they are said to have for healing and prayer. Meanwhile, residents often quote the Bhagavad Gita as they describe Ultimate Being. Yet others gather every week in front of one of the temples to sing passages from the Ramcharitmanas -- the great Hindi devotional poem of the seventeenth century poet-saint, Tulsi Das. |