Invitation to World Religions

154  CHAPTER 4  Hinduism

Vedanta  (vay-dahn’tuh; Sanskrit, “end of the Vedas”) Synonym for Upanishads; prominent Hindu philo- sophical school. Vedas  (vay’duhz; from Sanskrit veda , “knowledge”) Broadly, all Vedic literature; narrowly, four ancient collections (samhitas) of hymns and other religious material. SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING Eck, Diana. Darsan: Seeing the Divine Image in India . New York: Columbia University Press, 1998. An excellent discussion on the significance of darshan and traditions of Hindu temple worship. Flood, Gavin. An Introduction to Hinduism . Cam- bridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1996. A concise and in-depth study of Hinduism. Flood, Gavin, ed. The Blackwell Companion to Hindu- ism . Oxford, UK: Blackwell, 2003. A presenta- tion on select special topics that are key to under- standing Hindu belief and practice. Hawley, John Stratton, and Mark Juergensmeyer. Songs of the Saints of India . Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2006. A survey of the lives of medieval bhakti saints, with excellent translation of some of their poetry.

yoga  (yoh’guh; Sanskrit, “yoking” or “uniting”) Gen- erally, uniting of the self with God; sometimes used as an alternative to marga when referring to the three main paths to liberation; also (normally capitalized: Yoga) one of the six philosophical schools, focusing on moral, physical, and spiritual practices leading to liberation.

Hawley, John Stratton, and Vasudha Narayanan, eds. The Life of Hinduism. Berkeley : University of California Press, 2006. Special topical articles that explore personal voices and perspectives on Hindu life experience. Klostermaier, Klaus K. Hindu Writings: A Short Intro- duction to the Major Sources . Oxford, UK: One World Publications, 2000. A keen survey of ex- cerpts from many of the important textual sourc- es that inform Hindu belief.

ONLINE RESOURCES Internet Sacred Text Archive (Hinduism) sacred-texts.com/hin Knipe, David M. Hinduism: Experiments in the Sacred . New York: HarperCollins, 1991. A dependable and clear study organized based on the history of the tradition; includes a helpful timeline and glossaries. PROPERTY OF OXFORD Understanding Hinduism hinduism.co.za

The Internet Sacred Text Archive provides an excellent array of the many genres of Hindu sacred texts with multiple public domain translations of key works. The University of Wyoming HinduismWebsite www.uwyo.edu/religionet/er/hinduism The University of Wyoming Hinduism website of- fers concise but in-depth discussions on numerous aspects of Hindu tradition, literature, and belief.

An informal collection of articles and information on key topics offering some range of viewpoints. Internet Sacred Text Archive (Yoga) sacred-texts.com/hin/yoga The Internet Sacred Text Archive offers an extensive array of works on Yoga, including both original sa- cred texts in translation and modern explorations of the subject.

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