Course Name : Advanced Study of Hinduism
Course Code : SPSAG6207
Units : 3
Hinduism provides an abundance of sacred scriptures, religious ideas, themes, and phenomena that necessitates drastic selectivity. This abundance also needs a clear definition of the phenomena we encounter when talking about Hinduism. For this reason, the course combines a polythetic definition with an emic-descriptive, four-part approach to beliefs and practices shared by many Hindus at specific spaces, times, and situations. Hence the course explores into the religious history of India and Indonesia by contextualizing particular moments in religious history.
The topics are organized historically in order to show the evolution and diffusion of ideas and themes and how such ideas are the reaction of ideas that came before, but also how those ideas have been inspired or configured by the events of times. Thereby the course attempts to show how the evolution of ideas and themes in the lives of Hindus are wrapped in the flow of historical and cultural change.
The course explores into the Indian and Indonesia context systematically by continuous comparison. The red thread of continuity shall be traced by paying special attention to the history of Hinduism in the Indonesian Archipelago. Hinduism has a long-established history in Indonesia bringing about unique religion of Shiva-Buddhism only to be found in Indonesia, especially in the kingdom of”Medang i Bhumi Mataram” around the Prambanan Plain. Hindu ideas, themes and symbols influence Indonesian identity until today – remember Garuda is the national symbol.
