Title: The body of God
Description: "The book is a finely detailed examination of a virtually unstudied Tamil Hindu temple, the Vaikuntha Perumal (ca. 770 C.E.). Hudson offers a sustained reading of the temple as a coherent, organized, minutely conceptualized mandala. Its iconography and structure can be understood in the light of a ten-stanza poem by the Alvar poet Tirumangai, and of the Bhagavata Purana and other major religious texts, even as it in turn illuminates the meanings of those texts." "Hudson takes the reader step by step on a tour of the temple, telling the stories suggested by each of the 56 sculpted panels and showing how their relationship to one another brings out layers of meaning. He correlates the stories with stages in the spiritual growthof the king through the complex rituals that formed a crucial dimension of the religion. The result is a tapestry of interpretation that brings to life the richness of spiritual understanding embodied in the temple."--Jacket.
Subjects: Cult, History, Krishna (Hindu deity), Religion, Vaikuntha Perumal (Kānchipuram, India), Vaishnavism, Temples, India, social life and customs
Places: India, Kānchipuram Region
People: Nandivarman II King of the Pallavas (fl. 732-796)