Abstract
The sociopolitical frame of HIFMs is defined by their relationship with global political economy, the nuances of exchange between HIFMs and the state, HIFMs’ relationships with the market, and their interfacing with the civil society. HIFMs have associations with the primary, secondary, and tertiary spheres of the social compass (i.e., the civil society, market, and national-global political economy).
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Notes
- 1.
The Brahmakumaris and the Anand Ashram, whose meditation courses have featured prominently in lifestyle magazine articles on health and stress management since the 1990s, have also helped to introduce urban publics to a deconfessionalized and partly scientized notion of ‘spirituality’ (using the English borrowing or Indonesian cognates such as spiritualitas) as an attractive alternative to devalorized but conceptually overlapping concepts such as kebatinan (literally ‘inwardness’, but more broadly ‘spirituality’ or ‘mysticism’). This usage keys into the international growth movement and New Age literature that is now well represented in major bookshops in Indonesia and variously puffed or critiqued in local publications. The term ‘New Age’ is used also by journalists and critics to refer to local spiritual groups and activities that do not conform to high modern conceptions of proper religiosity but have a certain cachet derived from their similarities to international New Age activities. In major cities of Indonesia Brahmakumaris and Anand Ashram meditation courses are now part of a broad array of loosely ‘spiritual’ training programs alongside Reiki, Celestine Prophecy, Spiritual Quotient, Satori, Parent Effectiveness Training, AsiaWorks, and numerous domestic versions of spiritualized stress relief and leadership and management training (see Howell, 2005).
- 2.
Jurgen Habermas’s communicative rationality says that meanings are constructed in shared lifeworlds and in processes of interaction and rational action (Ashenden & Owen, 1999).
- 3.
Blanke (2004) looked at how in the 1970s religious organizations became active participants in public policy debates on Latin America in Washington, DC, by moving as visible foreign policy players into the public sphere. Having been directly in touch with the social and political conflict in El Salvador, faith-based groups presented their concerns regarding the human rights situation in El Salvador to the US and Salvadoran governments. Even though they could not stop the flow of US aid to El Salvador or lobby for a better distribution of that aid, their awareness campaign and ‘power of information’ was decisive for attracting the attention of a small but important group of policymakers in Washington, DC.
- 4.
To maintain the functioning of the Trust, an elected body was constituted in 1952 which functioned until 1960. Later, it was caught up in litigation, and a civil court in Bombay appointed a receiver to take over the administration of the Sansthan. The receiver functioned till August 1984 when the twenty-two-member Board of Management was appointed by the Maharashtra Government to take over, with an executive officer in charge. Since then, the functioning has been stabilized with the headquarters at Shirdi and an office in Mumbai for liaison purposes with the state. The fifteen-member committee which oversees the trust management is appointed by the state. This aspect has accompanying political controversies owing to the political connections of members. In a recent PIL (public interest litigations) filed by two Shirdi residents, Rajendra Gondkar and Sandip Kulkarni, which said that the committee had carried on way beyond its legal tenure, Justice Naresh Patil and Justice T.V. Nalawade of the Aurangabad bench of the high court directed the state government to appoint a new committee, failing which it said that a three-member panel would be given the reins of temple administration. The three-member committee which is in place of a new committee comprises of the collector of Ahmednagar, the additional district judge of Kopargaon, and the CEO of Saibaba Sansthan. The original tenure of the committee was three years, which ended in August 2007, but it has continued for over seven years. As per the Shree Saibaba Sansthan Trust (Shirdi) Act, 2004, the term is for three years and the existing committee could continue on an ad hoc basis until a new committee was formed. The move was accepted by the CEO (Thomas & Jaisinghani, 2012).
- 5.
In 1906, Aurobindo Ghosh came to Kolkata as the Principal of Bengal National College but resigned soon after. From 1906 to 1910, he was actively engaged in political activities. He commenced with writing revolutionary articles (from 1902 onwards, he had started writing some political articles in Indu Prakash) and formation of secret societies that would eventually realize the goal of swarajya or freedom. The opportunity to enter politics was further propelled by the 1905 outbreak of the agitation against the partition of Bengal. Initially, he cofounded one significant radical group, the Anushilan Samiti, and participated in the revolutionary movement that developed in association with the radical movement, Jugantar. Later, agitation in Bengal furnished an opening for public initiation to move forward and direct political action, as opposed to the moderate reformism which had been the creed of the Indian National Congress. Hence, in 1906, he joined an extremist New Party which had the vague ideal of non-cooperation. At first, Sri Aurobindo took part in Congress politics only from behind the scenes as he had not yet decided to leave the Baroda service, but he took a long leave without pay in which, besides carrying on personally the secret revolutionary work, he attended the Barisal conference broken up by the police and toured East Bengal along with Bipin Chandra Pal and associated himself closely with the forward group in the Congress. It was during this period that he joined Bipin Pal in the editing of the Bande Mataram, founded a new political party in Bengal, and attended the Congress session at Calcutta at which the extremists, though still a minority, succeeded under the leadership of Tilak in imposing part of their political program on the Congress. The Bande Mataram agenda was that of swaraj, swadeshi, boycott, and national education. After the Bande Mataram case, he became a leader of Nationalism in Bengal. He also took up a charge of a Bengal daily, Nava Shakti, and moved from his rented house in Scott Lane, where he had been living with his wife and sister, to the office premises of the newspaper. He was arrested from there and sent to Alipore Jail in 1908 and was acquitted after a year. Later on, this proved to be a fruitful year, for during this period he had intense spiritual experiences, which set him definitely on the path of his future work. After detention for one year as an undertrial prisoner in Alipore Jail, he came out in May 1909 to find the party organization broken. For a year, he strove for its upkeep, and hence, he published Karmayogin in English and Dharma in Bengali propagating the spiritual-political views of the party. In February 1910, he withdrew to a secret retirement in Chandernagore and in the beginning of April sailed for Pondicherry in French India. Two other charges were levied against him—one for the doings of a revolutionary group founded by his brother Barindra where he was acquitted, and the second while he left for Pondicherry. The third prosecution was launched against him for a signed article in Karmayogin, but the conviction was squashed under appeal to the Calcutta High Court.
- 6.
Pedziwiatr (2007) analysed the critical engagement in public debates of the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB), an organization formed by second-generation immigrants. They created a public sphere and influenced state policies, positing British Muslim interests vis-à-vis the government.
- 7.
Diaries and calendars also contribute to recreating history from the Swaminarayan Sanstha lens with anniversaries of the spiritual founder and subsequent successors as also temple consecration dates locally and globally along with dates of commencement of projects and sister concerns highlighted.
- 8.
The Hindu interpretation of Saibaba gained momentum since his death in 1918. His burial in the Dixit Wada and the subsequent predominance of the Patil clan in propagating Hinduized versions of his teachings were responsible for the same. Furthermore, the major biographies of Saibaba were written after his death. Dabholkar’s Satcharitra was begun in 1910, but only two of the fifty-three chapters had been written till 1918 and the biography was not completed and published until 1929. Research for Narasimha Swami’s four volumes on the Life of Saibaba did not begin until 1936 and was completed only in 1955–1956 (Warren, 2004). The source of Saibaba’s Sufi origins as per Warren’s (2004) study has been the notebook of a devotee Abdul, the son of Sultan of Nanded who lived with Saibaba in Shirdi for a period of 29 years and then till 1954, tending to Saibaba’s Dargah. This notebook called the Saibaba manuscript is a rare manuscript, being Abdul’s notes and jottings of the words and teachings he received from Saibaba in Urdu. The study has proposed that it displayed Saibaba’s familiarity with Islamic history, starting from the family of Prophet Mohammed, the companions of the Prophet, the early developments of Islam, the Khalifas or the line of succession of the early Islamic dynasties, early Shi’ism, and the later esoteric teachings of the Isma’ilis in India. Sufism in India is also presented with the lists of its organization into various orders with their silsilas or chain of succession. Furthermore, Shah Waris Ali, a Sufi saint, was also Saibaba’s teacher according to the study and is subsequently said to have explained to Abdul the four aspects of Islam—shariat (the law), tariqat (the way and mystical practices), haqiqat (the reality of God as the only truth), and marifat (gnosis). Although he did not align himself formally to any established Sufi orders, he had a number of features common with the Chisti order and due to his moods; he was like a majzub—meaning one who is attracted to God.
- 9.
Peter Berger’s market model proposes that in a situation of free market, New Age religions and FBOs compete with each other on economic and non-economic terms. Furthermore, rational-choice theorists of religion have assumed that Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations advocates a free market of religion, which they argue leads to increased religious vitality. Peterson (2009), however, proposed that while Smith opposed direct government subsidies for religion and argued that a free market was the first-best solution, as a second-best policy he advocated religious regulation, including state-appointed clergy and the reduction of clergy income. Smith’s rational-choice approach to religion, which springs from his understanding of public goods, externalities and the need for civil peace, and government stability, does not always support a policy of religious free markets (Redden, 2005; Das & Datta Ray, 2008).
- 10.
New Age perspective further includes the following theological notions: the scheme in which HIFMs fit in. The first contention is that human beings are essentially Gods in themselves. Each individual is believed to contain a ‘God-spark’, a central infusion of divinity. At one’s deepest level, one participates in and identifies with the Godhead. A second generally held idea is that human beings undergo successive reincarnations as part of an evolutionary process, which returns them to full God-realization. Third, a prominent New Age doctrine is that the human individual is responsible for creating his/her own reality. The last relates to the concomitant conviction in the power of positive thinking to mould and shape our own destinies. It is balanced, but not necessarily defeated by the understanding that our behaviour is in part influenced by our actions in previous lives. Finally, however, New Age places the entire evolutionary quest and desire to transmute ignorance and negative karma into its comprehension of the universe as a single interconnected field. This ultimately holistic notion provides the New Age spiritual orientation with its guiding transcendent value. It is the very context which also provides the New Age with its justifying rationale for attempts to spiritualize commodification and commercial exchange (York, 2001).
- 11.
As Zaidman (2003) discussed, traditional consumers and New Agers differ in their perspectives about commercialization of religious goods. The New Age subculture endorses a spiritualized counterpart of capitalism—one that seeks ever-extended markets and new sources of marketable goods. In traditional religion, more importance is given to the movement of meaning from the cultural world to the object. In the New Age subculture, the individual is the main source of meaning attribution, and the authority rests in the individual as a consumer. Pace (2006), on the other hand, theorized as follows: salvation goods are governed not only by the exchange economy but also by the gift economy. They have less to do with the logic of social action aimed at profitable returns and more to do with the non-utilitarian aspects of behaviour. The salvation goods have features that cast serious doubts on the hypothesis that they are basically governed by market forces.
- 12.
Zaidman (2007) said that key among the factors that affect the market of New Age goods is the value societies attribute to their cultural products. He argued that New Age is an open system that manifests differently in different contexts. Contextual influences prioritize the acceptance of particular notions that are part of the New Age network, and these priorities in turn shape the market of New Age goods in each country.
- 13.
In the context of New Age conceptualization, Muir (2007) further maintained that cultural appropriation and commodification is predicated on the assumption that transformation of cultural goods into commodities is essentially a process of alienation from tradition and that salvation goods in themselves have greater agency than what is recognized.
- 14.
Scheifinger (2009) studied the online darshan facility at the Jagannath Temple in Puri, Orissa, India. The study challenges those globalization theorists who claim that local sites decline in importance as a result of advanced communications technologies and instead supports Roland Robertson’s theory of ‘glocalization’. Online darshan is an important development for devotees of Jagannath because it allows access to the deity which may previously have been difficult or even impossible for most of the year. In his study on photographs of Vivekananda taken in the US and the UK, Beckerlegge (2008) said that instead of glocalization imported localism explicates the situation better. In his appearance, Vivekananda embodied (in and for the ‘West’) a tailored presentation of Hindu and Indian culture (the ‘East’) as a form of universal religion. His vigorous rejection of the exclusivist claims of institutional Christianity was proclaimed in the ‘Chicago Pose’, which was originally produced for an American audience. The ‘Contemplative Pose’, on the other hand, symbolized more positively what his message appeared to offer to the spiritual seekers drawn to Vedanta Societies. Neither of these representations, as Beckerlegge (2008) says, would have summoned more traditional associations with the figure of the sanyas in Hindu India. Yet, when seeking to understand early Vedanta in the US and the UK, due recognition also needs to be given to the level of importance attached by some American and British followers to the specifically Indian and Hindu dimensions of Vivekananda’s mission, an ‘imported localism’ that rather runs contrary to the process of ‘glocalization’.
- 15.
Remediation in Bolter and Grusin’s (1999) influential theorization of new media is a refashioning characterized by a ‘double logic’ whereby new media ‘remediate and are remediated by their predecessors’.
- 16.
Mallapragada (2010) has articulated these to be the ideas of the Hindu image, embodied ritual practice, and the temporal and spatial logic of the temple as sacred place.
- 17.
See Walliss (2007) for more details on types of followers of the Brahmakumaris.
- 18.
Land donations, cash donations, and material donations are recurrent common features among Chinmaya Mission devotees; Chinmaya Mission, on the other hand, has a well-chalked-out policy for grant/donation receipts with several subordinate trusts formed under which donations are remitted—all under the umbrella of CCMT.
- 19.
Householder disciples and monastic disciples persistently strive to discuss Amma’s teachings with any lay person who enters the Amritanandamayi Mission set-up and also show the balance struck between transcendental goals and humanitarian activities—translating the faith mandate into the universal and secular directive of social service.
- 20.
The covenantal model of public relations refers to a model that is based on an agreement held to be the basis of a relationship of commitment with God.
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Pandya, S.P. (2019). Faith Movements: Negotiating State, Market, and Civil Society. In: Faith Movements and Social Transformation. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-2823-7_3
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