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The ancient Vedic religion lacked the belief in reincarnation and concepts such as Saṃsāra or Nirvana. It was a complex animistic religion with polytheistic and pantheistic aspects. Ancestor worship was an important, maybe the central component, of the ancient Vedic religion.
Female figurine. Mature Harappan period, 2700–2000 BCE. Indus civilization. National Museum, New Delhi. Indus Civilization pottery figure of horned deity. [1]The religion and belief system of the Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC) people have received considerable attention, with many writers concerned with identifying precursors to the religious practices and deities of much later Indian ...
The ancient emergence of Vaishnavism is unclear, and broadly hypothesized as a fusion of various regional non-Vedic religions with worship of Vishnu. It is considered a merger of several popular non-Vedic theistic traditions, particularly the Bhagavata cults of Vāsudeva-Krishna [ 8 ] [ 9 ] and Gopala-Krishna , [ 8 ] [ 10 ] as well as Narayana ...
Worship of anthills, snakes and other forms of guardian deities and heroes are still worshiped in the Konkan coast, Maharashtra proper and a few other parts of India including North India which traces its origins to ancient Dravidian religion which has been influencing formation of mainstream Hinduism for thousands of years.
At one time there were many prevalent different renditions of the serpent cult located in India. In Northern India, a masculine version of the serpent named Rivaan and known as the "king of the serpents" was worshipped. Instead of the "king of the serpents", actual live snakes were worshipped in Southern India (Bhattacharyya 1965, p. 1).
The literature on Shakti theology grew in ancient India, climaxing in one of the most important texts of Shaktism called the Devi Mahatmya. This text, states C. Mackenzie Brown – a professor of religion, is both a culmination of centuries of Indian ideas about the divine woman, as well as a foundation for the literature and spirituality ...
The subsequent Slave dynasty of Delhi managed to conquer large areas of northern India, approximately equal in extent to the ancient Gupta Empire, while the Khalji dynasty conquered most of central India but were ultimately unsuccessful in conquering and uniting the subcontinent. The Sultanate ushered in a period of Indian cultural renaissance.
Jainism co-existed with Shaiva culture since ancient times, particularly in western and southern India where it received royal support from Hindu kings of the Chaulukya, Ganga and Rashtrakuta dynasties. [321] In late 1st millennium CE, Jainism too developed a Shaiva-like tantric ritual culture with Mantra-goddesses.