Devotional bodies and embodied devotion

This chapter studies the notion of yoga and bhakti in the tradition of Radhasoami of the 19th-, 20th-, and 21st centuries. Radhasoami is a devotional “reform” tradition that challenges and transcends traditional Hinduism in multiple ways. The chapter analyzes the role of the body in Radhasoami ritual practice, which involves elaborate meditational practice known as surat sabda yoga. The figure of the guru as a raft to the divine “Other” and as the embodiment of the divine “Other” is of central importance to the study of the body in Radhasoami. In terms of the notion of guruship and perceiving the divine, Radhasoami draws upon the intellectual tradition of Kabir and Nanak with regard to the realms of consciousness and the concept of guruship, but also develops new models for mythologizing the divine. There have been several important studies of the body in South Asian traditions in recent years

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