Bovine Bodies and Foreign Kings
Immunity and Dharma in the Hindu Epics
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 3974683 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Adam Lee Newman (0000-0002-6104-0896, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Volume | 64 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 225-246 |
| Publication date | 2025-05-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | History of Religions (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0018-2710 • E-ISSN: 1545-6935 |
| Publisher | University of Chicago Press (PUBLISHER • US) |
| DOI | 10.1086/734931 |
| OpenAlex | W4410769055 |
| Language | DE |
| References cited | 12 |
This article explores a brief but rhetorically powerful interaction between Vasiṣṭha and Viśvāmitra found in the two Sanskrit Hindu narratives Mahābhārata and Rāmāyaṇa. The story involves the emission of non-Āryan, non-Brahminical forest-dwelling and foreign groups from the Brahminically pure body of the wish-granting cow (kāmadhenu/surabhī) and explores one possible meaning for this rather perplexing narrative moment. I draw upon the metaphor of biopolitical immunity as explored by Roberto Esposito, particularly in his Immunitas: The Protection and Negation of Life, to help understand the narrative emission of non-Āryan bodies from the body of the wish-granting cow and her destruction of Viśvāmitra’s army. In short, the king Viśvāmitra trespasses into Brahminical space, at which point he is perceived as a threat and becomes, as it were, akin to a contagion. What I suggest in this article is that the wish-granting cow emits non-Āryan groups from her divine body as an immunitary response to the trespassing of Viśvāmitra and his violent army into the domain of the Brahmin. The armies that the wish-granting cow emits are a threat to the Brahminical body politic but are included within the domain of the political body in order to minimize and circumscribe their threat
Ancient history · Archaeology · Biology · Buddhism · Dharma · Hinduism · Immune system · Immunity · Theology · History · Immunology · Indian History and Philosophy · Philosophy
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |