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Society in the Pit of Suffering, Society in the Ocean of Bliss – How the Ironical Language of Nārāyaṇa Guru Contributed to His Politics of Social Transformation with the Help of the Tamil Siddhas’ Concept of the Lord’s Grace

Author: Hanna Urbańska | AAV 38 (2025) | Pages: 273–295 | https://doi.org/10.60018/AcAsVa.kgmq5047      cc by nd

Abstract

The paper is an attempt to analyse the ironical language of selected philosophical works by Nārāyaṇa Guru – the mystic and social reformer from Kerala. As a follower of the tradition of Tamil Siddhas, based on the idea of liberative grace of the Lord, Nārāyaṇa Guru applies the same conceptual patterns in his poems. In order to promote the politics of social transformation, Nārāyaṇa Guru does not hesitate to introduce a highly sophisticated ironical language, which allows him to shift the sphere of esoteric mysticism and place emphasis on the realm of “social” mysticism, while claiming firmly that the process of Self-realisation should be aimed at the whole of society.

cc by nd     This article is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/).

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