... of bringing alive stories connected with the sacred places and of conveying to a largely illiterate audience the spiritual message of the emotional kind of devotion typical of the Krishna sects. Hawley's intention in presenting the scripts of four rasa lilds is to allow the figure of Krishna to speak...

... with the bias and methodology of Hindi scholars. His own methodology, essentially formalist in approach, is of special interest to scholars of Indian literature. Its major assumption is that Sur's strategy is an attempt to draw his audience into a continual participation in Krishna's lild: His intention...

.... By NOEL SHETH, S.J. Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal, 1984. xv, 180 pp. Selected Bibliography, Index. Rs.80. The lilds of Krishna have been the subject of a number of recent studies, and this book by Noel Sheth adds a useful piece to the growing collection. Many interested in the youthful cowherd-god turn...

... kind of devotion typical of the Krishna sects. Hawley's intention in presenting the scripts of four rasa lilds is to allow the figure of Krishna to speak for himself, just as he does to audiences all over India. The first chapter, "Pilgrimage to Brindavan," effectively sets the scene by providing...

... of the chapters. In this chapter Sheth explores the development of such important Vaisnava concepts as lild, mdyd, prasdda, and bbakti. These concepts, which receive little attention in the Harivama, are crucial to the understanding of Krishna's nature in the later texts. Sheth presents his conclusions...

...") and Giinther D. Sontheimer ("Bhakti in the Khandoba Cult") each follow Vaudeville's concern with identifying folk origins of Hinduism. The former explores the folk elements of a contemporary rds lild performed in Brindavan; the latter analyzes the Maharashtrian Saivite cult of Khandoba, concluding...

... elements of a contemporary rds lild performed in Brindavan; the latter analyzes the Maharashtrian Saivite cult of Khandoba, concluding that Khandoba is not primarily a puranic Siva, but rather an earthbound god, while arguing that "folk bhakti" must be considered on its own terms and not as a degenerate...

... A. GORDON Brooklyn College The Divinity of Krishna. By NOEL SHETH, S.J. Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal, 1984. xv, 180 pp. Selected Bibliography, Index. Rs.80. The lilds of Krishna have been the subject of a number of recent studies, and this book by Noel Sheth adds a useful piece to the growing collection...

..." (pp. 47 71) is on the sixteenth-century Vaisnava "recovery" and reconstitution of Krishna's earthly "lild-bhumi." The historical evolution of the gods of both temples and wayside in Vrndavan is traced in this and the other essays. "Krishna Gopala, Radha, and the Great Goddess" (pp. 140-57...

... in an unending cycle, brings the king into contact with chaotic forces that ultimately ensure the continuing vitality of the universe. Concomitantly, this second phase is identified with the theme of divine play (vilaiyatal, lild) that Shulman associates with comedy. One senses that Shulman is especially drawn...

... the way as Norvin Hein has already done26 in which the festival of Ram Lild is brought about in an Indian community, the peasants and the literate paryilit cooperating to the end that the sacred stories are acted out to the accompaniment of readings from the sacred text of the higher tradition...

..., the enjoyer, he was perpetually manifesting himself in his relation to Radha, the enjoyed; and as Radha, in his relation to Krsna. This eternal play (lild) of self-realization or love between the two was, to the Vaisnavas, the Eternal Truth; hence, the final state aspired to by Vaisnavas was also full...

... and the straightening out of his crooked back; the transformation of the foxes into horses are re-presented by the text as miracles performed by Tamil, not Siva. Vilayatal (and its Sanskrit equivalent, lild) has been identified recently as "the central term[s] in the Hindu elaboration of the idea that god in his...

... the reader's visualization from a wilderness lake to a reservoir or temple tank, foursquare and encompassed by flights of steps. It also graphically suggests the contrast between the unbounded and unfathomable acts of the Lord (his lild, or "play," aptly signified by the fluidity and depth of water...

... thus urges the reader to view the villagers as personages in the re-enactment of an earthly Krishna lild, suggesting that this is also how they see themselves. Dr. Prashant appears next, still untouched by the colors flying around him. His relationship to the village since his arrival has been one...