Gordan Djurdjevic – författare

The medieval vernacular (non-Sanskrit) traditions of yoga represent an aspect of Hinduism that to date has received much less scholarly attention than classical and contemporary Hinduism. Gordan Djurdjevic here brings together a representative selection of medieval Hindi poetry attributed to the legendary guru Gorakhnath. Gorakhnath is famed as the founder of the influential order of the Nath yogis, who are credited with the development of hatha yoga. The poetry gathered in the collection, known as The Sayings of Gorakh Bani, reflects this worldview. Its major thematic concerns relate to the practice of yoga, engagement with the various chakras within the body, and the attempts to reverse the flow of seminal fluid, by which process yogis believe the state of immortality may be reached. These often-enigmatic texts on the one hand provide a criticism of religious authority based on bookish knowledge, while on the other hand they celebrate yogic engagement with the subtle body and its centers of occult energy and miraculous powers.Sayings of Gorakhnath offers translations or the complete sabad and pad sections from the Gorakh Bani, the two largest sections in the collection. Some additional texts from the collection are also provided. Translations are preceded by an introduction and accompanied by notes, which contextualize and elucidate the subject matter.

The study of the ideas and practices associated with occultism is a rapidly growing branch of contemporary scholarship. However, most research has focused on English and French speaking areas and has not addressed the wider spread and significance of occultism. Occultism in a Global Perspective presents a broad international overview. Essays range across the German magical order of the Fraternitas Saturni, esoteric Satanism in Denmark, sexual magic in Colombia and the reception of occultism in modern Turkey, India and the former Yugoslavia. As any other form of cultural practice, the occult is not isolated from its social, discursive, religious, and political environment. By studying occultism in its global context, the book offers insights into the reciprocal relationships that colour and shape regional occultism.