“The influence of the Bhagavata Purana on what has come to be known as Hinduism is paralleled only by the epic Ramayana. Yet it is, at first glance, a thematically complicated and stylistically unusual text. Building on his work analyzing the narrative structure of the Bhagavad Gita, Ithamar Theodor expertly argues that the combining of all the elements contained in the Bhagavata was a conscious harmonizing of two distinct orthodox scholastic traditions: the philosophical one stemming from the Upanishads, and the literary aesthetical one drawing from the rasa theory of kavya poetics. This is a fascinating and groundbreaking work”.
Edwin Bryant, Professor of Hindu Religion and Philosophy, Rutgers University
“The Bhagavata Purana, composed in eloquent Sanskrit about a thousand years ago, has subsequently become one of the principal sources of inspiration for Hindu traditions of devotion to Krishna as Supreme Being. In his carefully researched work, Ithamar Theodor takes us along a new path of interpretation, arguing systematically for an aesthetic understanding of the text as key, and showing in the process how apparent incompatibilities of its teaching – for example of both an impersonal and personal view of the Supreme Being – can be reconciled by this approach. In future, no meaningful comment about or study of the Bhagavata Purana can afford to neglect the illuminating argument of this book.’
Julius Lipner, FBA, Professor Emeritus of Hinduism and the Comparative Study of Religion, University of Cambridge