Along with the five topics the text defines a Purana to be, it includes mythology, a guide for building art work such as paintings and sculpture, features and design guidelines for temples, objects and house architecture ( Vastu-shastra), various types of Yoga, duties and ethics ( Dharma) with multiple chapters on the value of Dāna (charity), both Shiva and Vishnu related festivals, geography particularly around the Narmada river, pilgrimage, duties of a king and good government and other topics. The Matsya Purana is also notable for being encyclopedic in the topics it covers. These five characteristics are cosmogony describing its theory of primary creation of the universe, chronological description of secondary creations wherein the universe goes through the cycle of birth-life-death, genealogy and mythology of gods and goddesses, Manvantaras, legends of kings and people including solar and lunar dynasties. A history written with five characteristics is called a Purana, states Matsya Purana, otherwise it is called Akhyana. The text is notable for providing one of earliest known definition of a Purana genre of literature.
The Matsya Purana has survived into the modern era in many versions, varying in the details but almost all of the published versions have 291 chapters, except the Tamil language version, written in Grantha script, which has 172 chapters. However, the text has been called by the 19th-century Sanskrit scholar Horace Hayman Wilson, "although a Shaivism (Shiva-related) work, it is not exclusively so" the text has also been referred to one that simultaneously praises various Hindu gods and goddesses. The text is a Vaishnavism text named after the half-human and half- fish avatar of Vishnu. It will nicely complement Vasuda Narayanan's forthcoming introduction, which takes the opposite approach of focusing on the lived experience of Hindu believers.The Matsya Purana ( IAST: Matsya Purāṇa) is one of the eighteen major Puranas (Mahapurana), and among the oldest and better preserved in the Puranic genre of Sanskrit literature in Hinduism. Although many books purport to introduce the Hindu tradition, this is the only one with a broad historical focus that emphasizes archaeological as well as textual evidence. Historic places and persons are fleshed out as actors in a narrative about the relation of the sacred to ordinary existence as it is mediated through arts, sciences, rituals, and philosophical ideas. The overarching organizational principle is a historical narrative largely grounded in archaeological information. Each of the 13 chapters combines historical material with key religious and philosophical ideas, supported by substantial quotations from scriptures and other texts. This book is designed to be accessible and comprehensive in a way that other introductions are not, maintaining an appealing narrative and holding the reader's interest in the unfolding sequence of ideas through time and place. In either case, readers are discouraged by the sense that they are getting only a tiny sample or a shallow overview of something huge and impossible to understand. Or it doesn't exist at all - Hinduism is merely a convenient (and foreign) term that masks a plurality of traditions.
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it is fascinating."-Times Literary Supplement "Here is a fine example of what the geographic study of India needs: disciplined work that shows full awareness of Indian cultural sets a worth standard."-Professional Geographerīooks about Hinduism often begin by noting the immense size and complexity of the subject. Bhardwaj's study are profound and necessary to the understanding of Indian religion. to its degree of sanctity, type of deity, and caste and motivation of the pilgrim.The implications of Mr. And, not least importantly, it is highly readable."-Journal of the American Academy of Religion "Detailed, accurate, and generally informative he has succeeded in tracing, for the first time, the relationship of the rank-order or 'level' of a sacred place. Bhardwaj's book is an important step towards the recognition of a social phenomenon which has for millennia played a crucial role in the integration of religions, nationalities, and international communities. integrating diverse forces, various cults, and numerous traditions over the ages."-Asian Student "This is the best general survey of a major religion's total pilgrimage system and the best intensive investigation of one of its subsystems. Bhardwaj's in-depth study of the various aspects of the institution of pilgrimage shows that instead of being a simple practice it has been a gigantic phenomenon affecting all aspects of Indian life.