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Indigenous Roots of Ecocritical Ideas in Select Bengali Vaishnava Poems of the Middle age

Abstract

Abstract: The present paper intends to focus on the ecocritical aspect of Bengali Vaishnava verses composed during the Vaishnavite movement in the sixteenth century Bengal. First, it discusses at length the Indian parlance of ecocriticism and how it is linked to religious paradigms. The objective for taking Vaishnava poems is to look for a new vision in an otherwise text of theological fervour. This paper analyses the Vaishnava verses in terms of the relation between human and non-human lives perceived through the Absolute Spirit. This paper will be dealing with the sub-theme of Literature, Culture, Environment, and Indigenous rights viz., the middle age literature of Bengal, the Vaishnava culture, the connection between human world and the environment as well as the rights of each individual entity in the Nature. India and its spiritual traditional culture have always believed in the unanimous presence of the Supreme soul in each living and non-living particles of the universe. The ancient Sanskrit literature is also evident to the fact that human beings share an integrated correlation with the elements of environment- such as in Kalidasa’s Meghdutam, Ritusamvabam, AvijnanShakuntalam. Even in the mythological civilizations of Ramayana and Mahabharata, we find Nature playing an impactful role everywhere; the lives of the great epic heroes were mostly spent on the lap of Mother Nature. Our tradition recognizes the place for each and every individual being of creation; from enormous deities to tiny creatures, from giant animals to microscopic herbs – all are endowed with equal right, that is, right to live, flourish and moreover the right to have the love of the Supreme Being.

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