Le Rauravagama. Un traité de rituel et de doctrine sivaïtes

by M.L. Barazer-Billoret

Rauravagama is one of the 28 fundamental texts (mulagama) of the saivasiddhanta system. It deals with various subjects in 80 chapters: formation of mantras, daily rituals, temple festival, several ceremonies (installation of images, funeral rites, initiations, atonements etc.), iconography, architecture, etc. as well as tattvas, the sixfold path of liberation, saiva Yoga etc. Between 1961 and 1988, Pandit N.R. Bhat provided a critical edition of this huge corpus. The authors of the present French translation of the whole work, have tried to highlight the several strata which have marked the redaction of the corpus of more than 3800 verses and which show how saiva doctrine and ritual have evolved over the centuries.