svAbhinava Benefactors

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Last Edited: Wednesday, January 02, 2008 10:04 AM -0600 /  Last Updated: Wednesday, January 02, 2008 10:04 AM -0600

Rameshwar Jha

The living inspiration behind svAbhinava could only have been a realized soul capable of transmitting the spark of spiritual insight across the millennium. Sunthar's first direct encounter with Jhaji is recounted in his post of 3rd December 2005 to the Abhinavagupta Yahoo! Group.

Elizabeth Chalier-Visuvalingam

Over and above her anthropological contributions on Bhairava, substantiating my theoretical work on transgressive sacrality, and introducing me to French Indology (Dumézil, Dumont, Biardeau, Malamoud, etc.) and wider intellectual traditions (Bataille, Caillois, Foucault, Lévi-Strauss, Vernant, etc.), my French wife and collaborator, Elizabeth, has been the most committed supporter of my endeavors to understand Indian civilization and to share my appreciations with the world at large. Inspired by Foucault's work on The History of Madness in the Classical Age and Lilian Silburn's work on Kashmir Shaivism, Elizabeth came to Benares in 1977 to undertake her PhD research on Unmatta Bhairava, and hence on Hindu tantricism. Starting off by helping her with her Sanskrit (that she later also continued with Rameshwar Jha) and Bhairava manuscripts, I became increasing involved with her anthropological fieldwork in Benares and the Kathmandu Valley. She earned her PhDs in Ethnology in 1981 from the University of Nanterre (Paris-X), and in Indian Philosophy & Religion in 1983 from the Benares Hindu University, and then remained to pursue post-doctoral fieldwork towards her French "thèse d'état" (D.Litt., 1995). Before moving to Chicago in 1998, she had taught French and Indian Philosophy for 3 years (1993-95) at the Eotvos Lorand National University in Budapest (Hungary). Her D.Litt. thesis is available in abridged book-form as Bhairava, Terreur et Protection: mythes, rites et culte (Peter Lang 2003). Elizabeth currently teaches French, Literature, and Philosophy in Chicago, while pursuing here earlier cross-cultural researches in her spare time.

Mahes Visvalingam

Close to me since early childhood, my elder sister Mahes (Rani) had taken it upon herself to support my desire for knowledge, both morally and materially, whatever the educational paths I chose to pursue. She had topped her year (1967-68) in the University of Malaya results for her B.A. in Geography/Geology, and was awarded a Commonwealth Fellowship to pursue directly a Ph.D. in Hydrology in the UK. Though my original intention was to join her there to pursue an academic career in 'scientific' psychology after passing my Cambridge Ordinary Level exams in Kuala Lumpur, I decided while preparing for my Advanced Levels to study Sanskrit at the university level in India instead. Rani's unwavering support helped bring my father around to my sudden change in life-direction, and was crucial in completing my studies till the completion of my Ph.D. She remains Reader Emeritus at the Computer Science Dept. at the University of Hull (UK), where her husband Graham also taught, and has done pioneering research in geographical information systems (GIS).  I had  always looked up to her as model for my academic pursuits, an attitude that was borne out by an incident to which I attach much significance. Upon arrival in Madras, I was feeling homesick while staying a couple of months with a Tamil family (before proceeding to Benares), where another student from Jaffna was also living. Upon learning that I was from Kuala Lumpur, we were both surprised when he asked if I had heard of a scholar by the name of Maheshwari. His uncle had sent him old newspaper cuttings from Malaysia of the public acclaim of her academic achievements at the university, urging him to take this as a model for his own scholarly ambitions.  She and Graham retired have retired from Hull to Derbyshire, where Elizabeth and I continue to visit regularly. She now devotes herself to her hobbies that are shared with the world-at-large through her online blog (also hosted by Viji): gardening, herbal remedies, public health, family-tree tracing, and amateur videography.

Félix and Aurora Ilarráz

Felix and I originally met during the 'First' World Humor Conference in Hyderabad in 198? (Gujarati and) Indian traditions. On our first visit to America in Dec. 85, we were received royally by the Ilarraz', the whole humanities program at Indiana State University (ISU), and by the Indian community at Terre Haute. Their proximity was a decisive factor in my taking up the computer publishing job in Indianapolis in Nov. 1993. On retiring to Madrid in 199?, after having taught Spanish and Indian philosophy at ISU for over 30 (?) years, Félix continued to further the cause of Indian culture in the West, not only through his meticulous translations of the Upanishads, but also through their significant contributions to the endowment of the Tagore Chair in Bloomington. Back in Madrid, he assumed active direction of the Purusha Foundation dedicated to promoting knowledge of Indian (and other) tradition(s) in Spain. Their generous hospitality in Dec-Jan. 2000-01 and again in summer of 2001 allowed us to discover the cultural riches of the Iberian peninsula. Hailing from a family of Jesuit priests, Félix was himself a product of its rigorous discipline. Aurora is a volunteer at the Caritas organization dedicated to truly catholic relief world-wide, including saving the starving children of Iraq. After several years of an unsatisfactorily diagnosed ailment that increasingly isolated him from his loved ones, Félix passed away peacefully early on Easter morning of 20 After several years of an unsatisfactorily diagnosed ailment that increasingly isolated him from his loved ones, Félix passed away peacefully early on Easter morning of 2006. Much of my work on the svAbhinava website has been indirectly subsidized by Félix and Aurora.

Raphael Joseph (Free Enterprise)

Raphael (fondly known as Viji) is the Malaysian husband of my niece Anu, younger sister of Sumi, who has been living and working in Kansas City (Missouri) for the past several decades. Their talented daughter Katrina (Nina) was born in 1996. An IT entrepreneur and networking professional, Viji, who is also a programmer, has been hosting and and maintaining this svAbhinava site since late 2001 as a philanthropic service. If you have enjoyed uninterrupted access to our work, this is largely because Raphael and his associates have been very responsive to any reports of technical problems at their end, and have also been ready share their know-how. Located in the American mid-West, Accelerated Enterprise Solutions (formerly Co-Pilot) was also the technical host for a web-site (as of February 2003) dedicated to alternative sources of (especially world) news with critical commentary. Please check them out, if you are in need of web-related services: hosting, design, e-commerce, etc. Embedded below are clips of Nina playing the piano (at ages of 9-10), and taking a comprehensive anatomy quiz on the bones of the human body (at age 4).

Video clips of Katrina (Nina) Joseph playing the piano (age 9-10) and responding to an anatomy quiz (age 4)

Premlata Sharma

As the Head of the Musicology Department of the Benares Hindu University (BHU), Prof. Sharma's knowledge and interest was primarily from the perspective of music and secondarily aesthetics. Our flat at #14 Multiflat Guest House was just adjacent to and facing the Musicology building, so much so that we could hear the teachers (including Premlata) rehearsing their songs and instruments almost daily.

Gary C. Moore

I discovered Gary's ific American Internet thinker learnt of my background and intentions, he not only immediately agreed to take a backseat and let me take 'ownership' of the site as moderator, but also publicized our writing and project across his various other forums. Having studied Western philosophy in the university, Gary's prime interest has been Heidegger who has served as a springboard for animating his explorations of not only Greek and Continental philosophy, but also Indian philosophy (Shankara) and aesthetics (Jeffrey Masson), and Iranian theosophy (Corbin). You can review a listing of Gary's posts on Abhinavagupta at our Forum-Index, and also visit him for a chat at any of his several homes at Yahoo!Groups below.

  • Gary's homepage - maintained by Jud Evans

    "Gary.C.Moore was born in Dallas, Texas December 24, 1943. He went to the University of Texas Austin, a great school, off and on, often flunking out, until he was going to be drafted in 1966 whereupon, the thought of "involuntary servitude" being totally repulsive him, he quixotically volunteered for three years. He was trained as an artillery field wireman at Fort Hood outside Killeen, Texas. Gary's groups were divided into two parts to be shipped to Vietnam. The first part left and they all died. American casualty lists from both the Korean War (36,000 killed) and the Vietnam War (50,000 killed) were highly underestimated, so these figures are old. At the very last day Gary's group got a change of orders, and by a bureaucratic blunder he ended up at Camp Darby ("Darby's Rangers" from WWII), ten miles outside of Pisa. Gary is a well-known and celebrated thinker and commentator of some stature amongst the Internet's worldwide philosophical community. His assiduously researched, trenchant analyses of the works of Martin Heidegger and other metaphysicians, together with his searching explorations of Greek and Oriental Philosophy and Religion appear in the archives of many of the web's foremost mailing lists. Delivered in a liquid prose redolent of a poet rather than a philosopher, his writings are eagerly read by all lovers of philosophical hermeneutics, interpretation and investigation. He is also held in some affection, as well as respect, because of his invariably patient, friendly and helpful attitude particularly to 'philosophical newbies'." - Jud Evans.

    • Posts to Abhinavagupta forum

    • Other forums hosted by Gary C. Moore

      Ontological Ethics

      Heidegger

      Henri Corbin

       

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