Chapter 9: Expansion of Civilization in South Asia

Chapter Objectives

• Some of the chief destinations of the Silk Road, and the kinds of products and ideas that traveled along the route
• How Buddhism changed in the centuries after Siddartha Gautama’s death, and why its popularity ultimately declined in India
• The impact of Muslim rule on Indian society, and to what degree the indigenous population converted to the new religion and why
• The most important cultural achievements of Indian civilization in the era between the Mauryas and the Mughals
• The main characteristics of Southeast Asian social and economic life, culture and religion before 1500 C.E.
• The factors that caused the spread of new religions into southern Asia, some of the changes that took place as a result of the introduction of these new faiths, and the effects on the religions themselves by their spread into new regions

Glossary

Bhakti:  devotion, central concept in evolution of Hinduism, belief that religious devotion brought the possibility of improving one’s karma

Bodhisattvas:  in some schools of Buddhism, individuals who have achieved enlightenment but, because of their great compassion, have chosen to renounce Nirvana and to remain on earth in spirit form to help all human beings achieve release from reincarnation

Caste system:  a system of rigid social hierarchy in which all members of that society are assigned by birth to specific "ranks," and inherit specific roles and privileges

Gamelan:  orchestra composed of percussion instruments

Gopuras:  great towers, found in India

Kampongs:  Malay villages

Hinduism:  the main religion in India, it emphasizes reincarnation, based on the results of a previous life, and the desirability of escaping this cycle.

Mahayana:   a school of Buddhism that promotes the ideas of universal salvation through the intercession of bodhisattvas, predominant in north Asia.

Moon:  Indian Ocean, blows from southwest in summer and northeast in winter

Nada:  physical vibrations of music, related to Indian spiritual world

Nirvana:  in Buddhist thought, enlightenment, the ultimate transcendence from the illusion of the material world, release from the wheel of life

Nuclear family:  a family group consisting only of father, mother, and children

Parsis:  Persian Zoroastrians who fled to India, they became a major economic force in Mumbai (Bombay)

Purdah:  the Indian term for the practice among Muslims and some Hindus of isolating women and preventing them from associating with men outside the home

Raga:  Indian musical scale

Reincarnation:  the idea that the individual soul is reborn in a different form after death

Sati:  the Hindu ritual requiring a wife to throw herself upon her deceased husband's funeral pyre

Sikhs:  “disciples,” religion founded in Punjab by Nanak, integration of parts of Hinduism and Islam

Sitar:  stringed instrument

Theravada:  “teachings of the elders,” a school of Buddhism that stresses personal behavior and the quest for understanding as a means of release from the wheel of life, rather than the intercession of bodhisattvas, also known as Hinayana or the “lesser vehicle”

Varna:  Indian classes or castes, term also appeared in Southeast Asia