in modern times, the principle of nonviolence. Even though the so-called
classical scheme of social classification known as varnaclearly defined the
role of warrior princes in relation to other occupational groups and the two
preeminent epics, the Mahabharataand the Ramayana, are replete with mil-
itary exploits and martial heroes, Indian civilization has come to be associ-
ated with the values of Brahmanic Hinduism and colored by the values of
orthodox ritual religiosity on the one hand and contemplative, otherworldly
speculation on the other. In both public conception and much of the aca-
demic literature, these attributes are conceived of as decidedly noncombat-
ive and, very often, abstracted from the body rather than linked to it.
Nevertheless there is a strong tradition of martial arts in South Asia,
as D. C. Muzumdar brought out in his Encyclopedia of Indian Physical
Culture, published in 1950, and this tradition is not nearly as dissociated
from the so-called mainstream of spiritualism and philosophical thought as
popular perception would have it. In practice, the martial arts in India are
clearly marginalized, and their popularity is sharply limited, but in theory
various forms of martial art are closely linked to important medical, ritual,
and meditational forms of practice. Moreover, it is somewhat problematic
to think of the martial arts in India as a discrete entity upon which an
equally discrete entity—spirituality and religion—has a direct effect. When,
as in South Asia, the distinction between mind and body is not applicable,
other categorical binary distinctions also tend to lose their meaning. As a
result, what might be classified as religion shades into metaphysics, which,
in turn, shades into physical fitness. Thus, in a sense, devotionalism, med-
itation, and the martial arts are, perhaps, best seen as part of the same ba-
sic complex rather than as interdependent variables.
The concept of shakti (Hindi; power/energy) or its various analogs,
such as pran(vital breath), is of central importance to this complex. Most
broadly, shakti as a metaphysical concept denotes the active, or animating,
feminine aspect of creation. It also means cosmic energy or, simply, the su-
pernatural power associated with divine beings and spiritual forces. Shakti
is regarded as a kind of power that pervades the universe, but that does not
always manifest itself as such. To the extent that human beings are micro-
cosmic, they are thought to embody shakti, and this shakti can be made
manifest in various ways under various circumstances.
Most often one is said to manifest shakti when one so closely identi-
fies with a deity that one embodies that deity’s power. Moreover, the per-
formance of austerities, such as fasts and other forms of renunciation, as
well as various forms of ritualized sacrifice, produces shakti. Thus, shakti
is thought of as something that can be developed through practice, and
this, in particular, is what links it to the performance of various martial
arts. Most significantly, shakti is at once supernatural and therefore meta-
Religion and Spiritual Development: India 463