ABSTRACT
Though little-known, living Digambar Jain renouncers, especially the naked, male munis, are today regularly ritually venerated. Their veneration closely mirrors the formats of Digambar temple ritual (aṣṭadravya-pūjā, ārtī), and is performed both daily in the form of modest rituals, and more elaborately on special occasions, often at mass events. Recounting observations of specific performances of such rituals, and ultimately connecting these practices to the textual compositions accompanying them, I develop an understanding of this ritual veneration of renouncers as an epistemic technology. Anchored in sensorial and somatic fields, this ritual performance constructs a practical, relational and embodied knowledge, and as such practices like these function as prime, idiosyncratic methods of learning.
