ABSTRACT
Assamese Vaishnavism is institutionalized at village level in the Name House system. The Name House is the local community within which its members ordinarily live their lives. In every village there is at least one, and usually several, Name Houses whose members form a ‘religious congregation’ (Weber 1966:60) consisting of a restricted association of households who combine for the specifically religious purpose of maintaining a local centre of devotional worship. Each lay congregation is autonomous in the management of its affairs and exercises not only religious but also social and jural functions which, in other parts of India, are commonly vested in village or caste councils. There is no village organization except in the rare cases where the whole village belongs to a single Name House and there is no local caste or sub-caste organization except where the Name House is composed of members of a single caste. The Name House is therefore the basic unit of rural society in the greater part of the State.
