Vedic Authority in the Gaudîya Vaishnava Tradition: Journal of Vaishnava Studies

Abstract

One of the factors that is shared by many of the traditions that are brought together under the rubric of “Hinduism” is their acceptance, on some fundamental level, of the Veda as a source of transcendent knowledge and authority. Brian K. Smith goes so far as to claim that “Hinduism is the religion of those humans who create, perpetuate, and transform traditions with legitimizing reference to the authority of the Veda.” Among this confederation of traditions, Vedic authority has come to assume a very important symbolic role in relation to a text’s or tradition’s claims to authority. Indeed, it is by invoking, appropriating, emulating, and at times challenging the Veda that texts and traditions attempt to establish their own authority among the diversity of “Hinduisms.”