‘Rebellion in Verse’ talks about how Tamil poet-saints democratised the Divine

Rajkumari Sharma Tankha

Rebellion in Verse (Penguin) by Raghavan Srinivasan explores the Tamil Bhakti movement, a medieval South Indian devotional surge, which the author argues was not only spiritual but also a profound social and cultural revolution. The book looks at how Tamil poet-saints challenged rigid religious hierarchies, caste-based discrimination, and Sanskrit-centric ritualism by composing Tamil hymns that spoke directly to masses. They proudly proclaimed that the Divine was not the preserve of priests and kings but a birth right of every single individual. And each person’s connection with divine is deeply personal.

The book talks about how, in the vast Tamil region, Bhakti emerged as a form of resistance, a grassroots movement and went on to redefine religious authority. Again, it wasn’t just personal devotion to God, but became a movement that can brought about profound social and political change.

The book talks about poet-saints – Appar, Sambandar, Andal, Nandanar, among others – as voices from marginalised sections of society. But, it were these very poets whose hymns challenged the caste-based power structures, democratising spirituality, hitherto limited to Sanskrit, Vedas, Pandits.

Here, author has done a very noble deed: He has translated Tamil hymns and contextualized them, which helps a reader unfamiliar with Tamil or medieval history (like me) connect with it.

It is common knowledge that there was a time not when not just Tamil, but all vernaculars were side-lined; Sanskrit – the deva’s language – was considered supreme and those who couldn’t read or understand Sanskrit had no access to Vedic knowledge. It was the Bhakti movement of 6-7 century that made vernaculars a medium of an inclusive spiritual language. This in turn made connection with divine direct and personal. While, it originated in Tamil region, it soon spread far and beyond influencing northern saints like Kabir, Guru Nanak.

The book connects the rise of Bhakti to broader socio-economic changes in early medieval South India, and rightly so. It emphasizes that devotion cannot be separated from the lived experiences but is deeply intertwined with an egalitarian society. This is how it challenges elite ritual norms.

One has to give it to Srinivasan for bringing forgotten voices from India’s past (Appar and Andal, among others hitherto reduced to myth) into contemporary conversation.

But there are two small issues about which I felt needed to be expanded: One, while the book talks about cultural and religious aspects in a detailed manner, it has little information about how economic conditions of that time viz trade, agricultural changes supported the rise and spread of Bhakti. Two, it talks about Tamil Bhakti Movement impacting north India, but information on how it reached northern region is lacking.

But all in all, a good, detailed book, written in lucid English wherein the author has blended historical narrative, cultural analysis, social critique as well as poetry.