Author Meets Critics Panel on Rajbir Judge's Prophetic Maharaja

Author Meets Critics Roundtable Session for discussion on Rajbir Judge’s new book Prophetic Maharaja: Loss, Sovereignty, and the Sikh Tradition in Colonial South Asia published this year by Columbia University Press. Prophetic Maharaja asks the question of how do religious traditions and communities grapple with loss, particularly when it is of such magnitude that it defies the possibility of recovery or restoration? More specifically it asks this question in the context of examining the thought and career of Maharaja Duleep Singh (d. 1893), the last maharaja of the Sikh empire, and his struggle during the 1880s to reestablish Sikh rule, the lost Khalsa Raj, in Punjab. At its core Prophetic Maharaja argues for what Judge calls “dwelling in loss,” and for exploring the notions of sovereignty and history that such a practice of dwelling might make available.