Indian ascetics have captured the Western imagination since the late 19th century. While some Indian gurus began travelling internationally to spread their teachings, at that time it was almost impossible for a foreigner to join a Hindu traditional religious order (sampradāya). However, this began to change in the second half of the 20th century, when waves of people following in the hippy trail reached India in search of alternative teachings. Today, not only can foreigners be initiated, but some of them are even able to obtain important religious titles. This paper focuses on the one hand on these groups of foreigners as representative of contemporary changes resulting from the new possibilities for cultural and religious exchange offered by a globalised society and the revolution in travel and communication. On the other, on the changes affecting traditional Hindu orders that also involve the monetarisation of religious titles and offices. We will see, in fact, that foreigners are entitled to hold positions and perform practices to which not all Indians have access.

Daniela Bevilacqua is an Indianist specialized in Hindu asceticism, investigated through an ethnographic and historical perspective. She is currently a researcher at CRIA (ISCTE-IUL) in Lisbon. She worked as a post-doc research fellow at SOAS, for the ERC- funded Haṭha Yoga Project (2015–2020). She authored Modern Hindu Traditionalism in Contemporary India, published by Routledge, From Tapas to Modern Yoga forthcoming in 2024 published by Equinox, and several articles and book chapters on topics related to Hindu religious tradition, gender, and embodied practices.