25 Aug

Vedantic Acharya Tradition

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Contents

• Adi Shankaracharya
• Table of All Vaishnava Acharyas
• Vishishtadvaita (Srivaishnava) Sect
• Vishishtadvaita of Ramanuja
• Madhvacharya’s Dvaita Vedanta
• Nimbarkacharya’s Dvaitadvaita (Bhedabhed)
• Vallabhacharya’s Shuddhadvaita

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Adi Shankaracharya

(Also called as Hindudharmoddhakara)

Very little is known about his personal life. Shankara Digvijaya (life of Adi Shankara) by Anandigiri was written during the Vijayanagar era, and established Shankaracharya as the rallying symbol. He is often considered to be the founder of the Advaita Vedanta school, but was actually a systematizer, not a founder.

Background:

• The Upanishads form the basic texts and Vedanta philosophy gives an interpretation.
• Badarayan (4^th-5^th century) wrote Brahma Sutra to systematize and summarize the philosophical and spiritual ideas in the Upanishads.
• Gaudapada (6^th century) was a grand teacher of Shankaracharya. He wrote Mandukya Karika commentary on the one of the shortest Upanishads called Mandukya. Shankaracharya’s commentary on it is at the core of his Advaita philosophy.

Adi Shankara tried to revive Hinduism through Vedantic philosophy, which was used as a cohesive idea to unite all strands, based on the Vedic dictum of ‘One Truth, Many Expositions’.

To justify and promote his idea, he wrote commentaries on Prasthana-trayi (10 Upanishads, Brahmasutra and Bhagvad Gita) and tried to reinvigorate the Upanishadic thought. He gave a new interpretation to Upanishadic philosophy. Such philosophy was attractive for the scholars/elites. Shankaracharya systematized Advaita by as jnanamarga

• Brahma Satyam Jagan Mithya Jivo Brahmaiv Naparaha.
• Brahma Sat – it exists.
  • The supreme truth of Brahman is Nirguna, sat-chit-ananda (truth-consciousness-bliss). It is neti, neti.
• Jagat Mithya – all creation is mithya. (Mayavada)
  • In his view, this world is nothing but illusion or maya. Brahman, the spirit that suffuses the cosmos, is the sole reality; other than Brahman, everything else, including the universe, material objects and individuals, is ever changing, transient and illusory (maya).
• Jivo Brahmaiva Napara – both are the same. Atman-Brahman is one and the same. There is nothing else. (eka Brahmo dwitiyo nasti)
  • Thus, Brahman is Paramarthika Satyam, Absolute Truth, and one’s atman or self is identical to it. Shankara’s Hinduism does not see God as external to the universe. God dwells in the universe, but God is not the universe; He is in it and beyond it. The world is in God, and the two are indivisible.
• Know that Atman-Brahman is one and the same, which is Satchitanand. Realising this and accepting the true self, pure consciousness, as the only reality (sat), leads to moksha or salvation, defined by some as a state of bliss (ananda).
• Jnanamarga: Sa Vidya Ya Vimuktaye.
  • Adi Shankara gave primary importance to jnana yoga. It is knowledge which gives Moksha, or spiritual release while alive (jivanmukti) or after death (videhamukti). Once you get moksha, you become Brahma, you experience being Brahma.
• To justify his stand, he focused on four Mahavakyas from Upanishads.
  • Aham Brahmasmi
  • Tat Tvam Asi
  • Ayam Atma Brahma
  • Prajnanam Brahma (Consciousness is Brahma)
• For common people, he authorized idol-worship to popularize gods among them.
  • To Adi Shankara, bhakti yoga (the practice of worship) was an important step towards jnana yoga (the cultivation of knowledge).
• Compositions
  • Commentary on Prasthanatrayi
  • Upadesha-sahasri
  • Vivekachudamani
  • Saundarya Lahari
  • Over 100 Stotrams
    • Bhaj Govindam
    • Nirvan Shatakam
    • Kashi Panchakam

Adi Shankara was not merely a philosophical thinker who reconciled the doctrines and traditions of the ancients with a robust interpretation for the future; he was also a practical reformer.

• Smart Puja: Five Hindu gods (Shiva, Vishnu, Shakti, Ganesh, Surya), include a sixth impersonal nirguna god in their practice.
• He purified the worship of the Goddess, which had become somewhat questionable thanks to dubious practices introduced by the tantrics, and introduced the samayachara form of Devi worship, involving hymns of exquisite beauty like the Soundarya Lahari
• Travelled widely in South and North (Shankar Digvijay) He was engaged in spirited debates and refuted opposing ideas.
  • Famous debate with Mandan Mishra
• In order to give ideological-institutional unity to Hinduism
  • He established 4 mathas in 4 directions to create religious boundary and envelope whole India.
    • Jyotirmath at Badrinath
    • Govardhan Math at Puri
    • Kalika Math at Dwaraka
    • Sharada Peetham at Shringeri
    • Kanchi Kamakoti Peetham in Kanchipuram (became important later)
  • Dashnami Sect of wandering monks: Shankara also created his disciples sannyasis (Hindu ascetic youth) who took learned shastras, travelled across, and debated with other religious groups across India. They took the message of his faith all across India.
  • Kumbha Mela
  • His ready acceptance of many Buddhist principles and practices so narrowed the gap between the two faiths as to make the absorption of Buddhism by the parent faith inevitable in India.
  • Social Commentary
    • Despite such ideas being seen by many as Brahminical and elitist, Advaita Vedanta, by conceiving of Oneness in this manner, lays the philosophical groundwork for the fundamental equality of all human beings. Advaita Vedanta realises that all living beings are essentially one, and thus essentially equal.
    • In Upadeshsahasri, Shankara states that any bheda (discrimination) based on class or caste or parentage is a lack of liberating knowledge. Shankara’s liberated individual understands and practises the ethics of non-discrimination, since the high-born and the low are all part of the same Oneness.

Vaishnava Acharya Tradition

Various Schools of Vedanta :

Shankaracharya (8th c)	Advaita Vedanta
Ramanujacharya (11th c)	Vishishtha Advaita
Madhvacharya (13th c)	Dvaita Vedanta
Nimbarkacharya (13th c)	Dvaitadvaita
Vallabhacharya (16th c)	Shuddha Advaita
Chaitanya Mahaprabhu (16th c)	Achintya Bhedabheda

Vishishtadvaita (Srivaishnava) Sect

• Founder: Nathamuni
• Real founder: Yamunacharya was the real founder.
• Most salient contribution: Ramanujacharya (1017-1137, 120 years)
  • Ramanuja succeeded Yamunacharya at Srirangam as the head of the temple.
  • Initially, he was a pupil of advaita philosopher Yadava–Prakasha at Kanchipura. However, soon he got disillusioned with the philosophy of advaita.
• Vishishtadvaita of Ramanuja:
  • Ramanuja speaks about three ‘eternal’ principles:
    • chit (the individual soul)
    • achit (the material world)
    • Isvara (the Supreme soul).
  • His commentaries on the Gita and on the Brahma Sutras contested Adi Shankara’s interpretations of those scriptures.
    • Shankara’s Nirguna Brahma was criticized by Ramanuja.
      • He argued when there is knowledge, there must be a knower [thus refuting Shankar]
      • Thus, Brahm cannot be nirguna, it cannot be without ‘quality’, because we can experience it. It in itself is an attribute.
    • Ramanuja also rejects that atman (chit) and paramatman (Ishvara) are identical.
  • Ramanuja’s conception
    • Chit and Achit are both parts of Ishvara. Chit is its atma and achit is its body. So, they are part of Ishvara, but not identical.
    • So, Ramanuja in a way supported Advita, that everything is Brahma. But he rejects Mayavad. Jagat is not mithya, it’s a part of Brahma.
      • Brahma is the same as Vishnu, as per Ramanuja.
    • Further, for Ramanuja, against Shankara, knowledge alone is not enough to save a soul. It has to be followed by devotion (bhakti) to attain salvation.
  • Thus, Ramanuja’s chief contribution was to mingle Vedic Brahm with ‘bhakti’ which became the chief component of all Vaishnava movements.
    • He gave philosophical justification to Bhakti and helped in its popularization.
    • However, the idea of Krishna, Radha and cowherds are absent from Ramanuja’s Vaishnavism.
  • Persecution?
    • According to Vaishnavite tradition, Vaishnatives were persecuted by a Chola king and Ramanuja was made to flee to Karnataka.
    • Bittideva, a Jain Hoyasala ruler of Belur in Karnataka. Ramanuja converted Bittideva into Vaishnavism and christened him Vishnu Vardhana. He built a very ornate and sculpturally magnificent temple dedicated to Lord Vishnu, Channa Kesava, in Belur.
  • Social aspect:

• He brought organisational energy into the faith, conducting daily pujas and annual temple festivals, allowing image-worship and more inclusive temple-based rituals at the Srirangam Mutt he headed and in other nearby temples.
• Pancharatra Tradition
  • It is a temple ritual which deals with the construction of temples, rituals in temples, idols, initiation of vaishnavites, their religious marks, etc.
• Ramanuja tried to establish a careful balance between orthodox Brahmanism and popular bhakti which was open to all.
  
  

  Statue of Equality, Hyderabad

  • He advocated bhakti as a mode of worship accessible to all including the Sudras and even the outcastes. While propagating bhakti, he did not observe caste distinctions and even tried to eradicate untouchability. He permitted women and worshippers of the lower castes to participate in temple worship, a privilege they had been denied.
  • Ramanuja also allowed the chanting of the popular Alvar hymns, which were sung in Tamil, the language of the people, rather than in the arcane Sanskrit.
  • Ramanuja’s reforms spread across southern India to other major Vaishnavite temples and can be seen in many ways as a reinvention of Hinduism, taking Shankara’s work to the masses.
  • Literature
    • Vedantasara, Vedantadipa, and his commentaries on Bhagavad-Gita and Brahma-Sutra.

Madhvacharya’s Dvaita Vedanta (13^th c)

• Also known as Anandatirtha.
• Madhvacharya rejected advaita completely. He was a critic of both Shankara as well as Ramanuja. He gave the idea of dualism.
  • Atman and Brahman are fundamentally separate from each other. These are two different realities, never the same.
  • Tattvavada
    • He divides the things into two tattvas:
      • Svatantra Tattva: Ishvara/Brahman.
      • Paratantra Tattva: Jagat (achit) and Jiva/atman (chit).
    • Paratantra Tattvas are dependent, but they cannot be one with Ishvara. Thus, it is dvaita.
  • Brahma of Vedanta is not an impersonal being but another name for Vishnu or Hari. He is the object of worship and devotion. God-soul relationship is like master-servant. Liberation is achieved through only the grace of god.
• His philosophy gave support to Krishna Bhakti.
• His greatest work is Anuvyakhyana.
• Udupi Ashta Mathas
  • The main area of his influence was Karnataka.
  • Madhvacharya established eight mathas in Udupi, with a murti he obtained from Dwarka.
• Madhvacharya’s ideas led to the founding of Haridasa sect of Vaishnavism in Karnataka, known for their devotional songs and music. During the rule of the Vijayanagar Empire in South India, the Haridasa movement spread out from Karnataka.

Nimbarkacharya’s Dvaitadvaita (Bhedabhed) (13^th c)

He was a Telugu Brahmin, born in a Karnataka. Most of his life was spend in Vrindavana. His followers believe that he was the re-incarnation of Sudarshan chakra.

(Time: Some believe he pre-dated Shankaracharya by a century, while other believe his time was after Ramanuja. It is disputed. But his ideas were prevalent in 13^th and 14^th centuries.)

• His idea:
  • He accepted Dvaita part – Ishvara is different from Jiva and Jagat. But he added that Jiva/jagat also depend on Ishvara. So, they are distinct (dualism, dvaita, bheda) yet dependant, so they are kind of identical (monism, Advaita, abheda).
  • Nimbarka equally emphasizes both difference (bhed) and non-difference (abheda), as against Ramanuja, who makes difference subordinate to non-difference.
  • He identified Ishvara/Brahman with Radha-Krishna, where both are conjointly understood to be the eternal deity. He emphasized on the importance of Krishna and cowherdesses headed by Radha. Thus, Nimbarka played a major role in spreading the worship of the divine couple Radha and Krishna, and founded Nimbarka Sampradaya.
• Books: Vedanta-Parajita-Saurabh, a commentary on Brahma-sutra.

Vallabhacharya’s Shuddhadvaita (1479-1531)

• He was born in a Telugu Brahmin family in Varanasi. His family escaped to the Champaran of Chhattisgarh during the conflicts in the late 15th century.
• He participated in philosophical debate at Vijayanagara and was honoured with the kanakabhishekam by Krishnadevaraya on victory.
• His philosophical ideas were the culmination of philosophical thought during the Bhakti Movement.
• Philosophy of Shuddha Advaita
  • There is no real difference between atman and brahman. There is no question of Bhed and Abhed. Brahma is everything. Jiva and Jagat are all Brahma.
  • Individual soul is not clouded by maya. The world of Maya is not unreal, but a power of Ishvara. Jagat and jiva are all real.
  • His brahma is equal to Krishna personified. All things are Brahma. Everything is Krishna’s Leela. There is absolute identity among them.
• Krishna-bhakti
  • Bhakti is the means to attain not Mukti, but eternal service of Krishna and participation along with His activities in divine Vrindavana. Focus of Vallabha’s Krishna Bhakti is on
    • Krishna’s childhood pranks with Yashoda (vatsalya bhav)
    • Youthful Krishna in relationship with gopis (madhura bhav)
    • Many lilas of Krishna (eg. Krishna’s protection of the good (divine grace) and his victory over evils, all with allegory and symbolism)
  • Nirvana is attainable through Pushti (divine grace). Any personal efforts such as good deeds or religious observances are not essential.
  • He founded Krishna-centered Pushtimarg of Vaishnavism in the Braj region of India.
  • Rejected asceticism and monastic life, suggested that through loving devotion to God Krishna, any householder could achieve salvation.
• Book – Anubhashya, Bhagwat Tika Subodhini
• Legacy preserved in Braj Region and in Mewar (Nathdwara temple of Srinathaji).
• His successor was his son Vitthalnath who was honoured by Akbar.
• Pichwai paintings