[Advaita-l] Re: Advaita-l Digest, Vol 1, Issue 32

[Jaldhar H. Vyas]

On Tue, 3 Jun 2003, Kotekal, Srinivas [Non-Employee/0200] wrote:

> This is factually wrong. Sri Madhva was not an Advaitin to begin with. From
> several works, we can trace origin of Dvaita system from ancient Monotheism
> of Bhagavatas.

>From what we know of the Bhagavatas, "monotheism" is not an accurate way
to describe their ideology.  The distinctive feature is the 4-vyuha theory
of the Pancharatra Agamas.  Vishishtadvaita endorses vyuhavada.  Does
Dvaita?

> From an account in Padma Purana (sampradayae brahmanamina
> madhvAchAryah pratistitah.) the school derives from Brahma
> (Brahma-sampradaya). The following is the traditional Guruparampara down to
> Sri Madhva ;
>
> Sri Hamsa (NarayaNa)
> Brahma
> The Four Sanas
> Durvasa
> Jnananidhi   Tirtha
> Garudavahana "
> Kaivalya     "
> Jnanisa      "
> Para         "
> Sattyaprajna "
> Prajna       " (a contemporary of Sri Sankara)
>

Which leads to another question.  Why is there no mention of this Prajna
Tirtha in the works of Shankaracharya?  Either at that point the Dvaita
school did not exist , its views were not original enough to mention, or
it was not significant enough to be noticed.  As a comparison, we have the
names of several ancient philosophers such as Bodhayana who can be
reliablely identified as Vishishtadvaitins.  We know of their views not
just from texts of their own school, but from outsiders.

I think it is more plausible to believe as Jay suggested that the Dvaita
school did not exist at that time.  It's philosophy developed as a result
of and in reaction to Shankaracharya.

-- 
Jaldhar H. Vyas <jaldhar at braincells.com>
It's a girl! See the pictures - http://www.braincells.com/shailaja/