w “Bhakti in Vaishnavism With Reference To Sri Madhva’s School Of Dvaita Vedanta” C H A P T E R 2 LIFE SKETCH OF S R i M A D H V A I ti- CHAPTER 2 LIFE SKETCH OF SRI MA D H V A Sri Madhvacharya (1238 -1317) was the founder of the Dvaita system, which is one of the five principal schools of Vedanta. Sri Madhvacharya was also known as Aanandateertha and Purna-Prajna. He was born in the village Prajakaksetra, eight miles south east of the modern town of Udipi, on the West Coast of South India and was a native of Tulunadu in Karnataka. He lived for seventy-nine years. He appeared on the Indian philosophical scene after the systems of Sankara and Ramanuja had been well established. The reasons, which led him to establish a new system of Vedanta, were his doctrinal differences and ideological dissatisfaction with the system of Sankara, which was the dominant philosophy of the time. In spite of the Theistic revolt against Sankara led by Ramanuja, Madhva could not agree with him on many points of Theistic doctrine. So he felt the need to give a new thought to his countrymen. “Madhva called his system, Tattvavada (Realism). It is described by Vidyaranya in his San/adarsana Sangraha as ‘‘Purnaprajnadarsan’’. [1] In early childhood, his natural intuition took him to Acyutaprajna, an ascetic of the Ekadandi order of Brahmasampradaya. He received initiation from him, as a Sanyasi. After this, Madhva studied the classics of the Advaita school such as the Istasiddhi. Later he began to expound the Prasthanatrayi independently and from a new standpoint. He found out the defects in the extant interpretations of 28 Sankara and his school. Sometimes entered into scholastic disputation with the veteran scholars of the day, viz. Vadisimha and Bhanu Pandita. He toured all over India several times and visited Badarikasrama, Bengal, Bihar and Banaras in the north and many centers of learning on the Godavari and also important places like Goa, Srirangam, Kanjeevaram and Kanyakumari in the South. Sri Madhva has left thirty-seven works in all, important of which are: I) Dasha Prakarnas or ten philosophical monographs explaining his logic, metaphysics and criticism of Advaita doctrines of Upadhi, Maya and Mithyatva. ii) Commentaries on the Ten principal Upanishads. iii) Commentaries on the Gita and the Brahmasutras. iv) A brief commentary on the first forty Suktas of the Rgveda. v) A perfect example of the Mahabharata in verses. vi) Brief notes and comments on the Bhaagavat. vii) Miscellaneous works comprising stotras, poems and works on worship and rituals. viii) His greatest work is the Anu-Vyakhyana, a critical exposition of the philosophy of the Brahmasutras. It is a metrical work and is his masterpiece. Jayateertha, one of his commentators in his famous work, the Nyayasudha, commented upon it. Sri Madhva's writings are characterized by extreme brevity of expression and compression of thought. They need the help of a very good commentary to be understood in their fullness of thought, depth of meaning and intention. Sh Madhva was endowed with a fine magnetic personality. He was a born leader of men. As a creative thinker he cared little for the conventions of fashionable belief 29 t - v> f-S and interpretation. His logic was as lovable as his faith. His Theisnn was unshakable. He made a deep impression on his contemporaries. Some of his eminent disciples like Trivikrarma Pandita, Padmanabha Teertha and Narahari Teertha were distinguished scholars of Advaita and other systems before they became converted to his views. After establishing his systems on firm foundations, Sri Madhva installed the idol of BalaKrishna secured from Dvarka at his Mutt in Udipi in 1285. He made Udipi the spiritual centre of his school and gave the responsibility of worshipping Sri Krishna to eight ascetic disciples and established Eight Mutt’ at Udipi Of these, the Uttaradi Mutt is very famous. Other Mutts of Sri Madhva’s following are: (1) Sri Vyaasaraya Mutt (2) Sri Raghvendra Mutt (3) Sri Padaraya Mutt (4) Sri Akshobhya Tirth Mutt (5) Sri Gokarna Mutt (6) Sri Kashi Mutt and (7) Sri Krishna Mutt. Their line of successors and those of other disciples, all propagating his system are flourishing to this day, according to tradition. Sri Madhva disappeared from men’s vision and retired to Badarikasrama in his seventy-ninth year. It is said that Sri Bibhisan came to visit Sri Madhva at this stage. Sri Madhva before disappearing from this world handed over Sri Padmanabha Teertha the idol of Sri Rama to and the five Saligramas which were given to Sri Madhva by Sri Vyaasa himself and asked Sri Padmanabha Teertha to propagate his system and his favorite Aitareya Upanishad. He narrated its contents to Sri Padmanabha Teertha arid disappeared from this world. Narayana Pandita, the son of one of his direct disciples, Trivikrama Pandita, considered Sri Madhva as a Vaayurupa. He wrote Sri Madhva’s biography in a Sansknt Kavya of sixteen cantos known as Madhva Vijay’. It is the main source information of Sn Madhva’s life and activities. 30 Sri Madhva’s thoughts are based on the Puraanas and Pancharatras. There was a strong note of mystic intentions in his thought and writings. Sri Jayateertha brought out the inherent logical strength from Sri Madhva's writings. “There were certain great ideas behind Madhva’s writings, viz. philosophical power, significance of potentiality such as the Conception of Saksi, the doctrine of SvatantraTattva, Visesas in relation to the Concept of identity and difference, and creation in the new sense of Paradhinavisesaptr. [2] 31 CHAPTER 2 PART ‘A’ : DVAITA PHILOSOPHY Indian Vedanta is firmly based on the Vedas, the Upanishads, the Puraanas, Brahmasutras and the Gita. The objective of all these scriptures is to attain the absolute good of man, which is Liberation, the Summum Bonum. To attain this Supreme goal, all scriptures have given various means/methods, e.g. Jnaana Maarga, Karma Maarga and Bhakti Maarga and Yoga Maarga. Veda, Upanishads mainly dealt with Yajna and Jnaana Maarga, Mimansakas dealt Karma Maarga wheras. Yoga Maarga of Patanjali was also very famous. The Bhaagavat, the Naarada and Shaandilya Sutras and the Vaishnava Acharyas like Sri Ramanuja, Sri Vallabha dealt Bhakti Maarga and Sri Madhva propagated this strongly. Sri Ramanuja’s philosophy is known as Visistadvaita, Sri Nimbarka’s philosophy is known as Bhedabheda. Sri Vallabha’s philosophy is known as Suddhadvaita and lastly and importantly, Sri Madhva's philosophy is known as the Dvaita Philosophy. The Sampradaya or tradition of spiritual descent from teacher to disciple of the different schools of Vedanta is as follows: “ (i) Sri Vaisnavism of Ramanuja: Vishnu or Narayana Sri or Laksmi Visvaksena - Satakopa - Nathamuni - Pundarikaksa - Rarnamisra - Yamuna - Mahapurna - Ramanuja. (ii) Hamsa Sampradaya of Nimbarka: Vishnu as l-lamsa - Brahma - Kurnaras - Naarada - Nimbarka, 32 (iii) Rudra Sampradaya of Vallabha: Vishnu - Rudra - Vishnuswami - Vallabha. (iv) Brahma Sampradaya of Madhva: Vishnu - Brahma - Vasistha - Sakti - Parashara - Vyaasa - Purna Prajna or Madhva ". [3] Madhva's philosophy is based on the axiom “Vishnu Sarvottam", Vishnu is the perfect Being, and He is the supreme God. “Vishnu is Lord of the Universe. He is the only Independent and Supreme Being. All others Jivas are dependent on him even after Moksha. Vishnu’s world is Real”. [4] “Lord Vasudev is Bhagvan, He is Hah, He is Vishnu, He is worshipped in the world”. [5] He is the Creator, Sustainer and Destroyer of this Real World. Man is His servant. Man must try to attain knowledge about Vishnu and through this knowledge man can attain Bhakti. Bhakti is the means as well as the end according to Sri Madhva's philosophy. To attain the knowledge of Vishnu and Aparoksha Jnaana, man has to do sravan, manana, and nididhyasa of Vishnu’s Name, Gunas and Avataras. “Firm, Ceaseless, unshakable love of God which surpasses every other form of affection and attachment, which is based on full knowledge of His transcendent Majesty is called Bhakti. By that alone one can attain liberation by and no other means". [6] Through Bhakti man does work for the sake of Lord. The work must be done by all, i.e. Muktiyogya Jivas. as well as Jnaanis. For this, the Lord cites the examples of King Janak and King Priyavrat. 33 Karma w ith detachm ent of fruits m ust be done a s said in Gita by Lord Krishna . “C onstantly perform your obligatory duty w ithout attachm ent a s King Janaka a n d others achieved perfection by action and w hatever the great m an does is followed by others, a s they set exa m p les for people so, perform your duty for all the tim e”. [ 7 ] “Do your obligatory w ork constantly and always rem em ber Lord Vishnu as the doer of our Karma". [ 8 ] I n Madhva's philosophy, Jnaana, Karma, a n d Bhakti are interrelated w ith each other. Th e y are dependent on each other, i.e. only Jnaana w ill not lead m an to the grace of Lord, only Bhakti w ithout Jnaana is of no use and only Karma w ill be a m echanical process. Sri Madhva tried to co-relate these three to attain Real h a p p i n e s s . 3 4 CHAPTER 2 P A R T ‘ B ’ : DVAITA VEDANTA DARSAN O F SRI MADHVA Sri Madhva’s system is called as Tattvavada (Realism ) and also as “Dvaita Siddhanta". The latter nam e is m ostly used for his philosophy. H is philosophy accepts two categories i.e.