THIS book is an attempt to bring out the gradual development of the concept of Vaisnavism over the last 1,500 years. We confess at the very beginning that the findings and data are not based on any specific research, but gathering information from various literature available written by great scholars. The source literature is presented at the end of every chapter. This is more to elaborate how Vaisnavism as a religious concept is practised by millions of people. Such concepts are never sustained over long periods of time unless they get stimulation and regeneration now and then. This is what had happened across India through yet another concept called the acaryas who appeared generation after generation to lead the people who tend to gradually gravitate towards materialism and assume that it is the be-all and end-all of human existence.
It all began during the fifth to eighth century CE, with the advent of a great movement by mystic saints in southern India who were of different castes, creeds and communities pouring their hearts out expressing Celestial Love (bhakti) towards the Lord. These were the twelve Vaisnava Alvars and sixty-three Saiva Nāyanmars. Though all of them lived at different times and in several areas in and around Tamil Nadu, they all sang the same theme in the same lingo of unalloyed love towards God. Their styles were diverse and the deities they propitiated were distinct but the message was loud and clear. For them, attaining the Supreme Lord was the only goal, and the modus operandi was simple surrender and bhakti.
They sang and danced in ecstasy exhibiting their bhakti (devotion) to God whom they chose to be the Supreme Reality. The amount of effort on their part was more in enjoying the closeness to their beloved Lord, than in expounding the phenomenon called God. They did interpret the term but were more particular in describing the nature, glory and attributes to spur and incite a person to get attracted towards Him. The Vaisnava Alvars were a class by themselves and they reveled in expressing their devotion more as love and visualized several relationships with the Lord. One imagined Lord to be a child and he exhibited parental love while another treated Him as her beloved and ultimately did reach Him also. Yet another behaved and likened himself to a women and wept over the separation while some other Alvar got into the role of a mother and cried over the misery of seeing her daughter suffering from the pangs of separation (i.e. the Alvar being separated from the Lord). In short, all this shows that they were all totally convinced that they were related only to Him and wanted to reach Him at the earliest possible time. I shall resist the temptation of getting into more details because these incidents were stated to demonstrate how these mystic saints expressed their devotion to the Lord. This, according to the Vaisnava Siddhanta, is called Bhakti.
Towards the end of this period there appeared on the Indian scene Srī Sankara Bhagavatpada who brought in a renaissance by re-establishing the supremacy of Vedas and Upanisads, and reconstructed the Vedanta Siddhanta on a high pedestal. His efforts and exegeses basically had pure metaphysics because his priority was to re-build the glory of Hinduism which was otherwise getting usurped by Buddhism and Jainism. Therefore, there were two movements, one "the Bhakti movement of the mystics" and the other the "pure philosophy of Sri Sankara". The synthesis of these two really happened two or three centuries later and the first notable personality was Srī Ramanuja (1017-1137).
THIS subject is called "Schools of Vaisnavism" or sometimes as "Other Schools of Vaisnavism". All of us know that Vaishnavism is one of the oldest and ancient living religions. The important doctrine of Vaishnavism is that Maha-Visnu is the Supreme Deity. The Vedas, Purāņas and Itihasas glorify Maha-Visnu as the Ultimate Reality. While Vaishnavism is clearly demarcated as a school or a system followed by people propitiating Visnu called Vaisnavas, why is the topic termed Schools of Vaişņavism? Can there be different Vaisnavisms? No is the clear answer. But different modes of interpretations of the same concept make Vaişņavism versatile and it enjoys a universal acceptance.
Darsana and Mata.
According to Indian tradition, which insists on the unity of theory and practice, philosophy and religion, though distinguishable, are not separable. Philosophy per se, which is darsana, is complimentary to religion, which is mata. Mata is more a word used in Indian context to mean a doctrine or tenet or religious belief. Vaisnavism is essentially a philosophy of religion, but developed out of Vedanta. Though inseparable, philosophy and religion follow different yardsticks. Philosophy arises when a certain question or doubt is answered. Since different minds are thinking about the same question, the answers might be different and divergent. But, however divergent they may be, they must be an answer to the same question. T.M.P. Mahadevan defines them very clearly as philosophical systems are like drawings in perspective of the same object. Their common object is Truth. Each of them attempts to give us a vision of Truth.
These philosophies are broadly classified as orthodox and heterodox depending on whether they accept Veda as a pramana or not. Carvaka, Buddhism and Jainism are considered by the Hindu philosophers as heterodox. We would take Buddhism for a discussion to show why Hinduism is opposed to it. Buddhism does not accept the Veda as a pramana. What is so sacrosanct about the Veda that makes Hinduism consider a great movement like Buddhism as heterodox.
The study of schools of Vaisnavism would be incomplete if Bhakti schools of Vedanta and their impact are not understood fully. While the Bhakti movements of Alvars and Nayanmars belonging the period, probably between the fifth to eighth centuries CE, were getting established, simultaneously contemporary interpretations of Vedanta were also becoming popular.
The schools of Vaisnavism primarily promulgate for the seeker that the mundane existence (samsāra) is real, liberation must be real, and worship and meditation are not mock battles. God is accepted as the Ultimate Reality - merciful and gracious, the seat of all auspicious attributes - by whose grace alone one can be freed from the bondage of samsara. These schools establish the Vedas and do not make a distinction between the Absolute (Brahman) and God (Iśvara) or equate jīva with Brahman. Thus, a subsummary what we discussed is: Vedantic scriptures highlighting the concept of "theism" reveal an Ultimate and Real God with infinite auspicious attributes.
Mundane living (samsara) and liberation (moksa) are real.
Spiritual sadhana is not a mock battle but a real and earnest striving.
Vedas (1207)
Upanishads (503)
Puranas (632)
Ramayana (749)
Mahabharata (365)
Dharmasastras (167)
Goddess (510)
Bhakti (248)
Saints (1520)
Gods (1299)
Shiva (383)
Journal (181)
Fiction (61)
Vedanta (372)
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