Authorship of Sarvadarzanasamgraha

[Rama Balasubramanian]

Vidyasankar Sundaresan <vsundaresan at HOTMAIL.COM> writes:

>The author of the preface to the nyAyAlaMkAra is perhaps confused.
>
>The author of SDS specifically names himself as mAdhava, and he is also
>related to the famous sAyaNa - SrImat sAyaNadugdhAbdhi kaustubhena
>vipaScitA kriyate mAdhavAryeNa sarvadarSanasangrahaH

[ ... ]

An excellent summary of the history of the SDS. I would like to add
two more facts about the SDS:

1. The author also salutes vidyAsha.nkara, who was a pontiff of the
Sringeri Mutt before bhAratI kR^ishhNa tIrtha, who was the predecessor
of vidyAaNya (1386-139?). However the main guru of vidyAraNya is
supposed to be vidyAsha.nkara. I am pretty sure that the author
salutes vidyAsha.nkara. I'll check up in my copy today and correct
this statement if necessary.

2. In the end of the SDS he says that he is omitting advaita since he
has explained it elsewhere.

These two facts will definitely rule out the possibility of a
naiyAyika authorship. In fact, the structure of the book is something
like this:

darshana A, explanation of darshana A, and in the end objection to
darshana A which is rectified by darshana B, then darshana B, it's
explanation and finally it's defects which are rectified by darshana
C, and so on and so forth. The author starts with chArvAka and ends
with pata.njala yoga. Since nyAya is somewhere in the middle, it can
hardly have been written by a naiyAyika. Then, as I said, he says he
has explained advaita elsewhere.

Another curious fact about the SDS is that it's explanation of the
pUrva mImA.nsA is supposedly very terse and can be understood only by
scholars of that field.

Rama.