Madhava, Vidyaranya, Sringeri, and Kulke

[Vidyasankar Sundaresan]

Swaminathan Madhuresan <smadhuresan at YAHOO.COM> wrote:

>  Hacker and others' 700 dating derives from the suggestion by
>  Kuppuswamy Sastri in the early 20th century that Sankaracharya
>  predated Mandana seeing few sentences that have similar ideas.
>  But this textual evdence may be wanting. Both could quote from

Perhaps, but note also Allen Thrasher's work on Mandana Misra, where all the
cross-references have been thoroughly discussed. If Sankara is to be dated
to the 10th century, Mandana's date should also be similarly brought down.
Textual evidence from Sankara, Mandana, Suresvara and Padmapada is too
extensive to ignore. So also with Bhaskara, the bhedAbheda vedAntin, who
refers copiously to Sankara's works, and with Buddhist authors who clearly
post-date Mandana and Bhaskara. It would be rather difficult to defend such
a late date for Sankara.

>  an earlier author. However, inscriptions from Chola, Pandya, Hoysala
>  periods dating to 11, 12, 13th centuries have been found related to
>  Adi Sankaracharya. These inscriptions need to be taken into account,
>  and parallels from dating of say Basava, Tamil alvars, nayanars
>  or Sankara mathas like Kanchi or Sringeri suggest a much later
>  date than the one by Hacker.

??? Kanchi matha claims Sankara lived in 500 BCE. Contemporary Sringeri
publications give the "standard" 788-820 CE dates, which is based on a
traditional chronogram prevalent in the Deccan. This was published by K. B.
Pathak in The Indian Antiquary, 1882. The old Sringeri record simply says
that Sankara was a contemporary of a king named Vikramaditya. Who this
Vikramaditya could be is a matter of interpretation. The inscriptions you
note indicate only that Sankara lived prior to the 11th century, and not
that he lived later than the 9th century.

Vidyasankar
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