SANKARACHARYA, who lived about the 8th or 9th century A.D., was a religious reformer. He is said to have been a Natnburi Brahman of Oran ganore, in Malabar or Kerala; but another account describes hint as having been born at Chedum baram, in S. Arcot, and afterwards residing in Malabar. He seems to have engaged in acri monious controversies with other Brahmans of the Saiva and Vaishnava sects. The Sankara Charitra, the Sankara Kat'ha, the Sankara Vijaya, and Sankara Dig Vijaya, are books descriptive of his successes. He himself wrote numerous works, including commentaries on the Upanishads, Ve danta, Sutra, and Bhagavat Gita. Ile opposed the Naiyayika, the Sankhya, and the Mintansa philo sophies, the last as represented by Madana Misra, with whom he held a long and acritnonious dis cussion. He led an erratic life through India and Kashmir, where he sat on the Pitha or throne of Saraswati, which is still shown to visitors. He then went to Badarikasrama (Badarinath), and finally to Kedarnath, in the Himalaya, where he died at the early age of 32. A 3falabar Brahman is still the officiating priest at Badarinath.
He has been accused of having headed the general persecution against the Buddhists which was the main cause of the disappearance of that sect in Southern India.
The local persecution is recorded by Ananda Giri, a disciple of Sankara, about the 8th or 9th century A.n., and the author of the Sankara Vijaya. The magnified version appears in the Sarva Darsana Sangraha of Madhavacharya in the 14th century. In the course of Sankara's peregrinations he established several maths or convents, under the presidence of his disciples, particularly one still flourishing at Sringiri, on the Western Ghats, near the sources of tha Tunga budra. The influence exercised by Sankara in person has been perpetuated by his writings, the most eminent of which are his Bhashyas or commentaries on the Sutras, or Aphorisms of Vyasa. He wrote also the Atma-Bodha or Knowledge of the Soul, which has been trans= lated by Taylor in 1812, afterwards by Kearns, and into French by Neve.
His philosophic views are adopted by the Smartta Brahmans, a numerous and prominent sect in the south of India.
Sankara taught that there was one sole and supreme God, Brahma Para Brahma, the ruler of the universe, and its inscrutable first cause, who WAS to be worshipped by meditation. The Smartta Brahmans follow this philosophic bide of his teaching. Sankara moulded the later Mimansa or Vedantic philosophy into its final form, and popularized It ill to national rel igion. Ile
itddreseed himself to the high-caste philosophers on the one hand, and the low-caste multitude on the other. Ile left behind, as the twofold results of his life's work, a compact BraInnen sect and a popular religion.
Weber (p. 51) doubts if he was a follower of Siva, but Sankara is the first great figure in elmost every Hindu hagiology, or book of saints, frotu the Sarva Dam.= Sangraha of Madhava charya downwards ; aud some of the Saiva sects believe that ho was an incarnation of Siva. Ile was undoubtedly monotheistical, and since his short life in tho 8th or 9th century, every new ilindu sect has had to start with a personal God.
The literature relating to this reformer is con tained in the Sankara Charitra, Saukara Kat'lla, Sankara Vijaya, and Sankara Dig Vijaya. The Sankara Vijaya was written by Allan& Giri, published in the Bibliotheca Indica, and critically examined by Kashinath Trimbak Telang in vol. v. of the ludian Antiquary. The Sankara Dig Vijaya is a poletnic work by Ananda Bhima Deva. There are many Saiva sects in India, who believe that Sankaracharya was their founder. Ile was the most renowned master of the school of Vedanta philosophy. Ile &tys— • A drop that trembles on the lotus leaf, Such is this life, so soon dispelled, so brief.
The eight great mountains and the seven seas, The sun, the gods who sit and ride over these, Thou, I, the universe, must pass away, Time conquers all : why care for what must pass away!' The term Dandi means any one who bears a staff, but is applied especially to a numerous order of religious mendicants founded by Sankara charya, many of whom have been eminent as writers on various subjects, especially on the Vedanta philosophy. They are divided into ten classes, Das-nami, each of which is distinguished by a peculiar name, as Tirtha, Asrama, Vana, Aranya, is'araswati, Puri, Ilharati Giri or Gir, Parvata, and Sagara, which is added to the proper name of the inclividual,—as Purushottama Gir, or Baden dhra Saraswati. They are hence known collect ively as the Das-multi, or ten-name Gosain. Of these, only the classes named Tirtha, Asrama, Saraswati, and part of Bharati, aro now considered (Li pure Dandi ; the others are of a more secuku. character, and are more usually termed Atit.— Iris. Gloss. ; Tr. of Hind. p. 275 ; Bunsen's God in History, p. 332 ; Dowson ; Weber ; Gaz.