Madhvacharya
Madhvacharya, also known as Purna Prajna and Ānanda Tīrtha, was an Indian philosopher, theologian and the chief proponent of the Dvaita school of Vedanta. Madhva called his philosophy Tattvavāda meaning "arguments from a realist viewpoint".
Madhvacharya was born at Pajaka near Udupi on the west coast of Karnataka state in 13th-century India. As a teenager, he became a Sanyasi joining Brahma-sampradaya guru Achyutapreksha, of the Ekadandi order. Madhva studied the classics of Hindu philosophy, and wrote commentaries on the Principal Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita and the Brahma Sutras, and is credited with thirty seven works in Sanskrit. His writing style was of extreme brevity and condensed expression. His greatest work is considered to be the Anuvyakhyana, a philosophical supplement to his bhasya on the Brahma Sutras composed with a poetic structure. In some of his works, he proclaimed himself to be an avatar of Vayu, the son of god Vishnu.
Madhvacharya was a critic of Adi Shankara's Advaita Vedanta and Ramanuja's Vishishtadvaita Vedanta teachings. He toured India several times, visiting places such as Badrinath, Bengal, Varanasi, Dwaraka, Goa and Kanyakumari, engaging in philosophical debates and visiting Hindu centres of learning. Madhva established the Krishna Mutt at Udupi with a murti secured from Dwarka Gujarat in 1285 CE.
Madhvacharya's teachings are built on the premise that there is a fundamental difference between Atman and the Brahman, these are two different unchanging realities, with individual soul dependent on Brahman, never identical. His school's theistic dualism teachings disagreed with the monist teachings of the other two most influential schools of Vedanta based on Advaita's nondualism and Vishishtadvaita's qualified nondualism. Liberation, asserted Madhva, is achievable only through the grace of God.
The Dvaita school founded by Madhva influenced Vaishnavism, the Bhakti movement in medieval India, and has been one of the three influential Vedānta philosophies, along with Advaita Vedanta and Vishishtadvaita Vedanta. Madhva's historical influence in Hinduism, state Kulandran and Kraemer: "has been salutary, but not extensive.“
Early life
The biography of Madhvacharya is unclear about his year of birth. Many sources date him to 1238–1317 period, but some place him about the 1199–1278 period.Madhvācārya was born in Pajaka near Udupi, a coastal district in the present-day Indian state of Karnataka. Traditionally it is believed that his father's name is Naduillaya and the name of his mother is unclear, although many sources variously claim it as Satyavati and Vedavati. Born in a Tulu Brahmin household, he was named Vāsudeva. Later he became famous by the names Purnaprajna, Anandatirtha and Madhvacharya. Pūrnaprajña was the name given to him at the time of his initiation into sannyasa, as a teenager. The name conferred on him when he became the head of his monastery was "Ānanda Tīrtha". All three of his later names are found in his works. Madhvācārya or Madhva are names most commonly found in modern literature on him, or Dvaita Vedanta related literature.
Madhva began school after his Upanayana at age seven, and became a monk or Sannyasi in his teens, although his father was initially opposed to this. He joined an Advaita Vedanta monastery in Udupi, accepted his guru to be Achyutrapreksha, who is also referred to as Achyutraprajna in some sources. Madhva studied the Upanishads and the Advaita literature, but was unconvinced by its nondualism philosophy of oneness of human soul and god, had frequent disagreements with his guru, left the monastery, and began his own tattvavada movement based on dualism premises of Dvi – asserting that human soul and god are two different things. Madhva never acknowledged Achyutrapreksha as his guru or his monastic lineage in his writings. Madhva is said to have been clever in philosophy, and also to have been tall and strongly built.
Career
Madhvacharya never established a matha dedicated to Dvaita philosophy, however his lineage of students became the sanctuary for a series of Dvaita scholars such as Jayatirtha, Sripadaraja, Vyasatirtha, Vadiraja Tirtha, Raghuttama Tirtha, Raghavendra Tirtha and Satyanatha Tirtha who followed in the footsteps of Madhva.A number of hagiographies have been written by Madhva's disciples and followers. Of these, the most referred to and most authentic is the sixteen cantos Sanskrit biography Madhvavijaya by Narayana Panditacharya – son of Trivikrama Pandita, who himself was a disciple of Madhva.
Incarnation of Vayu, the wind god
In several of his texts, Sarma and other scholars state, "Madhvacharya proclaims himself to be the third avatar or incarnation of Vayu, wind god, the son of Vishnu". He, thus, asserted himself to be Hanuman – the first avatar of Vayu, and Bhima – a Pandava in the Mahabharata and the second avatar of Vayu. In one of his bhasya on the Brahma Sutras, he asserts that the authority of the text is from his personal encounter with Vishnu. Madhva, states Sarma, believed himself to be an intermediary between Vishnu and Dvaita devotees, guiding the latter in their journey towards Vishnu.Miracles
Madhva is said to have performed several miracles during his lifetime, including transforming tamarind seeds into gold coins, consuming 4,000 bananas and thirty big pots of milk in one sitting, fighting and winning against robbers and wild animals, crossing the Ganges without getting his clothes wet, and giving light to his students through the nails of his big toes after the lamp went out while they were interpreting a text at night.Interpretations
Madhvacharya is said to have quoted some verses from his unique revisions of scriptures. Also, he is said to have quoted many unique books like Kamatha Sruti. The interpretation of Balittha Sukta by Madhvacharya and his followers to prove that Madhvacharya was an incarnation of Vayu is considered highly unique by standard commentaries on them like Sayana and Horace Hayman Wilson.Works of Madhvacharya
Thirty seven Dvaita texts are attributed to Madhvacharya. Of these, thirteen are bhasya on earliest Principal Upanishads, a Madhva-bhasya on the foundational text of Vedanta school of Hinduism – Brahma Sutras, another Gita-bhasya on Bhagavad Gita, a commentary on forty hymns of the Rigveda, a review of the Mahabharata in poetic style, a commentary called Bhagavata-tatparya-nirnaya on Bhagavata Purana. Apart from these, Madhva is also attributed for authoring many stotras, poems and texts on bhakti of Vishnu and his avatars. The Anu-Vyakhyana, a supplement to Madhvacharya's commentary on Brahma Sutras, is his masterpiece, states Sharma.While being a profusely productive writer, Madhvacharya restricted the access to and distribution of his works to outsiders who were not part of Dvaita school, according to Sarma. However, Bartley disagrees and states that this is inconsistent with the known history of extensive medieval Vedantic debates on religious ideas in India which included Dvaita school's ideas.
Madhva's philosophy
The premises and foundations of Dvaita Vedanta, also known as Dvaitavada and Tattvavada, are credited to Madhvacharya. His philosophy championed unqualified dualism. Madhva's work is classically placed in contrast with monist ideas of Shankara's Advaita Vedanta and Ramanuja's Vishishtadvaita Vedanta.Epistemology
Madhva calls epistemology Anu pramana. It accepts three pramānas, that is three facts or three correct means of knowledge, in contrast to one of Charvaka and six of Advaita schools of Hindu philosophies:- Pratyaksha means perception. It is of two types in Dvaita and other Hindu schools: external and internal. External perception is described as that arising from the interaction of five senses and worldly objects, while internal perception is described as that of inner sense, the mind.
- Anumāna means inference. It is described as reaching a new conclusion and truth from one or more observations and previous truths by applying reason. Observing smoke and inferring fire is an example of Anumana. This method of inference consists of three parts: pratijna, hetu, and drshtanta.
- Śabda means relying on word, testimony of past or present reliable experts. It is also known as Agama in Madhva's Dvaita tradition, and incorporates all the Vedas. Hiriyanna explains Sabda-pramana as a concept which means reliable expert testimony. The schools of Hinduism which consider it epistemically valid suggest that a human being needs to know numerous facts, and with the limited time and energy available, he can learn only a fraction of those facts and truths directly.
Madhva's Dvaita school holds that Vishnu as a God, who is also Hari, Krishna, Vasudeva and Narayana, can only be known through the proper samanvaya and pramana of the Vedic scriptural teachings. Vishnu, according to Madhvacharya, is not the creator of the Vedas, but the teacher of the Vedas. Madhva's school of thought assert that knowledge is intrinsically valid, and the knower and the known are independently real. Madhvacharya asserted that both the ritual part and the knowledge part in the Vedas, are equally valid and an interconnected whole. As asserted by the Mimamsa school of Hindu philosophy, Madhvacharya held that the Vedas are author-less, and that their truth is in all of its parts...
Metaphysics
The metaphysical reality is plural, stated Madhvacharya. There are primarily two tattvas or categories of reality – ' and '. Ishvara is the cause of the universe and the only independent reality, in Madhvacharya's view. The created universe is the dependent reality, consisting of ' and Jada. Individual souls are plural, different and distinct realities. 's are sentient and matter is non-sentient, according to Madhvacharya.Madhva further enumerates the difference between dependent and independent reality as a fivefold division between God, souls and material things. These differences are:
Between material things;
Between material thing and soul;
Between material thing and God;
Between souls; and
Between soul and God.
This difference is neither temporary nor merely practical; it is an invariable and natural property of everything. Madhva calls it Taratamya. There is no object like another, according to Madhvacharya. There is no soul like another. All souls are unique, reflected in individual personalities. The sea is full; the tank is full; a pot is full; everything is full, yet each fullness is different, asserted Madhvacharya.
Taratamya is based on inherent differences amongst all beings. These differences determine whether souls are eligible for liberation, rebirth, or darkness.
According to Madhvacharya, even in liberation, the bliss is different for each person based on each one's degree of knowledge and spiritual perfection. This liberation according to him, is only achievable with grace of God Vishnu.