Sri Satchidanandendra Saraswati Swamiji (5 January 1880 – 5 August 1975) was monk-scholar in the Shankara Advaita tradition. He is the founder of the Adhyatma Prakasha Karyalaya in
Holenarasipura
Holenarasipura is a town and taluk in Hassan district of Karnataka. The town is situated on the banks of the Hemavati, one of the tributaries of the Kaveri.
Demographics
India census, Holenarasipura had a population of 29,938. Males constit ...
,
Hassan district,
Karnataka
Karnataka (; ISO: , , also known as Karunāḍu) is a state in the southwestern region of India. It was formed on 1 November 1956, with the passage of the States Reorganisation Act. Originally known as Mysore State , it was renamed ''Karnat ...
,
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
. He was a great Vedantin of Advaitha Philosophy.
Life
Swami Satchidanandendra Saraswati (1880-1975) is one of the greatest exponents of traditional Advaita Vedanta in modern times. Born as Sri Yellambalase Subbarao, he worked as a school teacher in the Indian state of Karnataka.
[Adhyatmaprakasha Karyalaya website]
Retrieved 4 November 2011 He gave many lectures and wrote many articles on the
Vedanta
''Vedanta'' (; sa, वेदान्त, ), also ''Uttara Mīmāṃsā'', is one of the six (''āstika'') schools of Hindu philosophy. Literally meaning "end of the Vedas", Vedanta reflects ideas that emerged from, or were aligned with, t ...
in English,
Kannada
Kannada (; ಕನ್ನಡ, ), originally romanised Canarese, is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by the people of Karnataka in southwestern India, with minorities in all neighbouring states. It has around 47 million native s ...
and
Sanskrit
Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...
.
His books, articles and lectures have made an important impact on disciples, pandits, sadhus and also scholars in the field of classical Indian philosophy. Satchidanandendra Swamiji authored some 200 works, and he dedicated his life to teaching about the pristine pure Advaita Vedanta philosophy of Shankara.
Satchidanandendra Saraswati was a philosopher
who dedicated all his life for the Vedanta sadhana and attained Brahma-jnana. He was known as a Jivanmukta sage. He was the best example of a Sanskrit saying, "One should spend one's life until sleep and until death only in Vedantic contemplation".
Having grown up in an orthodox South Indian Brahmin family, young Y. Subbaraya Sharma (as was his name prior to sannyasa) became attached to Vedanta and Hindu philosophy. In 1910 he was initiated into the study of Shankara's scriptures by the Jagadguru Shankaracharya of Sringeri Peetham. He learnt Vedanta from Virupaksha Shastri (the guru of Swami Chandrasekhara Bharati) and K.A. Krishnaswamy Iyer. Swami Satchidanandendra Saraswati soon became well known for having shown that the later Vedantic tradition had in fact deviated from the teachings of the classical acharyas Gaudapada, Shankara and Sureshvara. This led to many fascinating discussions with learned pandits. In 1920 he founded the organisation Adhyatma Prakasha Karyalaya, which is still very active today. He was initiated into sannyasa in 1948. As a sannyasi, Satchidanandendra Swamiji lived a very simple and secluded life at his small ashram in Holenarsipur.
Teachings
According to Satchidanandendra Saraswati, Shankara employed a method called ''Adhyaropa Apavada'', in which a property is imposed (''adhyaropa'') on Atman to convince one of its existence, whereafter the imposition is removed (''apavada'') to reveal the true nature of Atman as nondual and undefinable. For example, Atman, the real "I," is described as
witness
In law, a witness is someone who has knowledge about a matter, whether they have sensed it or are testifying on another witnesses' behalf. In law a witness is someone who, either voluntarily or under compulsion, provides testimonial evidence, e ...
, giving "it" an attribute to separate it from non-self. Since this implies a duality between observer and observed, next the notion of "witness" is dropped, by showing that the Self cannot be seen and is beyond qualifications, and only that what is remains, without using any words:
[''adhyAropa apavAda'']
/ref>
Literary works of Satchidanandendra Saraswati
Books written in English
* Adhyatma Yoga
* Avasthatraya or The Unique Method of Vedanta
* Collected Works of K. A. Krishnaswamy Iyer
* Essays on Vedanta
* How to Recognize the Method of Vedānta
* Introductions (to vedānta texts)
* Intuition of Reality
* ĪS'āvāsyōpanishad (with the commentary of Sri S'ankaracharya)
* Misconceptions About Śaṅkara
* S'ankara's Sutra-Bhashya (Self-Explained)
* S'uddha-S'āṅkara-Prakriyā-Bhāskara
* Salient Features of Śaṅkara's Vedānta
* Śaṅkara's Clarification of Certain Vedȧntic Concepts
* The Basic Tenets of Śāṅkara Vedānta
* The Method of the Vedanta. A Critical Account of the Advaita Tradition (1989–1997)
* The Heart of Sri Samkara
* The Pristine Pure Advaita Philosophy of Ādi Śaṅkara (Śaṅkara Siddhānta)
* The Reality Beyond All Empirical Dealings
* The Science of Being
* The Unique Teaching of Shankara
* The Upanishadic Approach to Reality
* The Vision of Ātman
The Method of the Vedanta
In ''The Method of the Vedanta. A Critical Account of the Advaita Tradition'' (1989–1997), Satchidanandendra Saraswati gives a critical account of the Advaita tradition. Satchidanandendra Saraswati argues that most of post-Shankara Advaita vedanta actually deviates from Shankara, and that only his student Suresvara, who's had little influence, represents Shankara correctly. In this view, Shankara's influential student Padmapada misunderstood Shankara, while his views were manitained by the Suresvara school. According to Satchidanandendra Sarasvati, "almost all the later Advaitins were influenced by Mandana Misra and Bhaskara."
Notes
References
Sources
;Printed sources
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;Web-sources
External links
Adhyatmaprakasha Karyalaya website
Adhyaropa Apavada
Indian Classical Music Online Radio Station, ''Sri Sri Satchidanandendra Saraswathi''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Saraswati, Satchidanandendra
People from Hassan district
20th-century Hindu religious leaders
20th-century Hindu philosophers and theologians
1880 births
1975 deaths
Advaita Vedanta