4-5

After an eventful trip to Mantralaya, I was back in Chennai . Umesh wanted to hear all the details of the visit and I gave a very elaborate account of the trip. He was very pleased about my experiences and promised to share it with Acharya during his mAnasIka conversations (telepathy).

Umesh was getting invited to conduct Satsang by many devotees of Sringeri Acharya all over Chennai. After one such a Satsang in Thiruvanmiyoor, we went to a local Shiva Temple. We were all standing and watching the priest perform puja to Shiva Linga. I found Umesha smiling and mumbling something. I waited for all the puja to be over and asked him if he was seeing Rudra sitting on the Shiva Linga or he was content talking to Linga. Umesha had shared his experience of talking to Shiva in Buddy terms many times. I thought I was being smart in asking that.

Umesha looked at me for a moment , gave his magnetic smile and asked me in return, “ Do you think Rudra as a young boy is different from Rudra as a Shiva Linga ?”

I stood there frozen and the true meaning of all Itihasa Purana, all our rituals , worship practices flashed in a moment. As it happens with Sringeri Acharya or Umesha always, it will take several years to fully understand their statements. Some 30 years later found an elaboration of this in Shrimad Ananda Theertha’s Tantra Sara Sangraha. 

As Dr Bannanje Govindacharya explains in his commentary, we Hindus are NOT idol worshippers; we worship the God that we invoke and request to reside in the idol.God takes the form we want him to take, for our sake, while he is beyond the concepts of forms. This statement may appear like a rhetorical one that means nothing. It actually means everything Indian philosophy stands for. 

Every ritualistic worship we do has a structure if we analyze carefully. They always start with an objective ( Sankalpa), a target form ( Upasana Murty), Invocation requesting god to come into that form ( aavahana), 16 different offerings ( sodasa Upacara), and then flagging the god off the form ( visarjana). There are rule books called Agama that define these procedures in minutest detail. The most important factor is that, as a worshipper, we should see no difference between the God we worship and the form into which we bring him to worship. If we miss this, sanctity is lost. This holds psychologically as well; if we see a difference between a principle and its form, we lose interest in the principle.

The greatness of Umesha was that in the midst of all fun, laughter and frolic he will make a single statement that will summarize  a whole book. Sringeri Acharya Abhinava Vidyatheertha would accomplish this in just a look or gesture. He wouldn’t even utter a word but we will get the meaning in a flash. 

My family took a similar viewpoint while creating a hurdle for me , although in a misplaced way. Some believe in a concept of Gods occupying a human being for a brief period, crudely termed ‘possession’. As opposed to a devotee invoking a god into a form, this was about a person invoking the god into himself/herself and talking like God. In my mind the former is an aid for concentration while the latter is about distraction bordering on autosuggestion. Hence I am always reluctant to take such thins seriously.

My family got in touch with an Oracle lady who would get ‘possessed’ by God Nrusimha . She went into trance once and had told my mom that I was going around with a Sanyasi who was all about money and she promised to wean me away from him. My family was insistent that I should meet her and take her blessings.

I got enraged to hear this  and refused to see her. I consulted Umesh on this and he laughed it off. He advised me to have faith in Acharya and happily go meet her. No one can stop me from meeting Acharya as long as He wanted me to come and see him. So, I went to one of her sessions with my mom. The lady went into trance and started forcefully advising me not to go and meet Sringeri Acharya. My family was relieved  to hear her give such a clear instruction. “So, you would stop associating with Sringeri Acharya, won’t you?”, they asked as soon as we reached home. “ It is Nrusimha devaru himself, don’t you see?”, they asked.

My response shocked them. “If we believe the lady’s claims she gets possessed by Nrusimha, we have to believe the story of Nrusimha saving Adi Shankara from Kapalika by possessing PadmapAda’s mind. Why would the Lord now speak against Sringeri Jagatguru who is heads the pitha set up by the very same Shankara?”. Shree Shankara stoically offering himself to Kaapalika and later pacifying Possesed Padmapad have been chronicled ….
आसीनमुच्चीकृत पूर्वगात्रं सिद्धासने शेषितबोधमात्रम् ।
चिन्मात्रविन्यस्त हृषीकवर्गं समाधि विस्मारित विश्वसर्गम् ॥……
त्वमेव सर्गस्थितिहेतुरस्य त्वमेव नेता नृहरेऽखिलस्य ।
त्वमेव चिन्त्यो हृदयेऽनवद्यें त्वामेव चिन्मात्रमहं प्रपद्ये ॥

Undaunted my family next pressed my brother’s father in law, a Dwaitha Scholar, into the game. He came home one day, gave elaborate defense of Tatvavaada and pitfalls of Advaitha. He tried to floor me by saying even the great Vidyaranya Theertha of Sringeri was defeated by one of Madhwacharya’s direct disciple in a debate. What is more, the debate was adjudicated by none other than the great Vedanta Desikacharya.

He suggested I read the Madhwa Historian Dr BNK Sharma if I did not believe him. He advised me to go to Mulbagal and  see the Jayastamaba erected to commemorate the event to get reassured. For corroboration, he quoted from Vedanta Desika Vaibhava Prakasika, a eulogy on the great Vishishtadvaita scholar.

कदाचित अक्षोभ्यमुने विध्यारण्यस्यजातं बहुलं विवादं 
विलिख्य भूपो विबुधाय यस्मै सम्प्रेषयामास तमाश्रयेऽहं 
तत्वमसिनासिना तं विध्यारण्यं मुनिस्तदाक्षोभ्य 
अच्छिनदित्यवदध्यः तं सेवे तत्व निर्णये चतुरम्
“I surrender to that learned person to whom the King (Hakka and Bukka) dispatched a message writing about the raging argument going on between akshObhya muni and VidyaraNya 

I serve the wise person who is clever at judging and refereeing the debate on philosophy who declared that then akshobhya muni wielding the sword of "tattvamasi" cut VidyAraNya's jungle of philosophy into pieces”


The ground fell off under my feet. A gnawing self doubt caught me suddenly. Ananda Theertha’s direct disciple had defeated Vidyaranya Theertha of Sringeri Mutt and I am abandoning his Tatvavaada to take refuge into the very same defeated guru parampara?

I tried to reach out to Umesh on this but he had already gone off to Sringeri. I had no option but to make that secret trip to Sringeri with a mind that was reluctant to abandon Tatvavaada . How would I accept Abhinava Vidyatheertha as my Guru, when I am reluctant to accept his philosophy ? What is the point of calling someone as Guru if we don’t accept or follow his directions implicitly ? jignAsa is a serious business in which we need to courageously accept the conclusions we arrive at and move deeply in that path.


It appeared that Akshobhya Theertha was winning where even Lord Nrusimha failed.

Self doubt is the worst enemy one can ask for. Self doubt is a proud peacock, wouldn’t come on its own. We lack courage, seek comfort and end up inviting Self doubt. 

My self doubt was not about the veracity of debate; it was tying the decision of meeting  Abhinava Vidyatheertha with an  unsubstantiated debate that happened 600 years back. The key point that winning an argument is not establishing a philosophy or jignAsa was totally lost on me and I trembled like a dry leaf. With Umesh not being around to stabilize me, I was spinning like a gyroscope that lost its bearings. 

Days rolled on and I immersed myself into the voluminous History of Dwaitha Vedantha written by eminent professor Dr.BNK.Sharma. While he did make reference to Akshobhya Theertha’s victory over Vidyaranya, he provided no details. Surprisingly there are no records available for such a historic event. Neither has Akshobhya Theertha left any details nor has Vedantha Desika who reportedly wrote the judgement based on transcripts. The transcripts are no where to find either.To confound it all, the Vijayastamba pillar erected in Mulbagal has no inscriptions. 

Some how, we have to accept that the scholarly, erudite Vidyaranya Theertha - who digested 15 philosophies to write Sarva Darsana Sangraha, who wrote the Advaita classic masterpiece Panca Dasi, who was wise enough to guide Harihara & Bukka to establish mighty Viajayanagar empire, was tongue tied and got defeated by Akshobhya Theertha-who had authored no book at all. 

While my research did not help, I did not want to disbelieve Akshobhya Theertha’s story either. We are not talking of average people but those  who gave up everything in their quest for Truth. Why would they lie which was against their svadharma? 

As I continued to reel under confusion and self doubt, a magical thing happened. My brother gifted me a thin book , ‘Dialogues with the Guru”. It was a collection of a few conversations devotees had with 
Shri Chandrashekara Bharati, the legendary guru and predecessor of Abhinava Vidyatheertha. This short book tore through my mental block , destroyed all self doubts and brought in clarity, like the brilliant sun after a cloudy monsoon rain.

Shri Chandrashekara Bharati came across as a no nonsense, rational, logical, tough talking guru who does not pull a punch.The book did not mention Akshobhya Theertha and what is more, he defends every faith and even advises a Christian fascinated by Upanishads, not to try to convert but first become a true christian. He even declares conversions are not needed as every path prepares the aspirant for the next level. He even ridicules the idea of debating whether Advaitha is correct or Dwaitha. When we are not even following common ethics, what difference does it make if final Truth is One, Two or even One & half, he thunders in the book.

The book gave me was a fresh perspective - how to see the validity of a different opinion, even as you don’t agree with it. It was more about what is right for the individual, rather than what is correct as per you. His approach shifted the focus to the benefits to the person concerned, than establishing one’s own point.

Things started to fall in place in my mind. It no longer mattered that said debate is not mentioned anywhere, including the works of Akshobhya Theertha’s legendary disciple Jayatheertha; Or that only reference we have is just two couplets in the eulogy written by a devotee of Vedantha Desika, some  200 years later. It did not matter that the only argument  Akshobhya Theertha had against ‘Tatvam asi’ was to say it was actually ‘atatvam asi’, the way his guru Ananda Theertha argued.

Shrimad Ananda Theertha would argue that Tatvam asi is actually ‘Atat Tvam asi svetaketo’, based on the examples Svetaketu’s father Uddalaka gives in the Chandogya Upanishad conversation. 
“Like a bird and the string; like the juices of various trees;Like rivers and the sea; like fresh and salt water;Like a robber and the robbed; like a man and his energy;So are soul and the Lord diverse, for ever different”.

Dr BNK Sharma quotes references from Vacaspati Mishra’s Bhamati and Madhusudana saraswath’s Advaitasiddhi conceding  that the examples quoted in the Upanishad do talk of plurality. 
“नदिपाथः परमाणूना तु समुद्रपाथः परमाणुभ्यो भेद एव नाभेदः एवं समुद्रादपि तेषा भेद एव”
“स्पष्ट भेद भाव अभिप्रायेण” 
While rivers that merge with oceans are indistinguishable from the ocean, a particular of atom of river continues to be different from atoms of the ocean - if we continue to tag them as specific atom. 

But then, this is the core of Advaitha Vaada- an experience is predicated by the a-priori definitions and boundary conditions. Granted that an H2O molecule, electron, Proton and neutrons are all same as Ocean components ; but if you choose to keep the artificial identity of a particular molecule or atom , you can see the difference always. 

I thought it was quite possible that Shri Vidyaranya Theertha gave a conditional agreement for the Atatvam Asi argument from Tatvavaada point of view. After all he writes like a true dwaithin when he covers Poornapragna darsana in his Sarva darsana  sangraha. It was perhaps a technical acceptance of an alternative interpretation of examples; I am sure he did not agree with Akshobhya Theertha that “Tatvam Asi” should have been “Atatvam Asi”. Tatvavaada protagonists must have been thrilled that their new  fledgling philosophy scored an agreement, at least on a point, from a great guru of Advaitha.

That Shri Abhinava Theertha, who I was yet to meet, would help me find clarity, that too through his jIvan mukra guru Chandrashekara Bharati would appear like a miracle. But it is not.It is a wrong notion that we have to work hard to get divine grace and blessings. God’s grace is always available, we are immersed in it all the time. The tragedy is that we block it with Five doors - Avidya, Asmita, Raga, Dwesha, Abhinivesha; and fortify with 6 locks -Kaama, krodha, lobha, Moha, Mada, matsarya.

With this new found conviction, my pride was swelling to no limits. I decided to challenge Umesh on this when I get to meet him in a few days in Sringeri. 

Little did I realize that Umesh I would see will be totally different.Nor did I have any clue about was waiting for me in Sringeri.