The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Hindusim vol 2

Vishakhadatta
758
Vishakhadatta
(6th c.) Sanskrit dramatist whose
only surviving work is the play
Mudrarakshasa (“Rakshasa’s Ring”).
The play is of some historical interest,
for its major theme is the rise of
Chandragupta Maurya (r. 321–297
B.C.E.), founder of the Maurya dynasty,
although the play ascribes his success to
the machinations of his cunning brahmin
minister, Chanakya. The play
paints the king as a weak figure, with the
minister as the real power behind the
throne, although in fairness to the
historical king this portrayal seems
inaccurate. The drama’s plot is highly
complex, as with many Sanskrit plays,
but its climax comes when the principal
characters are dramatically rescued
from execution at the last moment.
The play has been translated into
English by Michael Coulson, and
published in an anthology titled Three
Sanskrit Plays, 1981.
Vishishthadvaita (“Qualified Non-
Dualism”) Vedanta
One of the branches of Vedanta, the
philosophical school purporting to
reveal the ultimate meaning and purpose
(anta) of the Vedas, the oldest and
most authoritative Hindu religious
texts. Vishishthadvaita’s greatest figure
is the eleventh-century philosopher,
Ramanuja, who was central to its formation,
although he was building on
earlier work. Ramanuja was convinced
that Brahman or Supreme Reality was a
personal deity, rather than an impersonal
abstract principle, and he was
also convinced that devotion (bhakti)
was the most important form of religious
practice. Vishishthadvaita
Vedanta, his philosophical position,
stressed both of these convictions and
thus opposed the position of the
Advaita Vedanta school, founded by
the philosopher Shankaracharya.
The Advaita school upholds a
philosophical position known as
monism, which is the belief in a single
impersonal Ultimate Reality, which they
call Brahman. For Advaita proponents,
reality is “nondual” (advaita)—that is,
all things are nothing but the formless
Brahman, despite the appearance of difference
and diversity in the perceivable
world. For the Advaitins, this assumption
of diversity is a fundamental misunderstanding
of the ultimate nature of
things and a manifestation of avidya.
Although often translated as “ignorance,”
avidya is better understood as
the lack of genuine understanding,
which ultimately causes human beings
to be trapped in karmic bondage, reincarnation
(samsara), and suffering.
Since for the Advaitins the real problem
is this mistaken understanding, this
means that realization (jnana) was the
best spiritual path to gain final liberation
(moksha).
According to Ramanuja’s formulation,
the material world and selves have
real and independent existence,
although their existence is ultimately
rooted in God, whom he identifies as
Vishnu. The world comes from God in a
process of evolution adapted from the
Samkhya model, but since matter is
unconscious, it is both similar to and
different from God. In the same way,
human beings share similarity to God in
having God as their source, and difference
from him in being subject to ignorance
and suffering. For Ramanuja and
his followers, God is not identical to
Selves or the world, all of which are perceived
as having real and independent
existence. This doctrine of identity and
difference makes the perceivable world
real, in a sense that the Advaita proponents
would never admit. This same
contention of simultaneous identity and
difference distinguishes Ramanuja’s
position from that of a later thinker,
Madhva, whose Dvaita Vedanta stressed
the great gulf between God and all other
things. Given this difference in capacities
between deity and devotee (bhakta),
Ramanuja and his followers have
stressed bhakti as the most efficacious
means to salvation. Even after liberation
the souls retain enough of a distinction