to help his hearers destroy their illusions
and gain final liberation of the soul
(moksha). Given this underlying goal
and his acute philosophical mind, one
can argue that he was aware of such
metaphysical questions but chose to
ignore them, since they were unrelated
to his primary goal. For further informa-
tion on Shankaracharya’s thought, see
Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan and Charles
A. Moore (eds.), A Sourcebook in Indian
Philosophy, 1957; and Karl H. Potter
(ed.), Advaita Vedanta up to Samkara
and His Pupils, 1981.
Shankaracharyas
The philosopher Shankaracharya
(788–820) is traditionally said to have
established centers for the Dashanami
Sanyasiascetics, devotees (bhakta) of
the god Shiva, at four places in India:
Badrinath, Puri, Shringeri, and
Dwaraka. The head monk at each
of these centers has been given the
title Shankaracharya, as a sign of the
status of his office. The head of the
Kamakotipith, an asceticcenter in the
southern Indian city of Kanchipuram,
has also come to be described as a
Shankaracharya, even though this site is
not one of the original four; this reflects
the Kamakotipith’s importance as an
ascetic center and Kanchipuram’s gen-
eral status as a religious center.
Although by this reckoning there are
five places, at present there are only
four Shankaracharyas, since Swami
Swaroopanand Saraswati holds the seat
for both Badrinath and Dwaraka. The
other Shankaracharyas are Swami
Nishchalanand (Puri), Swami Bharati
Tirtha (Shringeri), and Swami Jayendra
Saraswati (Kanchipuram). Their trad-
itional office gives the Shankara-
charyas a great deal of religious status
and prestige, and because of this they
have become highly influential figures,
even in an intensely decentralized reli-
gious tradition.Shankaradigvijaya
(“Shankara’s victory tour”) A written
account of the life of the philosopher
Shankaracharya traditionally attrib-
uted to the fourteenth-century writer
Madhavacharya, although evidence
within the work points to composition
several centuries later. The story is clearly
hagiographical, for it is filled with fan-
tastic legends intended to highlight
Shankaracharya’s achievements and his
ultimate identity with the god Shiva
himself. According to this story, after
gaining full wisdom, Shankaracharya
embarks on a “victory tour” (digvijaya)
of India. During this tour he travels
throughout the country, debates all
opponents, and defeats them all con-
vincingly, thus establishing the
supremacy of his Advaita Vedanta
philosophical school. The motif of the
digvijaya (literally, “conquest of [all]
directions”) was a common theme in
works about political and military lead-
ers, and here it has been adapted to tell
a religious story.Shankha
(“conch shell”) In Hindu religious
imagery, one of the identifying objects
always carried by the god Vishnu, along
with the club (gada), lotus (padma), and
discus (chakra). Vishnu’s conch isShankaracharyas
A shankha, or conch shell. Used as a musical
instrument, it is an identifying object
carried by the god Vishnu.