John Braisted Carman, The Theology of
Ramanuja, 1974.
Shrivatsa
An auspicious mark on the god Vishnu’s
chest, also found on Vishnu’s form as
Krishna, which is sometimes described
as a mole and sometimes as a curl of
hair. In statues and pictures, the
Shrivatsa is usually portrayed as a four-
petaled flower, and it is believed to be
the kaustubhajewel, which was one of
the precious things churned from the
Ocean of Milk along with the goddess
Lakshmi, the wishing-cowSurabhi, and
amrta, the nectar of immortality. See
also Tortoise avatar.
Shrividya
Southern Indian school of tantra, a
secret, ritually based religious practice,
in which the principal deityis the
goddess Lalita Tripurasundari. The
Shrividya tradition is noted for its ritual
use of the shrichakra, a particular sym-
bolic diagram (yantra) composed of a
series of interlocking triangles. The
Shrichakra ritual is known as samhara-
krama, and is a systematic ritual decon-
struction of the perceivable world and
all illusions of duality, to attain union
with the single true reality. The interior
counterpart to this exterior ritual is the
practice of kundalini yoga, which is
based on the tantric idea of the subtle
body—the six psychic centers (chakras)
running along the spine—and seeks to
gain ultimate union within the aspirant’s
own body by bringing together the
microcosmic forms of the deities Shiva
and Shaktithat exist within the body.
For a careful and considered picture of
the Shrividya tradition, see Douglas
Renfrew Brooks, The Secret of the Three
Cities, 1990.
Shriyantra
Another name for the Shrichakra, a
symbolic diagram (yantra) used in
worship by the Shrividyaschool, a
particular branch of the secret, ritually
based religious practice known as
tantra. See Shrichakra.Shrutashravas
In the Mahabharata, the later of the two
great Hindu epics, Krishna’s paternal
aunt and the mother of Shishupala.Shruti
(“[that which is] heard”) The most
authoritative type of Hindu sacred liter-
ature, made up of all the Vedas, the old-
est Hindu religious texts. The Vedas are
generally considered to have four types
of texts: the hymns to the gods known as
samhitas, the ritual manuals called the
Brahmanas, and the speculative texts
known as the Aranyakas and the
Upanishads. The term comes from the
traditional Hindu belief that these texts
were not composed by human beings
but are based in the primordial vibra-
tions of the cosmos itself. The ancient
sages, whose faculties of perception had
been sharpened through persistent reli-
gious practice, were able to “hear” and
understand these vibrations, and trans-
mitted them to others in a lineage of
learning. Thus, the belief that their ori-
gin is nonhuman makes the shruti the
highest religious authority.Shuddadvaita
(“pure monism”) Philosophical school
first propounded by Vallabhacharya
(1479–1531). Vallabha called his school
shuddadvaita, or “pure monism,” to dis-
tinguish it from the Advaita Vedanta
school founded by the philosopher
Shankaracharya. The latter school pro-
pounds “nondual” (advaita) monism, in
its claim that a single Ultimate Reality
lies behind all things, and that all things
are merely differing forms of that reality.
The Advaitins call this single reality
Brahman, which they conceive as form-
less, impersonal, and having no defining
attributes except for being, conscious-
ness, and bliss (sacchidananda). In the
Advaita understanding, since all
conceptions of particular deitieshaveShuddadvaita