Abstract
Śrivaishnavism venerates Vishnu as the Supreme godhead. The term Śrivaishnavism distinguishes the sect from other Vaishnava denominations because of a ‘crucial theological belief in the inseparability of Vishnu and Sri, the later signifying both the god’s Śakti and the mediatrix between the god and his devotee’. The impetus for Śrivaishnavism came from Sri Ramanujacharya. He broke away from his guru who belonged to the ancient school of Advaita Vedanta, a non-dualistic tradition, and chose to follow the footsteps of the Vaishnava Ālvārs and scholars Nathamuni and Yamunacharya. He propounded Viśishtādvaita, a non-dualistic school of Vedanta philosophy or qualified monism, and wrote several bhāshyas on the Brahmasūtra and the Bhagavad Gīta. It is believed that he may have lived between 1077 and 1157 ce. He taught that moksha or liberation could only be achieved with the help of a personal god, the saguna Vishnu.
Ramanuja and later āchāryas of Śrivaishnavism appropriated the Ālvārs who were basically individual poets and writers wedded to the idea of absolute bhakti or devotion to their lord Vishnu. Each had individual preferences of temple and incarnation. For example, Andal, the sole woman among the Ālvārs, is associated with Srivilliputtur and later Srirangam. The Ālvārs ignored caste and class and sang of merging with their lord, their single objective.
The author of the book has done excellent research on each Ālvār and his/her contribution to Śrivaishnava literature in Tamil Nadu. The hagiographical accounts describe each Ālvār’s realisation of the Supreme Lord Vishnu and how he/she devoted his/her life to certain specific temples. It is interesting to know that some of the Ālvārs praised temples which were a part of the traditional 108 Divya Desams, but which they probably never visited in their lifetime, such as the temples of Ayodhya and Mathura. The author suggests that communication with the lord was not necessarily a joyful experience for the Ālvārs, since many songs of the early Ālvārs ‘expressed a submissive devotion to a Supreme and sublime god’.
The author has delineated the background in which Śrivaishnavism developed, covering the political and religious situation of the Tamil country. Her primary sources are both literary and archaeological, including 16,000 inscriptions from the states of Tamil Nadu and Kerala. She has used epigraphical sources to strengthen her research. The primary literary source is the Nālāyira Divya Prabhandham, which contains the corpus of 4,000 hymns of the twelve Ālvārs. From the inscriptions, it is apparent that Śrivaishnavism had already taken root in the Tamil country by the Pallava period and expanded to greater heights during the Chola period. It contributed to the political necessity of the rulers to use religion to substantiate their right to rule. Thus, in spite of the general belief that the Cholas had declared war against Vaishnavism, she shows how the Cholas also encouraged Vaishnavism.
The author has also covered every aspect of Śrivaishnava philosophy. Ramanuja himself, although a Vedic Brahman with Advaita Vedantic roots and the Śaiva roots of his father Somayaji, was deeply immersed in bhakti. Ramanuja became a follower of the Pancharātra Agama which, he believed, was sanctioned by the orthodoxy. He fused Vedic and Vaishnava traditions. Although he was an inheritor of the Upanishadic tradition which used Sanskrit exclusively, he preached in Tamil. His biggest contribution was the initiation of members of other castes into his sect and even as Brahmins. In fact, most of the Ālvārs, as described by the author, had origins ranging from ‘untouchable’ castes to the highest. It was to the credit of Ramanuja and his school of Śrivaishnavism that he adopted the Ālvārs, irrespective of their origins, as his source of inspiration. This was at a time when the bhakti movement was taking root and both the Saiva Nāyanmārs and Vaishnava Ālvārs came from every caste and were revered for their words of wisdom and philosophy. Although the author is primarily covering the bhakti of the Ālvārs, she constantly refers to the bhakti of the Nāyanmārs and establishes the commonality between the two. The Tamil bhakti tradition, being rooted in reality, offered greater opportunity for the soul to commune with the divine. This was best illustrated by Andal who, in the Tiruppavai, does not ask for moksha or final liberation, but association with Krishna in life after life, so that she could continuously serve him. Krishna is both the goal and means to reach the goal.
The Ālvārs were indifferent to caste in spite of the strict varna order. Both Ālvārs and Nāyanmārs preached a devotion to their lord beyond the rigid boundaries of birth. The temple served as the institutional basis of bhakti, integrating servitude and loyalty to an absolute being. In fact, many of the saints themselves hailed from low and untouchable castes. Although the teachings of the Vaishnava and Śaiva saints did not aim to upset the varna system, they could be easily interpreted as doing so.
The Vedic religion was transformed into Vaishnava and Śaiva cults in the medieval period, through bhakti. According to the author, the Śaiva hymns of the Periyapurānam were undertaken by royal decree, unlike the hymns of the Vaishnavas, which did not follow royal diktat. However, some of the Ālvārs were of royal birth, so that statement may be disputed.
The author has also discussed Vaishnavism in relation to the two heterodox religions of Jainism and Buddhism, while the rivalry between the Vaishnava and Śaiva sects is well documented. Medieval Śrivaishnava literature was also full of vituperative comments on the Buddhists and Jains. She suggests that the Jain concept of authority and kingship was inadequate, unlike the brahmanical tradition, hence the preference of the rulers for the popular bhakti tradition of the Vedic religion.
Jainism and Buddhism reached the Deccan around the third century
The book ends with a description of the Vaishnava traditions of worship and pilgrimage. The author mentions the visits to Divya Desams, bathing in every tīrtha and worshipping the twelve Ālvārs, which were a result of the liberalisation in temple worship as introduced by Ramanuja. She suggests that ‘Ramanuja entered the Śrivaishnava movement in order to legitimize its fundamental religious concepts’, which were a composite of the Tamil tradition of bhakti deriving from deifying the Ālvārs. She finally says that the ideas elaborated in the Śribhashyas and other texts were already present when Ramanuja broke with his Advaitic guru. Although Viśishtādvaita was formulated as the philosophical basis for the bhakti cult of the Ālvārs, the resulting tensions were doctrinal and social and required a continuous interpretation and elaboration of the older tradition of the Ālvārs. This was carried out through hagiographies, commentaries, praise poems and philosophical works.
Bharati Jagannathan has done yeoman service to the school of Śrivaishnavism by integrating Ālvār bhakti and Śrivaishnavism, which has been beautifully described by her. This book is very well researched and written, with extensive notes and bibliography. It is a worthy addition to the history of religious development in India.