THE Saint Reformer

Jamuna Ragachari introduces us to Sri Ramanuja, who propounded one of the three main schools of Vedanta. He broke away from the prevalent Advaita tradition to promote Vaishnavite bhakti in a big way

- Jamuna Ragachari

Sri Ramanuja was born on April 25, 1077 CE, in Sriperumbudur (in today's Tamil Nadu) to Keshavasomayaji and Kantimethi Devi. He founded Vishishtadvaita Vedanta, which is a non-dualistic school of Vedanta philosophy. According to him, it is the nondualism of the qualified whole, in which Brahman alone is seen as the Supreme Reality but is characterised by multiplicity. It is a philosophy taken from ancient wisdom which believes in all diversity reaching an underlying unity. In other words, he averred that the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita, and the Brahma Sutras are to be interpreted in a way that shows this unity in diversity, for any other way would violate this consistency. He wrote nine literary texts in Sanskrit including Vedartha Samgraha, Sri Bhasya, and Gita Bhasya, and was considered a king of sanyasis.

Sri Ramanuja accepted that any Vedanta system must base itself on the Upanishads, the Brahma Sutras (a brief exposition of the major tenets of the Upanishads), and the Bhagavad Gita. He has explained in detail the method of understanding the Upanishads in his Vedartha Samgraha (Summary of the Meaning of the Veda). He also wrote a commentary on the Brahma Sutras, the Sri Bhasya, which presents his fully developed views, and a commentary on the Bhagavad Gita, the Gita Bhasya.

Sri Ramanuja's influence on the course of Sanatana Dharma has been great. By talking about devotional worship in his doctrine on salvation, he aligned popular religion with the pursuits of philosophy and gave bhakti (devotion) an intellectual basis. The devotional poems and songs of the 7th-10th-century poet-mystics of southern India, called Alwars, became incorporated into temple worship. This kind of devotionalism, guided by Sri Ramanuja, made its way northern India, where influence on religious to its thought and practice has been profound.