Madhva

Key ideas

1. Two orders of reality. Madhva called his philosophy Tattvavāda, the realist doctrine. Reality has two orders: the independent (svatantra), which is Brahman alone, identified with Viṣṇu, and the dependent (paratantra), which is souls and matter. The dependence is that of real finite things on God, not of appearance on reality.
2. The five differences. Pañcabheda: God differs from the soul, God from matter, the soul from matter, one soul from another, and one material thing from another. These differences are not temporary or merely practical but belong to the nature of things, so no two souls are alike.
3. Realist epistemology. Madhva accepts three means of knowledge: perception, inference and testimony, which for him means the Veda. Perception and inference are valid in themselves, and the world they disclose is real; the inner witness, sākṣin, is the final arbiter of experience.
4. Graded souls. Souls fall into three classes: those fit for liberation, those bound to endless rebirth, and those destined for darkness. Even among the liberated the bliss is graded, a gradation he called taratamya.
5. Grace and devotion. Knowledge and ritual action are not enough. Liberation comes through the grace of Viṣṇu, which is won by devotion, bhakti, and the liberated soul remains forever distinct from God.
6. Against non-duality. Madhva rejected the idea of a Brahman without qualities and the claim that the world is illusory, and he read the Upaniṣadic saying tat tvam asi as teaching difference, not identity. Against Rāmānuja, he held that even a qualified identity of soul and Brahman would compromise Viṣṇu’s supremacy.

Madhva (also Madhvācārya, Ānandatīrtha and Pūrṇaprajña) was an Indian monk, commentator and debater who founded Dvaita Vedānta, the dualist school of Vedānta. He taught that God, who is Viṣṇu, individual souls and matter are eternally and really different, that the soul is never identical with Brahman, and that liberation comes through God’s grace. He called his philosophy Tattvavāda, the realist doctrine, because it takes the world and its differences to be real.

When did Madhva live?

His dates are uncertain. The dating most often given is 1238–1317; some scholars place him about forty years earlier, c. 1199–1278. He was born Vāsudeva, into a Brahmin family at Pājaka near Udupi on the coast of Karnataka, and became a renouncer in his teens. Hagiography makes Acyutapreksa, who led an Advaita monastery at Udupi, his teacher; by some accounts Madhva came to disagree with the non-dualism taught there and left. He travelled widely, debating rival teachers.

The principal biography, the Madhvavijaya by Nārāyaṇa Paṇḍitācārya, son of one of his disciples, tells of miracles, of the image of Kṛṣṇa he set up at Udupi, and of how he did not die but disappeared; these are tradition.

What did he write?

Thirty-seven works are credited to him. They include a commentary on the Brahma Sūtras of Bādarāyaṇa and a verse supplement to it, the Anuvyākhyāna, usually reckoned his greatest work; two commentaries on the Gītā; commentaries on ten Upaniṣads and on hymns of the Ṛgveda; and short polemical tracts. His style is extremely condensed, which is why the commentaries of later Dvaitins, above all Jayatīrtha, are the usual way into him.

What is real, according to Madhva?

Reality has two orders. The independent, svatantra, is Brahman alone, whom Madhva identifies with Viṣṇu, the possessor of all qualities in their fullest form. The dependent, paratantra, is souls and matter. From this follow the pañcabheda, the five differences: between God and the soul, God and matter, the soul and matter, one soul and another, and one thing and another. The differences are not provisional. Each soul is unique, and no object is exactly like another.

His epistemology is realist too. Madhva accepts three pramāṇas: perception, inference and testimony, the last meaning the Veda. As Valerie Stoker puts it in the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, his case is that perception and inference must be valid in themselves, since otherwise we could not even understand scripture. The inner witness, sākṣin, is the final arbiter of experience, and only scripture discloses Viṣṇu’s supremacy.

What happens to souls?

Madhva divides souls into three classes: those fit for liberation, those bound to endless rebirth, and those destined for darkness. Even the bliss of the liberated is graded, a gradation he called taratamya. This is his most disputed doctrine, since Advaita and Viśiṣṭādvaita both assume that every soul can in the end be freed. His defenders reply that these natures belong to the souls themselves, so that changing them would be changing who the souls are; critics such as David Buchta answer that an omnipotent God could still change the arrangement.

Liberation comes through Viṣṇu’s grace, and knowledge and works are insufficient without devotion. The liberated soul keeps its individuality and does not become God.

Why did he oppose Advaita and Viśiṣṭādvaita?

Madhva wrote most against Advaita. He rejected a Brahman without qualities (nirguṇa) and the view that the world is māyā, illusory; he accused Śaṅkara’s school of teaching Buddhism under cover of Vedānta, a charge Advaitins reject; and he read tat tvam asi, which Advaitins take as asserting identity (the passage is in the library), as expressing difference.

With Rāmānuja the quarrel was narrower. Both identify Brahman with Viṣṇu and hold the world and souls to be real. But Madhva argued that any identification of the soul with Brahman, even a qualified one, undermines Viṣṇu’s supremacy and empties devotion of its meaning.

Was his scriptural evidence genuine?

Madhva cited many passages from the Purāṇas and the Mahābhārata that cannot be traced in any known text, and he declared himself the third incarnation of Vāyu, the wind god, after Hanumān and Bhīma. The sixteenth-century scholar Appayya Dīkṣita accused him of adducing spurious texts. The Indologist Roque Mesquita, studying over 250 pages of untraceable citations, concluded that they were Madhva’s own compositions, written in what he sincerely took to be divine inspiration. Dvaita scholars such as B. N. K. Sharma reply that Mesquita did not consult all the manuscript traditions. The question is open.

What was his influence?

The Udupi monasteries and three great Dvaita lineages carried the school forward, and the Haridāsas, devotional singers in Kannada, made its teaching known beyond Sanskrit readers. Chaitanya’s Bengal tradition traces a line back to Madhva’s, though it differs from him on Kṛṣṇa’s supremacy.

How should you start reading Madhva?

No free English translation of his own works has been verified for this page, so start with Stoker’s entry in the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy and the page on Dvaita Vedānta. To see what Dvaita argues against, read the library’s Śaṅkara text and Rāmānuja’s reply in the Śrībhāṣya. The UGC NET syllabus covers Dvaita; see the UGC NET guide.