Scholars and Wonder-Workers: Some Remarks on the Role of the Supernatural in Philosophical Contests in Vednta Hagiographies Author(s): Phyllis

Granoff Source: Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 105, No. 3, Indological Studies Dedicated to Daniel H. H. Ingalls (Jul. - Sep., 1985), pp. 459-467 Published by: American Oriental Society Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/601521 . Accessed: 08/09/2013 18:54
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

American Oriental Society is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Journal of the American Oriental Society.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 142.150.190.39 on Sun, 8 Sep 2013 18:54:24 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

SCHOLARS AND WONDER-WORKERS: SOME REMARKS ON THE ROLE OF THE SUPERNATURAL IN PHILOSOPHICAL CONTESTS IN VEDANTA HAGIOGRAPHIES
PHYLLIS GRANOFF MCMASTERUNIVERSITY

HAGIOGRAPHIES FORM A DISTINCT AND RECOGNIZABLE CLASS of literature in both Sanskrit and the vernac-

ular languages in medieval India. Hagiographies have been written of the major Vedanta founders, the leaders of many other religious movements and some of their followers as well. In keeping with the fact that the founders of the different schools of Vedanta, for example, Safikara, Ramanuja and Madhva, were regarded by the tradition as intellectuals with whom originated major developments in philosophy, the biographies of these figures generally pay careful attention to the thought of these men and to their conquest of rival schools in systematically conducted debates. Thus philosophical debates may occupy as prominent a place in the biographies of the Vedanta founders as do stories of their unusual birth, religious vocation and ultimate attainment of perfection. Despite the centrality of the philosophical debate, however, its position in these texts is not without ambiguity. As part of an ongoing study of religious biography in Sanskrit, the present paper examines in detail several descriptions of philosophical debates from religious biographies and one from a popular Jain text, the Kathdkosa of Prabhdcandra (late I1 th c. A.D.). The texts used in this study include the SrLmacchankaradigvijayaof Vidyaranya, the Prapannamrta of Srimadanantacdrya, a biography of Ramdnuja dated to the 17th c. A.D., and Nardyanacarya's two works on Madhva, the SrTsumadhvaviyaya and the Manimaniari of the 14th c. A.D.1 It will be argued that these texts all reveal a deep-seated suspicion of the ability of debate to determine the truth and convince people of the validity of any given philosophical doctrine.
San kara, Brahmasatrahhaisi'a, 2.1.27; Brhadaranvakabhasia, introduction; Ramdnuja, SrThhaisva, 2.1.27; ?rTsuniadhvavijavia, 14.13. Compare Sri Harsa's statement of the same principle in P. Granoff, Philosophj and Argument in Late Vedanta, Dordrecht: D. Reidel, 1978, pp. 192 ff. For modern material see Dilip Kumar Visvas, Rammohan SamnTksia (Bengali), Calcutta: Sdrasvata Library, 1983. 459

Debate and rigorous argument had always formed the backbone of Indian philosophical texts from the time of their earliest composition. Nonetheless, Indian religious scholars who engaged in these debates had also always been consistent in emphasizing the primacy of sruti, or revealed doctrine, over human reasoning. Within the Vedanta tradition itself, classical thinkers, regardless of their particular scholastic affiliation, agreed in confining human reasoning unsupported by textual authority to the sphere of the mundane.2 By this they meant to imply that no religious truth could be determined by human intellectual activity alone. The source of such truth must ultimately remain the authoritative texts. It seems obvious that in such an atmosphere the philosophical debate itself would occupy a somewhat uneasy position. Involving human reason to the extent that it does, the debate though necessary for the practical purposes of winning popular
Kathakosa, ed. A. N. Upadhye, Manikcandra Digambara Jaina Granthamald, no. 55, Delhi: Bhdratiya JRina Pitha, 1974. Srimahanhkaradigvijava of Vidyaranya, Ananddirama Series, vol. 122, Poona, 1932. On the date and authenticity of this text see W. R. Antarkar, "Samnksepa Sankara Jai'a of Madhvdcdrya or Sankara Digvijava of Sri Vidyaranyamuni," Journal of the Univer.sity of Bombav, vol. XLI, 77. 1972, pp. 1-23. As with all the hagiographies mentioned in this paper, research on this and related texts is in its infant stages. Dr. Antarkar informs me in a letter that he is continuing his work and collecting manuscripts of the various hagiographies of Sankara. We must await his final results. Prapannanirta of Srimadanantacdrya, ed. Swami Rdmanarayanacarya, Benaras: SrTVenkateivara Press, V.S. 2023. On the date of this text see Friedhelm Hardy, Virahahhakli, The Earlv History of Krsna Devotion in South Indlia. Delhi: Oxford Press, 1983, p. 243. SrTsumadhivav'ijaya with commentary of SrfvisvapatitTrtha,Udipi, N.D. I thank Professor KamaleNvara Bhattacarya for providing me with a copy of this text. Maniniafjari, ed. Visnupada~rifrimadbhaktisiddhantasarasvatTgoswdmi,Dacca: grimadhave Gaudiya Math, Gaura 440, Bengali script.
2

This content downloaded from 142.150.190.39 on Sun, 8 Sep 2013 18:54:24 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

460

Journal of the American Oriental Societ' 105.3 (1985) named into three broad thematic categories. The first category consists of stories in which divine assistance is invoked in a debate. The second category involves black magic (abhicarakrid) and differs from the first in that the powers that aid the debater are not major protecting deities, but belong to that class of supernatural beings generalily invoked in magical rites. The third group is of stories that reveal a generalized suspicion of the results of debate and introduce the motif of divine sanction or divine ordeal or some other supernatural act to validate an argument. These three sections will then be followed by some general comments on the uses of supernatural intervention in this quintessentially human contest. The basic point will be made that the introduction of supernatural elements into the debate is in each case purposeful though the purpose it serves is specific to the individual story. The paper by no means intends to be exhaustive in its treatment, but only to illustrate a few types of stories that must have circulated orally as well as proliferated in written versions. In defending his own processes of selection that governed his composition of Madhva's biography, Narayanacarya in his commentary the BhaivaprakaPato his Srisumadhvaviija'a remarked:3 Cari'i drslainaraih kaV id v'ismriadevamivaial A vismrlaV. (a purusair nasmina/hih sakalkh sruia-h
Sruld.s (a ka-k-in naiv'okiah cldeaguh l'ail aanii,(aai7hv.

support and gaining converts, required at the same time ample assistance from numerous citations from the texts in order to provide much needed support for the purely human syllogisms that formed its mainstay. For the Vedanta philosopher, in short, rigorous argumentation and respect for the texts must go hand in hand. Indeed textual authority unsullied by human fallibility must and does take precedence in every case over logic and wrangling which could in fact be misused, and the efficacy of which could depend in part merely on the cleverness of the debaters who might manipulate the rules that govern such argumentation. The writers of the religious biographies to be examined in this paper and Prabhacandra, the compiler of the Katha-kosa,for the most part record a very different attitude towards philosophical debates in the colorful accounts that they give of such contests. The philosopher distrusted human reasoning on principle (precisely because it was human and therefore subject to error) and sought refuge in the superhuman revealed literature. By contrast, the participants and bystanders in the debates recorded in the hagiographies generally turn this objection upside down and suspect the outcome of debates because they fear in fact that the debate has transcended the merely human and that the debaters have invoked some form of supernatural aid. This supernatural aid may take the form of enlisting the help of a benign deity, usually a major protector of the faith, or of summoning up minor and often evil powers in order to deprive an opponent of victory. In both these instances recourse to the supernatural is had because a debater fears that human effort will not be adequate to the task, besting an opponent of superior wit and skill. At times it is the hero of a story who turns to the Gods for help in his moment of adversity, feeling that his own position is correct but fearing that it will be defeated in the debate at hand. At other times it is a villain who is described as resorting to trickery and magic, convinced that his doctrine is wrong and that it could otherwise never triumph, or perhaps with even baser motives in mind than the simple propagation of heresies. In addition, if one may judge from a sampling of the Vedanta hagiographies and popular story collections, the fear of supernatural intervention in the philosophical debate and the overriding doubts that debate could determine truth were so widespread that even those debates seemingly conducted with all propriety and according to all the correct rules required some form of divine sanction in order to convince onlookers that nothing untoward had occurred. It is convenient for purposes of discussion to organize the accounts of debates from the texts earlier

"Some of his wondrous deeds in fact seen by men were forgotten, hidden from their memories by God's magic power of illusion; and some of them, though not forgotten, were not heard by me. And some of them, though heard, I have elected not to tell, convinced that they are too secret for mortals to hear." I can only plead the first two, and hope that future

research will supplement the present discussion.

1. TRUSTING IN GOD: A JAIN-BtJDDHIST BY CHARISMA DEBATE AND

CONVERTING

IN THE PRAPANNAMRTA

The Kathikosa of Prabhacandra forms part of the Ara-dhanaliterature, a species of literature in Jainism dealing with the successful accomplishment of religious, particularly ethical norms. Prabhacandra's text follows closely the Bhagavati Ariidhana, a Prakrit work attributed to Sivarya, whose date remains problematic.4
3 Cited p. 15, introduction to Srivuniadlhv'avzi/aa. For an excellent discussion of the Arddhand literature see A. N. Upadhye's introduction to Harisena's Brhatkathdko.5a, Singhi Jain Series, 17, Bombay: BhdratiyaVidya Bhavan, 1943.
4

This content downloaded from 142.150.190.39 on Sun, 8 Sep 2013 18:54:24 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

GRANOFF:

Scholars and Wonder-Workers

461

The second story, entitled "Jnanodvotanakathai," "A Tale on the Display of Knowledge," tells of a debate between the Jain savant Akalanka and a Buddhist master, Samgharir. Akalanka has fled from Manyakheta to Kalifiga, after being discovered in a Buddhist monastery in Manyakheta, where he had concealed his true identity in order to learn Buddhism. Angry Buddhists pursue him, and after some stirring adventures he arrives in the town of Samcayaputra.The king of the town is named Himasitala, and his wife MadanasundarT is a pious Jain. She is about to celebrate a chariot festival in honor of the Jina, when a haughty Buddhist, Samghasri declares before the king, "You must not allow this celebration of the chariot festival in honor of the Jina, for the very doctrine of the Jinas is a ludicrous impossibility." And with that he offers to the Jains a challenge to meet him in debate. The king goes to his queen and tells her that she cannot celebrate the festival until she first establishes the truth of her Jain religion. For her part, the queen is of course distressed, but mostly angry and she retires to her palace. She seeks the advice of the Jain monks who inform her that the pandits of distant Manyakheta are far smarter than Samgha'rT. To the queen this seems little consolation; as she herself says she feels rather like a person about to be struck by a snake while the snake charmer is miles away. She abandons the royal dwellings and retires to a Jain (aitla where she swears that she will starve herself to death unless someone comes who can crush Samghasri's pride so that she can celebrate her chariot festival to the Jina. In the middle of the night the seat of the image begins to tremble and CakreivarT DevT appears to the queen. The Goddess tells the queen to set aside her worries, for on the very next day the divine man Akalanka will come and he will destroy the pride of Samgha?ri. The queen is overcome by joy and sends out messengers in all directions to search for Akalanka. Those sent to the East find the Jain monk in a garden resting from his journey with some of his disciples. The queen herself then goes to meet Akalanka, and honoring him with gifts she tells him of the great danger to the Jain sarngha that the Buddhist Samgha~ri poses. Akalanka's wrath is aroused as he declares, "Who is this worthless fellow, SamghasrT? Why, even the Buddha himself could not debate with me!" And he tenders to SamghasrTa letter of challenge, summoning him to debate. At the very sight of the letter SamghaSri shakes; he lacks even the courage to open it up and read its contents. The king HimasTtalamust intervene; he escorts Akalanka into the assembly and demands that SamghasrTdebate with the Jain sage. Samgharir is

quick to see that he hasn't a chance in front of Akalanka, and he in turn summons all the Buddhist savants he knows from all over India. But human aid is not sufficient. Samghasri must turn to divine aid, and he invokes the Goddess Tara, with the brief and peremptory statement, "O Goddess, there is no way I can debate with this man! Listen, you debate with him for me and defeat him." The Goddess agrees and further instructs Samgharir to place a pot behind a curtain; she will come down into the pot and debate with Akalahka on Samgharir's behalf.5 The next morning Samgharir declares before the king that he will no longer debate with Akalanka face-to-face; from now on all discussions will take place with him behind a curtain. This strange request does not seem to have occasioned any suspicion, but once hidden from public view Samgharir begins his machinations. He worships the Buddha and Tara, and summons Tara to take up her station in the pot and begin debating for him. The first thing Tara does is to set forth the Buddhist doctrine of momentariness, only to have it shattered by Akalanka who in turn establishes the Jain doctrine of anekantatva, wherein he proves that all objects in fact possess a multitude of characteristics, their natures encompassing all possibilities. After six months of rigorous debating, one night Akalanka is struck by the thought of how odd it is that a mere human should be able to debate with him for so many days, day after day. Suddenly Cakresvari Devi appears to Akalahka and explains to him what has happened: "No mere mortal could ever debate with you these many days. It is the Blessed Tara who has argued with you all this time. Now tomorrow you must ask her what she said in the past days; thus will she be defeated." Akalanka, his strength renewed by the vision of Cakre'vari, makes the solemn vow, "I have just been amusing myself all this time by arguing with the Goddess Tard. Now today I shall finish off the debate and have a proper feast." And so Akalahka follows the advice that his Goddess has given him. He asks Tara what she had said on an earlier occasion. As the narrator of the Kathakoga tale explains, this completely throws Tara off balance, for the speech of the Gods is one, that is,

Summoning a God or Goddess into a pot is common in Indian popular religion. Cf. for example the various pratisthd ceremonies according to the paificara-tratexts (Jaya'khva, Padnia, Sanatkumirasarnhitis) and the Saivdgamas (Raurasva, Ajita, Mrgendrdgamnas). See also Sudhir Kakar, Shamans, Mastics and Doctors: A PsYchological InquirYinto India and Its Healing Traditions. Bombay: Oxford Press, 1982, p. 104.

This content downloaded from 142.150.190.39 on Sun, 8 Sep 2013 18:54:24 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

462

Journal of the American Oriental Society 105.3 (1985) The next text to be considered is considerably different in tone, and supernatural intervention where it occurs in a debate is required not to settle an unequal contest waged between God or Goddess and mortal as in the case of the Buddhist Tara versus Akalanka, but to assist a mortal, Ramanuja, the propounder of the correct doctrine in arguing against cleverer but wrongminded opponents. In addition the attitude towards debate expressed in this text comes closest to that of the philosopher, but for different reasons, revealing a basic distrust in human intellect in favor of divine assistance. The Prapannamrta, a late hagiography of Ramanuja in Sanskrit, in contrast to hagiographies of the rival Vedanta teachers Madhva and Safkara, does not consistently present Ramanuja as a towering intellect. All of these hagiographies share a similar structure, which I have outlined elsewhere.6The subject of the biography is regarded as an avatara or incarnation of a major deity, come to earth at the request of the Gods to destroy heretical demons who are propagating the wrong faith. The digvijaya or worldconquest of the religious hero, clearly modeled on that of the king, usually consists in a series of philosophical contests which are again most often related in the hagiographies in great detail. In addition, in keeping with the divine origin of the sage, his early childhood is described in grandiose terms, with particular attention generally given to his prodigious feats of learning. So, for example in the Sahkaradigvijava of Vidyaranya we learn that by age seven Sankara had mastered all the revealed scriptures. Furthermore, the text repeatedly makes mention of Sankara's debating skills and his wisdom and reiterates that he will destroy the heterodox teachings.7 Similarly, in the SrTsumadhvavijai'a Madhva as a child displays extraordinary knowledge, correcting his elders when they misinterpret passages from the sacred books; later he defeats skilled debaters and his marvelous intelligence is repeatedly praised in the text by his biographer.8 By contrast, although the Prapanndmrta does give a glowing account of Ramanuja's earliest intellectual achievements, having him at the age of eight days learn the Veda and as a student criticize his teacher Yadava's interpretation of the scriptures,9 in general the picture of the mature

without limitation with respect to time, and Tara is therefore unable to answer. She flees in defeat. Akalanka immediately jumps up, pulls back the curtain and with a swift kick breaks the pot in which Tara had been contained. He then gives his Buddhist opponent another swift kick and shouts, "This wretched Samgha'rT I defeated on the very first day of our contest. I only continued to argue with the Blessed Tara in order to display the greatness of the Jain doctrine." The king and his court all rejoice in the victorious Jain doctrine, as the story ends, exhorting others to follow in Akalanka's footsteps and display the
superiority of Jainism.

Divine intervention in this debate takes place at several junctures in the story; the first is simply a prediction by Cakreivari DevTto the queen Madanasundari that Akalanka will come and rout the proud Buddhist Samgharir. The outcome of the debate, then, from the start has been divinely ordained. The Goddess supporting the Jains has promised their victory, although it is still possible at this point in the story that the contest will take place in the human realm, its result predetermined by the Gods. Samghairt alters the arena of the debate, however, when he plaintively and peremptorily orders the Goddess Tara.to take his place and debate the Buddhist side. The debate is no longer between two exceptional human scholars; it is now between a Buddhist Goddess and a Jain monk whom the Jain Goddess has described as a "div'a purusa," a man with divine nature. As the debate proceeds, Akalanka, the mortal, is unable to defeat his opponent, the Buddhist Goddess Tara. He realizes that for a mere mortal to debate with him for so many days is a singular situation, and it is necessary for further divine intervention to take place to put an end to the contest. Cakresvari Devi tells Akalafika how to silence her Buddhist rival, which Akalafika then does. He adds, of course, that he himself had defeated Samghairt on the first day of the debate, which would be before the divine intervention. His further debating with Tara just further shows the greatness of the Jain doctrine-the Jain Goddess Cakre'varTis greater than the Buddhist Goddess Tara. On human and suprahuman spheres Jainism is triumphant. The function of supernatural intervention, then, in this narrative, is hinted at by the text itself: the simple victory of one man over another might have redounded to the credit of the winner alone. The victory of the protective deity of one faith over the protective deity of another is a clearer, unambiguous statement of the superiority of the winning doctrine over the losing doctrine, though the text credits Akalanka with the victory, where it more properly belongs to Cakre'vari Devi.

"Holy Warriors" A Preliminary Study of Some Biographies of Saints and Kings in the Classical Sanskrit Tradition," vol. II, 1985, pp. I-13. Journal of Indian PhilosophY. ' 1.86; 3.83; 4.6-9; 4.16-20; 4.46; 4.51; 4.61; 4.63; 4.74-87; 4.96; 4.105-106; 5.1, etc. 8 3.22; 3.28-30; 3.52; 4.46-54; 4.54-56; 6. 1ff., etc. 9 2.27; 3.59-60.

This content downloaded from 142.150.190.39 on Sun, 8 Sep 2013 18:54:24 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

GRANOFF:

Scholars and Wonder-Workers

463

Ramanuja provided by this biography is of the pious devotee who achieves direct communication with his God, and not of the militant philosopher whose dialectical acumen is such that he marches from victory to victory in debate with other schools of philosophy. In fact, of all the texts of the major Vedanta philosophers examined to date the Prapannamrta is unique in its singular lack of interest in the philosophical debate. The biographies of of Madhva and Sankara named above are filled with painstaking details of philosophical arguments, which makes the texts often difficult to comprehend without the elaborate commentaries provided for these verses, and indeed removes them from the sphere of the popular, oral biography into the erudite, esoteric, studied literature of the academic philosopher, with descriptive verses on the seasons and locales rivaling the most difficult of Sanskrit court poetry. The Prapannamrta reads in fact more like a puran, and debates are reduced to mere statements of victory and defeat, with few or no details given. In addition, Ramanuja most often accomplishes his digvijava, his conversion of his opponents, by means other than philosophical argument. For example in chapter 46 of the Prapannamrta Ramanuja converts the Advaitins at Salagrama by having his disciple Dasarathi dip his feet into the tank from which the Advaitins draw their drinking water. They are then converted by the taste of the water which touched his disciple's feet, belief in the curative and magical properties of the teacher'sfoot-water being well attested in this text, for example in the same chapter where Ramanuja's footwater cures a girl who is possessed by a demon.'0 Perhaps even more telling for the present investigation is the treatment of Ramanuja's role in debate where debates are specifically described. In chapter 46, vs. 51ff. some Buddhists learn that the King Vitthaladeva, whose daughter Ramanuja has just cured from possession, has become Ramanuja's disciple. Enraged, they order Ramanuja to appear in the court and debate with them. Rammnuja is frightened at the demand, as the Prapannamrta says, "feeling like a frog caught in the mouth of a snake," "dvijihvavakrasamkrantaplavavad vatibhiipatih" (vs. 55). In a pitiable voice he beseeches God, "Kim karomi Hare deva kva gacchamij agatpate ityevam dTna1a va-cavadan . . .," "What shall I do, 0 Lord, 0 Hari, where I shall I go, 0

") 46.46 The belief in the magical properties of the teacher's foot water is widespread and finds frequent mention in medieval story literature, particularly the extensive story collections of the Jains.

Ruler of the Universe" (vs. 56). Ramanuja is regarded as the incarnation of Sesa, the serpent on which Visnu lies. In answer to this prayer he becomes again his divine self, Sesa, and like the Buddhist Tara, hidden behind a curtain he fires off a thousand rejoinders to each of the arguments advanced by the Buddhists. The Buddhists are astounded by his superhuman power (divyasakti, vs. 59); some flee, but others become his disciples. Ramanuja's response, then, to a human challenge is to remove the contest to a higher sphere. It is as the God Sesa that Ramdnuja debates; it is in response to the Divine superiority of Ramanuja that the Buddhists are converted and not in response to his prodigious human intellect as in the case of Madhva and Sankara in their respective hagiographies. Ramdnuja the man trembles at the thought of entering into debate; Sesa the God establishes the supremacy of Vaisnavism over Buddhism. This is not the only debate in the Prapanndmrta where Ramanuja shrinks from the challenge presented by his opponents and resorts to divine intervention. Earlier in the text, in chapter 25, Ramanuja meets the Mdyavadin or follower of Sankara, whose name is given as Yajfiamrirti. Ramanuja is unable to hold his own against this cleverer opponent. Losing the debate he offers up his prayers to RafigasvamT who then appears to him in a dream. Ranfgasvami tells Ramanuja that Yamuna's refutation of the Advaita doctrine is correct. Ramdnuja should rely on it to defeat his rival Yajfiamriirti.Emboldened by the divine vision of his dream Rdmdnuja the next day proudly enters the assembly hall. But instead of resuming the debate, he now conquers his opponent by his charisma, a technique used repeatedlyby the Buddha in the Lalitavistara and Maha-vastu, but less frequently by later Indian sages. YajfiamiUrti simply capitulates before the splendour of Rdmrnuja's renewed spiritual power; he declares Ramanuja to be Visnu and bows at his feet. The chapter concludes that it was by the grace of God that Ramanuja conquered Yajfiamrirti, "gSrdevarajasi a Krpiavasena nirjitr a svatejasa sa Xa/fiamiirtimn vvaracaaditv a iva dvityivah svate/asa krantatamo l'atzndrah," "Having conquered Yajfiamuirtiin debate by the Grace of the God of Gods, that Lord of ascetics shone like a second sun, having bested the darkness with the power of his own light." The next chapter of the Prapannamrta continues this story, and in fact makes absolutely explicit what has happened between Yajfiamirti and Rdmanuja. The chapter opens, Tatovicinfaini ausali'tndrah karunakarah / praiiva'a vidi'a'a

vaapi te/asd va.zasai

This content downloaded from 142.150.190.39 on Sun, 8 Sep 2013 18:54:24 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

464

Journal of the American Oriental Society 105.3 (1985)

srij'a/ 1/ matto 'dhiko na sandeho X'ajiamuirtir a}am mahan. / devarajakatdksena. si.yo 'bhhnmamasanipratam/2/ Vadenajetum kah saktas tam imam vibudhottaman. / upari'upari vartante i'uktai'ah gatagastada/3/ "And then that compassionate Lord of Ascetics thought, 'There is no doubt that Yajniamiirtiis greater than I am, both by reason of his cleverness and his knowledge; he surpasses me in his inherent charisma, his fame and his glory. Such a one has become my disciple now only because of the Grace of the Lord of Lords. Who could have defeated such a man, the best of the wise, in debate? For he has hundreds and hundreds of clever arguments at his disposal'."

receive this grace is through service and devotion, not through rigorous study and argumentation. The debate, so central in the biographies of Sankara and Madhva to be discussed below, is reduced in the Prapannamrta to but one of many arenas for God to display His powers.
2. BLACK MAGIC AND THE DEBATE: RELIGIOUS BIOGRAPHY AS A WEAPON IN SECTARIAN CONFLICT

There could be perhaps no clearer statement of the attitude of the author of the Prapannimrta to the philosophical contest between the monk Ramanuja and his opponents: Ramanuja is by no means the stronger in debating skill, learning or even natural abilities. He needs supernaturalaid in his conversion of opponents by debate, and he is not depicted in the text as a towering intellect. Indeed the text displays a profound anti-intellectual bent in later chapters when it clearly states that one should not take pride in his learning, but should take refuge in the lotus feet of Rdmdnuja." The introduction of supernatural aid in the debates in this text is thus more than a narrative device designed to emphasize the superiority of one doctrine over another, as it has been described in the story of the debate between Akalanka and Samghasri from the Katha-kosa. The fact that Ramanuja requires divine assistance in order to win a debate must be understood in combination with several other peculiar features of this text: its lack of emphasis on Ramanuja's intellectual achievements in general and consequent downplaying of the debate as part of the digvijaj'a or spiritual conquest Ramanuja undertakes, and its openly hostile attitude towards the intellectual approach to religion, with its strong support of surrender and devotion to God as the only means to release. Supernatural intervention in debate and the downgrading of human intellectual activities thus represent two parallel means to achieve a clear statement of religious doctrine: that God alone by His Grace can bring a soul into the correct path and that the way to prepare oneself to
'' 62.53-55; 63.64-67; 63.70-75.

One of the most important incidents in the biography of gankara is his victory over Mandana Mi~ra, in a debate which is detailed in chapter 8 of Vidyaranya's ?ankaradigvijaya. The wager between Sankara and Mandana Misra is that the loser must accept the lifestation of the winner; Mandana Misra is a householder married to Ubhayabharati the incarnation of SarasvatT, the Goddess of Learning, while Safikara is a monk. In general the debate between the two philosophers is straight-forward and stays within human possibilities; the only supernatural element in the contest is the divine sanction that Safikara's victory receives when Sarasvati garlands the two and the condition is formulated that the loser will see his garland wither, while the winner's garland will remain fresh, a reminder perhaps that the Gods have eternally fresh flowers and that the philosopher who wins, S~akara, is god-incarnate. While debates which receive divine sanction such as this will be the subject of the next section, it is necessary to turn to a rival school's treatment of this same philosophical contest to see a further use that could be made of supernatural intervention in the debate. Narayanacarya's Manimafjari is a curious text. Often described as a biography of Madhva; it is far more an anti-biography of Madhva's arch-opponents' founding father, the Advaitin Sankara. Sankara is depicted in the Manimafijari as a demon, Manimat, come to earth to delude people with his false teachings, incarnation, and ultimately to be extirpated by BhTma's Madhva. Sainkara'sname is taken to be evidence of his disgusting origins; he is the offspring of a loathed mixed-caste union. More important throughout the text his knowledge is ridiculed and his actions are severely castigated, perhaps nowhere more so than in chapter 7 where the great debate between Sankara and Mandana Misra is rewritten. According to the Manimanfjari it is not without significance that the wager in the contest is an exchange of life-station. Sankara has actually been involved in an illicit liason with Mandana Misra's wife; the wager that if he defeats Mandana Mandana will have to become a monk holds out the promise that he will be able to

This content downloaded from 142.150.190.39 on Sun, 8 Sep 2013 18:54:24 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

GRANOFF:

Scholars and Wonder-Workers

465

dally with Mandana's wife without any interference from her lawful husband. It is this that spurs Sankara on. In keeping with his ignoble motives gafikara proceeds to fight with underhanded means. The debate becomes not a display of his prodigious learning, but a magical contest in which he uses Tantric mantras, named as the Bhairavi and Kukkuta mantras, to defeat his unsuspecting opponent. What in the ?ankaradigvijaila was a moment of unparalleled glory for gankara is here turned into a shameful exercise of black magic in pursuit of vile ambitions. That a debate could be manipulated by the use of spells or mantras was widely acknowledged in medieval India. Jain texts tell of Buddhists using spells against their Jain opponents when all else a compilation failed,'2 and the Indrajalavidv'a-samgraha, of texts on magic, supplies its readers with the details of the black magic rites that would ensure victory in debate." The use of black magic against an opponent was not of course confined to the arena of the debate. Abhinavagupta casts spells at Saikara in the ?ahkaradigvijai'a chapter 16, vs. 2, for example, making him ill. But Saikara eventually triumphs as a magician as well as a philosopher; having defeated Abhinavagupta in debate he now hurls back at him the disease caused by his spells and kills Abhinavagupta altogether. 14 Black magic formed an important element in Tantric rites and it is not surprising to see examples of its practice in the medieval hagiographies. Nonetheless the introduction of the motif of a debate won by black magic in the Manimafijari does more than merely reflect popular belief. It serves the important function of denegrating the chief representative of the school that was regarded by the followers of Madhva as their main opponent. The rewriting of the famous debate between Safikara and Mandana which had been used by the followers of Sankara to exalt their founder's wisdom into a sordid scene in which both Sahkara's knowledge and his morals are impugned is part and parcel of the many devices available to the religious biographer in an atmosphere of intense sectarian rivalry. To bring magic into this debate allows Narayanacarya to make light of Safikara's celebrated victory, and indeed cast aspersions on his motives and
12R. N. Saletore, indtiat7 Witchcrafi, Delhi: Abhinav Publications, 1981, p. 165. K1i3aramna,

character. The Manimaijari is an intensely aggressive short text, which takes every opportunity to attack the Advaitins, but all of the hagiographies of the Vedanta founders are informed with a spirit of sectarian rivalry and display hostile attitudes towards opposing schools. Black magic in the debate is an effective device indeed for the Madhvaites to challenge the claims of their major opponents."5
3. DIVINE SANCTION AND DIVINE ORDEALS

Thus far we have reviewed stories that indicated that philosophical arguments might in fact be more than an exchange of words and ideas between two mere mortals. The Kathakosa story of the debate between Samgha?rt and Akalanka revealed that it was possible to call upon the Gods for aid and involve a God or Goddess directly in the debate, tipping the balance of power in favour of the mortal who had secured such divine assistance. In addition, the Prapannamrta treatment of the debate shifted the emphasis from a display of brilliance and learning to a show of charisma, again divinely bolstered. Maniman-jariadded another supernatural factor to the debate: it told of a debate rigged by black magic. What is clear from all of these accounts and common to them all is an unambiguous understanding that a philospohical debate between two contending parties may not settle anything at all, for the result of the debate might be due not to the correctness of the winning position, nor even to the brilliance of the winning party. A debate was as likely to be won from supernatural causes as from natural causes. Many suspicions thus color debates in the Vedanta hagiographies, and even where there is no direct supernatural intervention detectable debates are not immune to suspicion. It is to a few such suspect debates that we now turn. The ?ahkaradigvijaya of Vidyaranya opens with a story of a debate between Kumarila, regarded as an incarnation of the God Skanda, against a Buddhist. Kumarila defeats the Buddhists, but the king in whose court the debate takes place is not satisfied with the results. His objection seems natural enough; winning in a debate might be due to nothing more than skill in argument. A good debater should be able to argue successfully even for a wrong doctrine. How then, the king asks, is a bystander to know who was really right? The king then demands that the two parties undergo a
'" For other techniques see my "God as Idol: The Role of Special Images in Sectarian Conflict in Medieval Vaisnavism," SARAS, 2, October 1983, pp. 12-25.

pp. 37-38

in Indra/ilavi(da'sasingraha,

ed.

riTnityabodhavidydratna and Srisubodhavidydbhusana, Calcutta: Bdcaspatya Press, 1915.

1 16.29-32.

This content downloaded from 142.150.190.39 on Sun, 8 Sep 2013 18:54:24 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

466

Journal of the American Oriental Societv 105.3 (1985) problems."9That her garland should pass final judgement on which doctrine is correct in the momentous debate between Sankara and Mandana Misra is thus a natural choice. The Srisumadhvavi/ayva also contains an example of a debate in which a supernatural event corroborates the results of the human contest and helps convince the onlookers that the victory was correctly won. In chapter 6, vs. 18 Madhva has been instructing people on his interpretations of the revealed scriptures. His audience, however, is reluctant to accept his views. Madhva then predicts that a Brahman will come and tell them that the text means exactly what he has said it means. It is this prediction of the future and its coming to fruition that convinces Madhva's listeners as much as any logical argument he has offered them. In all of these cases we move from direct manipulation of the debate through divine intervention or the use of black magic into an atmosphere where debate is regarded as insufficient to convince third parties of which view is correct; it is insufficient, then, to convert the philosopher's opponents, which is, after all, his ultimate aim. In one case, the contest between Kumarila and a Buddhist in the Sahkaradigvijava, the debate is suspect because its results might be due to mere cleverness on the part of a debater who in fact holds the wrong position, something we have seen the Prapannanrna acknowledge as well when Ramanuja praised the wit and learning of Yajfiamflrtiand credited his own victory to God. In other cases the reasons why supernatural signs are required to validate the debate are not given, but stories in other texts help the reader to fill in the gap-the results of a debate could be determined by divine aid or magical spells. The supernatural sign in these debates, then, surely reflects a general hesitancy about the usefulness of debate as a conversion strategy. At the same time it also brings into line the philosopher's activity as philosopher with some of his other deeds, for in all of these texts the Vedanta philosophers are depicted as wonderworkers as well as thinkers. Thus, for example Ramdnuja in the Prapannamrta cures people suffering from demonic possession, and receives visions from God that lead him to magical images;20Sankara in the Sankaradigvijava alters the course of a river; he flies through the sky and he causes a dead child to be revived and an idiot to shine with wisdom.2' Madhva's
'9 Brahmav'aivartapurdna, Prakrtikhancla, 5.21-27. 1 am indebted to my student Mrs. Luitgard Soni for this reference. 20 3.40-41; 46.5-8. 21

trial by divine ordeal; he orders them to jump off a cliff; whoever is unharmed will be accepted as being correct. Kumarila of course comes through unscathed, but the Buddhists now object, saying that he could have survived his terrible fall through the power of spells and magical herbs. The king Sudhanvan then sets up another trial for the opposing parties; this time they must guess what is concealed in a hidden pot. Kumarila again wins, and the Buddhists are at last silenced.' In this contest between Kumarila and the Buddhists, supernatural events are necessary to corroborate and confirm the results of the human contest. The philosophical contest is secondary to the contest that takes place after victory is achieved on a natural plane; the hero of the story must now triumph in another sphere, asserting his ultimate strength and
superiority.

The great debate between Sankara and Mandana Misra that is recorded in the Sankaradigvijava also makes use of a supernatural sign to confirm the victory of Safikara; as mentioned earlier, the victor's garland does not wither."' It is not insignificant that it is Ubhayabharati, the incarnation of Sarasvati, the Goddess of Learning, who possesses this magic garland and places it around their necks. One of the functions of Sarasvati was to arbitrate in philosophical disputes. A brief story in the Jain Puratanaprabandhasamgraha'8 entitled the Saddarsanaprabandha or "Account of the Six Philosophical Systems" tells of King Bhoja's determination to bring agreement amongst the competing schools of thought. He summons all six of them and announces, "Here, here! Release is one, but the paths are five. You must get together and agree with each other." Understandably, the competing systems are unable to follow the king's orders, and in turn ask him to summon the Goddess Sarasvat! whom Bhoja has the unique ability to perceive directly. The king fasts and performs the necessary ritual, after which the Goddess of Learning appears to him and asks why she has been summoned. Bhoja replies, "Tell me what is true. What path shall I follow?" The Goddess replies with a compromise, drawing from each system of thought something that may be followed, and then disappears. Sarasvati is also widely known as bestowing upon mortals the ability to solve philosophical
1.73ff. A similar story is told of Udayana. See Karl Potter, Enrc/lopedia of Indian Philosophies, Niwfa, Princeton: Princeton University Press. 1977, p. 52. 17 8.67-68. 18 Puratanaprahandhasarngraha, ed. Jinavijaya Muni, Singhi Jain Series, 2, Bombay: Bhdratiya Vidyd Bhavan, 1936, p. 19.
16

5.9; 7.121; 8.1; 12.21; 21.63-70.

This content downloaded from 142.150.190.39 on Sun, 8 Sep 2013 18:54:24 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

GRANOFF:

Scholars and Wonder-Workers

467

miraculous deeds in the SrTvsumadhvax'i/ava are legion; he cures headaches by breathing in the sufferer's ears; he predicts the future; he travels at supernatural speed and eats a superhuman amount of food, and crosses rivers without any boat.22 The introduction of a supernatural element into the debates discussed here, then, not only reflects a suspicion of debate as a means of persuasion but also serves to harmonize the human, intellectual achievements of the subjects of these biographies with their more wondrous, superhuman deeds, and reflects a resolution of the tension between mortal and divine that is essential to the biographies of the Vedanta founders who are regarded as human avatdras of Gods, partaking of both human and divine essence.
4.
CONCLUSIONS

This paper has reviewed a number of stories revolving around philosophical debates and drawn primarily from biographies of the three Vedanta philosophers, Sankara, Ramanuja and Madhva. In each case an effort has been made to understand the function of the supernatural elements that appear in the accounts of the debate under discussion. In brief, supernatural elements function differently in these stories, sometimes serving to bolster the narrator's doctrine by asserting its triumph on a supermundane plane as well as the mere human sphere where the debate takes place vs Akalanka). In another case the introduc(SamghasrT tion of the supernatural was seen as intimately related to the narrator's religious viewpoint, in which human intellectual activity was regarded as less significant than divine grace (the Prapannimrta). In a third case, the Manimafjari, the use of the supernatural in the form of black magic was seen as a weapon in a sectarian battle, the assertion that Sankara won by
22

black magic allowing Narayanacarya both to denegrate Sankara's intelligence and impugn his motives. Finally, the use of the supernatural to corroborate the results of debate was regarded on the one hand as a reflection of a generalized suspicion about the honesty of debate and its ability to determine the truth and convince people, and on the other hand, as a means to elevate this human activity into the superhuman, further aggrandizing the winner who is capable of bringing about such acceptance from the Gods, passing such a divine ordeal or himself reinforcing his own position with a small miracle. A single debate may in fact involve more than one of these types of supernatural intervention. There is a famous debate between the Digambara Jain Kumudacandra and the Svetambara Devastiri recorded by Merutunga in his Prabandhacintamani, in which the protecting Goddess Cakre~varT Devi instructs the intended victor Devastiri, much as she does Akalanka in the Kathdkosa story discussed above. Later in the debate Kumudacandra employs black magic against his opponent, but his evil actions are uncovered and a witness, another Svetambara, is successful in countering with his own black magic.23 In all of the stories reviewed in this paper the philosopher whose victory or defeat in debate is detailed is singled out for the reader's attention by the supernatural events that accompany his intellectual feats, whether that attention is meant to be laudatory or defamatory. Supernatural events thus serve to emphasize and draw our interest into a scenario that might otherwise seem far less exciting, the rigorous battle of wits in a philosophical debate. Finally, they also greatly enhance the structural unity of the hagiography, integrating these philosophical sections into the rest of the text which sparkles with stories of the unusual.
23Merutunga, Prabandhacintamani,edited Jinavijaya Muni, Singhi Jain Series, 1, Sdntiniketan: Singhi Jaina Jndnapitha, 1933, pp. 66-69.

3.53; 5.31-33; 6.18; 6.51-52; 10.8.

This content downloaded from 142.150.190.39 on Sun, 8 Sep 2013 18:54:24 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions