Shri Shankara Peethams

May 1, 2003

Dear Divine Souls,

I wanted to know the list of all Shankara Peethams in India and

abroad. Tried to find out this information in this group but there

is no mention on this. There are 4 Shankaracharya Peethams

basically. Sometimes, I get confusion finding some more Peethams

affiliated to these.

Can I know what are the prime Peethams and what are all other

affiliated to them.

One more doubt. When Shankaracharya established only 4 major

peethams how other Jagadgurus taken the liberty of establishing some

more. If I have written any where wrongly I request you to forgive

me.

Om Sai,

May 1, 2003

Namaste:

More than one version of the life history of Shankara exists and

almost all of them agree that originally, Shankara established four

mutts - one in the north (Badrinath), one in the south (Sringeri),

one in the west (Dwaraka) and one in the east (Puri). The most active

and prestigious of the Shankara mutts is Kanchi Kamakoti Peetam and

the Kanchi Mutt claims that it also belongs to one of the original

establishment of Adi Shankara. This dispute was referred to the

Bombay High Court and the Supreme Court of India and their Verdict is

shown below.

It is not disputed that the religious reformer Shankar about the

eighth century A.D. established four mutts or monasteries for

sanyasis and ascetics in the north, south, east and west of India

namely the Jyotir Mutt in Badrinath in the Himalayas, the Sringeri

Mutt in south India, the Sharada Mutt, Dwaraka in Gujarat and the

Goverdana Mutt at Puri in Cuttack."

- High Court, Mumbai - 33 Bombay 278.

"Sankara established four maths as seats of religion at four ends of

India. the Sringeri mutt on the Sringeri hills in the south; the

Sharada mutt on the Dwaraka in the west; the Badrinath mutt at

Badrinath in the North and the Goverdana mutt at Puri in the

East ...Each of the mutts has a sanyasi as its head who bears the

title of Sankaracharya in general. Sankara is said to have four

principal disciples who were all brahmins. The orthodox Hindu

recognizes no other sanysis."

-Supreme Court - 1972

Honestly, the religious disputes though can be ratified by the courts

but the general public is the only final decision maker. In the most

recent disputes on the Ayodhya's Sri Ram Temple, both the Islamic

institutions and Hindu institutions have requested the Acharya of

Kanchi Mutt (SriSri Jayendra Saraswathi Swamigal) to the mediator and

a Jury. To a larger extent both Sringeri and Kanchi have established

many religious and social institutions to serve the needy community.

The Puri Mutt is attached to the Puri Jaganath Temple and both

Dwaraka and Badrinath are also less active. Sringeri Mutt has some

sort of a branch known as Rajarajeswari Petum located near the

Pocano. The Sringeri homepage contains the information about this.

Please understand what have provided here is based on my perception

of the functioning of these institutions and they may not be very

accurate representations of what they are.

Warmest regards,

Links:

URL: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/~ucgadkw/position/shank-jyot-ascii.html

(This article by Sri Vidyasankar sundaresan provides some interesting

details related to Sankara mutts and I recommend everyone interested

to read.)

URL:

http://www.madhuramurali.org/mm/year2001/jun2001/ji_adisankara1.html

(Interesting two part article on the life history of Sankara - this

is one of the many accounts that are available in the Internet)

Kanchi Kamakoti - http://www.kamakoti.org/

Sringeri Sarada Peetam: http://www.sringeri.org/

Jaganath Puri Site: http://www.jagannathpuri.com/jptourism.asp

Dwaraka Mutt: I did not notice any separate site describing about

the Dwaraka Mutt. It should be pointed out that the Mutt was

originally associated with the famous Dwaraka's Krishna temple. But

the temple became one of the important Vaishnava temple (Divya

Desam). It is not clear why the Dwaraka mutt is not active.

Jyotir Mutt: http://www.templenet.com/Tamilnadu/df067.html

advaitin, "vasu145" <vasu145> wrote:

> Dear Divine Souls,

>

> I wanted to know the list of all Shankara Peethams in India and

> abroad. Tried to find out this information in this group but there

> is no mention on this.

May 1, 2003

Namaste:

It is highly controversial only when it boils down to Sringeri and Kanchi. Some

researchers opine that Kanchi was earlier a brach mutt of Sringeri and later

became independent.

http://www.audarya-fellowship.com/showflat/cat/hinduism/31454/9/collapsed/5/o/1

http://www.advaita-vedanta.org/avhp/alt_hindu_msg.html

Regards

Theju

-

Ram Chandran

advaitin

Thursday, May 01, 2003 6:25 PM

Re: Shri Shankara Peethams