Translating Vraaivism: The Early Modern Monastery as Transregional Religious

Network
Elaine Fisher
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Religious identity, for Hindus across the Indian subcontinent, is a fundamentally regional
phenomenon. To be a part of a particular sectarian community, for many, depends first and
foremost on ones region of birth and mother tongue. Thus, it is hardly surprising that
scholarship has made a habit of approaching the regional devotional community, treated as the
most basic and irreducible designator of religious belonging, as an isolated unit, historically
segregated from transregional shifts in polities, economies or innovations in thought. And yet,
when it comes to the historical dynamics first bring a regional religious tradition into living
color, our historical archive seamlessly traverses the boundaries of region and language. Perhaps
the best contemporary example from south India is Vraaivism, a tradition at once highly
regional in its contemporary idiom while forged, in historical perspective, in the crucible of
vibrant transregional and interlinguistic exchange, a process that laid the foundations for a
fundamentally new pan-aiva religious culture.
If Hinduism is a category with relatively recent origins (e.g., Nicholson 2010, von
Stietencron 1989), the same may be said for its primary constituents, broadly referred to as
aivism and Vaiavism. In telling the story of the construction of modern aivism in south
India, trans-regional exchange constituted not an exception but the fundamental mechanism
through which south Indian aivas redescribed their identities as members of an overarching
Hindu unity, defined by shared canons of scriptural authority. As I have argued elsewhere
(Fisher 2016), the widespread Vedicization and Vednticization of south Indian aivism took

place through a multi-linguistic discursive process, synthesizing classical aiva liturgy and
theology with non-dualist interpretations of the Brahmastras, a hybrid orthodoxy known within
the tradition as ivdvaita. In particular, I focus on the pivotal role of a network of Vraaiva
theologians virtually unstudied in the Western academy in the transmission of non-dual aivism
across regions and languages in south India: the Pacrdhya Vraaiva tradition, a multiregional lineage that cultivated a theistic tradition of non-dual Vednta philosophy described as
aktiviidvaita or ivdvaita. In subsequent centuries, Pacrdhya Vraaivism and
ivvdvaita set new normative standards for aivism across lineages and languages, from the
privileging of non-dual Vednta to the public embodiment and performance of aiva identity.
How is it possible, then, that the Pacrdhya tradition exerted such a substantive influence on
south Indian aivism while remaining relatively unknown to both contemporary scholarship and
regional devotional communities? The key to this story, as at turns out, lies not in philosophy but
in religious institutionsabove all, the south Indian monastery, or maha.
Monasteries, as the present volume aims to elucidate, soared in social importance in the
early modern centuries, serving not only as a backdrop for otherworldly asceticism but as
landlord and banker to vast segments of the population. It is no wonder, in this context, that
many of the Hindu sectarian identities that came into sharp relief during this period were
centered on the social prestige and charisma of monastic lineages. I would like to focus today,
however, on one particular model for explaining the centrality of monasteries to changes in
religious identity and social organization: and that is the monastery as network. For most of
Indian history, certainly, monasteries were not isolated local institutions but outposts, or
franchises, if you will, of what were often pan-Indian religious lineages. These lineages brought
with them new ritual technologyprocedures for initiation or dk, for instance, that appealed

at once to a lay populace and to local rulersas well as rules of social conduct, or cra,1 that
carried prescriptive legal standing in the surrounding community. In short, monastic networks
provide us with fertile ground for understanding how modes of religious identity can spread
across regional and linguistic boundaries, and how religious communities can take root in new
locales.
Across disciplines, talk of networks may call to mind an array of computational methods
currently in fashion in fields such as sociology and the digital humanities. At the same time, the
concept of network itself bears enormous potential across the humanities and qualitative social
sciences for bringing fresh thought to the question of what we do when we explain change over
historyhow social actors and institutions make possible new identities of being. Within
Indological studies, for instance, network location analysis2 has provided a window for Indian
intellectual history to map the social and intellectual dimensions of newness of Indian early
modernity (eg., Pollock 2001, OHanlon and Minkowski 2008). For scholars of Religious
Studies, the network speaks directly to slippery questions such as the nature of the religious
public, or public religious culture. In its broadest sense, public religious culture can range from
the macrocosm of new religions such as Hinduism or aivism, down to the micropublics
generated by lineages of monastic preceptorsat once institutional pontiffs and charismatic
saintsand their circles of devotees. Succinctly, the monastery as network can account for how
locally rooted religious communities develop portable publics, forging a religious culture on a
local level that can develop a pan-regional influence.
And in its new institutional form in early modern south India, the monastery undoubtedly

1

This subject will be explored in further detail in Schwartz (forthcoming).

the application of network analysis to humanistic scholarship, see for instance Collins (2003), Latour (2005);
Ikegami (2000) puts forth a particularly compelling discussion of the relationship between networks and local
publics.
2 On

takes the shape of a network phenomenon: the central monastery of a lineage comes to function
as network node, hosting the charismatic head of the community within its walls while
propagating numerous branch monasteries across the southern half of the subcontinent. These
local branch monasteries, adoring the central squares of pilgrimage centers and temple towns,
can serve simultaneously as shelter for traveling ascetics and as public relations centers,
advocating the agenda of the lineage and attracting new public circles of devotees. Such a
strategy was commonplace at major pilgrimage centers such as Tirupati (Stoker 2011) and
Kanchipuram, as sectarian lineages vied for a share of ritual privileges. The social influence of
central monasteries, moreover, was by no means marginal. By the seventeenth century, an
individual monastery may have controlled tens of thousands of acres of land managed under the
auspices of regional temple complexes (Oddie 1984), functioning in essence as region-wide
landlords, managing agricultural production while simultaneously serving as the primary
repositories for textual culture by mediating the circulation of manuscripts in multiple languages.
In the case of transregional Vraaivism, then, tracing the influence of the Pacrdhya
monastic network allows us to bridge the gap between the abstract world of the text and concrete
social and economic reality, telling the story, in the process, of how south Indian aivism was
reinvented in the early modern centuries. For the purpose of the present essay, I will focus on
how recovering the early Pacrdhya network is crucial to understanding the changing face of
aivism in the Tamil South. Let me begin, then, by briefly making the case that the pervasive
shifts in Tamil aivism during the early modern centuries have to be read transregionally
specifically, that aiva non-dualism in the south is derived directly from the Sanskritic Vraaiva
traditions. It may be possible, in fact, to capture in a single example the indebtedness of Appayya
Dkita, early modern Indias most renowned aiva theologian and Sanskrit polymath, to the

Pacrdhya Vraaivas. When Appayyas grandnephew, Nlakaha Dkita, a aiva public

theologian in his own right (Fisher 2017), cites an authority on public aiva ritual, he turns to
none other than the illustrious feet of our grandfather, Appayya Dkita, credited by
scholarship with singlehandedly reinventing south Indian aivism, and his ivrcanacandrik,
authoritative handbook on the daily worship of the aiva initiate. On closer examination,
however, it appears that Appayya himself never wrote this work at all.

As it turns out,

Appayyas handbook is almost exclusively borrowedor plagiarized,3 if you willfrom an

earlier aiva treatise entitled the Kriysra, which deals not primarily with ritual but philosophy,
structured as a sub-commentary on the Brahmastrabhya. The Kriysra, composed around
the fifteenth century and attributed to Nlakaha ivcrya, represents the height of
philosophical speculation from the aktiviidvaita school of Vednta. In short, it was not only
his ritual manual that Appayya borrowed from the aktiviidvaita of the Kriysra, but much
of his philosophical agenda in revitalizing the ivdvaita of rkaha. In essence, while
originally a product of the Vraaiva tradition, aktiviidvaita provided a central vehicle for
the synthesizing of aivism with non-dualist Vednta, thus proving integral to the reimagining of
aiva religious identity among both Brahminical and Tamil aivas in the Tamil country.
Remarkably, previous scholarship on Appayyas ivdvaita (McCrea forthcoming,
Duquette 2015, Sastri 1930) is without exception unequivocal in the assertion that Appayyas
ivdvaita is completely unprecedented. And yet, the textual record unambiguously
communicates that the core of his theological innovations and social agenda were borrowed
directly from the transregional networks of the Pacrdhya lineages (Fisher 2016). The story of
the Pacrdhya Vraaiva network, succinctly, has yet to be told; the vast majority of

3

The first verse of Appayya Dkitas ivrcanacandrik after invoking the blessings of iva is transcribed, along
with the following content, beginning from verse 14.3 of the Kriysra: avayakrya aivnm tmrtha
ivapjanam / tac ca vaidikamirbhym ete aivam uttamam //

multilinguistic Vraaiva literature in Sanskrit, Telugu, Tamil and Marathi remains unstudied and
untranslated. Above all, the pivotal role of railam in Andhra Pradesh as a formative center for
Vraaiva religious culture has received little attention. Indeed, the Pacrdhya monastery at
railam came to function as the central node of transregional Viraaivism by the fifteenth
century, and provides a crucial missing link to understanding how Appayya Dkita became to be
who he was. It is precisely on account of erasing the context of changes in aiva institutional
cultures and networks that we fall into this narrative of the genius working in isolation. Rather,
these transformations need to be understood as they are lived in the socio-religious landscape,
and as they occur across regions, a story that cannot be told without monastic networks. In this
spirit, the present essay makes the case for foregrounding not only the monastic network as such
but its distribution across geographic and linguistic boundaries, a dynamic that facilitated the
dissemination of new religious identities in the Indian subcontinent.

The Maha and the Multilinguistic Transmission of Vraaivism

In our traditional scholarly narrative, Vraaivismas with the majority of bhakti
traditionsis generally interpreted as a homegrown, grassroots phenomenon. Bhakti or
devotion, as a so called religion of the people, is marked, in this understanding, by recourse to
the vernacular as a medium for mass communication, and often inflected in recent centuries by a
fervent regional and linguistic nationalism. And while recent scholarship (Hawley 2015) has
questioned our reliance on the historical metanarrative of the bhakti movement, Vraaivism is
most commonly represented as firmly rooted in Karnataka, its doctrine and social agenda
captured most eloquently by the Kannada-language vacanas or sayings of the theologian and
reformer Basava (e.g., Ramanujan 1973, Schouten 1995). On the other hand, a more specialist-

oriented body of literature, the majority of which is written in south Asian languages (e.g.,
Akkuramath 2003, Lalitamba 1976, Mogalevara 1977-82, Hans 1984), documents the inroads of
Vraaivism into present day Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh. Vraaivism in Tamil Nadu, even
in the modern period, is particularly poorly studied, perhaps because it fits awkwardly with
nationalist narratives of the strictly Tamil origins of Tamil-based religious movements.
Nevertheless, particularly from the Vijayanagar period onward, Vraaivism flourished as a
trans-regional and multi-linguistic religious movement, boasting substantial literature not only in
Kannada but in Telugu, Marathi, Tamil, and Sanskrit.
Fortunately, recent work has significantly advanced our understanding of the formative
stages of pre-Vraaiva devotionalism in Karnataka, drawing critical scrutiny to the master
narrative of Vraaivism as a unitary movement of social protest, conducted under the guise of
religious revolution pioneered by the radical reformer Basava. And yet, contrary to popular
wisdom, the terms Vraaiva and Ligyat scarcely occur in the literary or epigraphical record
prior to the fifteenth century.4 In this light, the reinvention of Basava, chief minister of the
Kalya Cukyas in the twelfth century, as the inspirational voice of an anti-Brahminical mass
revolution has been called into question by Prithvi Datta Chandra Shobhi (2005), who
demonstrates that modern Virakta identity, Vraaivism as a strictly Kannada-based, antiBrahminical religious identity, can be situated quite precisely as an invention of the fifteenth
century. 5 Likewise, Gil Ben-Herut (2013) refocuses attention on the pre-fifteenth-century
devotional culture of aivism as a multi-centric tradition of poet-saints in motion, a literary

4

For an extended discussion of the first attested mentions of the word Vraaiva, and vociferous debates as to their
authenticity, see Ben-Herut (2013) pg. 15ff.
5 On the more recent conflicts between the Virakta and Pacrdhya Vraaivas, see Ripepi (2007). This apparent
duality between the Viraktas and Pacrdhya mahas (often described polemically as Gurusthalins) was articulated
earlier in Sadasivaiah (1967), who proposes to complete a comparative analysis of the traditions while in fact
comparing two apparently Virakta mahas.

culture that seamlessly extended through the northern Ca realm, manifested most notably in the
Tamil Periyapuram of Cekkir. Nevertheless, while Ben-Herut emphasizes the transregional
scope of the proto-Vraaiva movement he calls the ivabhakti tradition, mingling fluidly with
the cultural worlds of Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, his account of Vraaivism retains
curious traces of the narrative he aims to problematize. Describing Vraaivism as an inherently
vernacular, anti-Brahminical movement, he writes: In its purest form, the vraaiva thoughtsystem does not adhere to the hierarchical structures of the Brahmanical-centered society and
does not acknowledge the priestly status of Brahmins.
While it is unclear precisely is meant by the phrase vraaiva thought-system, the
implicit allegationwhile not strictly necessary to Ben-Heruts larger argumentechoes
popular scholarly wisdom: as a foundational wing of the vernacular Bhakti movement,
Vraaivism as a category must necessary exclude anything associated with Brahminical
cultureabove all, with Sanskrit. In its religious literature, Vraaivism, in this view, must keep
the company only of vernacular hagiography (raga) or the aphoristic sayings of saints
(vacana), rather than Sanskrit genres of textualityrevealed aiva scripture (gama), aiva law
and conduct (dharmastra), or speculative philosophyall of which were foundational to the
transregional spread of aivism in previous centuries at the height of the aiva Age (Sanderson
2009). This narrative has been problematized most articulately by Robert Zydenbos (1997), who
draws attention to the substantial subset of Vraaiva thought that has been excluded from
academic study by virtue of being written in Sanskrit, the so-called language of Brahminical
oppression. Indeed, the historical archive offers quite a bit of support for Zydenboss insight: a
crucial story remains to be told of how Sanskrit allied with vernacular aiva textuality (theology
as much as devotional poetry) to produce a mobile network of Vraaiva institutions that fluently

traversed the boundaries of region and language.

It is in this spirit that the present essay begins by bracketing out, temporarily, the
metanarrative of the bhakti movement and the vernacular as the autochthonous voice of the
people, sketching the contours of an alternative history of Vraaivism through the lens of the
monastic network. And for most of its history, the epicenter of south Indian aivism has resided
squarely in railam, the mountain pilgrimage center on the banks of the Krishna river in
northern Andhra Pradesh. Indeed, as a central node of multiple aiva lineages, multiple
monasteries have made their home on the auspicious mountain, most notably, in earlier
history, the regional branch of the Golaki Maha of the aiva Siddhntins,6 who held a dominant
share in the transregional pilgrimage site through the thirteenth century, negotiating periodic
alliances with the Kalachuri, Ca, and Kkatya kingdoms (Inden 2000). And while our
inscriptional record for railam is sadly truncated, with early evidence lost to the tides of
history, the fourteenth century stands as a pivotal turning point in the institutional culture of
railam, as aiva Siddhnta officiants are abruptly ousted from social and liturgical authority
by another monastic lineage, identifying under the nameperhaps for the first time in history
of Vraaivism. The lineage in question is typically known, both historically and in its
contemporary institutional form, as Pacrdhya or Paccrya Vraaivism, the lineage of the
five teachers, referred to colloquiallyand sometimes pejorativelyas Sanskritic
Vraaivism.
Much of what has been written by and about the Pacrdhya lineage7 belongs to the

6

For more information about the earlier transregional Golaki Mahas of the aiva Siddhnta, see Sanderson (20122013) and Sears (2014). On the Golaki Maha in Andhra, see Talbot (1987).
7
I refer to the early Sanskritic Vraaivas (post-Mallikrjuna Paitrdhya) interchangeabley as the Pacrdhya or
Paccrya communities, as they would later self-identify, or to the Vraaiva circles of twelfth-century Andhra by
their own chosen names: the Vramhevaras, the Asakhyta (innumerable), or Pramaha Gaas. As we will see
the term Vraaiva comes into use fairly early in this community and thus is not inappropriate as a term of reference.
Polemical phrases such as the guru mahas or gurusthalada, employed both in Western and Kannadiga

domain of hagiography rather than history. And yet, the origin story of the lineage seems to
contain the shadow of a historical truth: these five originary teachers, Reukcrya 8 (or
Revardhya), Maruasiddha, Mallikrjuna Paitrdhya, Vivrdhya, and Ekorma,9 are said
to have dispersed across the Indian subcontinent to found the five principle monasteries that
remain the seats of the lineage today, located in Balehonnur and Ujjayini in present-day
Karnataka, railam, Varanasi, and Kedarnth respectively, which serve as the backbone of the
contemporary Pacrdhya network. 10 To this day, the substantive corpus of Pacrdhya
writings remains virtually unstudied, much of which lies untouched, let alone published or
translated, in manuscript libraries. Where the Pacrdhya tradition does enter into academic
discussion, it is often figured as a foil of the authentic Virakta Vraaiva tradition, which, as

scholarship, have no historical roots in this period and will not be employed here. See also Zydenbos (1997) on this
latter point.
8
Reukcrya is accepted in the hagiography of the Balehonnur maha to be a native of Kolnupka in Andhra
Pradesh, placing him near to the ambit of Paitrdhya and railam, as discussed below; only after first founding
his maha in Kolnupka, according to traditional accounts, it was later moved to Balehonnur in Karnataka during
his lifetime. This progenitor of the Balehonnur lineage is believed within the community to be identical to the author
of the Siddhntaikhmai (ca. fourteenth century).
9
Hanumantha Rao (1973) asserts that Ekormrdhya is identical to the historicizable Vraaiva saint
Ekntarmayya, but offers no evidence to support this claim.
10
A mythological account of the lineages origin can be found in the Paccryapacamotpattiprakaraam, a
mythological extract claimd to be sourced from the Suprabheda gama: the five teachers named here are, in
sequence, Revardhya, Drukrdhya (or Maruasiddha), Ekorma, Paitrdhya, and Vivrdhya. who are
referred to as the pacaphdhidvat (the superintendent deities of the five monasteries.) Other variants of this
narrative recall four principle teachers with divine origin: e.g., Rrevaasiddha is said to have emerged from the
Somealiga, Maruasiddha from the Siddhealiga, Paitrdhya from the Mallkrjunaliga, and Ekorma from
the Rmanthaliga (See Dasgupta 1922, pg. 46 for further details). In The Mysore Castes and Tribes, vol. 4,
Nanjundayya and Iyer record mention of a narrative linking the pacrdhyas with the five faces of iva:
Revardhya, Marulrdhya, Ekoramrdhya, Paitrdhya, and Vivdhya, are said to have emerged from
Sadyojta, Vmadeva, Aghora, Tatpurua, and na respectively (pg. 92). In contrast to these theological
revisionings of the past, a manuscript housed in the GOML, entitled the Vraaivaguruparampar (D 5490) speaks
to a Pacrdhya lineage that at the very least is rooted in historical memory. Twelve teachers are listed:
Vivevaraguru, Ekorma, Vrerdhya, Vrabhadra, Virardhya, Mikyrdhya, Buccayyrdhya,
Vramallevarrdhya, Deikrdhya, Vabha, Akaka, and Mukhaligevara. Certain of these figures are
mentioned elsewhere in our textual record as authors verifiable or attributed works of Vraaiva theology; for
instance, Viradhya is the author of the Pacaratna, commented upon by Sosale Revardhya (commentary
dated to 1650 CE); this text is preserved in four volumes as GOML D 5087-90; the prior author may or may not be
identical to a certain Sampdanasiddha-Vraaivayogin, author of the Andivraivcrasagraha (ca. 1600 CE).
Vrabhadrrdhya, very possibly the same as the Vrabhadra of this manuscript, is the author of the
Viraivasiddhntottarakaumud (GOML D 5495, 5496). That this lineage traces it self to Ekorma and Vivevara
rather than to Paitrdhya is likely significant.

10

Chandra Shobh has demonstrated, dates not to the days of Basava but to fifteenth-century
Karnataka. R. Blake Michael (1983, 1992), for instance, refers to the Pacrdhya Vraaivas as
Gurusthalins, in his reading a lapsed lineage of Vraaivas who abandoned the revolutionary
fervor of a truly Protestant Vraaivism in favor of the Catholic habits of Brahminical
ritualism.
When did this network of five monasteries first emerge? The institutional history of the
Pacapha monasteries still stands in need of recovery, although certain of these sites, such as
the Ujjaini pha in Karnataka, almost certainly participated in older monastic networks of preVraaiva lineages such as the Kmukhas.11 In fact, the very idea of the pacapha seems to
echo a prefiguring series of Kmukha monastic institutions, often associated with Belagavi in
western Karnataka.12 Likewise, worship of a certain Rvaa Siddha proved popular in the
western Deccan well before the height of rdhya Vraaivism, a figure perhaps conflated in
later centuries with a member of the Paccryas, Rvardhya or Reukcrya.13 Tantalizingly
suggestive as these early networks may be, the hard stone evidence of epigraphy allows us to
contextualize one of these teachers quite precisely time and place: Mallikrjuna Paitrdhya,
remembered by many of his descendants as the founding father of Vraaivism in Andhra.14
Author of the Telugu-language ivatattvasramu, The Essence of the Principles of iva, a
didactic work of theology rather than devotional poetry, Paitrdhya is one of the more

11

See ARE 1 of 1953-54 for a grant of land and temple rights to a Pupatcrya at Ujjaini.
On the original pacamahas of Belagavi, see for instance Epigraphia Carnatica, vol VII, no 126 of Shikarpur,
and no. 118 of Shikarpur, dated 1054 CE. A network of Kalamukha institutions known as pacamaha sthnas
can be found across Karnataka from the ninth century onward.
13
For instance, see the mythological account of the Paccrya lineage found in the
Paccryapacamotpattiprakaraam. The legend narrated here places the dissemination of the Paccrya lineage
in the hands of Reukcrya; as a result, we see a Western rdhya narrative developoing over the course of time
that views the railam lineage as derivative of the branch at Balehonnur.
14
Besides being revered as one of the five human incarnations of the five cryas, Paitrdhya is remembered in
the hagiography of the Girirja Sryasihsana Paitrdhya Pha as the third Jagadguru and is regarded by the
present-day community as the founder of this monastery.
12

11

prolific names in the twelfth-century inscriptional record, confirming the rdhya figurehead of
the Andhra regionlinked in hagiography to the railam monasteryas a historical figure
roughly contemporary with Basava himself. Remembered as a native of Draksharama near
Guntur in East Godavari District, Paitrdhya is shown in inscriptions to have been active in
the railam region in the late twelfth century. For instance, an inscription on a stone slab found
in the Sangamesvaram, ten miles from Alampur, records a gift of land to Mallikrjuna Paita by
Kara Gkaradva, dated to 1187-1188 CE.15 Another intriguing series of inscriptions speaks
in the voice of a certain Vibhti Gauraya, self-described as servant in the household of
Paitrdhya of railam: rgiri-gavsi-rpaitrdhya-ghasthadso.16 Perhaps more
importantly, however, a land grant to two of Paitrdhyas sons by the Kkatya king
Gaapati17 (r. 1199 1262) testifies that beyond his immediate circle of followers, the fledgling
rdhya lineages had leveraged sufficient social capital to vie for a place in the regions
economy of religious patronage during subsequent generations.
Paitrdhya, in short, was no doubt an active participant in the aiva religious public of
the twelfth century. His public memory, however, as the preeminent Vraaiva saint of the
Andhra region was fashioned through the writings of one of his key disciples, Plkuriki
Somantha, author of the Telugu-language Paitrdhya Caritra.18 In Somanthas writings,
proto-Vraaiva devotion is figured as a tradition that fluidly transcends regionality: in addition
to his hagiography of the Andhra-based saint, Plkuriki Somantha composed a Dvipada-meter
Basava Puramu (Rao and Roghair 1990), which, contrary to what the name suggests, is more

15

Hyderabad Archaeological Survey (HAS) vol. 19, pg. 71 (Mn. 34).

SII XX No. 357, written in Kannada, Telugu, Tamil, and Nagari scripts. HAS vol. 19, pg. 92 (Mn. 44); cited as
ARE 25 of 1993-1994. ARE 4 and 6 of 1993-1994; written in Telugu and Sanskrit (Nagari), with characters dated to
the thirteenth century. See also HAS vol. 3, pg. 12 for Telugu text.
17
HAS vol. 13, pg. 4 (No. 1).
18 Whether one can speak of Paitrdhya as the intentional founder of a lineage, or even as a Vraaiva, is very
much open to question. Sarma (1980), for instance, describes Paitrdhya as leaning far closer to Pupata
theology than later Virakta Vraaivism.
16

12

of a garland of narratives of aiva bhaktas on the model of the Tamil Periyapuram, blurring
the lines between the Karnataka and Andhra regions. In fact, the Paitrdhyacaritra even
speaks of a meeting purported to have taken place between Paitrdhya and Basava in
railama narrative that homogenizes the languages of devotion (Kannada vs. Telugu) while
retaining the geographical primacy of railam, a sacred center undoubtedly foundational to the
poets own religious culture. Nevertheless, in popular memory, Paitrdhya and Plkuriki
Somantha have been twinned, so to speak, as the forefathers of Telugu Vraaiva literature,
remembered for inaugurating a tradition with a distinctively local Andhra flavor.
What can we make then, of the conjunction of epigraphy popular memory that would
figure Paitrdhya a primogenitor, if not the singular inventor of the Pacrdhya tradition?
This emplotment runs into significant obstacles, unfortunately, when we attempt to square
hagiography with institutional history: while tradition remembers Paitrdhya as the legendary
founder of the Pacrdhya Pha in railam, no such institution can be found, arguably, until
the fourteenth century, nearly two centuries after his lifetime. Our data is limited, moreover, in
establishing whether or not Paitrdhya himself bore any overt monastic affiliation.
Vraaivism, it must be remembered, had not emerged as a conceptual category in the twelfth
century much less as the sectarian designation of a monastic lineage or devotional community.
The title Vramhevara does come to be commonplace in the aiva circles of the Andhra region,
a title that surfaces in connection to monasteries in the Ca country in literature and epigraphy.19
What sort of philosophy or ritual practice the term Vramhevara may entail, on the other hand,
remains ambiguous; on the basis of his theology in the ivattvasramu, some have suggested that

19

In his Takkayka-Parai (v. 12), the twelfth-century Tamil poet Oakkttar pays homage to the Vramhevaras
of the Periya Maam at Kumbhakonam. Whether this is the same institution discussed below remains open to
question. On the patronage of the Vramhevaras by Kulttuga Ca, see ARE 111 of 1893, published in
Epigraphica Indica vol. 6, pg. 276.

13

Paitrdhya may have held greater sympathy with Pupata doctrine than with transregional
ivabhakti religious culture. As a result, it is far from unlikely that Paitrdhya may have
been involved with a monastic institution, either a monastery explicitly incorporated as
Vramhevara or with an existing Pupata institution such as the Abhinava Golaki Maha of
railam.
It is important to reiterate, then, that Vraaivism as a sectarian identity was no more
invented in twelfth-century railam than it was in twelfth-century Kalya. The term rdhya,
however, bears far greater potential for contextualizing the early crystallization of the
Pacrdhya tradition, taking formative shape as a distinct religious culture as early as the
lifetime of Paitrdhya himself. As a title, it appears, rdhya was in current use as a caste
designation for certain Brahmin communities; indeed, contrary to later orthodoxy in the
Vraaiva community, the terms jagama and rdhya may have functioned primarily to
differentiate caste identity in these early centuries. On the other hand, in what we may be
tempted to label a distinctively religious sphere, early hagiography attests to both Paitrdhya
and Plkurike Somantha taking initiation under teachers bearing an rdhya suffix to their
names: Paitrdhya, we learn, is said to have studied under a certain Kipalli rdhyadva,
while Plkuriki Somantha claims to have received dk from an rdhya Brahmin by the name
of Belidvi Vmanrdhya. It is quite possible, succinctly, that whatever theological innovation
can be traced to the twelfth century was circulating within a broader socio-religious network,
taking embodied form in the legends of Paitrdhya only through the hagiographical ventures
of his spokesman, Plkuriki Somantha.
Nevertheless, by the time of Plkuriki Somantha, many of the defining features of the
Pacrdhya tradition had already been articulated as a distinctive religious culture. One of our

14

most important documents for this emerging religious culture is attributed to Plkuriki
Somantha himself: a Sanskrit treatise on Vramhevara conduct and ritual entitled the
Vramhvarasroddhrabhya (Commentary on The Upliftment of the Essence of Vramhevara [Conduct]), commonly known in shorthand parlance as the Somanthabhya.20
Even anticipating more definitive evidence to confirm this attribution of authorship, the
Somanthabhya is undoubtedly a work of proto-Vraaivism in its early stages in Andhra.
While structured in part around theological axioms immediately recognizable in later Vraaiva
literature, theology itself, much less Vraaiva orthodoxy, is hardly the core preoccupation of the
text. Rather, having paid homage to Basava at the outset of the text, Somantha proceeds to
catalogue the central ritual obligations of a practicing Vramhevara, with particular emphasis
on publicly legible embodied religious practice such as the bearing of ash, rudrka-bead
rosaries, and the tripura or aiva forehead mark (tilaka). While the practice of bearing a
personal liga on ones bodyknown to Vraaivas today as the ialigafinds distinct
mention, it is by no means the defining feature of Somanthas catalogue of praxis. One can see
the contours emerging, in the early chapters, of the canonical avaraa, or eight veils
foundational to fully articulated Vraaiva theology, but the term itself has not emerged as
explicit doctrine.
What we do, however, find in the Somanthabhya is a fluent conversance in the ritual
and textual culture of early aiva sectarianismthat is, an explicit fusion of the aivism of the
aiva Age with Brahminical textual culture and normativity. As Somantha writes:
Those illustrious ones, the best of those intent on the conduct of the Vraaivas, always
connected with the liga [that is, the guru], who partake of the prasda and foot water of

20

The sole known surviving manuscript of the Vramhevarasroddhrabhya, or the Somanthabhya, is

preserved as D 5493 in the Governmental Oriental Manuscript Library in Chennai. While little mention of the
Somanthabhya exists in secondary literature, a brief summary of the texts contents can be found Uma Devis
monograph, Palkuriki Somanatha (1990).

15

that teacher, must abandon the remembrance, praise, darana, touch, or recitation of any
deity other than ivabecause, such was practiced by the multitude (Gaa) of ancient
devotees, and the demon attendants of iva (Pramathagaa), in the manner propounded
by all of the rutis, smtis, itihsa, gama, and pura.21

Beyond Somanthas own work, we find crucial evidence of earliest strata of Sanskritic
Vraaivism in a text that most likely pre-dates even Somantha himself, namely Jyotirnthas
aivaratnkara. Situating himself clearly at Srisailam, Jyotirntha describes himself as a disciple
of a certain ivadeva, whose lineage migrated from the Pupata circles at the Somantha temple
in Saurra. The aivaratnkara is apparently contemporary with or predates both Mallikrjuna
Paitrdhya and Basava themselves, as we find no mention of them or any of the expected
Vraaiva saints. Nevertheless, what we do meet with is a substantively articulated version of
what Palkuriki Somantha knows as the core scriptural canon and normative religious practice of
Sanskritic Vraaivism, placing the usual emphasis on the embryonic members of the
avaraa, or eight veils.22 We meet with citations from an already formed Vraaiva scriptural
canon, including gamas such as the Vrgama and Vtulgama; intriguingly, these quotes even
contain mention of the term Vraaiva itself; while perhaps developing in this early period as a
metri causa variant of Vramhevara, existing scholarship believes the phrase Vraaiva to be
virtually nonexistent until the fifteenth century.
Perhaps the most compelling evidence, however, that the above works were intertwined
in

single

discursiveand,

implicitly,

monasticcommunity

is

found

in

the

21

rmadvraaivcranihparai sad ligasannihitai talliga-pdodaka-prasdopabhoga[svannai]

ivetaradevatsmaraasastavanadaranasparanapahandayo varjany / iti
sakalarutismttihsgamapuroktaprakrea bhgirii-ghakara-sukey-upamanyu-bhgu-dadhcigautamdibhi pramathagaai purtanabhaktagaai caivam anuhitatvt //
22
From Jyotirnthas aivaratnkara: asminn eva aivaratnkare varramadharmaaivabhedavramhevarabheda-ivdhikyaprakaraa-ligotpattiligalakaa-pjdravyaprakaraa-upacranirayarvibhtimhtmya-rudrkamhtmya-guruiyalakaa-dkprakaraa-packarmhtmya-antarygavidhiligrcanavidhi-sadcraligadhraavidhi-pdodakamhatmya-prasdamhtmya-sadcraprakaraapraligasthala-jagamasthala-ivayogilakaaarayaikasthala-ptradeakladnadharmaparopakraprakaraa-mhevaramhtmynty ekaviaty adhyay /

16

Vramhevarcrasagraha of Nlakahangantha. Referring to his community of devotees

not as Vraaivas, butmore typically of this stratum of literatureas the asakhyta
vramhevaras, Nlakahangantha explicitly situates Jyotirntha, Paitrdhya, and
Plkuriki Somantha within the same lineage. After paying homage to Basava and Cannabasava,
he invokes figures we can now confirm to number among the founding fathers of the protordhya lineages of railam:
I bow to the omniscient Guru r Paitrdhya,
His mind thoroughly moistened by the lotus feet of the Great Lord.
I bow to Guru Lakmdeva, by whom, having excavated the aiva essence
In the Vedas, stras, and Puraas, was written this Upliftment of the Essence.
Homage to Plkurke Somantha, noble of conduct,
Who composed the text known as the illustrious Basavarjya,
Suitable to the Vramhevaras, having defeated all disputations.
I bow to him, Jyotirntha, who out of compassion, for the sake of the world,
Once composed the text known as the aiva Treasury.
I pay homage to these great primordial heroes, innumerable (asakhyta),
The great hosts (gaas), whose minds are immersed in the ocean of true devotion
to iva.23
In short, the textual culture and lineages of what we can call the proto-Pacrdhya
Vraaivas were firmly entrenched in the Srisailam region in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.
The fourteenth century, however, stands as a pivotal turning point in the institutional history of
railam. The new prime shareholder in the aiva liturgy of railam was known as the

23

nama rpaitrdhyagurave sarvavedine / maheacarambhojapariniitacetase //

vedastrapureu sram uddhtya karam / sroddhra kto yena lakmdevaguru bhaje // yas sarvavdn
nirjitya vramhevarocitam / rmadbasavarjya nma grantham ackarat // plkurkesomanthya namas tasmai
suline // aivaratnkara nma grantha ya ktavn pur / jagaddhitrtha kpay jyotirntham nammi tam
// evam dn mahurn asakhytn mahgan / nammi ivasadbhaktisgare magnamnasn // 1.13 - 1.18. He
continues in the next verse to name his own teacher, who may well have been a younger contemporary of
Paitrdhya: Vykarod ya ivajnasamuccayam akalmaam / Jagadrdhyangeaguru tastata bhaje //
1.19. I have not been able to find any further attestation of this ivajnasamuccaya or a teacher by the name of
Ngea or Ngerdhya.

17

Bhikvtti Maha, a pontificate whose devotees included celebrities of the stature of rntha,
iconic representative of high Telugu literature.24 In 1313, aiva Siddhnta officiants are abruptly
superseded in social and liturgical authority by what we might call a cousin of the Pacrdhya
lineage, at which point railam can be arguably described as the institutional center of a
transregional monastic community. Indeed, many have suggested that the conspicuous absence
of inscriptions at railam prior to the dawn of the fourteenth century speak to a forcible
overturn of ecclesiastical authority; with a certain reputation for ferventindeed, ferocious
devotion, the incumbent Vraaivas are reputed to have demolished evidence of prior donative
inscriptions. It is well within the realm of possibility that the Bhikvtti Maha may have used
force to exert its control over the railam region, particularly based on the testimony of a
Telugu language historical chronicle, the Velugtivrivavali, detailing the military exploits
of a family of local Andhra chieftains. In this text, we discover that the Vema dynasty launched a
full-scale military assault on the Bhikvtti Maha and its pontifical head, Mukti ntaliga in
the early sixteenth century, who responded by launching an attack of his standing army. A
contemporary manuscript from the Mackenzie collection fills in the events of the encounter:
nta Ligayya, we learn, in addition to managing maha properties to supplement the
institutions income, erected a fort and stationed a garrison to protect the neighboring villages
under maha control.25
While the very fact that monasteries in late medieval south India were armed and fortified
is very much of interest in its own right, the rise of the Bhikvtti Maha, confirmed in the new

24

In the preface to his ivartrimhtmyamu, rntha offers an homage to Mukti nta Bhikvttirya, whom we
learn was responsible for commissioning the poem. Rao and Shulman (2012) date this Mukti nta Bhikvttirya
to around 1449 CE based on inscriptional evidence; hence, this individual is not identical to the Mukti ntaliga
described below.
25
See Venkata Ramayyas edition of the Velugtivrivavali for further details. The Mackenzie manuscript in
question is cited here as Mac. Mss 15-3-2 (railam), pg. 19.

18

wave of inscriptions beginning in 1313,26 testifies beyond doubt that a new monastic community
had come to power.27 Nevertheless, while the Bhikvtti Maha is unequivocally understood in
existing scholarship to be a Vraaiva institution, its relation to the local ecology of religious
lineages has yet to be articulated. Parabrahma Sastry (2014), for instance, explicitly refers the
Bhikvtti lineage as rdhya aiva, but no evidence exists to suggest that its preceptors would
have used this as a term of self-description. As our textual evidence reveals, however, early
rdhya religious culture seems to have fragmented into at least two distinct monastic lineages:
namely, the successors to Mallikrjuna Paitrdhya and the Bhikvtti lineage. Pontiffs of the
Bhikvtti Maha trace their initiatory descent to the very same Koipalli rdhyadeva credited
for initiating Paitrdhya, making the two communities cousin lineages, competitors as
much as compatriots. As little in the way of textual culture seems to have been produced by the
Bhikvtti preceptors themselvesperhaps spending more of their time as property managers or
military tactitiansprecious little evidence exists to suggest how their theology may have
differed from their rdhya contemporaries of the lineage of Paitrdhya and Plkurike
Somantha.
Nevertheless, the inscriptional record makes clear that the early rdhya community
maintained an active network of branch monasteries in the greater railam region, catering to
local communities of devotees. Notably, records from the fifteenth century demonstrate that
despite Bhikvtti control of the Mallikrjuna temple, rdhya preceptors of multiple monastic
lineages retained a substantive influence among the higher echelons of royal power in ndhra. A
copper plate grant, dated to August 2, 1422 registers a gift of villages bestowed by Vma Rei

26

The crucial inscriptions are SII vol. X, Nos. 502-504.

See for instance Reddy (2014) and Parabrahma Sastry (1994) for further discussion of the rise of the Bhkvtti
Maha. On the changing landscape of aiva mahas at Srisailam, see Anuradha (2002) and Sastry (1990).
27

19

upon Vivevara Mallanrdhya,28 whom we learned served as his Rjaguru, commemorating his
officiating at the initiation of Vma Reis mother into aiva practice (aivavratcra).29
Likewise, an epigraph dated to aka 1515 reveals a grant to the maha managed by the pontiff
Kuppasakante ivaligadva, disciple of a certain Paada Pramthvara who presided over
Basavaas house in rgiri. Prefixed to the grant is a benedictory invocation to Mallikrjuna of
rgiri as well as Paitrdhya himself, affirming allegiance to Paitrdhya as Guru on behalf
of the Gaas who accept the doctrine of the Vraaivas.30 That the institution referred to here as
Basavaas house is a monastery is clear from the honorific Paada, indicating the pontiff of a
monastic lineage; the disciple mentioned in this inscription appears to have been entrusted with
managing the operations of a local branch monastery. While little is known about Paada
Pramthvara as a historical figure, his name is remembered in hagiography as the 22nd
Jagadguru of the Girirja Sryasihsana Paitrdhya Pha (GSPP), the current incarnation of
the railam Pacrdhya lineage monastery.31
We have seen, thus far, that Paitrdhyas community cemented a potent institutional
presence in the railam region in the centuries following his own lifetime. This very same
community, in turn, set the stage for much of the textual culture, scriptural canons, and embodied
practice now accepted as Vraaivismparticularly Sanskritic Vraaivismacross regions and
languages. How and when, then, did the Pacrdhya Vraaiva tradition transcend regions? The
worship of iva as Mallikrjuna, most famously enshrined at railam, was immensely popular
westward through Maharashtra even in the early centuries of the second millennium; in short,
rdhya Vraaivism built on a rich legacy of religious transactions across the Deccan, possibly

28 This Mallanrdhya may be identical to the author a text entitled the Advaitaratna or Abhedaratna.
29

Cited as ARE Copper Plate 6 of 1986-7.

APGAS vol. 3, Mn. 81. Also referenced in Kannada Inscriptions of Andhra Pradesh, pg. 195 (No. 689).
31
See Reddy (2014) for further discussion of the recent institutional history of the GSPP.
30

20

mapped onto the very same monastic networks utilized by earlier lineages. And yet, due perhaps
simultaneously to the strengthening of rdhya presence in railam and to the rise of the
Vijayanagar empire, it is only after this point that Sanskritic Vraaivism is exported to
Karnataka in the fifteenth century. Indeed, as Chandra Shobhi (2005) has demonstrated with
regard to Vraaivism in Karnataka, it is only in the fifteenth century that Ligyat Vraaivism,
following the tradition of Basava, was codified in its current form, through the compilation and
commentary on vacana and narrative literature. Works such as the Prabhuligalle and
nyasampdane stand out as codifiers of this distinctively fifteenth-century Virakta, or
Ligyat Vraaivia identity. And yet, these very same works speak to an intermingling of
worldviews, with intellectual and ritual influence crossing seamlessly across community lines
and testifying the vibrant influence of rdhya Vraaivism in the Vijayanagar period.32
As we have seen, once the Pacrdhya lineage was imagined into existencethat is,
conceived of by definition as a network of five teachers and five mahasit was at its inception
already transregional. From railam to Balehonnor, the monasteries themselves span nearly
from the eastern to western extremities of south India. As a result, Reukcrya, remembered as
pontiff of the Balehonnur Maha, known today as Rambhpuri Pha, is crucial to measuring the
extent of early rdhya exchange across regions. According to traditional hagiography,
Reukcrya, an incarnation of the primordial Reuka Siddha or Revaasiddha, compatriot of
Agastya, was born in the Kali Yuga in Kolnupka in Andhra Pradesh (Uma Devi 1990), not far
from railam; during his own lifetime, he is said to have relocated the monastery he founded at
Kolnupka, one of the original five mahas, to its current location in Balehonnur. With regard to
the historical Reukcryaauthor of the Siddhntaikhmai, also known as ivayogi

32

It is worth noting, here, that despite its acceptance by Virakta Vraaivas, the nyasampdane shows definitive
evidence of influence from rdhya textual culture in its crucial use of the term ivdvaita, a hallmark of the nondual Vednta of Sanskritic Vraaivism (see Fisher 2017).

21

ivcryaalthough unconfirmed, such an account is by no means implausible, given the initial

efflorescence of rdhya Vraaivism at railam. Could Reukcrya be a historicizable
figure, and one with transregional ambitions for the rdhya lineage he represented? In fact, in a
proto-canonical lineage chronicle, found in a scriptural work entitled the Vraaivgama,33
speaks not of five teachers but of four: Revaa, Marua, Vmadeva, and Paitrdhya. As this
gamic extract appears rather early in doctrine and hagiography, possibly dating as early as the
thirteenth century, this encapsulated lineage may preserve memory of a historical Revaa or
Reuka at the moment of canonization.
Whatever may be determined about Reukcrya as a historical personage, the work
attributed to his hand, the Siddhntaikhmai, speaks volumes about the early westward
transmission of rdhya Vraaivism. The Siddhntaikhmai dates most likely to the thirteenth
or fourteenth centuries, referring by name to Basava and being cited by ripati, author of the
rkarabhya on the Brahmastras. Clear doctrinal similarities exist between the
Siddhntaikhamai and the early theology of the Andhra-based rdhyas; most notable among
these, however is the use of the phrase Vraaiva itself. It is in the Siddhntaikhmai, in fact,
that the often cited definition of Vraaiva first appears, a neologism that, I would argue, finds its
first articulation in this thirteenth-century text as the explicit designation of religious identity:
In the wisdom (vidy) consisting of iva, they take particular delight (ramaam);
Therefore, these fortunate ones are known as Vraaivas.34
Despite continuities, however, in its pages we discover a substantively different cast of
characters and citations, many that never grace the hagiographies of Andhra-based rdhya
preceptors in rsailam. After claiming divine incarnation for the historical Reukcrya from

33

See footnote 8 above.

Siddhntaikhmai 5.15: Vidyy ivarpy vied ramaa yata / tasmd ete mahbhg vraaiv iti
smt //
34

22

the semi-divine Revaa Siddha, the text situates itself in the lineage not of Paitrdhya but a
certain Siddharmevara, or Rma Siddha, a twelfth-century ivayogi from Solapur in southern
Maharshtra

and

author

(or

attributed

author)

of

his

own

corpus

of

Sanskrit- and Kannada-language vacanas. Thus, while internal textual continuities make it
highly unlikely that Reukcrya, author of the Siddhntaikhmai, was not at the very least in
dialogue with the nascent Vraaiva community at railam, the devotional world of the text is
centered in greater Karnataka. The same may be said for subsequent Vraaiva theologians
claiming the same lineage of descent: most notably, rpatis commentary on the Brahmastras
(ca. fourteenth century) not only cites the Siddhntaikhmai but mentions by name to Revaa
Siddha, Marua Siddha, and Rma Siddha (i.e., Siddharmevara); his clear avowal of affiliation
with Reukcryas lineage would situate him as well most likely in Karnataka rather than
Andhra Pradesh. And yet, rpati refers to known rdhya authors as historical personages
Udbhardhya and Vemanrdhya, the latter being a preceptor of Mallikrjuna Paitrdhya
suggesting that Reukas lineage descended from a transplant from railam rather than through
adventitious inspiration.35
In what sense, then, was rdhya Vraaivism disseminated through a monastic network?
Our historical record of when and where monasteries were founded is often fragmentary.
Nevertheless, textual and inscriptional evidence allow us to reconstruct the contours of how the
rdhya preceptors, whether networks of branch monasteries or intra-lineage fragmentation,
produced transplant communities that flourished in diverse regions and languages across the

35

Placing rpati at a geographical distance from railam would explain his incentive to compose a novel
Vraaiva commentary on the Brahmastras to supercede the rkahabhya. While never employing the term
Vraaiva or Vramhevara (possibly predating their efflorescence at railam), rkaha is undoubtedly a product
of the rauta-aiva world in Andhra that allowed for the fusion of gamic aivism and the devotional ivayogi
movements in early rdhya textual culture. rkaha is, however, explicitly remembered in the Kriysra, to this
day the foundational ritual handbook of the Pacrdhya lineages (and plagiarized by Appayya Dkita in his
ivrcanacandrik). See Fisher (2017) for further discussion.

23

southern half of the subcontinent. Moreover, we can situate key historical breakpoints that
facilitated this religious culture to become portable, curiously resembling, one might say in ways
the modularity Benedict Anderson attributes to nationalismin other words, allowing
monastic preceptors to replicate, in new geographical locals, the religious identities, ritual
practices, and public culture of distinct sectarian communities.
In the case of transregional Vraaivism, the rise of the Vijayanagar Empire was
undoubtedly one of these factors; known as prolific patrons of Vraaiva literature
(Marulasiddiah 1967), emperors and officiants sponsored a substantive translation enterprise of
transregional Vraaiva classics into Kannada. Perhaps best known is Bhma Kavis translation
of Palkuriki Somanthas Basava Pura into Kannada (1369 CE), prefaced by an explicit
homage to Paitrdhya.. To name an example near at hand to the present discussion, a
Kannada commentary on the Vramhevarcrasagraha of Nlakahangantha was
composed by rdharka around 1550. The philosophical literature of ivdvaita, the non-dual
Vraaivism that left its mark on the theology of Appayya Dkita, flourished under Vijayangar
patronage, which produced, among other works, the ivdvaitamajari of Svaprabhnanda. The
most conspicuous example of royal patronage, no doubt, was Prauhadevaryas commissioning
of Lakkaa Deikas ivatattvacintmai. This was the period of Myidvas Anubhavastra,
the Kannada Vivekacintai of Nijagua ivayogin,36 and most likely of Maritoadryas
commentary on the Siddhntaikhmai, among numerous others. It might not be an
exaggeration to say that it was the modularity of the rdhya traditionand its cultural
translation, not to mention linguistic reinterpretationthat made Sanskrit-language and multilingual Sanskritic Vraaivism what it remains to this day, imprinted with the textual enterprises

36 The Vivekacintmai of Nijagua ivayogin proved so immensely popular that it was translated into Marathi in
1604 by Shanteshvara Sivayogi, and into Sanskrit in 1652 by Sivaprakasha Swami.

24

of the Vijayanagar centuries.

Vraaivism in Tamil Nadu

Although Sanskritic Vraaivism took root across regions in multiple directions,
extending westward through Karnataka to Maharasthra, the case of rdhya Vraaivism in
Tamil Nadu hints at a particularly intriguing chapter in the transregionalization of south Indian
aivism. As we have seen, Appayya Dkita, the sixteenth-century Sanskrit polymath credited
with singlehandedly reinventing aivism in the Tamil South, borrowed extensivelyif
surreptitiouslyfrom rdhya Vraaiva textual culture. His crowning achievement in the
domain of theologythe invention of ivdvaita and the revival of rkahas commentary on
the Brahamstraswas a commonplace fact of discourse for generations among rdhyainspired thinkers in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. Nor was Appayya the sole voice of his
generation to actively appropriate the innovations of rdhya thought; similar themes surface in
the works of his near contemporary, ivgrayogin, multi-lingual Saiddhntika theologian writing
in Tamil and Sanskrit. How, then, did Appayya come to lay hands on the classics of Sanskritic
Vraaivism, in some cases importing them wholesale into his own oeuvre? By tracing rdhya
activity heading south from Andhra Pradesh into northern Tamil Nadu, specifically in the
vicinity of Kanchipuram, concrete evidence emerges for contextualizing just how aiva
theologians in Tamil Nadu come to be formatively influenced by Vraaiva thoughtmost
notably, Appayya Dkita himself.
Proto-Vraaivism, in the form of the Vramhevaras that initiate the earliest strata of
Vedicized aiva thought at railam, may itself have quite a lengthy history in the Tamil
country, although these lineages seem never to have set down deep roots as they did further

25

north. One intriguing reference to a proto-Vraaiva institution in the Tamil country, in fact,
predates Appayya Dkita by a number of centuriesand for that matter, predates Paitrdhya
as well. Specifically, the Tamil poet Ottukkttar, sponsored by Kulottunga Chola, pays homage
in one of his literary works to a certain monastery of the Vramhevaras in Kumbakonamthe
name Vramhevara being a title that remained in use for quite some time among Vraaivas in
the Andhra regionwhich, as I mentioned earlier, is a subject we will have reason to return to
shortly. This reference becomes all the more intriguing, however, in light of the name that
Ottukkttar assigns to this monasterythe Periya Maam, a title adopted to this day by the
Vraaiva monastery in Kumbakonam. Whether the present day Periya Maam is in fact the same
institution referenced by Ottukkttar remains to be seen; nevertheless, contemporary news media
have made repeated reference to the Periya Maams claim to a 1,000 year history strictly on the
grounds of Ottukkttars reference, the monastery grounds even boasting a memorial temple
dedicated to the legacy of the Tamil poet.
That a Vraaiva monastery should find fertile ground at Kumbakonam should perhaps
come as no surprise. It is quite typical, in fact, to discover monasteries of quite an array of
sectarian communities at major pilgrimage sites, often directly located along the perimeter of a
major temple site, ideally located to cultivate network connections with both temple officiants
and lay pilgrims. The confluence of communities at Kumbakonam in particular is renowned to
have sparked vociferous sectarian debate between rival lineages, the Vraaivas being no
exception. Traditional memory within the Mdhva community, for instance, in a certain
Vijayndrastotra, describes a public debate between Vijayndra Trtha himself and a popular local

26

preceptor based at a Vraaiva monastery.37 Vijayndras victory, according to the Mdhva

account, lead to the transfer of ownership of local Vraaiva monasteries to Mdhva control.
Whether there is any historical veracity to this narrative may ultimately be impossible to
ascertain, but the proposition that Vraaiva monasteries were established in the vicinity of
Kumbakonam during Vijayndras day in the early seventeenth century is a plausible proposition.
Nevertheless, the Kumbakonam Periya Maam was not the only Vraaiva monastic
institution to be incorporated by the seventeenth century. Other active monateries included the
Mayilam Bommapuram Adheenam in Villupuram and the Ambalathadi Maam in Cidambaram.
Two of the most significant contenders to this honor, howeverwhose lineage hagiographies are
intertwined from the roots upare the Perur Maam in the vicinity of Coimbatore, and the
Tiruthuraiyur Vraaiva Adheenam in Tiruvannamalai. The lineage chronicles of these
monasteries, in fact, raise significant questions about the interconnected histories of what are
now considered distinct sectarian communitiesnamely, the Tamil Vraaivas and the Tamil
aiva Siddhnta. 38 Both the Perur Maam of Coimbatore and the Tiruthuraiyur Vraaiva
Adheenam in Tiruvannamalai trace their ancestry to a single charismatic saint, popularly known
as di Civappirakcar (ivapraka). di Civappirakcar so named to distinguish him from
another Civappirakcar, otherwise known as Turaimakalam Civappirakcar,39 the most prolific
Vraaiva theologian of the early modern Tamil country. His early seventeenth-century
namesake, howeverthe earlier Civappirakcaris said to have been initiated by
Namacivyamrti of the Tiruvvauthurai maam of the Tamil aiva Siddhnta. As legend has

37

See Heras, Aravidu Dynasty of Viajayangar, pg. 532 and Also Epigraphical Indica XIII pg. 346. B. K. N. Sharma
(1961, pg. 399) claims that such a aiva maha can be found facing the Kumbhevara temple in Kumbakonam, now
fallen into disrepair, but indeed the property of the Vijayndra Maha.
38 On the monastic lineages of the Tamil aiva Siddhnta, see Koppedrayer (1990).
39
Turaimakalam Civappirakcar, in fact, is well-known for his prolific importation and translation of Kannada
Vraaiva classics, as is discussed below. In later generations, this strata of Tamil Vraaiva literature seems to have
been actively embraced by the Tamil aiva Siddhnta community, as we find nineteenth century Tamil Saiddhntika
thinkers commenting on these works (see, for instance, Steinschneider, forthcoming).

27

it,40 di Civaippirakcar, a devotee of Lord Naarja of Cidambaram, chanced to meet with a

vassal of the Vijayangar Empire by name of Ligana, who, as his name suggests, was a devout
Vraaiva. Upon meeting Ligana, we are told, a celestial voice visited di Civappirakcar in a
dream and enjoined him to promptly convert to Vraaivisma narrative that, we must note,
implies a firm distinction between the aiva Siddhnta and Vraaivism as distinct sectarian
identities, boundaries that may have in fact been remarkably malleable.
Little evidence exists to suggest that di Civipirakcar underwent what we might call a
conversion process, disavowing an original allegiance the theology and practice of the aiva
Siddhnta. One of his works does raises a distinct possibility that he can be linked theologically
to the pan-south Indian ivdvaita movementa treatise by the name of the Attuvta (Advaita)
Vepa, an exegetical work of the Vraaiva ivdvaita tradition. But whatever his sectarian
origins may have been, due to his attested miracles and widespread success as a charismatic
saint, di Civapirakcar was gifted with a monastery of his own in Tiruvannmalai, splitting
with the Tamil aiva Siddhnta lineage at Tiruvvaduthurai to found what is now the
Tiruthuraiyur Vraaiva Adheenam. He is remembered, nevertheless, as a pivotal figure in the
history of the Tamil aiva Siddhnta, as legend has it that he secured the succession of the
lineage by installing the subsequent preceptor, Marainadesikar, to the seat of Tiruvvaduthurai
after the death of his own initiatory teacher Namacivyamrti.
On the Vraaiva side, however, di Civappirakcar was indubitably a father of
monasteries. Over the course of his travels, he initiated a well-known Vraaiva theologian by the

40

This hagiographical accountas well as those discussed belowis summarized in Sivagnanam and
Balasubrahmaniam (2011), with explicit celebration of the lineages connection to the Tamil aiva Siddhnta at
Tiruvavatuturai. See also N. Murugesas Mudaliars (1972) translation and analysis of the Path of Pure
Consciousness (uddha Sadhakam), a Tamil composition of Kumra Tvar, disciple of Cantalika Cuvmika. Both
the text itself and the contextualization on the part of the author speak to the widespread synthesis of Vraaivism
and the Tamil iva Siddhnta in the Tamil country.

28

name of Cantalika Cuvmika, founder of the Perur Maam in Coimbatore. He is reputed to

have been acquainted as well with Civana Blaya Cuvmi, the founder of the Mayilam
Bommapuram Adheenam in Villupuram. He was also said to have been the initiatory preceptor
of his namesake, Turaimakalam Civappirakcar, who is particularly renowned for his literary
efforts to make Vraaivism accessible to the Tamil country, translating a number of Kannada
and Sanskrit classics into Tamil for the first time, including, most notably his Pirapulikallai, a
translation of the Kannada Prabhuligalile, and a Tamil translation of the Siddhntaikhmai.
What we encounter, succinctly, is a hagiographical narrative from within Tamil Vraaivism that
would trace the efflorescence of the movement to a single charismatic figure who converted to
Vraaivism from the Tamil aiva Siddhnta, which by the early seventeenth century could boast
a more properly Tamil pedigree. In other words, Tamil Vraaivism, in its self-representation,
has been thoroughly and deliberately marked by the stamp of Tamil authenticity, perhaps to
purge any sense that it may be something of a foreign import.
Let us assume for the moment, for the sake of argument, that each of these monasteries
has accurately captured the impetus behind their establishment. If we accept these accounts,
preliminary, as valid historical documents, we run into something of a historical dilemma: the
forefather of these monasteries, di Civappirakcar, was not active until the early seventeenth
century, up to half a century after Appayya Dkita. This proves something of an insoluble
problem for tracing the advent of ivdvaita in the Tamil country, as represented by sixteenthcentury theologians such as Appayya Dkita and ivgrayogin, to known Tamil Vraaiva
institutions. Were these figures simply influential path-breakers, acting of their own volition to
import a textual corpus that had never before been seen in the Tamil country? Or might there be
another institutional context that makes sense of how Appayya Dkita may have found works

29

like the Kriysra readily available when seeking to compose his own manual for daily aiva
practice, the ivrcanacandrik?
The hypothesis I would like to propose for this dilemma actually takes us fairly far afield
from the Tamil Vraaiva monasteries active from the seventeenth century through the present
day. We are forced, in the process, to scrutinize the implicit assumption of both scholarship and
hagiography that Vraaivism in Tamil Nadu is necessarily an import from Karnataka and the
nascent Virakta communities of the Vijayanagar period. One text in particular provides us with a
missing piece to this puzzle, one ideally encapsulated by the name of its author: Kc
ankarrdhya, who claims to have translated the Basava Pura of Palkuriki Somantha into
Sanskrit. The peculiarity of this name may perhaps be readily apparentthe author signals, first
and foremost, his affiliation with the Tamil city of Kanchipuram, itself a major monastic center
that has for centuries fostered dialogue between sectarian lineages. But just as importantly, the
name akarrdhya suggests a lineage affiliation that is not only Vraaiva but rooted in the
Sanskritic Vraaiva tradition of the Pacrdhya preceptors. In fact, the Sanskrit Basava Pura
proves to be quite a wealth of information on the transregional transmission of the Pacrdhya
lineage, as Kanci akarrdhya provides us with an entire first chapter of nearly two hundred
verses, laying out the details of his sectarian lineage, intellectual influences, and the political and
familial history of his patron. The lineage he invokes, unsurprisingly, testifies to his explicit
affiliation with the rdhyas operating out of the railam region:
Having forcibly lead Viu in K to the sanctuary of the Lord of the Universe,
He broke his enemies: I honor him, Macanapaita.
Long live rpatipaita, who having set fire to a cloth, with the thesis,
Grace is purifying, bound it to a am tree.
I offer my folded hands in homage to Lord Mallikrjunrdhya,
Who has dispersed his detractors, who has attained a gaze upward from Rudra.

30

The mountain rgiri, by name, surpasses all, adorned with gravitas,

Where the Lord Mallikrjuna resides with Bhramara Dev.41
What do we make, then, of this invocation? While himself a resident of Kanchi, and, as he
will subsequently inform us, an ardent devotee of iva as Ekmrantha, who is local to Kanchi
itself, akarrdhya places front and center an homage to a lineage that originates well beyond
the orbit of Kanchi. Beginning with his genuflection to Macana Paita,42 a historical as well as
hagiographical figure in the early rdhya community, akarrdhya indicates unambiguously
his affiliation with the founding preceptors of the Pacrdhya lineage, who are responsible for
the earliest theological efflorescence of Vraaiva writings in Sanskrit. Moreover, he makes
explicit the geographical and institutional foundations of the Pacrdhya lineage with his
reference to the deity Mallikrjuna, and the rgiri mountain otherwise known as railam on
the Krishna River in Andhra Pradesh. akarrdhya makes particular mention of ripati, author
of the rkarabhya, the first Vraaiva-inflected commentary on the Brahmastras. A case can
be made, in short, that Sanskritic Vraaivism as a whole owes its historical trajectory to the
import and institutionalization of Vraaivism around the thirteenth or fourteenth century in the
railam region.
Having placed himself within the extended lineage of the rdhya aivas at railam,
then, akarrdhya proceeds with a somewhat lengthy dynastic chronicle of the Reddy
kingdom, to whom he attributes directly the prosperity of his own sectarian community and the

41

Kc akarrdhya, Basavapuram: 1. 3, 4, 6, 12: nya tu hahd viu ky viveasannidhim /

babhaja vidvio yas ta manye macanapaitam // prasda pvana iti pratiygnim auke / badhv
babandha ya amy jyc chrpatipaita // rmallikrjunrdhyadevyjalir arpyate / avptordhvade
rudrd vidrvitavirodhine // jayati rgirir nma girir garimabhita / yatrsti bhramardevy deva
rmallikrjuna //
42
Macana Paita, often known within the community as one of the twelve venerables (rdhyas), also known as
ivaleka Macaa, to whom a collection of vacanas is attributed, s also a historicizable figure. For instance,
Macana Paita is mentioned in conjunction with Mallikrjuna Paitrdhya in the benedictory verses of Bhma
Kavis Kannada Basavapura (1369 CE).

31

Mallikrjuna temple at railam. His strong cultural memory of Reddy influence in southern
Andhra, one might surmise, would place akarrdhya at a surprisingly early date in
comparison to other known Vraaiva theologians in the Tamil country, possibly as early as the
end of the fifteenth century. And indeed, further evidence within the text confirms this
hypothesiscuriously enough by way of an intriguing autobiographical anecdote that recounts
akarrdhyas motivation in translating the Basava Purana into Sanskrit. He first arrived in
Kanchipuram, he tells us, out of a desire to see the world, although residing in Kanchipuram he
acquired a fervent devotion for the citys local aiva deity, Ekmrantha. But perhaps more
importantly, over the course of his travels, akarrdhya was compelled to take up residence in
Kanchi after encountering a charismatic saint who, as he puts it, acted like the dawn as charioteer
to the sun to dispell his veil of ignorance, a aiva preceptor he refers to as Praknanda Deika.
It was this same Praknanda, he tells us, who, having taken a keen interest in learning more
about Vraaiva theology, implored akarrdhya to translate the Basava Pura from Telugu
into Sanskrit, the Language of the Godsfor, as he puts it, the vernacular, bh, does not travel
beyond ones immediate region.
Just who is this Praknanda, and what was his sectarian affiliation? Intellectual history
at the turn of the sixteenth century lends us the temptation to equate this Praknanda with the
well-known Advaita theologian, promulgator of the di-si approach to Vednta and chief
opponent and interlocutor of Madhusdana Sarasvat. While the chronology does fit, and
precious few Praknandas can be pinpointed as his direct contemporaries, such an
identification is difficult to confirm. Were this the case, akarrdhyas account would make
for one of the more intriguing biographical episodes preserved in early modern intellectual
history in south India. Whatever his identity may be, his initiatory name would suggest affiliation

32

with a Dasanam or akarcrya lineagewhich itself is a tantalizing piece of evidence, as

akarcrya presence in Kanchipuram is still in its foundational stages up through the end of
the sixteenth century.
What we discover, then, in the migration of akarrdhya to Kanchipuram and his
productive exchange with Praknanda, is compelling evidence of interchange between
Sanskritic Vraaivism and Brahminical aivas established in the Tamil region as early as the
late fifteenth century. akarrdhya, indeed, may predate Appayya Dkita himself by as much
as a century, suggesting that by the late sixteenth century, the gradual migration of rdhya
Vraaivas from railam southward to northern Tamil Nadu may have been a fairly widespread
phenomenon. Appayya Dkita himself, it must be recalled, took up residence on the outskirts of
Vellore, not far from Kanchipuram, and his own Smrta Brahmin family is reputed to have
hailed from the Andhra region in previous generations. By reconstructing rdhya presence in
the northern Tamil region, we can begin to trace an entirely different network of transmission of
Vraaiva influence in Tamil aivism, arriving not by adventitious conversion at the hands of
visitors from Karnataka as seventeenth century monastics would have it, but by the gradual
expansion of monastic networks that were previously rooted in the cultural orbit of the greater
railam region.

Religion in Translation: Networks and Religious Publics

From its inception in twelfth-century Andhra, Pacrdhya Vraaivism was always
already transregional. Its transcendence of the boundaries of language and region manifested first
in the cultivation of earlier Kmukha networks, spanning the breadth of the subcontinent, and
its embrace of the narrative literature of the itinerant ivayogi. Accepting Basava of Kalya as a

33

principle figurehead, the early rdhya theologians founded a discursive community that was
geographically and linguistically distinct from north-eastern Karnataka. Its textual culture was
not only born bilingual but was fundamentally polyglossic in its textual registers, balancing the
early Telugu prabandha as hagiography with a novel canon of philosophy, scripture, and popular
mythology in Sanskrit. The polyvocality of its regional commitments, succinctly, belie the postnationalist alliance between language, region and religionwhat Arvind Pal Mandair (2009)
has called mono-theo-linguisma staple of post-colonial identity formation that has found all
too fertile ground in the scholarship of the pre-colonial south Asian past. The fluid commingling
of identities and voices, then, itself by no means a unique product of the rdhya lineages but
typical of many localities in South Asia, offers us a glimpse at the precolonial production of a
public religious culture: insistently multi-lingual, mapping transregional networks within the
space of a single temple town.
Twelfth- and thirteenth-century railam, no doubt, would offer an ideal locale for the
sort of project Francesca Orsini (2012) calls for as multi-lingual literary history, replacing
fabricated literary histories of a single language with the cacophonous circulation of people,
manuscripts, and performances in local urban space. There is much to be said for telling the story
of transregionality at the level of the local, or better yet, for viewing an entire continent from a
single city street.43 And yet, this sort of project does little to tell us how a new religious public
once envisioned, vividly enacted by a local populaceitself becomes transregional, such that to
be a Vraaiva, or an rdhya aiva, can mean something eminently similar in Srisailam and
Balehonnur, in Solapur and Kancipuram.
In early modern south India, the rise of this sectarian modularity cannot be explained by

43 Campus talk by Justin McDaniel, University of Wisconsin-Madison, February 2, 2016.

34

restricting the archive to isolated spheres of discourse, centered on specific caste or linguistic
communities. Indeed, the fluent reproduction of identities across linguistic boundaries pressures
us to move beyond mere discourse to explain the institutional foundations that foster cohesive,
transregional religious communities. Together, the essays in this volume set a new agenda for
rethinking the south Indian monastery, or maha, and its socio-religious significance. A south
Indian maha, though it may be a site for spiritual retreat or a repository of scriptural learning,
can also act as local power-broker, landlord, bank, or even as a self-contained fiefdom with a
standing armyall defying Euro-centric presuppositions about what the word monastery may
purport to translate. In all cases, however, the vast majority of mahas were not isolated
enterprises. The social capital of a monastic lineage depended, to a great degree, quite literally,
on its networkabilityon its ability to propagate its distinctive brand of ritual practice and
community identity even across the entrenched lines of language and region. As I have
illustrated here through the Pacrdhya lineages, the maha as network provides an ideal
foundation for rethinking religious change in institutional contexthow new movements,
identities, and worldviews transcend their context of enunciation through the foundation of
transregional sectarian communities.

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