The Sri Vaishnava sampradaya (Sri sampradaya)

What the Sri Vaishnava sampradaya is

“Sri” is a name of Lakshmi and also a prefix of respect. In this tradition Lakshmi is held to be inseparable from Vishnu and a mediator of grace between God and the devotee; hence the name Sri Vaishnava, and Lakshmi is counted as its first teacher.

One mark of the tradition is the joining of two streams: Sanskrit texts such as the Vedas, Upanishads, Brahma Sutra, Gita and Pancharatra Agamas, and the Tamil devotional hymns of the Alvar saints. This view, which holds both together, is also called Ubhaya Vedanta (“the Vedanta of both”).

History in brief

The Alvars were Vishnu-devotee saints of Tamil Nadu (traditionally 7th–10th century). Tradition dates the founding of the sampradaya to Nathamuni in the 10th century, who gathered the 4,000 verses of the twelve Alvars into the Nalayira Divya Prabandham. His grandson Yamuna (Alavandar) became the teacher at Srirangam.

Ramanuja was born at Sriperumbudur. At Kanchi he studied under Yadavaprakasha, a teacher of Advaita, but differed from him on the meaning of the Upanishads. By tradition he never met Yamuna: by the time he reached Srirangam, Yamuna had died. Yamuna’s disciple Periya Nambi (Mahapurna) gave him the fivefold initiation (pancha-samskara), and after taking sannyasa he became the teacher at Srirangam, where he wrote the Sri Bhashya on the Brahma Sutra.

Because of opposition from a Shaiva Chola king, Ramanuja spent several years in the Hoysala kingdom (today’s Karnataka). There King Bittideva became his disciple and took the name Vishnuvardhana, and with his help the temple of Tirunarayana was built at Melkote (Yadavadri). He also travelled in North India; Dasgupta lists Mathura, Vrindavan, Ayodhya, Badari, Benares and Puri, and writes that he founded a matha at Puri. Later he returned to Srirangam, where he died. According to Dasgupta he accepted disciples without regard to caste; one of his own teachers, Kanchipurna, was not a Brahmin.

After Ramanuja, teachers began to differ on the nature of prapatti (surrender). According to Dasgupta two branches formed in the time of Vedanta Desika (Venkatanatha, 1268–1369): the Vadakalai (“northern”, towards Kanchipuram), led by Vedanta Desika, and the Tenkalai (“southern”, towards Srirangam), led by Pillai Lokacharya and later Manavala Mamuni (1370–1443). Dasgupta notes that the teachers themselves were well disposed to one another, and that the main difference was the reading of prapatti, along with some differences of practice such as the forehead mark.

Beliefs and practice

Vishishtadvaita: Brahman is one and endowed with countless auspicious qualities. Souls and the world are real, not illusion; they are Brahman’s “body” and Brahman is their inner self, as a soul dwells in a body (sharira-shariri bhava). This Brahman is Narayana with Lakshmi. In liberation the soul serves the Lord in Vaikuntha without losing its own distinct nature.

The paths are bhakti and prapatti. According to Bhandarkar, Ramanuja’s bhakti is continuous meditation on God; prapatti is prayer made with the firm conviction that God alone is the saviour and that there is no other way to his grace. The difference between the two branches is explained by a simile: the Vadakalai speak of a baby monkey, which holds on to its mother itself (the devotee’s effort also counts), and the Tenkalai of a kitten, which the mother cat carries without its effort (all is by God’s grace).

The Vadakalai lay more stress on the Sanskrit Vedas and the works of Vedanta Desika, the Tenkalai on the Alvars’ Tamil Divya Prabandham and the line of Manavala Mamuni; yet both hold the Vedas and the Prabandham sacred, and both give the fivefold initiation according to the Pancharatra Agamas. Bhandarkar gives sixteen modes of worship quoted by a writer of Ramanuja’s school, among them the marks of the conch and discus on the body, the vertical mark on the forehead, the fast on the Ekadashi of both fortnights and offering tulsi leaves to the Lord; he names “Om Namo Narayanaya” as the tradition’s eight-syllable mantra.

Main centres

The Ranganathaswamy temple at Srirangam, on the island between the Kaveri and the Kollidam, is counted first among the 108 Divya Desams and was Ramanuja’s field of work; it follows the Tenkalai tradition, and by tradition Ramanuja’s body is preserved there in a shrine. Kanchipuram (the Varadaraja Perumal temple) is linked with Ramanuja’s early life and with the Vadakalai tradition, Sriperumbudur is his birthplace, and Melkote in Karnataka is where he lived in the Hoysala kingdom.

The heads of the sampradaya’s mathas are called Jiyar (Jeeyar). Leading Vadakalai mathas include the Ahobila Matha at Ahobilam in Andhra Pradesh (founded in the early 1400s by Adivan Shathakopa Jiyar), the Parakala Matha at Mysore and the Andavan Ashramam at Srirangam; leading Tenkalai mathas include those at Srirangam, the Vanamamalai Matha at Nanguneri, the Yatiraja Matha at Melkote and the Jiyar mathas of Tirumala-Tirupati.

Where the sources differ

• Ramanuja’s dates: tradition and Dasgupta give 1017–1137 (a life of 120 years), and Bhandarkar a birth in Shaka 938, that is 1016 or 1017; modern scholars such as John Carman suggest 1077–1157 on the basis of temple records.
• When the Vadakalai–Tenkalai split happened: according to Dasgupta in the 14th century, in the time of Vedanta Desika and Pillai Lokacharya; the Wikipedia article traces the disagreement to the 13th–15th-century debate between Srirangam and Kanchipuram and places the formal split in one place in the 16th and in another in the 18th century. According to Patricia Mumme the monkey-and-cat simile first appears in 18th-century Tamil texts.
• Founder: tradition counts Lakshmi as the first teacher; according to Wikipedia the founding is traditionally credited to Nathamuni (10th century); and the sampradaya is most often known by the name of Ramanuja, its chief philosopher.
• Ramanuja’s years in the Hoysala kingdom: tradition says 12; Dasgupta gives Gopinatha Rao’s view that it was about 20, of which 12 were spent at Melkote; Wikipedia gives 14.
• The two branches on caste: Bhandarkar calls the Tenkalai the more liberal, and according to Wikipedia some scholars (Raman) agree while others (Sadarangani) consider the Vadakalai the more liberal.

Frequently asked questions