Why did Adi Sankaracharya propagate his teachings and writing in Sanskrit?

Question

Adi Sankara was affluent in Tamil and Malayalam, why did he not choose to write his teachings and stotras in these native languages but choose Sanskrit which was hardly spoken and understood by the mass.

Answer 1

Good question. i will try my level best to answer this question. i will be happy if it gives you satisfaction. Now we will go to the answer.



my answer: It is true as per history that Shri Adi Shankaracharya propagate his teachings and done works in sanskrit language. why is the question now. why he wrote and why he do propagandas ? we will see now.



The following mensioned are in sanskrit language:



'Veda' means knowledge. The Vedas are the sacred texts for Hindu rituals and for the religion itself.

RigVeda, YajurVeda, AtharvaVeda and SamaVeda are the four Vedas.

The Rig Veda comprises of 1028 hymns in praise of various gods. These hymns or 'Suktas' are arranged in 10 'Mandalas' or books. The Yajur Veda is mostly prose and makes use of the Rig Veda to explain sacrifices. The Atharva Veda is a collection of spells and charms. The Sama Veda is almost wholly drawn from the Rig Veda. All the above mentioned scriptures are part of the Vedic Literature.



While a scripture, vedas, upnishads etc.,are in a specific language, it is good to learn, to spread, to create meanings in the same language. Suppose as you said if Adi shankara done the works in any other language, the meaning while translating the mantras as well as the sound of mantras may change and all opportunities are there. Hence, Shri Adi Sankara chose the origin of vedas which were in sanskrit felt better to spread. Moreover, the sanskrit language flourished all over the south Asia on those days like Tamil language in south india.



Sanskrit Language used in support of his Thesis:



Shri Adi Shankara is believed to be the organizer of the Dashanami monastic order and the founder of the Shanmata tradition of worship. His works in Sanskrit, all of which are extant today, concern themselves with establishing the doctrine of Advaita (Nondualism). He also established the importance of monastic life as sanctioned in the Upanishads and Brahma Sutra, in a time when the Mimamsa school established strict ritualism and ridiculed monasticism.



Shri Adi Shankara relied entirely on the Upanishads for reference concerning Brahman and wrote copious commentaries on the Vedic Canon (Brahma Sutra, Principal Upanishads and Bhagavadgita) in support of his thesis. The main opponent in his work is the Mimamsa school of thought, though he also offers some arguments against the views of some other schools like Samkhya and certain schools of Buddhism that he was familiar with.



If Shri Adi Sankara done the works in other than sanskrit, it will not help the people on religious texts. so, he chose the sanskrit language. Importantly, there were more fake religions at the time of Shri Adi Sankara period. Shri Adi Sankara felt that it will be better to argue, to find the truths with those fake religions, he used sanskrit language besides the Bhuddhism religion too.



The more important:



Considering this a healthy debate, i chose to answer to clear the doubts of all. Neither Malayalam the language, nor its script, nor the Devanagari script are attested at Shri Adi Shankara's time. His ethnicity is now assumed to Malayali because of his place of birth, but given that the area could be considered to be part of the wider 'Tamil country' of those times, so Dravida naadu. The debate about the Devanagari and Malayalam scripts was quite a while ago, but I just want to clarify something. Devanagari is not, and certainly was not in the past, "the" Sanskrit script. Sanskrit can be and has historically been written in all or most Brahmi-derived scripts. A Malayali is quite likely to use the Malayalam script to write in Sanskrit. However, neither of these scripts would have been around in Shankaracharya's time.



A movie in full sanskrit: The first and only Indian movie to be made in Sanskrit. The movie follows the life and times of Sankara - the founder of the non-duality (Advaita) school of Indian philosophy.



Thanks for the opportunity !!!

Answer 2

Malayalam came into existence almost eight hundred years after the Jagatguru. Samskrit, a blend of Germanic root words, words from Pali and Prakrit, and Tamil (all living languages at the time), was evolved to make communication easier to different parts of India. Hence, the Jagatguru chose it. It was out of necessity. But he had great admiration for his mother tongue, Tamil. In stanza 75 of Soundaryalahari, he calls St. Thirugnanasambandha the King among poets.

Answer 3

If he chose tamil or malayalam then the people who don't know the language cant understand a thing so he choose a common language since sanskritam is better than english he adopted it. If he would have written his teachings in mother tongue then it would have been limited to people who understood that language. His wanted his knowledge to go far and wide not limited to specific regions.

Plus in hinduism if u know sanskrit u can study vedams, upanishadams, strotrams, bhagwat gita,mantrams, puranams, etc. all the veda patashalas nowadays conduct classes in sanskritam only.

thats the way it is.

Answer 4

Sanskrit is primary Hindu religion language , so he might have thought that his teaching should reach the teachers and preachers of Hinduism . though them it will reach millions , than reach only to Tamil and Malayalam speakers .

Answer 5

Although he is known as the primary exponent in the theory of Advaitism, he too had his share of unjust moments. He was never accepted as a part of the traditional and orthodox tamil brahmins since one of his parent was from a low caste. They also asked him to move out of their spiritual areas. With this vengeance did Shankara move and built different mutts of his teaching and followings. He also then shunned Tamil for Sanskrit while writing theories and stotrams. Even for the purpose of debates he used Sanskrit. In this way he could reach more people and saints during those days to present his philosophy.

Answer 6

Its the same reason that the English scientist Sir Isac newton wrote his works in Latin. It was the scholarly language of the time and place.



Edit:

@grayure, Malayam appears to have been a separate language from Tamil from 100BCE. It was written in the Tamil script until the 700CE though, so that might be what you were thinking of. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malayalam#Evolution



Also Tamil is quite capable of expressing spiritual truths, the Tirumantiram shows this.

Answer 7

even today there are only ahandful of scientists who fully understand einsteins theory of relativity. Similarly only scholars well versed in sanskrit only could understand the teachings of Adi shankara.For massies he prescribe the five kinds of worship called Ganapatyam, Shaktam, Kaumaram, Shaivam and vaishnavam.The sixth one called advaitam was purely highly progresed spiritual souls. (ganaptyam is followed in Maharashtra, Saivam is spread all over Inis mostly in Bihar UP& Himacjal Saktam in Bengal, and Assam, Kaumaram in Tamilnadu and kerala, Vaishnavam in western UP, Rajsthan Gujarat, and along the westand east coastal regions)

Answer 8

Because Sanskrit is perfect for expressing spiritual truths. It's a language which has been used for that for millenia and has therefore become specialised for that purpose. Also, it's more closely related to lots of other languages than the Dravidian tongues and therefore more accessible to people elsewhere than in South India.



Also, just looked at his dates. You are aware, aren't you, that at that time Malayalam didn't exist as a separate language from Tamil?

Answer 9

because he was a scholar in it

and in those days sanskrit teachings were highly respected by religious people

Answer 10

Because it is Gods own Language.

Answer 11

Sanskrit is a perfect language and is therefore very glorious.

http://vedabase.net/bg/10/34/en2



In Sanskrit, there are definite rules that regulate poetry; rhyme and meter are not written whimsically, as in much modern poetry.

http://vedabase.net/bg/10/35/en2



According to learned scholars, there are three different sources of knowledge, which are called prasthana-traya. According to these scholars, Vedanta is one of such sources, for it presents Vedic knowledge on the basis of logic and sound arguments. In the Bhagavad-gita (13.5) the Lord says, brahma-sutra-padais caiva hetumadbhir viniscitaih: "Understanding of the ultimate goal of life is ascertained in the Brahma-sutra by legitimate logic and argument concerning cause and effect." Therefore the Vedanta-sutra is known as nyaya-prasthana, the Upanisads are known as sruti-prasthana, and the Gita, Mahabharata and Puranas are known as smrti-prasthana. All scientific knowledge of transcendence must be supported by sruti, smrti and a sound logical basis.

http://vedabase.net/cc/adi/7/106/en2



But as is seen from the verse below, Sanskrit is not so important without devotion.



"[Lord Krsna said:] 'Even though a person is a very learned scholar of the Sanskrit Vedic literatures, he is not accepted as My devotee unless he is pure in devotional service. However, even though a person is born in a family of dog-eaters, he is very dear to Me if he is a pure devotee who has no motive to enjoy fruitive activity or mental speculation. Indeed, all respects should be given to him, and whatever he offers should be accepted. Such devotees are as worshipable as I am.'

http://vedabase.net/cc/madhya/20/58/en2



Therefore, Sankaracarya wrote at the end:

bhaja govindam bhaja govindam

bhaja govindam mudha-mate

sampräpte sannihite kale

na hi na hi raksati dukrn-karane

"You intellectual fools, just worship Govinda, just worship Govinda, just worship Govinda. Your grammatical knowledge and word jugglery will not save you at the time of death."



Mayavadi sannyasis are always very puffed up because of their knowledge of Sanskrit and because they belong to the Sankara-sampradaya. They are always under the impression that unless one is a brahmana and a very good Sanskrit scholar, especially in grammar, one cannot accept the renounced order of life or become a preacher. Mayavadi sannyasis always misinterpret all the sastras with their word jugglery and grammatical compositions, yet Sripada Sankaracarya himself condemned such jugglery of words in the verse prapte sannihite kale na hi na hi raksati dukrn karane. Dukrn refers to suffixes and prefixes in Sanskrit grammar. Sankaracarya warned his disciples that if they concerned themselves only with the principles of grammar, not worshiping Govinda, they were fools who would never be saved. Yet in spite of Sripada Sankaracarya's instructions, foolish Mayavadi sannyasis are always busy juggling words on the basis of strict Sanskrit grammar.

http://vedabase.net/cc/adi/7/64/en2



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