Madhva's Critics and Non-Critics

Mesquita is very wrong in his impression that Madhva was criticized for his unknown sources right from his own time. Even if we accept his suggestion that Varadaguru and Venkatanatha were of Madhva's own time,³⁹ the fact remains that neither scholar has referenced Madhva, his doctrine, his works, or his statements. A random or undirected diatribe about people who use unknown sources cannot be correlated with Madhva except by a stretch of Mesquita's ill-founded imagination. The fact remains that the first opponent to clearly accuse Madhva was Appayyadiksita, who came three centuries later, and it is also highly significant that Appayya offers his criticisms on his own, with no reference to previous views. It is also significant that no follower of Madhva upto the time of Vijayindra Tirtha felt the need to respond to the charge, as surely would have been done had it been known before then. It is not plausible that such a charge made would have been ignored, since Jayatirtha and others were quick to consider and explain other charges against Madhva.

These issues have already been discussed by Sharma⁴⁰ in extenso under the rubrics `Problem of Sources' (pp. 87-89) and `Problem of Untraceable Texts' (pp. 437-438). Although this material must have been easily available to him, Mesquita remains unaware, as Sharma notes (p. 632).

As new evidence, we should note that Vyasaraya (1460-1539), who initiated the polemical battle between Dvaita and Advaita with his Nyayamrta, quotes some of Madhva's supposedly ``fictitious'' sources as authorities in his favor, and his opponent Madhusudana Saraswati, who did not even refrain from name-calling during the course of his defense of Advaita, makes no charge of unknown sources, but instead strives to explain the authorities in his own side's favor.

For instance, Vyasaraya quotes a line attributed to the Brahma-Tarka in the Visnu-tattva-vinirnaya, in the first pariccheda, under the topic pratyaksasya jatya upakramadinyayaisca prabalyam.⁴¹

Note particularly the following:

``prabalyamagamasyaiva jatya tesu trisu smrtam'' iti tu
vaidikarthavisayam $\vert$

In response,⁴² the Advaitasiddhi says:

tadagrhitagrahitvamapi na prabalye prayojakam ...

--and specifically concludes with:

pratyuta agamasyaiva sarvatah prabalyam smaryate
--``prabalyamagamasyaiva jatya tesu trisu smrtam'' iti $\vert$
na ca tad `vaidikarthavisayam' iti vacyam,
advaitasyapi vaidikarthavisayatvat $\vert$

Similarly, the Nyayamrta quotes⁴³ a verse attributed to the Parama-Sruti in the Visnu-tattva-vinirnaya:

``ahamityeva yo vedyah sa jiva iti kirtitah $\vert$
sa duhkhi sa sukhi caiva sa patram bandhamoksayoh $\vert$''
iti srutau moksanvayoktesca $\vert$

The Advaitasiddhi response is seen to accept the validity of the quote offered.⁴⁴

As such, the conclusions are that the question of unknown sources never figured in the Nyayamrta-Advaitasiddhi debate, the locus classicus for the criticism--and defense--of Madhva, and that criticism of his sources was not uniformly made from his time on, unlike the impression conveyed by Mesquita.