[Advaita-l] Interesting article.

[Vidyasankar Sundaresan]

> 
> Namaskar,
> 
> One doubt keeps lurking in my mind when this topic comes up. Suppose
> we accept the dates proposed by Sringeri Sharada peetham, what
> explanation could be given to the guru parampara of the other 3 amnaya
> peethams which date before 788AD? Is it really possible that all those
> acharyas before 788AD are fake or "created"?
> On the other hand, if we accept 509BC as the date, as proposed by the
> other 3 mutts, what explanation could be given to the huge gap of over
> 1000 years that would be generated within the Sringeri Guru parampara?
> What happened to all the gurus in between this huge time gap?
> 

Neither of the above. The true answer is that dates are shaky. In general, record
keeping about these matters and preserving them over time has not been a strong
point in the history of any of the Mathas or for that matter, in any traditional Indian
institution. The dates attached to the paramparAs have largely been derived in the
19th century and the discrepancies are because the various Mathas have all done
this exercise independent of one another. One should keep an open mind about the
dates currently being given out, without reading too much into their differences.
 
Vidyasankar