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Can someone explain Ramanuja’s Vishishtadvaita fairly, from an Advaitin’s point of view?

Arjun Iyer Fellow
· 3 replies
Religions comparedIndianVedantaAdi Shankara#advaita#vishishtadvaita
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I have read Shankara for decades and I confess I have never given Rāmānuja the attention he deserves. My Vaishnava friends tell me I misrepresent him whenever I speak about him.

So I ask, in good faith: what exactly is Vishishtadvaita, "qualified non-dualism"? How does it differ from Advaita on the nature of Brahman, the world and the self? And what are Rāmānuja's main objections to Shankara?

3 answers

Accepted answer

  1. Meera Kulkarni

    ✓ Accepted answer Fellow

    Happy to try, Arjun-ji.

    Rāmānuja (traditionally 1017–1137) agrees with Shankara that Brahman is the one ultimate reality. But Brahman is qualified: it has real attributes and includes real individual souls (cit) and real matter (acit). The relation is like that of soul and body (śarīra–śarīrī). The world and souls are Brahman's body: real, dependent, distinct, but inseparable from Brahman.

    Key differences:

    • Brahman is personal, Nārāyaṇa, with infinite auspicious qualities, not a featureless (nirguṇa) absolute.
    • The world is real, not an appearance.
    • The self is a real individual, eternally distinct from Brahman even in liberation; liberation is loving communion, not identity.
    • The path is bhakti, devotion, supported by knowledge, rather than knowledge alone.

    His famous critique in the Śrī Bhāṣya is the "seven untenabilities" (saptavidha anupapatti) of avidyā: where does ignorance reside? If in Brahman, Brahman isn't pure knowledge; if in the individual self, the self is itself a product of ignorance; and so on.

    Helpful · 2
    1. Arjun Iyer

      Fellow

      Thank you, Meera. The question "where does ignorance reside?" is indeed the one I find hardest. Later Advaitins split over it, Vācaspati placing it in the individual and the Vivaraṇa school in Brahman, which perhaps shows Rāmānuja found the weak point.

      Helpful · 3

Other answers

  1. Anand Pillai

    Contributor

    For completeness, there is also Madhva's Dvaita (13th century), which goes further: five eternal differences, including between God and souls and between souls themselves. The three Vedanta schools form a spectrum from identity to difference.

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