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From: rajeev@sfsup.UUCP (S.Rajeev)
Newsgroups: net.nlang.india,net.philosophy
Subject: "Adi Sankara": life of the Hindu philospher
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Date: Wed, 12-Mar-86 16:24:10 EST
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Posted: Wed Mar 12 16:24:10 1986
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Adi Shankaracharya [Sanskrit] 1983 GV Iyer. At the Museum of Modern Arts
and 11 other locations: part of the Film Program connected with the
Festival of India.

"Adi Sankara" is a difficult movie for me to review objectively, given
the subject matter, the life of the greatest philosopher in Hinduism for
over two thousand years. Anyway, first of all, one has to admire Iyer's
audacity in making a movie in Sanksrit, arguably the most difficult
language around, and one with such connotations for Indians. Chronicling
Sankara's life is not the easiest task either, considering that his life
was short and his message extremely complex and esoteric and not really
amenable to visuals. What Iyer has tried to do is to produce the story
of Sankara's travels leavened with a bit of his teachings. I would have
liked to learn more about Advaita (Non-Dualism) and Vedanta and perhaps
about the various philosophic debates that Sankara triumphed in. What
Iyer has succeeded in is recreating 8th century India in a generally
believable manner and in giving us an experiential view, a general
immersion into the world of the Acharya without too many
details. I thought the best part of the film was the magnificient
soundtrack, filled with the sonorous chanting of mantras. The crisp
Sanskrit dialogue was exciting, though it was also tantalizing, because
most Indians I suppose can understand the occasional word here and
there, but are lost without the subtitles. (I also liked what might be
called the "chorus mantra":

	"Akasham patitam thoyam		"Water falling from the skies
	 Sagaram prati gacchati..."	 Flows towards the sea..."

which I guess illustrates Sankara's basic monist idea of the identity of
the self with the Brahman, the Ultimate, That.) While the film is
visually not as impressive as it is to listen to, and somewhat long
(130 minutes), I found it very interesting.

The story of Sankara is of considerable interest to most Hindus, I
imagine, because his impact on orthodox Hinduism was immeasurable. His
concept of Advaita revitalized a Brahmanical tradition that was
seriously in decay and defensive in the face of such unorthodox faiths
as Jainism, Buddhism and Tantrism. Although it was really the intense
personal identification with an accessible God (the Bhakti movement)
that finally led to the comeback of Hinduism in India, Sankara's ideas,
while appealing to an elite few, helped Hinduism regain the 
philosophical high ground that it had gradually lost.

The movie starts off with some spectacular vistas of dawn at Kaladi in
Kerala, the birthplace of the Acharya, to the chant of the Gayatri
mantra (the Invocation Hymn) by the Brahmins on the bathing ghats. He grows up
in the strict traditional household of his father, who dies when Sankara
is quite young. He attends a gurukula, where he lives in the guru's 
household. He enjoys the usual pleasures of childhood, including the
village theatre (incidentally, that was Koodiyattam, not Kathakali)
where he watches the story of Nachiketa, the boy who, when given a boon
by Yama, the God of Death, insists on knowing the answer to the
questions of life and death. Sankara is preoccupied by the meaning of
death; he decides to become an ascetic and to seek wisdom from the
great monks.

He travels all over India until he reaches the hermitage
of the sage Govinda on the banks of the Narmada river. There,
symbolically, the master entrusts him with the restoration and
interpretation of the great Vedic and Upanishadic writings, which had
long been neglected. Sankara proves more than equal to the task; soon
he formulates his Advaita ideas; he also becomes an accomplished
poet. His "Bhajagovindam" (Hymn to the Lord) with its clear and simple
lyrics, still resounds in Hindu homes. He travels, engaging in
philosophical debate with adherents of the various schools of thought
that held sway: Nyaya, Purva Mimamsa, ... None is able to hold their own
against him; by the sheer force of his logic and rhetoric, he is able to
convince people of his ideas of the illusion of the material world; and
how reality becomes visible only at the moment that one merges with
the transcendent One, the Truth, the Brahman. He establishes monasteries
at the four corners of India to spread his ideas. His ideas take firm
root and have been a cornerstone of Hindu philosophy ever since. 

At the age of 32, in the Himalayas, Sankara passes on to Nirvana: he
vanishes one day, alone, into the mountain heights. 

I have a few quibbles about the film; one was the decision to personify
Death and Wisdom as two boys (and later, men) to show that these were
Sankara's constant companions. I thought this was, cinematically
speaking, not a very good idea. Another complaint was the glorification
of Brahmins: while they are shown as generally good, noble people, all
the others a) speak the inelegant vernaculars instead of the graceful
Sanksrit, b) appear as coarse, ill-groomed peasants. This depiction of
Brahmins as a class apart is ironic considering Sankara's non-dualist
theme and also the incident where he meets an untouchable. (The
untouchable wants to know which part of him is polluted, his body or his
Atman, the inner self. Sankara realizes that he had erred in accepting
the orthodox caste structure, which he now sees as unjustifiable.) The
final quibble is a long, unnecessary scene, where Sankara and his
disciples all pay tribute to a woman, for what appears to be no more
than the fact that she had just cooked them a good meal. I feel that
this scene was tacked on as an afterthought to show Sankara's deep
affection for his mother; for, he hurries across hundreds of miles to
her bedside when he knows she is dying. 

Apart from these minor problems, I feel 'Adi Sankara' is a good movie
for all those want to learn more about Hinduism.