PREFACE
The life and teachings of Sri Madhwacharya find elucidation in English in the works of a few early savants like Sri C.M. Padmanabhachar in his Life and Teachings of Sri Madhwacharya, C.N. Krishnaswamy Iyer in his Sri Madhwa and his life and times, S. Subba Rao in his The Philosophy of Sri Madhwacharya, C.R. Krishna Rao in his Sri Madhwa, His life and doctrine and others. Dr.
R. Nagaraja Sharma has, as he says, ‘attempted a faithful exposition of Sri Madhwa’s Philosophy in modem terminology’ in his Reign of Realism in Indian Philosophy. In recent years Sri H.N. Raghavendrachar has published a book entitled The Dwaita Philosophy and its place in the Vedanta and Dr. S. Dasgupta has published his third volume of History of Indian Philosophy containing an exposition of the doctrine and literature of the Dwaita Vedanta. Dr. B.N. Krishnamurthy Sharma has written a thesis on the Dwaita literature which is awaiting publication.
My aim in this book Is to place before the student of Indian Philosophy in general and the lay reader in particular the fundamental stand of Sri Madhwacharya in the construction of his Philosophy and to work out the logical conclusions of his position. The book is, however, intended primarily for the intelligent layman although the student of Philosophy also might find the book useful as an introduction to the Philosophy of Sri Madhwacharya. 1 have therefore taken special pains to be sufficiently intelligible. I have minimized the use of technical terms and wherever such terms are unavoidable I have given their approximate equivalents.
I have, in this book, attempted an exposition of the Philosophy of Sri Madhwacharya in outline in a comparatively new way which might appeal to the modern reader and in doing so I have freely employed the arguments advanced in the works of the Acharya and In the tikas and used them In my own way for the purpose. The first few chapters of the book deal with the epistemological basis of Sri Madhwacharya’s philosophy and the fundamental tenets find exposition In the later chapters. The epistemological principles and the metaphysical consequences that follow based on the several works of the Acharya are placed before the reader In as clear a manner as possible without loss of rigor so that the reader can form an idea of the Philosophy of Sri Madhwacharya almost in the words of the Acharya himself. Since the main object has been to present the Acharya’s Philosophy in a persuasive manner based primarily on his works no references have been made to the works of other savants in the field.
The significant contributions of Sri Madhwacharya to Indian Philosophy epistemological and ontological find special elucidation in the book. The concept of Sakshi which is most fundamental in the system with the associated concepts of space and time are elaborated in a chapter devoted for the purpose and the logical conclusions of these concepts are worked out in the later chapters. The last two chapters of the book are devoted to the enumeration and justification of the metaphysical categories of the system and the concept of Moksha according to Sri Madhwacharya.
It gives me the greatest pleasure to acknowledge my deep debt of gratitude to Dr. R. Nagarajasharma, the well-known scholar and savant of Madras who was kind enough to read through the manuscript and to suggest ways of improving the same. I can never be sufficiently grateful to him for his kind words of encouragement towards the publishing of the book.
I take this opportunity of giving expression to my sense of respect and gratitude to Asthanamahavidwan Agnihotri Sri Yagnavithalacharya of the Uttaradi Mutt, Bangalore under whom I was privileged to study the tikas on the prakaranas and the tatvaprakashika for over ten years. His erudite scholarship and clarity of exposition have left a deep impression on me.
Krishnaswamy Rao Boray