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Adi Shankara Quotes

Adi Shankara, also called Adi Shankaracharya , was an 8th-century Indian Vedic scholar and teacher . His works present a harmonizing reading of the sastras, with liberating knowledge of the self at its core, synthesizing the Advaita Vedanta teachings of his time.Due to his later fame, over 300 texts are attributed to him, including commentaries , introductory topical expositions and poetry . However, most of these are likely to be written by admirers or pretenders or scholars with an eponymous name. Works known to be written by Shankara himself are the Brahmasutrabhasya, his commentaries on ten principal Upanishads, his commentary on the Bhagavad Gita, and the Upadeśasāhasrī. The authenticity of Shankara being the author of Vivekacūḍāmaṇi has been questioned and mostly rejected by scholarship.The central concern of Shankara's writings is the liberating knowledge of the true identity of jivatman as Ātman-Brahman, taking the Upanishads as an independent means of knowledge, beyond the ritually-oriented Mīmāṃsā-exegesis of the Vedas. Shankara's Advaita shows influences from Mahayana Buddhism, despite Shankara's critiques; and Hindu Vaishnava opponents have even accused Shankara of being a "crypto-Buddhist," a qualification which is rejected by the Advaita Vedanta tradition, highlighting their respective views on Atman, Anatta and Brahman.Shankara has an unparallelled status in the tradition of Advaita Vedanta, but his influence on Hindu intellectual thought has been questioned. Until the 10th century Shankara was overshadowed by his older contemporary Maṇḍana Miśra, and there is no mention of him in concurring Hindu, Buddhist or Jain sources until the 11th century. The popular image Shankara started to take shape in the 14th century, centuries after his death, when Sringeri matha started to receive patronage from the kings of the Vijayanagara Empire and shifted their allegiance from advaitic Agamic Saivism to Brahmanical Advaita orthodoxy. Hagiographies dating from the 14th-17th centuries deified him as a ruler-renunciate, travelling on a digvijaya across the Indian subcontinent to propagate his philosophy, defeating his opponents in theological debates. These hagiographies portray him as founding four mathas , and Adi Shankara also came to be regarded as the organiser of the Dashanami monastic order, and the unifier of the Shanmata tradition of worship.

The title of Shankaracharya, used by heads of certain monasteries in India, is derived from his name. Wikipedia  

✵ 788 – 820
Adi Shankara photo
Adi Shankara: 19   quotes 5   likes

Famous Adi Shankara Quotes

“Though he lives in the conditionings (Upadhis), he, the contemplative one, remains ever unconcerned with anything or he may move about like the wind, perfectly unattached.”

Adi Shankara

Source: Atma Bodha (1987), p. 98-101: Quote nr. 52 - 54.
Context: Though he lives in the conditionings (Upadhis), he, the contemplative one, remains ever unconcerned with anything or he may move about like the wind, perfectly unattached.
On the destruction of the Upadhis, the contemplative one is totally absorbed in "Vishnu", the All-pervading Spirit, like water into water, space into space and light into light.
Realise That to be Brahman, the attainment of which leaves nothing more to be attained, the blessedness of which leaves no other blessing to be desired and the knowledge of which leaves nothing more to be known.

“All the manifested world of things and beings are projected by imagination upon the substratum which is the Eternal All-pervading Vishnu, whose nature is Existence-Intelligence; just as the different ornaments are all made out of the same gold.”

Adi Shankara

Source: Atma Bodha (1987), p. 16: Quote nr. 9.

“The Atman, the Sun of Knowledge that rises in the sky of the heart, destroys the darkness of the ignorance, pervades and sustains all and shines and makes everything to shine.”

Adi Shankara

Source: Atma Bodha (1987), p. 121: Quote nr. 67.

“Deities like Brahma and others taste only a particle, of the unlimited Bliss of Brahman and enjoy in proportion their share of that particle.”

Adi Shankara

Source: Atma Bodha (1987), p. 107: Quote nr. 58.

“He who renouncing all activities, who is free of all the limitations of time, space and direction, worships his own Atman which is present everywhere, which is the destroyer of heat and cold, which is Bliss-Eternal and stainless, becomes All-knowing and All-pervading and attains thereafter Immortality.”

Adi Shankara

Source: Atma Bodha (1987), p. 123: Quote nr. 68.

“Brahman the Absolute alone is real; this world is transient (mithya is anirvachaneeya, cannot be defined, cannot be translated as unreal), but the jiva or the individual soul is not different from Brahman.”

Adi Shankara

Refer to current Sringeri Shankaracharya discourses in Telugu and Tamil (two different pravachans). Do not blindly translate "Mithya" as Unreal. Do not misrepresent what Adi Shankaracharya preached in Sanskrit to his students and world using useless English translations.
Alternative translation: Brahman is the only truth, the world is illusion, and there is ultimately no difference between Brahman and individual self.
Translation in Global Encyclopaedia of Indian Philosophy (2010), by N.K. Singh and A.P. Mishra, p. 16.

Adi Shankara Quotes about the truth

“When the force of desire for the Truth blossoms, selfish desires wither away, just like darkness vanishes before the radiance of the light of dawn.”

Adi Shankara

P4
Atma Bodha (1987)

“Brahman (the existential substratum) is the only truth, the world is illusion, and there is ultimately no difference between Brahman and individual self.”

Adi Shankara

Original: (hi) Brahma satyam jagat mithyam, jivo brahmaiva naparah

“I find that Shankara had grasped much of Vedantic truth, but that much was dark to him. I am bound to admit what he realised; I am not bound to exclude what he failed to realise.”

Adi Shankara

Sri Aurobindo,1910-1914, quoted from Sri Aurobindo, ., Nahar, S., Aurobindo, ., & Institut de recherches évolutives (Paris). India's rebirth: A selection from Sri Aurobindo's writing, talks and speeches. Paris: Institut de Recherches Evolutives. 3rd Edition (2000). https://web.archive.org/web/20170826004028/http://bharatvani.org/books/ir/IR_frontpage.htm

Adi Shankara Quotes

“Atman is an ever-present Reality. Yet, because of ignorance it is not realised. On the destruction of ignorance Atman is realised.”

Adi Shankara

Source: Atma Bodha (1987), p. 82: Quote nr. 44.

Reality

“All objects are pervaded by Brahman. All actions are possible because of Brahman”

Adi Shankara

Atma Bodha (1987)
Context: All objects are pervaded by Brahman. All actions are possible because of Brahman: therefore Brahman permeates everything as butter permeates milk.

p. 109: Quote nr. 59.

“Action cannot destroy ignorance, for it is not in conflict with or opposed to ignorance.”

Adi Shankara

Source: Atma Bodha (1987), p. 6: Quote nr. 3.
Context: Action cannot destroy ignorance, for it is not in conflict with or opposed to ignorance. Knowledge does verily destroy ignorance as light destroys deep darkness.

“Just as the fire is the direct cause for cooking, so without Knowledge no emancipation can be had. Compared with all other forms of discipline Knowledge of the Self is the one direct means for liberation.”

Adi Shankara

Source: Atma Bodha (1987), p. 4: Quote nr. 2.

Knowledge , Cooking

“The Soul appears to be finite because of ignorance. When ignorance is destroyed the Self which does not admit of any multiplicity truly reveals itself by itself: like the Sun when the clouds pass away.”

Adi Shankara

Source: Atma Bodha (1987), p. 7: Quote nr. 4.

Soul , Appearance , Sun

“Like bubbles in the water, the worlds rise, exist and dissolve in the Supreme Self, which is the material cause and the prop of everything.”

Adi Shankara

Source: Atma Bodha (1987), p. 14: Quote nr. 8.

World , Water

“Among Hindus, the date of Shankara is controversial; some date him to c. 500 BC. In this case, I wholeheartedly support the conventional date established by Indologists, among other reasons because his choice of Dwarka for his Western matha, and not Hinglaj (west of the Indus) as intended, fits neatly with the fact that the latter area had passed under Muslim control in the early eighth century.”

Adi Shankara

Decolonizing the Hindu Mind (2001) by Koenraad Elst

Support

“One should become aware of oneself, indivisible, and perfect; free from identification with all things transient, such as one’s body, functions, mind, and the sense of being the doer, for all these are the product of ignorance.”

Adi Shankara

p4
Atma Bodha (1987)

Sense , Perfection

“It is not possible to speak with too much applause of so excellent a work.”

Adi Shankara

Sir William Jones, quoted in Londhe, S. (2008). A tribute to Hinduism: Thoughts and wisdom spanning continents and time about India and her culture. New Delhi: Pragun Publication.

“There is no Metaphysics superior to that of Shankara.”

Adi Shankara

Karl Jaspers (1883-1969) to Professor K. Satchidananda Murthy about Shankara's commentary. As quoted in Londhe, S. (2008). A tribute to Hinduism: Thoughts and wisdom spanning continents and time about India and her culture. New Delhi: Pragun Publication.

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