A Tradition of Teachers

The study selects one way of understanding the guru in classical Hindu life in the belief that this articulation offers something normative for an understanding of guru in the wider Indian development and history. Sankara has been selected because he identified with the scriptural tradition of the Upanisads and the early Vedanta system. Moreover, Sankara’s conception of guru continued for 1200 years, even into our times. The first of this book is drawn from texts that trace the role of guru and the guru-sisya relationship in the writings of Sankara. The second part of the book is an investigation of the five major acaryas of the Sankara tradition reigning during the last half of the twentieth century. Thus, the articulation of the guru in the writings of Sankara, in part one, is tested from the historical context among the Sankaracaryas of the recent past.