Adi Shankaracharya and Kedarnath

Read along

Namaste. Welcome back to Kedarnath. Sit comfortably, and let the day settle for a moment.

In the first two sittings we heard two stories of how Kedarnath began. The Shiva Purana gave us Nara and Narayana, praying in the snows for the good of all. The hills of Garhwal gave us the Pandavas, searching for Shiva among the herds. Today we come to a person who lived much later, and whose memory is also woven into this place: Adi Shankaracharya.

Before we begin, a word about sources, as always. Much of what people know about Shankaracharya's life comes from later traditional biographies, written with devotion, many centuries after him. Scholars and traditions also differ on when he lived. Many scholars place him around the eighth century, and some traditions place him much earlier. So as we tell his story, we will say "tradition holds" often. We say it out of honesty about what kind of story this is, and with full respect for it.

Tradition holds that Shankara was born in Kaladi, a village on the banks of the Periyar river in Kerala. He lost his father young and was raised by his mother. Even as a boy, the stories say, he wanted to take sannyasa, to give up the life of a householder and become a monk.

There is a much-loved story of how his mother finally agreed. The boy was bathing in the river when a crocodile seized his foot. He asked his mother to let him take sannyasa, at least in his last moments. She agreed, and the crocodile let him go. Whatever you make of that story, it is how families in Kerala have told it for a very long time. And the tradition also remembers that he promised to come back to his mother at the end of her life, and that he kept the promise.

From Kerala, tradition says, he walked north, all the way to the banks of the Narmada, where he found his teacher, Govinda Bhagavatpada. There he learned, and from there he began to teach.

What did he teach? Shankaracharya is remembered as the great teacher of Advaita Vedanta. Advaita means not two. In very simple words, the teaching is that the deepest self in each of us, and the ground of the whole universe, are not two separate things. He wrote commentaries on the Upanishads, on the Bhagavad Gita and on the Brahma Sutras, and these are still studied closely today.

But he is also remembered for hymns, full of feeling, sung in temples and homes across India. Tradition attributes to him the short hymn of the twelve jyotirlingas that we heard about in the first sitting, the one that names Kedara, on the back of the Himalaya. Another hymn often attributed to him, the Nirvana Shatakam, ends each verse with a refrain that says the true self is Shiva, pure awareness and joy.

There is also a hymn to Shiva built on the five syllables of the name of Shiva that devotees repeat, the panchakshara. Each verse of the hymn begins with one of those syllables, and together the verses spell out the prayer. It is often attributed to Shankaracharya too. We will not recite it here, since recitation belongs to a human voice, but it is worth knowing that such a small, careful hymn is linked with such a great thinker.

So here is a teacher of the highest philosophy who also walked to temples, sang to Shiva and to the Goddess, and wept, the stories say, at his mother's side. In his life, knowledge and devotion sit together easily.

Now let us follow him north.

Tradition holds that Shankaracharya travelled across the length and breadth of India, debating with scholars, teaching, and visiting sacred places. In the Himalaya, tradition says, he came to Badrinath and renewed the worship there. The traditions of the temples also say that he set up four great centres of learning, called mathas, in four corners of India. In the south at Sringeri. In the west at Dwarka. In the east at Puri. And in the north at Jyotirmath, not far from Badrinath, in these same mountains.

And he came to Kedarnath. The temple tradition holds that the worship here was renewed by him. In the first sitting we heard that tradition credits the Pandavas with the first shrine, and Shankaracharya with renewing the worship later. You will hear this said by priests and pilgrims alike.

Then comes the part of the story that makes Kedarnath especially dear to his followers.

A strong tradition, kept at Kedarnath, holds that Adi Shankaracharya's life on earth ended here, in the high Himalaya, when he was about thirty-two years old. The tradition says he entered samadhi, the final stillness, near the temple. Behind the Kedarnath temple stands a memorial to him, and pilgrims walk around to it after their darshan. Darshan means seeing the deity, and being seen.

We should say clearly that this is one tradition among several. Other traditions hold that he spent his last days at Kanchipuram in the south, and others speak of Kerala. Each is held with love by its own community. We do not rank them. At Kedarnath, the memory is that he walked into these snows at the end, and that is how the place honours him.

After the waters of 2013, which we will speak about in the last sitting, the old memorial behind the temple was badly damaged. In recent years a new memorial has been built there, with a large seated statue of Shankaracharya, calm, facing the valley. Pilgrims now sit near it in the cold, some reading, some simply quiet. Children ask who he was, and parents tell them the story of the boy from Kerala who walked to the snows. In this way the memory is passed on, one family at a time, the same way it has always been passed on in these hills.

There is one more thread worth noticing. The worship inside the Kedarnath temple today is led by the Rawal, who comes from the Veerashaiva tradition of Karnataka. That is a different lineage from Shankaracharya's. So at this small stone temple, a teacher from Kerala is remembered behind the shrine, a priest from Karnataka leads the worship inside, and pilgrims come from every corner of the country and beyond.

The same is true at Badrinath, just across the mountains. There, by long custom, the chief priest, also called the Rawal, comes from a Namboodiri family of Kerala, Shankaracharya's own home region. So the two great shrines of these hills are served by priests from the far south, one from Kerala and one from Karnataka. Pilgrims often find this surprising when they first hear it. The hill families who serve the temples alongside them, as priests, helpers and keepers of the local customs, are just as much a part of this web.

Nobody planned it this way in one day. It grew over centuries, and it has held.

Think of how far Shankaracharya walked, if the tradition is right. From the rivers of Kerala to the snows of Garhwal. No roads as we know them. No warm clothes as we know them. And at the end of it, the place that remembers him most tenderly is a small temple on the back of the Himalaya.

Let us take a short quiet moment together. If you would like to, sit up straight and let your hands rest. In a moment, you may say Om softly to yourself, once or a few times, in your own voice, at your own pace. Or you may simply listen to the silence. Either is fine.

Let us gather what we heard.

Tradition holds that Adi Shankaracharya was born in Kaladi in Kerala, became a monk as a boy, found his teacher on the Narmada, and taught that the self and the whole are not two. He is remembered for great commentaries and for heartfelt hymns. Tradition says he renewed the worship at Badrinath and Kedarnath, and set up four mathas across India. At Kedarnath, a strong tradition holds that he entered samadhi here, and a memorial stands behind the temple. Other traditions place his last days elsewhere, and we hold them all with respect.

One thing to take with you. Shankaracharya's life joins thinking and devotion. This week, when you pray, spend one minute simply sitting still afterwards, without asking for anything. Just sit, the way a traveller sits at the end of a long walk.

In the next sitting, we turn to the yatra itself: the seasons of Kedarnath, the doors that open in spring and close before the snow, the winter seat at Ukhimath, and how to walk the path with care.

Keep going

• Listen: Adi Shankaracharya and Kedarnath
• Previous: The Pandavas and the bull: the Panch Kedar of Garhwal
• Next: The yatra and its seasons: the doors, the snow and the winter seat
• हिन्दी में पढ़ें
• All episodes of Kedarnath: the shrine in the snows