--- In [email protected], Vaj <vajradh...@...> wrote:
>Vaj,
What makes you think that the shankaracharya tradition is a "vaishnavite" group?
The shankaracharya order has always been a shiva tradition, not a Vishnu
tradition (vaishnavites are vishnu/krishna followers).
Its obvious even from the name. Shankara is a name of shiva, not vishnu.
For someone who presents himself on this forum as being knowledgeable about
this stuff, at least get your facts straight.
>
> On May 30, 2009, at 6:43 PM, Marek Reavis wrote:
>
> > Like Judy pointed out, it's totally common for Indian devotees to
> > extol assumed enlightened saints and gurus with over the top
> > honorifics, and the idea that one of Maharishi's early followers
> > gave him that designation out of their own reverence and pride.
>
> While that is a possibility and worth investigating further, if you
> examine Sanskrit-Hindu literature, esp. in Vaishnavite groups like the
> Shankaracharya, you'll see it's typical to have a sannyasi name as the
> primary title, with additions to this name given by the guru (e.g.
> Yogananda's guru gave him the title "Paramahamsa" indicating that he
> believed him to belong to a certain class of yogins, a paramahamsa).
> You can see this trend going back as into the middle ages. A list of
> many other Hindu commercial gurus reveals this same pattern. While
> honorifics like 'His Holiness' may be added out of devotion to one's
> guru, in Mahesh's instance we definitely know this was not the case.
>
> It's important to distinguish between honorifics, like 'His Holiness',
> and order or ordination names, titles indicating attainment and titles
> indicating a certain skill ("yogi").
>
> In Mahesh's instance, he had the problem of being in the Shank. Order
> as an assistant and wanting to launch himself into the guru biz.
> What's a non-twice-born Hindu to do? After all he could not become a
> swami. You have someone confer a title on you or you make up one
> yourself. Usually the one conferring the title is the guru. And we do
> know SBS never conferred any titles on Mahesh.
>
> I guess the important here is if someone was dishonest from the get
> go, what does that tell us?
>
