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4 18 The Sailkara School of Vedanta [CH. uncontradicted experience. But no enquiry was made whether any absolute judgments about the ultimate truth of knowledge and matter could be made at all. That which appeared was re- garded as the real. But the question was not asked, whether there was anything which could be regarded as absolute truth, the basis of all appearance, and the unchangeable reality. This philosophical enquiry had the most wonderful charm for the Hindu mind. Vedanta Literature. It is difficult to ascertain the time when the Brahma-siUras were written, but since they contain a refutation of almost all the other I ndian systems, even of the Siinyavada Buddhism (of course according to Sankara's interpretation), they cannot have been written very early. I think it may not be far from the truth in supposing that they were written some time in the second century B.C. About the period 780 A.D. Gauapada revived the monistic teaching of the U paniads by his commentary on the Ma1)<;liikya Upaniad in verse called 1I1iil{lftkyakiirikii. His disciple Govinda was the teacher of SaIi.kara (788-820 A.D.). Sankara's com- mentary on the Bral'l1Jla-siUras is the root from which sprang forth a host of commentaries and studies on Vedantism of great originality, vigour, and philosophic insight. Thus Anandagiri, a disciple of Sankara, wrote a commentary called Nyiiyanirlaya, and Govindananda wrote another commentary named Ratlla- prabhii. Vacaspati Misra, who flourished about 841 A.D., wrote another commentary on it called the Bhiimati. Amalananda (1247-1260 A.D.) wrote his Kalpataru on it, and Apyayadlkita (1550 A.D.) son of Rai1garajadhvarlndra of Kafid wrote his Kalpa- taruparimala on the K alpataru. Another disciple of Satikara, Padmapada, also called Sanandana, wrote a commentary on it known as PailcaPiidikii. From the manner in which the book is begun one would expect that it was to be a running commentary on the whole of Sankara's bhaya, but it ends abruptly at the end of the fourth siitra. Madhava (1350), in his Sa;,karavija)la, recites an interesting story about it. He says that Suresvara re- ceived Sailkara's permission to write a viirttika on the bhaya. But other pupils objected to Sa'lkara that since Suresvara was formerly a great Mimarrsist(Mal){Jana Misra was called Suresvara after his conversion to Vedantism) he was not competent to write