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his illustrious predecessor, it is necessary to have some
kind of unbiased understanding of what Sankara's thought on
the subject was. Otherwise, it will be impossible to
understand what Madhus奴dana was seeking to accomplish in the
Bhaktiras膩yana. After a lapse of more than 800 years, he
was the first theorist following Samkara to make any
substantial contribution to Advaita's understanding of
bhakti. 6 If this is realized, both the extent of Samkara's
authority and the significance of Madhusudana's work will
begin to be appreciated. Here, then, I wish to make at
least a preliminary evaluation of Sankara's views on
devotional religion.
2.2 Samkara's Authentic Works
At the beginning, we must touch briefly on the
subject of the authenticity of the many works attributed to
艢amkara. Anyone who reads on the problem of bhakti in
Advaita will invariably learn of the many devotional hymns
(stotras), such as the Bhaja Govindam, the Govind膩峁ａ弓aka, the
艢iv膩nandalahari, and others that are said to have been
written by this teacher and are commonly presented as
evidence that he was a great devotee.
8 Unfortunately,
critical scholarship suggests that it is highly improbable
that these works were written by Samkara himself. It is
likely, instead, that they were composed by later followers,