The Academy of Sanskrit Research, established in Melkote, the holy Badarikaśrama of the South, for intensive study and research in the field of Visistädvaita and its comparative study with other systems of thought, has taken up the preservation of our cultural heritage to the posterity as one of its avowed objectives. Accordingly, the Academy is putting forth its sincere efforts to collect the old palm-leaf and paper manuscripts which are scattered all over India, which require proper care and preservation. With this objective in view, the Academy is steadily increasing collection of manuscripts for the last six to seven years and now the number of manuscripts so collected has gone up to 8,310.
Though the Academy is interested in indepth study of Viśiştadvaita philosophy, it has spared no efforts to collect manuscripts belonging to other disciplines like itihasa, purâna, ayurveda, etc. In this collection there are more than 1,500 manuscripts pertaining to the field of Visistadvaita philosophy.
The philosophy of Visiștâdvaita is also referred to as the Râmânuja school of philosophy, as it was he who tried his best to propagate this philosophy in India which has a universal appeal. According to this philosophy, the whole of this world consists of sentient and insentient beings which are inseparably associated with the Supreme Self. The goal of the individual self is to attain the Supreme Brahman, by accepting Him as the means as well, for reaching the goal. This philosophy brings out the identity of the Reality, the means and the goal as inseparable ones, which is nothing but the Supreme Brahman himself.
The system of Viśistâdvaita philosophy is well brought out by the Divyaprabandhams, a collection of 4,000 verses written by the Alwârs. The spontaneous outflow of their divine experiences as explained in the great Upaniṣads have taken the poetic form in Tamil. Hence, they are known as the Dravidaprabandhams and are elevated to the rank of Dravida Vedas.
After the generation of Alwârs, the generation of Acâryas followed. They were well-versed in both the Upaniṣads and the Dravidaprabandhams. These Acâryas who inherited esoteric knowledge contained in the Upanisads and Dravidaprabandhams from their predecessors wrote several Sûtra works and also their commentaries. They mainly elucidate the Astâksara Maha Mantra, Dvaya Mantra and Caramaśloka. Further several commentaries and individual treatises were written on these three rahasyas or esoteric secrets which started a series of Rahasyaprabandhams written in Manipravala style, i.e., a mixture of Sanskrit and Tamil.
This volume of the Descriptive Catalogue gives a detailed description of the Dravidaprabandhams and the Rahasyaprabandhams available in the Manuscript Library of the Academy.
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