Tenderness Towards Students
Lakṣmīnarasiṃha Śāstri was immensely fond of his students. Addressing those who were with him for a long time, he used to say: “Having students such as you all, I can happily teach Gauḍādi-gauḍānta Vedānta.”
[Ācārya Gauḍapāda was Bhagavatpāda Śaṅkara’s parama-guru. He authored the far-famed Māṇḍūkya-kārikā. Śrī Brahmānanda (end of seventeeth cen. – beginning of eighteenth cen. CE), who hailed from Gauḍa-deśa (Bengal)...
Śrī Navīnam Veṅkaṭeśa Śāstri had supplied several sets of logical refinement to Brahma-sūtras, which were not seen in extant commentaries thereon. Because of this, the moniker ‘Navīnam’ came to be associated with him. Vidvān Śeṣācala Śarmā insisted Lakṣmīnarasiṃha Śāstri to collate his Guru’s logical refinements in the form of notes and prepare them for publication. But he never gave his mind to this job.
As an exception to the inherent...
“On one occasion Vidvān Anantakṛṣṇa Śāstri (a towering scholar of the league of Navīnam Veṅkaṭeśa Śāstri) began to pose a series of questions to him. Lakṣmīnarasiṃha Śāstri answered them all with great conviction, confidence, and mastery. Anantakṛṣṇa Śāstri was visibly impressed—he patted his back and gave his blessings. This brought unbound happiness to the Jagadguru. Scholars present there exclaimed with joy.”
A text in the same league of...
Real-life Examples
He used to give real-life examples to drive home the import of a scriptural tenet. This made his lessons entertaining—a feature common to lessons given by Śrī Hānagal Virūpākṣa Śāstri.
He recalled the following incident while explaining Syādvāda[1]:
It seems on a fine morning Hānagal Virūpākṣa Śāstri arrived at Śaṅkara-maṭha and stood in a corner. It was his day of haircut. In those days, barbers carried their accessories in a...
Disseminating Dharma
Once this rigorous study of the scriptures was complete, Śrī Śāstri engaged himself primarily with delivering discourses on the Purāṇas. He used to address a batch each twice in a day—one in the morning and another in the evening—at the Āñjaneya temple in Vishveshvarapura. Traders and patrons of great repute, such as Pobbati Kṛṣṇayya Śeṭṭi and Anantayya Śeṭṭi, who hailed from the Vaiśya community, organized these lectures....
Śri Ḍoṅgre Vīreśvara Śāstri who hailed from Maharashtra was Lakṣmīnarasiṃha Śāstri’s classmate during one of the batches. In later years, he served in various institutions in a number of capacities: in Andhra Pradesh, as professor of Vedic exegesis; in the Sanskrit section of Deccan College in Pune, as a senior scholar; and in the Pāṭhaśālā established by Svadharma-svarājya-saṅgha in Hyderabad, as professor. Rashtriya Sanskrit Vidyapeetha based...
In 1931, Lakṣmīnarasiṃha Śāstri joined the Pāṭhaśālā in this Maṭha for higher studies. He was then eighteen years of age. The background of this Pāṭhaśālā requires mention.
शुद्धाद्वैतपथस्य पालनकृते पूर्वं त्वया स्थापित-
स्थानेष्वन्यतमस्थशिष्यततिगस्तत्कार्यकृत्यक्षमः।
अज्ञानां धुरि कीर्तनीयचरितो नाद्यापि विद्यालय-
स्तस्मात्स्थानमिदं गुरूत्तम कृपावार्धे त्वमेवाश्रय॥
यद्वा दुर्मतभेदपाटववतीं मेधां नवोन्मेषिणीं
विद्यामश्रुतशास्त्रपाठनचणां...
The following incident happened in the 1930s, when Śrī Candraśekhara-bhāratī Mahāsvāmi adorned the Śāradā-pīṭha at Sringeri. The Mahāsvāmi’s liking for and support of scholarship is well known. He took great interest in the development of Gīrvāṇa-prauḍha-vidyābhivardhinī Pāṭhaśālā that is housed in the Bengaluru Śaṅkara-maṭha. Back in the day, this Pāṭhaśālā was one of the greatest centres of traditional learning. Rabindranath Tagore, who...