This latest addition to Sankara literature is totally different in concept.It`s based solidly in tradition, and it is at the same time just the kind of presentation that makes the postmodern reader sit up and take notice. It is philosophical, yet never forbiddingly so. It reads more like a story. The prose is simple, smooth, and meditative. Padmapada, Sankara`s senior disciple, narrates the story in very human terms. His intent is not to glorify his master`s life and work--for that is hardly necessary--but to present him as a friend of humankind, someone who is needed generation after generation, millennium after millennium. Humans have not changed in terms of their strengths or their weaknesses since the race first evolved on the planet, nor are they likely to morph into saints any time soon. The prophets help us cope with the trials and tribulations of our daily lives and remind us of our divine roots if we care to listen. This book answers some of your serious questions about life if you have them read. If you don`t, it will help you formulate them. Coming up with the right questions, after all, is the first step toward finding the right solutions.INDUSEKHARA SASTRI MADUGULA taught English Language and Literature at Andhra University, Waltair, Central Institute of English and Foreign Languages, Hyderabad, India, and California State University, Bakersfield, California. He is currently head of the Reference Department in Palm Springs Public Library, Palm Springs, California.

Presenting the Conclusions of the GBC Foundational Document ISKCON’s GBC (Governing Body Commission) has issued a Foundational Document on the position of Srila Prabhupada, a document which it has declared to be “historic” and required reading by everyone in ISKCON. In the spirit of cooperation, this book published by the ISKCON Revival Movement (IRM) offers the conclusions of that GBC Foundational Document. These conclusions establish that Srila Prabhupada’s position as the Founder-Аcarya of ISKCON remains unchanged, which means that his position as ISKCON’s only diksa (initiating) guru also remains unchanged throughout ISKCON’s lifetime. The GBC’s Foundational Document is therefore in accordance with the IRM’s own foundational document, The Final Order, which was published and presented to the GBC in 1996, and thus such concordance is indeed “historic”. This book is not meant for casual reading but for implementation.

Rebecca J. Manring offers an illuminating study and translation of three hagiographies of Advaita Acarya, a crucial figure in the early years of the devotional Vaisnavism which originated in Bengal in the fifteenth century. Advaita Acarya was about fifty years older than the movement's putative founder, Caitanya, and is believed to have caused Caitanya's advent by ceaselessly storming heaven, calling for the divine presence to come to earth. Advaita was a scholar and highly respected pillar of society, whose status lent respectability and credibility to the new movement. A significant body of hagiographical and related literature about Advaita Acarya has developed since his death, some as late as the early twentieth century. The three hagiographic texts included in The Fading Light of Advaita Acarya examine the years of Advaita's life that did not overlap with Caitanya's lifetime, and each paints a different picture of its protagonist. Each composition clearly advocates the view that Advaita was himself divine in some way, and a few go so far as to suggest that Advaita reflected even greater divinity than Caitanya, through miraculous stories that can be found nowhere else in Bengali Vaisnava literature. Manring provides a detailed introduction to these texts, as well as remarkably faithful translations of Haricarana Dasa's Advaita Mangala, Laudiya Krsnadasa's Balya-lila-sutra, and Isana Nagara's Advaita Prakasa.

Reconstructing Tradition explores the devotional Hindu Krishnaite revival of the 15th and 16th centuries and its persistence into modern times through an examination of one of its principal figures, Advaita Acarya. He was the subject of several texts, and Manring considers all of them in terms of changing historical, social, and sectarian contexts.Rebecca Manring considers the role of hagiography in one school of Bengali Vaisnavism against the backdrop of regional religious history, examining the ways in which Advaita Acarya followers designed and used his life story for political and religious purposes.