Sharada Tirtha – A forgotten bit of Kashmir
I first heard about “Sharada Tirtha” (Sharada Temple) when I stumbled on these photographs on the net. A search led me to Varnam’s post from which I learnt that while “Sharada Peeth” was as important as Somnath, Multan and Thaneshvar in olden times, it does not find any mention in History books (nor does it find any mention in the Wikipedia list of Hindu Temples in Pakistan) .
Curious to find more, I ended up on this site which noted:
Kashmir contains the famous Sharda Temple where Sankara ascended the Sarvajna Pitha(the throne of the omniscience).It is about 100 kilometres from Srinagar, the entire route being studded with paddy fields, small villages and orchards. The whole plain is lovely with beautiful lakes and mighty masses of rock.
After crossing the plains a high range of mountains has to be trekked through a difficult stretch with treacherous slopes, sheets of snow at the foot and forests down the slopes. Kishanganga, a tributary of the Jhelum, is the last to cross before reaching Sharda Temple.
Sri Sharda Temple is situated at a height of about 3400 metres. Surrounded by snow-capped mountains and dense forests, inhabited by wild beasts, the temple inspires travellers with a feeling of awe and strangeness. Far from the ignoble strife of the madding crowds, the spot is pecularly divine with supreme peace. To fulfil this aim in life, Sankara travelled all over Bharata and visited Sharda Temple in Kashmir. There he vanquished many learned disputants and seated himself triumphantly on the throne of the omniscience. This part of kashmir was a flourishing stretch of land, housing scholars and pandits of high Vedic learning.
The seat of learning is symbolic and not one of materialistic grandeur. It is seen as a kind of stone slab, held sacred. All that you can now see inside the temple are a seat , round and smooth, hewn out of rock, a Sri Chakra and a few other figures.
So how is it that we hardly know anything about the temple? Your guess is as good as mine…
But there appear to be some efforts underway to revive the shrine (news report dt. Feb ’08):
Jagadguru Shankaracharya of Sharda Sarvagyapeeth, Swami Amritananda Dev Teerth, plans to revive the Shankaracharya parampara in Shardapeeth, which is located in PoK.
To attain this goal, he plans to restart the fair (mela) of Sharda Ashtami in Shardapeeth, which begins on the Bhadrapada Shukla Chaturthi and goes on for five days till Sharda Ashtami with the consent of the authorities concerned. The old record says that it was celebrated there in Kashmir—now PoK—till 1949.
And efforts by Kashmiri Pandits to get permission from government of Pakistan to visit the shrine have been continuing…which is ironic, considering that Sharada Tirth is in “occupied” territory.
I wish the Shankaracharya and the Pandits luck but I am not optimistic.
In the meantime, I worry about the present condition of the shrine. It is in a region that is not easily accessible…and the (Pakistan) government’s record of maintaining Hindu temples in Pakistan has been mixed.
I live in the fond hope though that someday I might be able to visit the shrine.
P.S. As an aside the Organiser interview mentions that upto 10 Lakh families that earlier belonged to PoK, continue to be stateless subjects (citizens?) in India. Does anyone have more information on this?
Shantanu, good one. Just to add to this, Adi Shankaracharya is unquestionably the one great saint India had seen just before the arab rise. During his time, there was mass conversion into Jainism and Buddhism too. During some general discussion with friends and family, I learnt from some elders that Shankaracharya saw the islamic invasions coming. To beat this, he wanted to establish spiritual centers of learning and debate in four corners of the country. It is said that Sharada Peeth in Pakistan, Haridwar, Sringeri and Kanchi.
In my later search on internet, I also learnt that infact, Sri Adi Shankara built various temples and peethas called Dashanami, most of them across the coast line. The west coast line on arabian sea today is filled with temples if you have a look at the map. He saw it coming and that was why he built these with the help of his disciples. Most of his establishments stand very near to the border of the country. If chanakya used politics to unite India, Shankara used spiritualism to unite India.
It is our pathetic situation that some of the peethas are disputed. Some so-called scholars and historians claim that some of the Dashanami peethas and mathas are not acutally built by Sri Adi Shankara or his disciples but were Budhist monastaries occupied by Hindu Kings and made into Peethas. The very seat of Advaitha thought – Kanchi peetham is also considered a disputed site by learned men of great Independent India. Pity!
Vivek: Thanks for the comment…I was not aware of the controversy around Kanchi Peetham…Pity indeed.
@ vivek’s mention of kanchi peetam
the history that we have been told is that adi shankara started four peetams in the four directions. what vivek has missed is the Puri peetam.
again there is a oral tradition that adi shankara finally settled at kanchi which survives as the kanchi peetam which unfortunately has no significant evidence except personal belief of millions of devotees (including myself).
what adds fuel to this dispute is the fact that the kanchi mutt operated from kumbakonam in the recent past till the famous pontiff H.H Chandrasekhara saraswathi moved the mutt back to kanchi.
it is also pertinent to note that the same pontiff shifted outside tamilnadu in the seventies and early eighties unable to continue in tamilnadu. it is only on the request of the then CM of tamilnadu – MGR – that he returned to tamilnadu.
Mathas established by Adi Sankara.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adi_Shankara
विद्याशंकर मंदिर (Vidyashankara temple) at Sringeri Sharada Peetham, SringeriAdi Shankara founded four Maṭhas (Sanskrit: मठ) to guide the Hindu religion. These are at
Sringeri in Karnataka in the south,
Dwaraka in Gujarat in the west,
Puri in Orissa in the east, and
Jyotirmath (Joshimath) in Uttarakhand in the north.
Hindu tradition states that he put in charge of these mathas his four main disciples: Sureshwaracharya, Hastamalakacharya, Padmapadacharya, and Totakacharya respectively. The heads of the mathas trace their authority back to these figures. Each of the heads of these four mathas takes the title of Shankaracharya (“the learned Shankara”) after the first Shankaracharya. The table below gives an overview of the four Amnaya Mathas founded by Adi Shankara and their details.[29]
Śishya Maṭha Mahāvākya Veda Sampradaya
Hastāmalakācārya Govardhana Pīṭhaṃ Prajñānam brahma (Brahman is Knowledge) Rig Veda Bhogavala
Sureśvarācārya Śārada Pīṭhaṃ Aham brahmāsmi (I am Brahman) Yajur Veda Bhūrivala
Padmapādācārya Dvāraka Pīṭhaṃ Tattvamasi (That thou art) Sama Veda Kitavala
Toṭakācārya Jyotirmaṭha Pīṭhaṃ Ayamātmā brahma (This Atman is Brahman) Atharva Veda Nandavala
Please see the table in Wiki as cited above.
the most authentic biography of Adi Sankara is by Vidyaranya , a Sankaracharyya of Sringeri . This is published by Ramakrishna Mission.
S Radhakrishnan former president of India and Prof of Religion Oxford University , also has written on Adi Sankara.
The Sharda Peeth, to be more correct a Vidyapeeth, referred here in the post is the great university Sharda university in Kashmir , which was a great seat of learning. There was a temple dedicated to Sharda in this University.
The Sringeri mutt is Shardha peetham.
How we treat our own Kashmiris.I used to send $12 us to Kumari Panna Sharma who resided in a camp in Jammu,having left-chased out-of Kashmir in the great exodus of Hindus.Now the Swat valley pays the price.
Panna was studying Dance. Where is she now? and her sister,brother,mother andfather who had a heart-attack.’
panna is my living Sharada’
I wish to change the world but it moves so slow!
@Sridhar,
Ironic isnt it. The Dravida Movement Bufoons need Kanchi Peetham to stay in TN because they know that most of the brahmins in TN have unwavering faith in Kanchi Muttam. These bufoons need such faith so that they can keep showing fingers at seers and make people buy their Dravidian theory and vote in their favour. The day TN shuns its identity as the seat of Advaitha Philosophy, it would become a rogue state waiting to be wiped out of existence. Andhra is moving in a similar direction. Y Samuels Rajasekhara Reddy faces the worst drought in the past decade whilst Karnataka is has had good rains in recent few weeks.
Vedic Yagna and Yaga is the quintessential thing that should be practised on this land. Once we moved away from it, we started suffering!
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