John M Denton

The Pancadasi of Sri Vidyaranya Volume 1 of 3 John M Denton

Chapter One - The discrimination of the realChapter Two - The discrimination of the five elements Chapter Three -The discrimination of the five sheathsChapter Four - The discrimination of dualityChapter Five - Examining the meaning of the great sayings Chapter Six - The lamp of the picture 300Chapters 7 to 10 are in volume 2 and chapters 11 to 15 are in volume 3Authors Note: This is the first volume of three covering the 15 Chapters of this seminal work on Advaita Vedanta - any errors of transcription, translation or philosophy are mine. Volume Two covers chapters Seven to Ten, and Volume Three Chapters Eleven to Fifteen. I have provided the workings for every verse so that readers may come to their own conclusions and translations. The work is a famous exposition of Advaita Vedanta by the outstanding Vedanta thinker of his day. He was the master (1380-1386) of one of the four schools established by the great master who revived and renewed the Advaita Vedanta tradition. It contains many beautiful thoughts, insights and phrases for deeper reflection and contemplation. Comprehensive explanations of difficult aspects of Maya and so on are worked through logically with vivid examples. The author served as a prime minister in the Vijayanagara Empire, and is said to have played an important role in the establishment of the empire. In the interests of readability the intention has been to convey the meaning or as close to it as practical so this is in prose without the poetry of the original consequently you wont see every original word feature in the translation. The poetry of the times had metre and other rules so extra syllables or variety of words were frequently used to preserve the rhythm.