Did Adi Sankara follow untouchability?

Question

In the life of Adi Shankara, there is a famous incident involving a Chandala and his Four dogs:

When Sankara was going with his disciples to the Ganges for midday ablutions, he noticed an outcaste approaching them with a pack of four dogs. Shankara and his disciples asked him to keep out of their path...

and the rest is history.

Does this act of Sankara indicate that he practiced untouchability?

_{SOURCE: Madhavīya Shankaravijayam Part 2, can be checked at the Sringeri Mutt website}

Answer 1

If Adi Shankara was trying to avoid the Chandala then he was simply following the injunctions of Scriptures. So, if you want to blame someone (or something) here, then blame the Scriptures. Because Adi Shankara was simply adhering to them.

See the following verses from Manu Smriti:

3.239. A Chandala, a village pig, a cock, a dog, a menstruating woman, and a eunuch must not look at the Brahmanas while they eat.

5.85. When he[a brahmin] has touched a Chandala, a menstruating woman, an outcast, a woman in child bed, a corpse, or one who has touched a (corpse), he becomes pure by bathing.

10.51. But the dwellings of Chandalas and Svapakas shall be outside the village, they must be made Apapatras, and their wealth (shall be) dogs and donkeys.

10.53. A man who fulfils a religious duty, shall not seek intercourse with them; their transactions (shall be) among themselves, and their marriages with their equals.

11.175. A Brahmana who unintentionally approaches a woman of the Chandala or of (any other) very low caste, who eats (the food of such persons) and accepts (presents from them) becomes an outcast;

And from Parashara Smriti:

23. For sleeping together with many of the Chandala caste, let a Brahman fast for full three nights. If he treads a path that a Chandala has trodden, his sin is removed by a remembrance of the Gayatri verse.

24. On seeing a Chandala, let him look at the sun without a moment's delay. For touching a Chandala, let him bathe with his clothing on.

So, Adi Shankara was simply following these instructions.

In any case, these verses should not taken as applicable only to a particular caste of people that is solely determined by birth. A Chandala is also the one who may not be that by birth but who is acting like one.

He who sets his face against righteousness, is but a Chandala by his acts. He gains nothing by being a mendicant, or by worshiping the household fire.

(Parashara Smriti)

Also, what Lord Shiva said simply means "What is the difference between a Chandala and a Brahmin when Atma-Gyana (Brahma Gyana, Knowledge of the Self) is obtained?

When Atma Gayna is obtained then one is free from all vedhas( dualities, differences) but till that (state of avedha) is achieved the vedhas are very much there.

When one achieves Atma Gyana there is no karma for him (good or bad) and there are no rules for him. There is no need for him then to follow the Scriptural injunctions either.

But for all other persons those rules laid down in Shastras should always be followed.

Answer 2

Adi Shankara is no doubt the most important Acharya in medieval India. He, however, had a dark side. A perusal of his commentary on Pseudo-Sudra in Brahma Sutra lays bare his attitude on Sudras. I am posting an excerpt of his bhasya below. We do not know enough of his daily activity to know whether he personally practiced untouchability. However, his writings suggest that he may well have done so (at least till he wrote the Maneesa Panchakam). He supports every barabaric suggestion of Hindu scriptures without any pangs of conscience.

And because the Smriti prohibits for the Sudras the hearing, study, and acquisition of the meaning (of the Vedas).

This is another reason why the Sudra has no right: By the Smriti he is debarred from hearing, studying, and acquiring the meaning of the Vedas. The Smriti mentions that a Sudra has no right to hear the Vedas, no right to study the Vedas, and no right to acquire the meaning of the Vedas (and perform the rites). As for prohibition of hearing, we have the text, "Then should he happen to hear the Vedas, the expiation consists in his ears being filled with lead and lac", and "He who is a Sudra is a walking crematorium. Hence one should not read in the neighbourhood of a Sudra". From this follows the prohibition about study. How can one study the Vedas when they are not to be recited within his hearing? Then there is the chopping off his tongue if he should utter the Vedas and the cutting of his body to pieces if he should commit it to memory. From this it follows by implication that the acquisition of meaning and acting on it are also prohibited, as is stated in, "Vedic knowledge is not to be imparted to a Sudra", and "Study, sacrifice, and distribution of gifts are for the twice born". But from those to whom knowledge dawns as a result of (good) tendencies acquired in the past lives, as for instance to Vidura, Dharmavyadha, and others, the reaping of the result of knowledge cannot be withheld, for the result of knowledge is inevitable. This position is confirmed by the Smriti text, "One should read out to the four castes (keeping the Brahmana in front)", which declares the competence for all the four castes for the acquisition of the anecdotes and mythologies. But the conclusion stands that a Sudra has no right to knowledge through the Vedas.

Brahma Sutra Bhasya of Sri Sankaracharya I.iii.38

Swami Vivekananda also felt that Shankara's writing on Sudras is obnoxious.

Buddha and Shankara

What Buddha did was to break wide open the gates of that very religion which was confined in the Upanishads to a particular caste. . . His greatness lies in his unrivalled sympathy. The high orders of samadhi etc., that lent gravity to his religion, are almost all there in the Vedas; what are absent there are his intellect and heart, which have never since been paralleled throughout the history of the world. . . The religion of Buddha has reared itself on the Upanisads, and upon that also the philosophy of Shankara. Only Shankara had not the slightest bit of Buddha's wonderful heart, dry intellect merely! For fear of the Tantras, for fear of the mob, in his attempt to cure a boil, he amputated the very arm itself.

(The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda, VI. 225-27)

Shankara's intellect was sharp like a razor. He was a good arguer and a scholar, no doubt of that, but he had no great liberality; his heart too seems to have been like that. Besides, he used to take great pride in his Brahmanism -- much like a southern Brahmin of the priest class, you may say. How he has defended in his commentary on the Vedanta Sutras that the non-Brahmin castes will not attain to a supreme knowledge of Brahman! . . . But look at Buddha's heart! -- Ever ready to give his own life to save the life of even a kid -- what to speak of bahujanahitayabahujanasukhaya -- For the welfare of the many, for the happiness of the many"! See what a large-heartedness – what a compassion.

(The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda, VII. 117-18)

Can one possibly explain Sankara's writings on Sudras?

We must remember that tradition says that Shankara wrote his great commentary on Brahma Sutra when he was between 12 and 16 years. It is thus possible to believe that the pitiless writing is a reflection of immaturity. Another possibility is that the young Shankara did not muster enough courage to challenge the orthodoxy.