The philosophical school to which Yadava Prakasha belonged

Question

Is there any authentic history of Yadava Prakasha? Was he really an Advaitin? There is the popular belief that he was a Svabhavika Bhedabheda Vaadin. His views are said to be examined by the Sri Bhashya. And now followers of Ramanuja are 'reconstructing' Yadava Prakasha doctrine and Bodhayana doctrine from the Sri Bhashya.

So, is there any finality about Yadava Prakasha having been an Advaitin and later a Bhedabheda Vadin and finally a Vishishtadvaitin? Madhvas list 21 schools which he rejected and one is Yadavaprakasha's.

Answer 1

Very little is known about Yadavaprakasa. He is considered to be an exponent of bhedabhed Vedanta.It is not clear if he taught Ramanuja even though one Yadavaprakasa is believed to have been a teacher of Ramanuja.

The Bhedabheda of Yadava is so closely allied to that of Bhaskara that one is often confounded with the other, and this confusion is further increased by the identification of Bhedabheda with the Visistadvaita of Ramanuja. Very little is known of Yadava and his system of Vedanta; and his commentary on the Vedanta-sutras is not, at present, available. According to tradition there was one Yadavaprakasa who lived at Kanchi in the eleventh century A.D. and taught Ramanuja for some time; the latter could not accept his teaching and so he formulated his Visistadvaita tradition which was a clear break away from the interpretation of Yadava. There is, however, no clear evidence to establish the identity of this Yadava with the exponent of Bhedabheda-vada.The philosophy of Yadava is, like other Vedanta systems, based on the authority of immemorial tradition and may be ultimately traced to the Upanishads. Sudarsana Bhatta, in his gloss on the Sribhasya of Ramanuja known as Srutaprakasika, identifies the view of Asmarathya, summed up in the Vedanta-sutra, I.4.20, with the philosophy of Yadava; and Thibaut translates the comment of Bhamati on the same Sutra and states that the doctrine represented by Asmarathya is known as Bhedabheda. The systematic account of Yadav's teaching that is here attempted is mainly based on the critical references to it that are contained in the works of Ramanuja and Vedanta Desika. The latter devotes a brief chapter in his Paramatabhanga to the critical examination of Bhaskara and Yadava.

The Philosophy of Bhedabheda, Book II, Part 1, Chapter 1, The philosophy of Yadavaprakasa by P. N. Srinivasachari

Answer 2

Since Sankaran Advaita is the primary purvapaksha for Visistadvaitins, the association of Yadava with "Advaita" is really an outcome of post-Ramanuja / post-Vedanta Desika rivalries between Visistadvaitains and Nirveseshadvaitins (Sankaran advaita). It became convenient to use the label "Advaita" for many pUrvapakShas.

Thus you will find Visistadvaita scholars (in lectures) refer to Bhaskara's school as Bhaskaraadvaita and Yadava's school as Yadavaadvaita when describing the respective philosophies. For example the scholar Sri Adoor Asuri Madhavachariar who explicitly says that Sankara, Bhaskara and Yadavaprakasha all are expounding on "Advaita" only (in the context of explaining the second verse or Ramanuja's Vedartha Sangraha). See around minute 6 of this YouTube video.

There are other modern scholars who will take the effort to explicitly liken the school to Bhedabheda or at the very least call it "Yadava-mata" alone without labeling it Advaita. In fact, Sudarshana Suri in his commentary on the Vedartha Sangraha called Tatparya Dipika refers to the school as Yadavaprakasha-mata. (I will try to find a link to a YouTube video for a modern scholar using this term.)

Interestingly, Patrick Olivelle in his introduction to the Yatidharmasamuchchaya of Yadavaprakasha remarks:

The Sri-Vaishnava tradition, indeed, claims Bhaskara and Yadava as its spiritual ancestors in in their opposition to the absolute monism of Advaita and to its understanding of ascetic renunciation.

Now I do agree that Yadava's YDS is revered in the Srivaishnava circles and even Vedanta Desika and Nadadur Ammal have high regards for it. However I have never heard of Yadava's philosophy being considered as foundational in its criticism of Sankaran Advaita. Yadava's interpretation of the Chandogya verse "tasya yathA kapyAsam puNDarIkamevamakShiNI" being identical to that of Adi Sankara, and Ramanuja being deeply disturbed by the analogy in the interpretation occupies an significant point in hagiographies about Ramanuja's life.

If Olivelle is right (he doesn't cite anything to back up his claim) about Visistadvaitins building up on Yadava's arguments against Sankara, then it is all the more likely that the labeling of Yadava's philosophy as Advaita is a recent development due to ideological/sectarian rivalries.