/lit/ - Literature

Adi Shankaracharya (700CE - 750CE)

>Shankara himself stated that Hinduism asserts "Ātman (Soul, Self) exists", whilst Buddhism asserts that there is "no Soul, no Self.

>Shankara has an unparallelled status in the tradition of Advaita Vedanta. He is believed to have travelled all over India to help restore the study of the Vedas. According to Frank Whaling, ""Hindus of the Advaita persuasion (and others too) have seen in Sankara the one who restored the Hindu dharma against the attacks of the Buddhists (and Jains) and in the process helped to drive Buddhism out of India."

>Shankara, in his text Upadesasahasri, discourages ritual worship such as oblations to Deva (God), because that assumes the Self within is different from the Brahman.

>The "doctrine of difference" is wrong, asserts Shankara, because, "he who knows the Brahman is one and he is another, does not know Brahman".

Ramana Maharshi (1879-1950)

>Question: Buddha is said to have ignored questions about God.

>Ramana Maharshi: Yes, and because of this he has been called an agnostic or nihilist. In fact Buddha was concerned with guiding the seeker to realise Bliss here and now, rather than with academic discussions about God and so forth.

Shankara started a whole philosophical school of Hinduism to 'disprove' the Buddha while not understanding the Buddha agreed with him, but was simply stating it in a way to avoid it turning into a endless philosophical debate for people to waste their lives on, which is exactly what he did.