The Rashtrakutas and their Times c20.62
The Rāṣṭrakūṭas and their Times c20.62
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c20.62.1
It seems that these institutions did not wield any influence in our period. In the first instance we have got not a single reference to any Pītha or its activity in any records of our period. In the second place there are indications that down to the 12th century A. D., the term Jagadguru, which subsequently came to designate exclusively the occupants of the Pīthas funded by S'ankara, was used to denote ordinary Brahmanas of outstanding preeminence, learning and character. The Managoli inscription of 1161 A. D.⁴⁵ mentions that towards the end of the 10th century, in the Brahmadeya village of Manigavalli there flourished a celebrity, Iśvara Ghalisāsa by name, who was the Jagadguru of the world and whose feet were worshipped by Taila II, the overthrower of the Rāṣṭrakūṭas. There is nothing to indicate in the record that Iśvara Ghalisāsa had any connection with the Pītha of Sringeri or its branch at Sankeśvara. Besides, were he a Jagadguru of the order founded by S'ankara, his name would have appeared in a Sanyāsin garb. He was a married man and the headship of the agrahāra of Managoli seems to have been hereditary in his family. His gotra was the same as that of the Chalukyas viz. Hārita, and Taila believed that it was the favour of this celebrity that had secured him the throne. It is therefore not unlikely that the title of Jagadguru may have been conferred upon him by his grateful and illustrious disciple.
c20.62.2
The record makes it clear that Iśvara Ghalisāsa was not the head of any Maṭha located at Managoli, and yet he was styled Jagadguru. If in our period the Pīṭhas founded by S'ankara had wielded the same influence as they did till recently, if there had been a branch of the Sringeri Pīṭha at Sankeśvara which is fairly near to Managoli, Iśvara Ghalisāsa, the head of the Managoli Agrahāra, who had no connection with any Maṭha, could not have dared to use the title Jagadguru. This record, therefore, makes it clear that the Pīṭhas founded by S'ankara were not exercising any appreciable influence in the Deccan till the end of our period. It must be further remembered that the claim to give the final verdict in socio-religious matters, claimed and conceded to the occupants of the Pīṭhas founded by S'ankara, must have appeared as preposterous in our period. In the Hindu period these matters were decided by special officers of Government who were variously known as Vinayasthitisthāpakas, Dharmānkuśas, Dharmapradhānas or Paṇḍitas.
c20.62.3
The last mentioned officer was to be a member of the ministry according to the S'ukranīti, a work which very probably belongs to our period with the exception of some interpolations, and it was he who was to review the realm of social and religious practices, to find out which of them, though prescribed in the S'āstras, were against the spirit of the age, which were absolutely obsolete, being countenanced neither by the S'āstra nor by custom, and to issue such orders regarding the points at dispute as may secure both this world and the next.⁴⁶ The Smritis of our and of earlier period⁴⁷ assign this function to a parishad or conference, composed of distinguished learned men of known character and piety. There is no real contradiction between S'ukra and these Smriti writers; for the royal officers, when and where they existed, may have presided over and been guided by the decisions of these experts. The case was similar to that of the judicial Panchayats; the judgments signed by Rama Shastri Prabhune of the Peshva period used to embody the decisions of the Panchayats to whom the cases were referred, though the signatures of the Panchas did not appear on the judgments. It is therefore not likely that the ministers of the Hindu states and the Parishads of our period would have looked with favour upon the proposal to surrender their rights in social and religious matters to the order founded by S'ankarāchārya.
c20.62.4
It is very probable that the occupants of the Pīṭhas acquired their present powers and jurisdiction subsequent to the fall of Hindu states. With the establishment of Muslim rule the state ceased to look after the social and religious usages and the Parishads may, therefore, have gladly welcomed the idea of utilising the prestige, which was by that time acquired by the representatives of the order founded by S'ankara, for the enforcement of their decisions. As years rolled on, the prestige of the Pīṭhas increased in the Deccan, and the Parishads were forgotten altogether.