Kanchi Sankara Mutt, Kanchipuram

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Kanchipuram, one of the seven holy cities of India, is considered a city of 1000 temples. Besides the temples, one of the important places in the city is Kanchi Shankara Mutt. (In South India, it is written as "mutt", whereas it is spelled as "math" in the north. It means monastery or a holy place where the sages live). 

Kanchi Shankara Mutt is located in the heart of the city. It is believed that it was established by Adi Shankaracharya, the great reformer of Hinduism, in 482 BC. It is also believed that he attained samadhi (died) in 477 BC in Kanchipuram. However, there are many controversies about the above statements. Many people believe that Adi Shankaracharya was born in the 8th century CE, and he attained samadhi in Badrinath. (Interestingly, we can find Adi Shankara samadhis in Badrinath and Thrisur.) Some people claim that Adi Shankaracharya didn't establish the Kanchi mutt; it was a branch of the Sringeri mutt in Kumbakonam city that became independent and shifted to Kanchipuram.

Adi Shankaracharya was the one who pacified the Goddess Kamakshi by establishing Sri Chakra. His history is very well connected to the temple of the most famous Kamakshi Amman Temple of Kanchipuram city. However, some people contend that the Kamakshi Amman temple was originally a Jain or Buddhist temple, and Shankaracharya converted that into Kamakshi temple in the 8th century CE.

Obviously, Shankara Mutt in Kanchipuram became very famous in the 20th century CE during the period of then Kanch Shankaracharya (Kanchi seer) Sri Chandrasekarendra Saraswathi Swami. He lived for 100 years, and there are still millions of devotees for him. His samadhi is located in Kanchi mutt.

The devotees visit Sankara Mutt to get darshan of two Shankaracharyas (Jeyendra and Vijeyendra) and visit the samadhi of Sri Chandrasekarendra Saraswathi Swami. There are also some small shrines and Murtis (icons) in Sankara Mutt.

Happy travelling.

Visit my site, krishnakumartk.com, to know more about the travel guides and other books that I have written.



Location: Vedachalam Nagar Extension, Kanchipuram, Tamil Nadu 631502, India

Comments

  1. PrashanthMonday, January 17, 2011

    hi ,
    I recently jumped into this post and never even thought of these things. I always wondered why there are 30 plus Jagadgurus in other mutts and Kanchi mutt has 70. If Shankaracharya was born BC then what about the other four mutts and their histroy? Do you have books and history literature on this. REcently a book The Holy Sankara Mutt was released by Times of india group, I havent read it yet

    ReplyDelete
  2. UnknownWednesday, January 16, 2013

    Can you tell me the importance of madam or mutt's and its concepts. If there is any book pls let me know.. My email id is sathyaswat1@gmail.com

    ReplyDelete
  3. UnknownWednesday, January 16, 2013

    Can you tell me the importance of madam or mutt's and its concepts. If there is any book pls let me know.. My email id is sathyaswat1@gmail.com

    ReplyDelete

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