That the ancient teachers, the ripest outcome of whose speculations and
discussions is embodied in the Vedânta-sûtras, disagreed among
themselves on points of vital importance is sufficiently proved by the
three passages quoted. The one quoted last is specially significant as
showing that recognised authorities--deemed worthy of being quoted in
the Sûtras--denied that doctrine on which the whole system of /S/a@nkara
hinges, viz. the doctrine of the absolute identity of the individual
soul with Brahman.

Turning next to the /S/a@nkara-bhâshya itself, we there also meet with
indications that the Vedântins were divided among themselves on
important points of dogma. These indications are indeed not numerous:
/S/a@nkara, does not on the whole impress one as an author particularly
anxious to strengthen his own case by appeals to ancient authorities, a
peculiarity of his which later writers of hostile tendencies have not
failed to remark and criticise. But yet more than once /S/a@nkara also
refers to the opinion of 'another,' viz., commentator of the Sûtras, and
in several places /S/a@nkara's commentators explain that the 'other'
meant is the V/ri/ttikâra (about whom more will be said shortly). Those
references as a rule concern minor points of exegesis, and hence throw
little or no light on important differences of dogma; but there are two
remarks of /S/a@nkara's at any rate which are of interest in this
connexion. The one is made with reference to Sûtras 7-14 of the third
pâda of the fourth adhyâya; 'some,' he says there, 'declare those
Sûtras, which I look upon as setting forth the siddhânta view, to state
merely the pûrvapaksha;' a difference of opinion which, as we have seen
above, affects the important question as to the ultimate fate of those
who have not reached the knowledge of the highest Brahman.--And under I,
3, 19 /S/a@nkara, after having explained at length that the individual