The sect is often called Brahma-sampradâya, because it claims that its doctrine was revealed by Brahmâ from whom Madhva was the sixth teacher in spiritual descent. Its members are known as Mâdhvas but prefer to call themselves Sad-Vaishnavas. Its teaching seems more rigid and less emotional than that of other Vishnuites and is based on the Pancabheda or five eternal distinctions between (_a_) God and the soul, (_b_) God and matter, (_c_) the soul and matter, (_d_) individual souls, (_e_) individual atoms of matter. God is generally called Vishnu or Nârâyana rather than Vâsudeva. Krishna is adored but not in his pastoral aspect. Vishnu and his spouse Lakshmî are real though superhuman personalities and their sons are Brahmâ the creator and Vâyu.[599] Peculiar to this sect is the doctrine that except through Vâyu, the son of Vishnu, salvation is impossible. Vâyu has been three times incarnate as Hanumat, the helper of Râma, as Bhîma and as Madhva himself.[600] Souls are separate, innumerable and related to God as subjects to a king. They are of three classes: those who are destined to eternal bliss in the presence of God: those who revolve eternally in the maze of transmigration: and those who tending ever downwards are doomed to eternal suffering.
This last doctrine, as well as the doctrine of salvation through Vâyu, the wind or spirit, has led many to suspect that Madhva was influenced by Christian ideas, but it is more probable that he owed something to Islam. Such influence would no doubt be distant and indirect, for a Brahman would not come into contact with Moslim doctors, though it is said that Madhva could speak Persian.[601] But some Moslim ideas such as the absolute separation of God from the world and the predestination of souls to eternal happiness and misery may have entered Brahman minds. Still, nearly all Madhva's views (with the possible exception of eternal punishment) have Indian analogies. The Yoga teaches that there are innumerable souls distinct from one another and from God and though salvation through the spirit sounds Christian, yet the Upanishads constantly celebrate Vâyu (wind) and Prâna (breath) as the pervading principle of the world and the home of the self. "By the wind (Vâyu) as thread, O Gautama, this world and the other world and all creatures are bound together."[602] Thus the idea that the wind is the universal mediator is old and it does not seem that Madhva regarded Vâyu as a redeemer or expiation for sin like Christ.