Thirumaalai(22)
Sri Parthasarathi thunai,
Srimathe Ramanujaya Namaha
“ Mattrondrum vEinda Maname Madhilarangar
Kattrinum meitha kazhalinai keezh- uttra
Thirumaalai paadum seer Thondaradipodi Emperumaanai
Eppozhudum peesu”
“ Srimat Krishna samahvaya Namo yaamuna soonave
yetkadAkshai kalakshyAnAm sulabha: Sridara: sadaa”
Pranams,
Paasuram-9
“mattrumOr deivan undE? MadhiyilAmAnidangAl
uttrapOdandrinEngal oruvarendruvunaramAteer
attram mEl ondru ariyeer avanallAl deivamillai
kattrinam mEitha endhai kazhalinai paniminneerE.”
mattrumOr deivan undE? MadhiyilAmAnidangAl: Here alwar wants to
say
that there is no other god than the emperuman himself. But many
people
around him say that there are muppaththu mukkodi dEvargal and
some say
there are only the thrimoorthis. But alwar poses a question to
all of
them, wondering if there can be anyother god equivalent to Sriman
Narayanan. In front of the purushOtamam all the others become
only
strees(ladies). Sri Parasara bhattar was once telling his shisyas,
the sridevi
avirbhAva charitram during the amrudha madhanam(churning of milk
ocean). He told the shisyas that when the devAs churned the
pArkadal then
sri Mahalakshmi appeared from inside and she went and put the
garland in
her hand to the lord and got a permament place in his chest. One
of
his shisyas Nanjeeyer asked bhattar ,”when shyness was a
important
characteristics of ladies how could the loka mAtha, head of all
the women in
this world go and sit in the chest of the emperuman in front of
so many
dEvas?” Bhattar replied, ”Ofcourse ladies are shy by
nature but they
never feel shy in front of 10 ladies only when a man is present
they
feel shy. In front of purushOtaman all the other men appeared as
women to
her and hence she didn’t feel shy.” So emperuman is
alone considered
as deivam or paramapurusham. But people inspite of the
explanations
given by alwar doesn’t want to accept it. They are still
stubborn in
their own opinions so alwar calls them, ‘madhiyilla
mAnidangAl’(human
without brains). Here alwar says mAnidangAl because he considers
such human
to be equal to animals. As sastras say, “jnAna heena: pasu:”(one
without knowledge is equal to an animal). Saint purandaradAsar in
one of
his krithis ,sings in yesOdhA bhAvam, and says “poochi
vandhadE kanna
poochi vandhadE” here he refers to brahma, sivan and the
other dEvas as
poochi(insects) because when compared to the magimai of the lord
Sri
Krishna(Yesodha’s kid) all others are like small insects.
uttrapOdandrinEngal oruvarendruvunaramAteer: BhAnAsuran was a
great
siva bhakthan. His daughter ushai wanted to marry krishna’s
grandson
aniruddhan. But coming to know of this bhAnAsuran put aniruddan
behind
the bars. Then Krishna and his army came to fight. At that time
bhAnAsuran lost all his power and requested sivan to come to his
rescue.
Sivan and his army came to fight against the lord but then he
knew he
cannot win over the lord and hence he fell to his feet and begged
to spare
the life of bhAnan who was his bhaktha. So emperuman spared him
for
the sake of Sivan. Ravanan was a great siva bhakthan but siva
peruman
didn’t come to his rescue in the rAma-rAvana war. In the
Mahabharata war
also no one could do anything against arjuna because Krishna was
shielding him. Siva peruman told dhuriyOdhana that, even his
pAsupadAstram
cannot go past Krishna, who was sitting in front of Arjuna’s
chariot.
Brahma gave a lot of varans to hiranyakasipu but then he couldn’t
do
anything against narasimha bhagavAn. So there are so many
instances where
the so called big deivams have lost to bhagavAn sriman Narayanan
and
have surrendered to him. There are many more to quote, so alwar
hear
says only when you are all put to such a crisis, will you realize
that
there is no other superior power greater than emperuman. He is
the ONE,
with no other one equal to him. But people refuse to accept this
fact.
Why? Alwar continues to explain,
attram mEl ondru ariyeer avanallAl deivamillai: why people do not
accept is because there is nothing inside their heads. They want
only
worldly pleasures and hence go behind the suddhra devatas which
give the
simple worldly pleasures. These people assume that the devatas
will
torture them if they do not give them the proper offering and
hence give
bali etc and waste their time. They never spend their time in
reading
through our sastras or listening to them. And hence do not
realize the
truth. Ramanyana says “Adianthecha madhyecha hari sarvathra
geeyathe”(hari is present in the first, end and the middle).
The shruthis and
smritis highlight the superiority of bhagavAn. In Mahabharatha(considered
as the 5th vedam) both Vishnu sahasranAmam and BG talk fully of
the
bhagavath magimai only. Full of Bhagavatam is only bhagavath-bhAgavatha
kathai(stories). Inspite of all these the people still remain
ignorant
because they do not have the brains to think and analyse. They
even do
not want to accept the Vedas and itihasa puranas instead talk ill
of
them. Still alwar pities them and says ‘avanallAl
deivamillai’. Even
though you people cannot understand by yourself I now tell you
that there
is no other deivam like him (infact there is no other deivam
other than
him). So now people ask alwar who this ‘avan’ is? Alwar
answers that
question,
kattrinam mEitha endhai kazhalinai paniminneerE: Alwar cautiously
says the lord is Sri Krishnan. Because if he says narasimhan
people will
fear to go near him. If he says chakravarthi thirumagan then they
will
say how can we cheap people approach a great king. So he says the
lord
is none other than the son of nandagopan who did nothing else
than
going at the back of the cowherds. Even today when we see our
kids not
studying well it is our tendency to say that you are fit for only
going at
the back of cowherds. But the emperuman, lord of lords chose to
be
born in a clan of cowboys. He came down to attract the people
with his
beauty. It is natural for anyone to loose themselves to a
beautiful kid.
Even though a flower may be in our enemies garden we do enjoy the
fragrance. Similarly irrespective of whose kid it is we like to
talk sweet
words to it and play with it. So emperuman opted to be born as a
gopan
and enjoy and also steal all our hearts(like he stole butter in
each
house in gokulam). So alwar says fall into the feet of my lord
who went
at the back of the cowherds.
To be continued
AzhwAr emberumAnAr jeeyar thiruvadigaLE saraNam
Adiyen Ramanuja Dasyai
Sumithra Varadarajan