Thiruvananthapura Paasurams : TVM -10.2: Part 1

[Guest guest]

Dear BhakthAs : In this post , I will add auxillary

material to the most recent posting of Sri MadhavakkaNNan

on Swamy NammAzhwAr's ten moving paasurams .

 

Divya Desam

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The Lord's name is Anantha PadmanAbhan and Madhavan .

ThAyAr's name is Sri Hari Lakshmi . Under His HemakUta

vimAnam , the Bhujanga Sayana mUrthy rests in His gigantic form .

The Garbha graham is so huge that it is split into three

gates or openings . On the extreme left , we are blessed

with the darsanam of the Thirumukha Mandalam (face )

of our Lord , in the middle opening , we have the

darsanam of chathurmukha Brahma seated on the Lotus

arising out of the Naabhi Kamalam of the Lord giving Him His

name , Padmanaabhan . On the extreme right opening ,

we have the darsana soubhAghyam of the sacred feet of the Lord .

Sri PadmanAbhan faces eastwards .

 

As we circumambulate (do prathkshiNam ) , we come across

Sri Narasimhan's sannidhi and KaNNan sannadhi in

the prAkAram . Here is MadhavakkaNNan just behind

the Garbha graham .

 

Few miles away is ThiruvaattARu , another Divya Desam of

MalayAla naadu , where we worship AadhikEsava PerumAL

and Marakathavalli ThAyAr under AshtAnga VimAnam , which is

very similar in appearance to the HemakUta VimAnam

of Thiruvananthapuram . Interestingly enough ,

the Lord here is also gigantic in size and has

a huge garbha graham that has three openings . The only

difference is that we have the darsanam of the face of this

Lord at the extreme right , the Lotus and BrahmA in the middle

and the Padha sEvai at the extreme left .The order is just

the opposite of the sevA kramam at Thiruvananthapuram .

Adhi Kesava PerumAL is also facing East .

 

It is interesting to observe that NammAzhwAr in his

first Paasuram asked us to recite the name of Kesavan

at Thiruvananthapuram , where the name of the Lord

is Madhavan and Anantha PadmanAbhan .Whenever the naamam

of Madhavan is invoked , Dhvaya Manthram has to be

invoked simultaneously . We will try to gain

some insights later into why NammAzhwAr talks about

Kesavan and recommends Kesava naama sankIrthanam to us

at Thiruvananthapuram , when there is an ArchAmurthy

at ThiruvAtturu with Adhi Kesava naamam

resting in the same gigantic Bhujanga Sayana Poisture

offering His darsanam.

 

MaNavALa Maamuni's Thiruvaimozhi NooRanthadhi paasuram

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In the 92nd paasuram , Vara vara Muni points out that

NammAzhwAr wanted to perform Nithya Kainkaryam

with the BhagavathAs to Ananatha PadmanAbhan , what he

was hoping to do at parama Padham for Sri Vaikuntanaathan.

 

The Paasuram is as follows :

 

kedumidarvaikunthatthaik kittinAppOlath

tadamudaya Anaanthapuram tannil , padavaravil

kaNdyuil mARkAtcheyyak kaathalitthAn MaaRan

uyar viNdaniluLLOr viyappavE

 

(Meaning ): To the utter astonishment and delight

of the nithyasUris , NammAzhwAr wished to perform

nithya Kaimkaryam of the kind to Ananatha PadmanAbhan

of Thiruvananthapuram as he would perform (later)

nithya niravadhya Kaimkaryam to Sri VaikuntanAthan

in His land that is free from sorrow of any kind

(viz)., Parama padham .

 

For the Lord sleeping on the Hooded serpent Adhi sEshaa ,

( padam aravil kaNN thuyil mARkku )Nammaazhwar desired

to do eternal service of the kind that he was going

to perform at Sri Vaikuntam (kedum idar Vaikunthatthai

kittinArp pOla Ananthapuram Tannil aaLL seyya kathalitthAn) .

AzhwAr saw the archA mUrthy of Ananatha PadmanAbhan as

though He was Sri Vaikunta Naathan and longed to perform

the Kaimkaryam right there at Thiruvanathapuram , what

he was eagerly thinking of doing at Parama padham .

 

Acharya Hrudhaya GranthA points out that

the Thiruvananthapura Paasurams are UpadEsaparam

or ParOpadEsam. SakshAth Swami goes one step furhter

in his analysis and points out that the first five

paasurams of this decad are upadEsam to others as

an AchAryA and the last five are pleas to his own

men (bhagavahtAs) to join together with him to

perform service to the Lord of Thiruvananthapuram .

 

PannIrAyirapadi points out that AzhwAr was in

Mukthi nilai and the Lord was in a hurry to show

His parama BhakthA the looks of His parama Padham

( bhOgya SthAnam )right here at His leelA Vinhuthi

(Earth )at Thiruvananthapuram as though it was a

demo of tastes to come .

 

(To Be continued )

V.Sadagopan