thiruppavai day twenty one song twenty one

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TIRUPPAVAI - DAY TWENTY ONE - SONG TWENTY ONE

Transliteration

ERRAk kalangaL ethirponki mIthaLippa

mARRAthe pAl coriyum vaLLal perum pacukkaL

ARRap pataiththAy makanE aRivuRAy

UkkamutaiyAy periyAy ulakinil

thORRamAy ninRa cutarE thuyilezAy

mARRAr unakku vali tholainthu un vacaRkaN

ARRAthu vanthu un ati paniyumARu pOlE

pORRi yAm vanthOm pukaLnthElOr empAvAy.

 

Translation

 

Son of Nantakopa whose many munificent cows

Yield brimming pots full of frothy milk! Wake up!

The Zealous in saving the devotees and the Noble!

The Unmistakable Light for the world! Wake up!

Like your vanquished foes sans their might

Surrender at your feet, right at your doorsteps,

We have reached your abode

Hailing you by your fame.

 

Songs 21-23 make up a cluster in which Nappinnai joins the maids and invokes

God.

Abundance at the abode of God, the zeal, nobility and unmistakability of God

and the attitude of total surrender on the part of the maids are brought

together in the densely packed song. In a way, the three songs can very well

be said to sum up the Vaishnavite concept of Divinity and the proper

attitude of the devotee as well as the ultimate goal of bhakthi.

The twenty-first song celebrates the first two of the three. The abundance

of the household of Nantakopa is implied in a graphic evocation. Pots are

already full with milk. There is yet more milk in the udders of the cows. So

pots already used for holding milk are used again

to displace the froth and accommodate more milk. Thus the addition of milk

and the spilling over of the froth have both been presented right at the

beginning of the song. God was praised in the name of Nantakopan’s son

earlier in the seventeenth and eighteenth songs. Identifying Krishna in the

name of Nantakopa has a specific intention. Descending into the clan of the

herdsmen in the form of Krishna is the manifestation of an intention on God’

s part – to redeem the maids. How could Krishna then indulge in sleep even

as the maids have sought him for succour? Therefore to repeatedly call him

the son of Nantakopa is to bring out the intention behind the manifestation.

The cows by extension become personifications of the spiritual teachers

called the gurus. They initiate the devotees into the path of God and their

abundant affection for the devotees is identified with milk. The picture

given is as follows. Once the herdsman lays his fingers on the udders, the

cows keep on pouring milk and do not stop when the pot is full. It is such

abundant concern for the devotee that gets celebrated here. Traditional

interpretation will cite an illustration from Vishnupurana. Maitreya sought

Parasara for instruction into the spiritual. Parasara poured forth much more

than Maitreya had sought. It is such profuse pouring forth that makes the

cows munificent – vallal perum pacukkal.

Traditional interpretation will also expand on ‘arivuray’ which has been

inadequately translated into ‘wake up’ at the second line. The word, rightly

translated, will read, “become aware” in which case it can be taken for

imploring God’s grace. Though there is no urgent business to Krishna as the

son of Nantakopa to attend to so early in the morning, the intention of the

manifestation is to grace the pavai observance with his august presence and

redeem the maids. So, though the son of such a rich person like Nantakopa,

Krishna as the manifestation of Narayana has to attend to the urgent

business of clinching the pavai observance with assured redemption to the

maids.

The next attribute to Krishna is being the Zealous. It is the translation of

the word ‘ukkamutaiyay’. The word can be read in two ways. In the first

reading it may mean that God in His manifest form is the meaning of the

Vedas. Without God, the Vedas become hollow. It is God who makes the Vedas

meaningful. The second reading refers back to the twentieth song in which

God is said to dispel the distress of the devas.

‘Soulapya’, the condescending grace of God is one of the basic attributes of

God in the Vaishnava concept. So the word ‘ukkamutaiyay’ is better

understood as referring to God’s earnestness as expressed in condescending

grace. Manifestations of God acquire their significance only in the context

of this attribute to God. In the Gita also Krishna comes out with the

explicit assurance that whenever injustice prevails, He will appear to

establish justice.

‘The Noble’ in the translation, again, is an inadequate version of ‘periyay’

in the original. It shall be read to mean as follows: The greatness and

nobility of God are so great that even all the extant Vedas and those to

come hereafter cannot adequately comprehend His greatness. He has a

greatness that transcends the greatness as experienced and explained in the

Vedas.

The first line in Nammalvar’s Tiruvaymoli has expressed the idea succinctly:

‘uyarvu ara uyarnalam utaiyavan’ – the greatness of God is so great that

even the greatest greatness understood is lesser by far. The point of

interest is that God of such transcendent nobility has chosen to condescend

in all His grace into the most easily accessible form to the maids. And yet,

the greatness is in no way to be missed. Therefore immediately follows the

next address: ‘torramay ninra cutare’ – the light that stood out

unmistakably. It is this concept of God who is at once far and near to the

devotee that makes the concept of God in Vaishnavism so endearing.

There is a Christian parallel too. Hopkins wrote a sonnet titled ‘God’s

Grandeur”. He begins the poem asserting that the world is charged with the

grandeur of God. He says that such grandeur will shine forth like shining

from shook foil. Reflected light from a silver paper will strike even the

closed eye with its brightness. So also even the most insensitive to God’s

presence in the world cannot escape the awareness of God in the world.

The concluding part of the song is also highly suggestive. Even the most

egoistic had to finally surrender to God. Such is the greatness of God’s

valour. And once the fiercest foe surrenders, God extends His grace so very

spontaneously. There is the story of the crow that offended Sita in the

Ramayana. Rama sent his arrow that followed the crow wherever it flew.

Finally, with nowhere to go, the crow fell at Rama’s feet. Rama ordered the

arrow to take away one eye of the crow and leave it alive.

There is also another interesting story, again in the Ramayana about God’s

abundant grace. When Rama had to leave his bow and arrow to go to the pond

to take bath, he stuck an arrow in the ground to lean his bow and sling

against. Unfortunately the arrow stuck into the ground had pierced a frog.

Rama, on his return, found the wounded frog. He became terribly sad. He

asked the frog why he did not give a call in warning, as the arrow was about

to pierce him. Then the frog is supposed to have said that whenever it was

in danger, it used to call Rama for protection. But when Rama’s arrow itself

came to wound him, whose name was it to call for protection? Such is the

greatness of God’s arms like the discus and the arrow that makes the

greatest egoistic to understand the futility of pride in valour and

ultimately surrender to God.

The maids however are not egoistic in that sense. Their egoism and surrender

is of a different kind. It is the total negation of the Self which in

Nammalvar’s words will be ‘nir numatu enru ivai ver mutal mayttu’ – to

negate considerations of ‘you’ and ‘yours’ by their roots. Nammalvar will

implore such negation as follows: ‘parrilaiyay avan murril atanku’ – with no

attachment, converge into Him. In such a context, the inevitability of

surrender is not because of the irresistible might of God but because of the

realisation of His essential Divinity.

This idea of negation of the self at the point of surrender to God is

further reinforced if we take the prayer in the previous song into account.

The maids had prayed for the fan and mirror in the previous song – ‘ukkamum

tattoliyum’. The fan is identified with driving away all kinds of

attachments. The mirror is synonymous with jnana – wisdom. Thus the prayer

in the previous song was a prayer for a certain attitude – an attitude of

negation of the self through giving up all attachments and realisation of

the essential nature of the Divine.

Thus the twenty-first song can be said to have philosophic implications that

go far beyond the obvious in the Vaishnavite pantheon.