nAcciyAr tirumozhi XIV – paTTi mEyndOr kArERu -General Introduction

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SrI:

SrI ANDAL samEta SrI ra’ngamannAr

tiruvaDigaLE SaraNam

 

General Introduction to nAcciyAr

tirumozhi XIV – paTTi mEyndOr kArERu

 

A. From SrImAn SaDagOpan's tamizh treatise:

 

So far gOdai has used the nAyaka-nAyaki bhAvam to show

that the sole purpose in life is for the jIvAtmA to

seek union with the paramAtmA and attain brahmAnandam

only after reaching paramAtmA. She has outlined in

detail the sorrow that the jIvAtmA goes through until

this union happens. This is the only and the supreme

goal. Sri SadagOpan quotes SrImAn Justice rAmAnujam:

“All the wealth in nature are God’s blessings; these

are meant to be used by people as fertilizers in

growing the bhakti in the society” - (i.e., to be

used in His service and nothing else). That is what

ANDAL is pointing out through her aRuL mozhigaL.

gOdai who showed us that the only goal of life is to

be united with emperumAn, sang the praise of “Ongi

ulagaLanda uttaman” and got the greatness of being

permanently united with Him. To show that reaching His

kaimkarya sAmrAjyam is a herculean task, she sang the

first one hundred and thirty three pASurams of

nAcciyAr tirumozhi depicting the viraha bhakti

(tApam), UDal (fight representing the temporary

frustrations) etc. In the last 10 pASurams, she

describes with great glee how her kaNNan, who was

playing hide and seek with her, finally showed Himself

up and gave her a sight where He revealed Himself to

her and her friends in AyarpADi and removed all their

despair. Thus ends the viSlesham (the separation and

the longing associated with it), and the samslEsham

(the brahmaAnda anubhavam associated with realizing

Him) is attained.

 

B. Additional thoughts based on SrI PVP and the

commentary of puttUr SrI kRshNasvAmi aiye’ngAr:

 

gOdai started with the realization and declaration:

“nArAyaNanE namakkE paRai tariuvAn” in the first

pASuram of tiruppAvai. Here, nArAyaNanE refers to

the upAyam or means, and “namakkE paRai taruvAn”

refers to kaimkaryam as the benefit to be attained.

Since she had not succeeded in attaining this, she

proceeded in nAcciyAr tirumozhi with falling at the

feet of kAman (1), performing SiRRil (2), resorting to

observances such as taking bath before dawn in the

river (3), playing kUDal game (4), and conversing with

the cuckoo and desiring to see Him in person (5).

Since she did not succeed yet, she tried to live with

just the dream of her marriage with kaNNan (6). Since

the dream anubhvam was not enough, she asked

pA’ncajanya AzhvAn for the means to attain Him (7),

then she was reminded of Him by the clouds because

their color resembled His nIla mEni (8), and used them

as messengers just like sItA pirATTi sent word through

hanumAn to Lord rAma. Being reminded of His

soundaryam because of the things she saw in the rainy

season, she started losing herself (9). She starts

the tenth tirumozhi with further expression of her

intense pain of separation from Him, and in pASuram

10-4, she expresses her losing faith in His word “na

tyajEyam” (I will not forsake My devotees). She then

starts feeling that even her AcArya sambandham

(association with periAzhvAr who was very dear to Him)

was not sufficient for her to reach Him. But by the

end of the 10th tirumozhi (10.10), she reaffirms that

even if His words (na tyajeyam) turn out to be false,

her AcArya sambandham will definitely yield the result

without fail. By the end of the 11th tirumozhi, ANDAL

again declares that His words cannot after all be

untrue, because priAzhvAr trusts in His words; even

otherwise, if He decides not to keep His word, who is

there in this universe who can question Him any way?

But neither her trust in her sambandham with her

AcAryan, nor her trust in His words, have yielded the

result as yet. She is becoming weaker every second,

and she decides to try to reach Him by her own

efforts; and since she is too weak to undertake any

effort by herself, she asks her elders to take her and

leave her in any place which has His sambandham (12).

In tirumozhi 13, she pleads with her elders that if

they cannot do that, then they should at least bring

any material that has had association with Him, and

establish a connection of that object with her self,

so that she can sustain her life (13).

 

Thus, ANDAL’s life was one of being born in a prapanna

kulam that had nArAyaNa as the sole object to be

attained and to be worshiped, and nArAyaNa as the

means to be attained as well as the end to be

attained. Even so, she could not just sit around for

Him to unite her with Him, and she resorted to all

means at her disposal to attain Him, and could not

sustain her life until she attained Him.

 

While ANDAL was thus going through intense pain

because of her separation from Him, emperumAn wished

to transform her love for Him into parama bhakti – the

stage where bhakti overflowed beyond limit and she

could not see herself alive without Him even for a

second any more, and then only He wanted to reveal

Himself to her. The bliss of this union with Him is

such that the person who is not prepared to receive it

will not be able to enjoy that experience. Just as

food given to persons suffering from indigestion might

result in danger to their life, the great bliss of

union with Him might not be digestible if a bhakta has

not matured to the stage of parama bhakti. Now that

ANDAL’s devotion to Him is at its ultimate limit, He

decides to shower this great bliss of union with Him

on her. Just as nammAzhvAr (tiruvAimozhi ) received

a blessing “en avAvaRac cUzhndAi”, gOdai also is

showered with His Grace. Finally, gOdai’s kaNNan

ennum kAdalan, her kaNNil ADum mAyavan, her “kuRai

onRum illAda gOvindan”, shows Himself to her.

 

Since the parama bhakti that is needed for reaching

Him, and the pErinbam that results from reaching Him,

are both limitless and beyond description by any one

individual, ANDAL captures this anubhavam by

presenting these two aspects through pASurams

involving conversation between two sets of people.

It can also be said that it is difficult to find a

cEtanan who has both parama bhakti and also the

pErimba experience at the same time in this world.

For this reason also, one can say that the pAsurams of

this current tirumozhi (paTTi mEyndu) are presented in

two parts – in the form of a conversation between two

sets of people. The first part starts with the

question from the seekers asking whether they have

seen emperumAn – this represents the seekers’ ‘parama

bhakti’; the second part is the response of those who

have had the pErAnandam of having attained Him – this

represents the ‘pErinbam’ of those that have attained

Him after seeking Him with parama bhakti.

 

C. Additional thoughts from SrI PBA:

 

For all the suffering that ANDAL went through as

conveyed from “tai oru ti`ngaL” up to “kaNNan ennum”,

she now concludes with the great blessing that she

received from kaNNan by His appearance to her. This

is analogous to the experience of nammAzhvAr in “en

ava aRac cUzhndAyE”. Unlike nammAzhvAr who describes

his realization in first person, ANDAL chooses to

present her realization in the form of a dialog

between two groups of gopi-s.

 

D. Additional thoughts from SrI UV:

gOdai decides to forsake all her own efforts “ciru

mAniDivar nAm Seyvaden” and leaves it all to her

father “villipuduvai viTTucittar tangaL dEvarai valla

pariSu varuvipparEl adu kANDumE” (NT 10.10). When

vishNu cittar understands through gOdai’s folks her

pitiful plight of pining for her gOvindan, he decides

to bring Him to her using his prabhAvam. To show that,

gOdai uses the term “viTTu cittar viyan gOdai” (NT

13.10). In order to please periyAzhvAr, kaNNan shows

Himself to her with His parivAram in brindAvanam.

Becoming ecstatic with the sight, gOdai shares her

delight with all her friends and composes this last

tirumozhi to describe that event.

 

There are three interpretations for the way the

pASurams are arranged with “kaNDIrE” in the first half

and “kaNDOmE” in the second half.

 

First interpretation: the tirumozhi is a dialog

between two groups of gopi-s – one set representing

the overflowing prama bhakti towards Him and the

resulting search for Him, and the other set

representing the resulting anubhavam on attaining Him.

This is the way that SrI PVP has interpreted the

tirumozhi.

 

Second interpretation: In the first two lines of each

pASuram, seeing kaNNan and being excited by His sight,

she asks the gopi-s around her whether they are seeing

Him the way she is seeing Him, and then in the next

two lines, she describes what she is seeing – her

anubhavam.

 

Third interpretation: ANDAL had pleaded with her

elders to bring anything that belongs to Him and

associate them with her so that her grief will be

removed. Now she has found kaNNan, and she is showing

Him to those surrounding her, and confirming that they

see Him also, so that they will believe her at least

now. In order to ensure that all those surrounding

ANDAL trust her and heed her words in future, kaNNan

reveals Himself to them also. She is repeating their

responses in the affirmative – that they are also

seeing kaNNan in bRndAvanam in their midst, in the

last two lines of each pASuram. This is similar to

kaNNan showing His viSva rUpam to the deva-s also, in

addition to showing the viSva rUpam to arjuna, to

ensure that the deva-s will treat arjuna with the

proper respect.

 

This third interpretation gains credibility because

mostly in the first two lines of most pASurams, we

find the words that refer to ANDAL (“ennai” etc.),

whereas the last two lines invariably end with

“bRndAvanattE kaNDOmE”. The reference to bRndAvanam

here confirms that the gopi-s are not really in

bRndAvanam, but that kaNNan is showing Himself to them

along with bRndAvanam, with all the specialities of

brindAvanam.

 

In NT pASuram 10.10 (‘nalla en tOzhi’), we see the

reference to “kANDumE” – in plural. The intent is

that because of the blessing of, and association with,

periAzhvAr, not only ANDAL but all the other gopi-s

are blessed with His appearance. What gOdai wants to

stress here with the plural of “adu kANDumE” is – with

just her way alone, even she cannot see Him; but, if

the same is a present from vishNu cittar, everyone can

see Him.

 

Abbreviations:

------------------

PVP= SrI periyavAccAn piLLai

PBA= SrI prativAdi bhayankaram aNNangarAcAriyAr

UV = SrI uttamUr vIrarAghavAcAriyAr

 

sarvam SrIman nArAyaNAyEti samarpayAmi.

 

aDiyAL,

kalyANi kRshNamAcAri

 

(Articles on nAcciyAr tirumozhi are available at:

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Troy/7673/azhwars/nachiyar.html

maintained by SrI VenkaT aiyengAr of SrI villiputtUr)

 

 

 

 

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