kAdambarI

[Guest guest]

Dear Sanskritists,

 

bANa's kAdambarI mentions an expert of flower ritual doing

worship. Does the incident of pUjA with flowers occur

at Srisailam in Kadambari?

 

 

tEvAram, Hymnes zivaItes du pays tamoul, TVG/FG,

Pondichery, 1984

 

F. Gros writes:

p. li

"The least disputable and most enjoyable reference

comes from the KAdambarI [28] where BANa takes

manifest pleasure in the description of an old priest

of Tamilnad (jaraddraviDa dhArmika), in charge of

a CaNDikA forest temple, begging DurgA for the boon

of ruling over all of Dravida terrotory, wagging his

head all day long as if to avoid mosquitoes but

to the rhytham of his mantra, dancing and chanting

devotional songs to BhAgIrathI in his mother tongue

(svadeza-bhASA-nibaddha-bhAgIrathi-bhakta-stotra-

nartakena) which should be seen as a homage to

Ziva JaladhArin, bearing GaGgA in his tresses, a

favorite theme in TEvAram hymns known as early as

the ParipATal, he spends his nights sleeping in

different temples in spite of the misadventures

this exposes him to and he is naturally outraged

when he sees a mistake in the established order

of the arrangement of the flowers in the aSTapuSpikApUjA

a rite which is well defined in agamic texts but which

BANa's literary commentators could not understand.

This authentic *gurukkaL*, unwilling to relinquish

his Zaivaite pride, avimukta zaivAbhimAnena is not

only contemporaneous with TEvAram hymns but could

have been the brother of another hungry dharmin

who was awarded a purse of gold before the assembly

of poets in the Sangam at Madurai (by the grace

of ziva), who inspired taht text, which is in fact

the second poem of the KuRuntokai, one of the

sangam anthologies. NakkIrar questioned the perfection

of that poem, obliging Ziva himself to appear so

that he could insist that "a mistake is a mistake"

until blasted by the third eye of the irritated

god. The incident is alluded to in Campantar's

tEvAram (verse 885) but often, the same historians

who see this as the first literary refernce

to the Sangam refuse to identify this NakkIrar,

the rebel, with the author of the TirumurukARRuppaTai

which was later integrated into the Zaivaite canon

whilst BANa himself gives us the best evidence

of the perfect internal coherence, whether historical

or not, of the legendary tradition and the story

of NakkIrar, who is a model of the line of the

"strong against God", conforms perfectly to the

paradigm of the rebel redeemed, the most frequently

repeated leitmotif of Zaivaite bhakti and which is

incarnate in RAvaNa.

---

[28] BANa, KAdambarI, Nirnaya Sagar ed., Bombay 1948,

p. 459-464. On the aSTapuSpikA mentioned by BANa,

see the zaivAgamaparibhASAmaJjarI of VedaJAna,

VIII 67-71a, in Bruno Dagens' La florilege de la

doctrine zivaite, PIFIN 60, 1979, p. 312

and references given ad hoc., of which Somazambhu

paddhati in PIFIN 25, Vol. I pp. 292-293."

 

 

Does the pUjA ritual conducted by dhArmika in bANa's

work takeplace at zrIzaila? Or, at some place else?

 

As always, Thanks for your help,

N. Ganesan

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Notes:

 

a)

The pUjAri in kAdambari is called a dhArmika.

Around bANa's time, tEvAram mentions a legend

of "tarumi" (something like skt. dhArmika) being

helped by Shiva himself to win a poetry prize.

 

"nan2 pATTup pulavan2Ayc cagkam ERi,

nal kan2akakkizi tarumikku aruLin2On2 kAN " - tEvAram 6:76:3

 

"ascending the academy of poets, assuming the form

of a poet who can compose good verses.

"granted the handsome gold tied in a piece of cloth to tarumi

(this is one of the sixty four sports of civan2 in maturai)" [VMS]

 

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b)

 

CTamil/message/230

 

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c)

K. Zvelebil, Tamil literature, E. J. Brill, 1975

 

p.49

"However, in early historical times, Sanskrit text composed in

the North of India show a rather unfriendly, even contemptuous,

attitude towards the Dravidians, cf. MAn. X, 44. CarakasaMhitA,

IndriyasthAna V, 28 mentions draviDa and Andraka in one breath with

CaNDaalas, pizAcas, dogs, etc., ie., with beings one should not

see in one's dreams since they are highly inauspicious.

BANa, in the kAdambarI describes the draviDa dharmika very

unfavorably (Kadambari edition, K. P. Parab, Bombay, 1921,

p. 398-401) The different kAmazAstras usually deal with the women

of the South in not too flattering terms".

 

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d)

 

CTamil, Jean-Luc CHEVILLARD <JLC@C...> wrote:

 

Prof. F. Gros says:

 

"C'est cette conscience aiguë de leur art poétique

"qui frappe dans la tradition des poèmes du Sangam,

"l'anecdote la plus exemplaire étant celle de nakkIrAr

"refusant de se soumettre à ziva lors d'une controverse

"sur une faute de rhétorique dans un poème

"qui est le second du kuRuntokai écrit par le Dieu

"et offert en cadeau au poète famélique Dharmi

"pour lui permettre de concourir avec succès

"pour un prix littéraire. Impossible paradoxe

"d'un dieu suprême qui enseigne la grammaire

"et se voit condamné au nom de celle-ci par ses poètes!

 

"Or l'anecdote est connue du plus ancien

"des trois auteurs du tEvAram zivaïte, appar

"(tEv. VI, 76, 3) qui fut aussi l'un des tous

"premiers auteurs tamouls datés avec quelque 'certitude',

"au VIIè siècle, sans doute dans la première

"moitié de ce siècle, soit une génération

"avant arikesari paraGkusa mAravarman2 [...]

 

[This quotation is taken from p.88 in:

"La Littérature du Sangam et son public",

in _Inde et Littératures, Etudes réunies par Marie-Claude Porcher_

Collection puruSArtha, N° 7,

Editions de l'Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, Paris,

1983]

 

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