svami manavala mamuni's vaibhavam - part 6

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srImathE saTakOpAya namah

srImathE rAmAnujAya namah

srImathE anantArya mahAguravE namah

srImathE vara vara munayE namah

 

dear bhagavathas,

 

for the past 10 days or so, due to some personal

committments, i could not continue with the

paraphrasing of svami manavala mamuni's vaibhavam.

I will continue with svami's vaibhavam from today.

This post will consist of details on one of the

foremost sishyas of svami manavala mamuni - svami

prativadi bayankaram aNNa.

 

During the time of adisesha's reign on earth as svami

manavala mamuni, there was a great scholar named

hasthigirinadharanna who lived in kanchipuram

(hasthigiri = kanchipuram). He was a great scholar in

the ubhaya vedanta philosophy, and had defeated scores

 

of scholars in debates regarding vEdAnta, and

established the srivaishnava sampradayam as the

religion propounded by the vedic seers. Due to his

excellence in debates, he was conferred the title of

"prativAdi bayankarar" - the one that stirs fears

in the minds of those debating him, and became to be

known as prativadi bayankaram aNNa. He had 3 children

who were scholars in their own right, and his wife is

normally held in the same regard as koorattAzhvAn's

wife ANdAL.

 

PB aNNA slowly developed revulsion for material

things, gave all of his material belongings away, and

went to thirumalai to perform service to the Lord of

the seven hills in the true spirit of what nammAzhvAr

advocated (ozhivil kAlamellAm udanaay manni), and

what anantAzhvAn practiced. There, thOzappa svami

(descendant of periya thirumalai nambi) gave PBANNa

the kainkaryam of fetching water from AkAsa ganga,

preparing it with fragrant material like elaichi and

submitting it for perumAL's thiruaradhanam everyday.

PB aNNa did that kainkaryam with great happiness.

One day, a srIvaishNava from srIrangam came to worship

 

the Lord of seven hills. PB aNNa served the

srIvaishnava by taking him to the temple, helping him

worship the Lord and by taking him to his home and

having him stay there. EVeryday, svAmi PBaNNa used to

listen to the srIvaishNava express the happenings at

srIrangam - the utsavas, the srivaishnavas there and

the great prabhavam of svami manavala mamuni. One day,

 

PB aNNa invited the srivaishnava to accompany him as

he was bringing water from akasa ganga, and the

srivaishnava did so. On the way to and from akasa

ganga, the srivaishnava was explaining the vaibhavam

of svami manavala mamunigal, especially through the

purva and uttara dinacharyas (two slokas written by

srI. erumbiappa, that contain details about svami

manavala mamunigals activities throughout the day).

both the srivaishnava and svami PB aNNa were overcome

with hearing about svami manavala mamuni, and there

was a slight delay in the bringing of the water. as

soon as they reached the temple, before the fragrant

material like elaichi were added, a ekangi took away

the vessel containing water for thiruaradhanam for

perumal.

 

The archaka used the water as usual for

thiruaradhanam, but svami PB aNNa was very dejected

and was feeling very sad that there were no fragrant

additives in the water for perumal. So, he took a

small vattil (small vessel), and took some of the

fragrant material in that vattil and stood near the

archaka so that he can give the material to the

archaka. At that time, the archaka mentioned " The

water today is much more fragrant than everyday" to PB

 

aNNa.svami aNNa realized that the fragrance was

because of the listening to svami manavala mamunis

vaibhavam and even the water became more fragrant

listening to the vaibhavam and becomes more attractive

 

for the Lord!. He requested to srivaishnava to take

him to srirangam so that he(aNNa) can become a sishya

of svami manavala mamunigal.

 

PB aNNa went to srIrangam with his family, and stayed

at the srIranga narayana jeeyar matam. He went to the

temple to worship Lord ranganAtha and in the temple,

he saw svami manavala mamuni performing upanyasam of

a specific decade (onrum thevum) of thiruvaymozhi in

the chitra mantapam inside the temple. svami manavala

mamunigal, on hearing that PB aNNa had come to the

gosthi, stopped the upanyasam, embraced svami and then

continued with the upanyasam.

 

after the upanyasam, svami manavala mamuni took pbanna

to the sannadhi and helped him worship the Lord. The

Lord, through the archaka, welcomed pb aNNa and

told anna thus "You have come here, knowing that even

the water that was present in a place where svami

manavala mamuni's vaibhavam is being described is

very dear to Me - I give you the most special

relationship now" and showed svami manavala mamuni

and entrusted pb anna in svami manavala mamuni's

hands.

 

pb anna, along with his family took refuge in svami

manavala mamuni and became his sishyas. he lived the

life of a true srivaishnavite performing service to

fellow srivaishnavas at srirangam. Here, it is a

appropriate to fit in an incident narrated by many

elders regarding pb anna. Once, when pb anna met a

srivaishnava and performed his obeisances to him,

the srivaishnava addressed pb anna as "prativadi

bayankararE", to which pb anna replied - "svami,

please do not address me so - i am prativadi

bayankara

in the goshti of non-srivaishnavas; in the goshti of

srivaishnavas, i am their servant" {para gOshtIshu

prativAdi bayankarah. srIvaishNavaanaam gOshtIshu

that dAsa ithi visruthah}. That is the reason why

most of the descendants of svami pb anna to this

day have the name "srivaishnava dasan" and use

"adiyen srivaishnava dasan" etc..

 

Another important detail about pb anna, especially

relevant in today's context, is that he was a shishya

of svami vEdanta dEsika's descendants. In fact

svami aNNa's thaniyan mentions him as receiving the

grace of vEdAnta dEsika and svami maNavALa mAmuni.

svami anna is a prime example that there were no

divisions among the ramanuja sampradaya followers

even during and a little bit after svami manavala

mamuni's time.

 

The lineage that descends from srI pb anna is very

illustrious. In the thiru nAngUr area, where a branch

of that lineage settled, this family has brought in

thousands and thousands of people into the ramanuja

sampradaya over the years. They are the heriditary

trustees and managers of all the divya desams in

the thirunangur area. This geographic branch is

known for great ubhaya vedanta scholars that are

present to this day. nAngUr PB aNNangarAchAriAr

comes to mind of the scholars in the last century.

In the divya dEsam known as aNNan kOvil, now, there

is a prativadi bayankaram svami, very very learned,

one of the kindest acharyas that one can see -

he is around 95 years old, and if one goes to

pay his/her obeisances to him, the first word

that comes out his mouth (even at this advanced

age) is "did you eat? have you eaten? please stay

here, eat here and then go". A branch from here went

to north india and settled there.

 

In kanchipuram, another illustrious branch of the

lineage is present. This branch gave us the two

most illustrious scholars of the ramanuja sampradaya

of the 20th century - svami PB anantAchAriAr and

svami PB aNNangarAchAriAr. Volumes and volumes have

been written on these two great acharyas.

svAmi PB anantAchAriAr (also known as gadhi svami),

perhaps illustrates what a true acharya needs to be -

He travelled long and far in North India, and brought

hundreds of thousands of people into the ramanuja

sampradayam. Out of his concern that language should

not be a barrier, he translated azhvar prabhandhams

and their meaning and delivered upanyasams in sanskrit

and/or hindi. He was instrumental in building the

famous panasvadi srinivasa temple in mumbai. He,

perhaps after ramanuja was the first acharya to have

gone deep into north india and spread the universal

knowledge of our religion. There are thousands

of sishyas who come to kanchipuram even today from

remote parts of north India to the current acharya

of this lineage.

 

svAmi PB aNNangarAchAriAr needs no introduction.

He followed the footsteps of svami gAdhi anantAchAr,

and became a scholar in his own right. His

contributions to ramanuja sampradaya are uncountable.

He spread the ramanuja sampradaya among many many

people in andhra pradesh. He , along with

thirukkaNNApuram pattappa svami and gadhi anantAchar

svAmi was among the very few acahryas to have carried

 

the universal message of the ramanuja

sampradaya to ALL people, irrespective of caste,

language or background. His contributions towards

making our acharyas' commentaries accessible to the

common man is infinite. The "divyArtha deepikai",

an easy to understand commentary on the naalayiram,

based on purvacharyas vyakhyanams is a treasure.

Similarly the simple to understand summaries of

the rahasya granthas. He also published countless

books on the sampradaya (commentaries by acharyas,

summaries, commentaries in simple colloquial

language) in telugu, sanskrit and hindi.

 

Perhaps the greatest contribution of svami

PB aNNangarAcharya was the debunking of several

(even today prevalant) myths about the difference of

views among ramanuja sampradaya acharyas. His

treatises establishing the unifying nature of all

of our acharyas are a treasure for us.

 

 

I will stop here and will continue in the next

posting.

 

 

azhvar emperumanar jiyar thiruvadigale saranam,

adiyen madhurakavi dasan,

varadhan

 

 

 

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