#431: Shri Lakshmi Narasimhan's Question

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/aUm namO/nArAyaNAya|

 

/namastE Sri Lakshmi Narasimhan.

 

About /periy/AzvAr's pAcuram No. 328, your question is about the sudden shift in

the /pAcuram from a praise of /SrI rAmaH to one of Lord /nara/simhaH. What is

the significance of this?

 

I will attempt to answer the question.

 

/pAcuram No. 328 is the first of ten songs, where /periyAZvAr wants to leave for

posterity proof that he and many of his contemporraies have seen the Lord in

person. How? The /pAcuram is No. 336, where he says that there are people [in

his times] who have seen the wedding of the Lord to /SrI /bhUmA/devi. The

reference is to /SrI ANDAL. Notice the reference to /vaRAga avatAram in /pAcuram

No. 336. Since Mother Earth is the One who was a participant to the

(rescue)saving of the World during /varAha avatAram, seeing /bhUmi/avatAram and

the Lord's personal wedding to her in his life time is proof of his having seen

the Lord and his /varAha avatAram.

 

It is known that /SrI ANDAl was wedded to the Lord and that she just walked into

the Lord's "Hands" in /SrIranGgam.

 

/periy/AZvAr wants to leave for us this personal appearance of the Lord in his

lifetime. It is not of an /avatAram, but an appearance of the form of an earlier

/avatAram to send a message, which is through /tirup/pAvai, for example.

/periy/AzvAr wants to make sure that he narrates it personally and that it be

not a hearsay. What better way to weave it than in his work? Of course, the new

form is of /SrI krishNA, but it seems fair to say that the form that appeared

set up the connection of /SrI ANDAL with the Lord's /varAha avatAram beyond

doubt.

 

The song you quote and the next 8 songs are part of the definition of the set of

pairs (/one act or one form of an avatAram, the subsequent appearance of the

same or different /avataram in another context). He gives eight examples to show

the correspondence between, say, "a" and "f(a)", where f is the function

defining the pairs. The "a" is a form that may be hard to believe, but f(a) is a

form witnessed by people for which there is personal testimony. He is at a loss

to define the concept involved, and so starts with an example, about which you

have raised a question. It will be interesting to give a name to this concept.

[Compare Jesus's mention of John the Baptist as the reappearance of the Prophet

Elijah???].

 

Looking at your example, it may be hard to believe that a person (Lord /SrI

rAmaH) is one with emitting light of a thousand suns and that He was present

here on Earth. But there atre people who have seen Lord /narasimhaH and have

left records. And this despite the faat that Lord /narasimhaH can hardly be seen

with human eyes. In fact /in /tiru/maGkai AZvAr the Lord is only presented as

One Whose Face is in the midst of a fire ball where one sees only a forehead

(/eyiRRu) and a mouth resembling a box of jewels, the jewels being the teeth.

Please see /pAcuram 1009 that begins with, "alaitta pEZ vAy". A very good way

to imagine the scene is a similar scene from the movie "Wizard of Oz".

 

/vantanam.

 

/nalam tarum collai nAn kaNTu/koNTEn, nArAyaNa ennum nAmam.

 

Visu