The Glory Of His Sacred Names In Kaliyuga

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Sree Guruvayurappante Bhaktha Vatsalyam The Glory Of His Sacred Names In Kaliyuga By M. B. Menon, Khar, Bombay in April 1967 These are the experiences of Sri C.P.S. Mani, an ardent devotee of Lord Guruvayurappan, who used to reside in Santscruz, few kilo meters from my home in Bombay. I used to visit Mani’s house often along with my wife and brother-in-law. We used to look forward to these visits with great enthusiasm during which Mrs. Mani often made it a point to recite melodiously few devotional verses and the entire family would

listen to theses verses leaving aside all other matters. Theirs was a family amply blessed by Lord Guruvayurappan. Mani greeted others as Narayana, Guruvayurappa and so on. Once, Mani was returning home with his wife and sister-in- law from a marriage alliance negotiation. They had to change the train at Bandra. Wading through the massive crowd, Mrs. Mani and her sister some how managed to board the train which was ready for departure, while Mani was way behind with their six month old baby. He was in the process of boarding the train holding the baby in his left hand,

precariously perched on the foot board holding on to the bar with his free hand, when the train began to move quite unexpectedly. His leg was dangling between the train and the platform, likely to be crushed to a pulp. Fortunately, someone took the baby from him so that he could grip the bar with both hands. Mani chanted the Narayana japam. The train moved for some distance and then the alerted driver stopped and reversed it back into the platform. All the way, Mani had felt as if some invisible hand was carrying him in the air. People rescued Mani who regained consciousness only after he was laid on a bench. He had escaped without even a scratch as if to highlight the power of reciting Lord Narayana’s name while also revealing Lord Guruvayurappan’s infinite love for His devotees. There is an interesting anecdote connected with the birth of his last son Krishnan. The astrologers had predicted two sons and two daughters for Mani which he had already, when his wife was again in the family way. In the eighth month of pregnancy the couple used to attend a Sapthaaham [bhagavatham] discourse nearby. When the shastry was describing the birth of Lord Krishna, Mrs. Mani felt strong movements inside her and swooned, Mani also passed out, both recovering quickly. The shastry [the speaker] later told Mani that being a devotee of Lord Guruvayurappan, Mani was beyond the planetary influence and guided only by the loving protective hands of the Lord and predicted a daughter then, though however, it turned out to be a boy who was

aptly christened as Krishnan. Waking up daily at the Bramhamuhoortham [3 a.m], Mani would offer worship at the shrines of the deities Ganesha, Maha Lakshmi and Guruvayurappan in his residence.When Krishnan was four years old the duty was assigned to the boy to light up the suspended lamps in front of each shrine for the evening pooja. Mani would top up the oil in the lamps daily before commencing the pooja. One day he noticed that the oil in a lamp was up to the brim, he noticed this consecutively for four days. To clear his doubt Mani dipped his finger in the oil of

the lamp and amazingly observed that it was water. Later he inquired and found out that Krishna, not knowing where the oil was stored had topped up with the readily available water. The overjoyed Mani could not help conveying the miracle to his wife and others mentally thanking Lord Guruvayurappan. What else could be inferred from this other than the Lord’s indulgent love for the boy named Krishna? Once, Mani was proceeding to his office in his motor bike mentally chanting the Vishnu Sahasra Namam . At the Bandra circle, he had to move

into the fast lane, as he did so, a pedestrian abruptly came in his way and Mani some how managed to avoid colliding with an oncoming bus. In the commotion, the dazed pedestrian fell down under the bus wheels just touching the prostrated body but not quite so. The victim did not get up at once, so Mani admitted him in the hospital and reported the matter to the Bandra Police station. The authorities visited the spot and looked out for possible eye witnesses who could vouch that Mani’s bike had not touched the pedestrian ,a fact which was known only to Mani They could find none and the panic stricken Mani prayed fervently to Lord Guruvayurappan. Even as they gave up hopes of finding a witness, a boy of about twelve years appeared and informed that he had seen the entire event and vouched that Mani’s bike had not knocked the victim and that he had fallen only due to fear. The boy identified himself as Anil kumar employed in a nearby tea shop. Mani proceeded to his office only to be later informed that the victim had died . Mani was very worried and rushed to the hospital. Imagine his relief when he was informed that the post mortem had revealed the victim to be epileptic and there were clear broad tire marks on his chest . The case was dropped. Later Mani went to thank Anil kumar at the tea shop address. The tea shop owner said that there never was a boy of Anil kumar’s description employed in his stall or any where nearby. Mani shed tears of gratitude for Lord Guruvayurappan. Look how He rescued His devotee while saving the

innocent bus driver! Who else but the Lord could have solved a vague case that had no clues? Once Mani was returning from the Bhajana math in Mattunga, when he paid a visit to a Brahrnin family residing in the same building. The house wife during the conversation happened to mention that her son was having high fever. Hearing Mani’s voice, the boy called out “Amma has Mani maama [uncle] come? Please request him to sprinkle some sacred ashes on me.” Mani went in and asked the boy “Do you have confidence in me?” Yes, like none

else replied the boy. Touched by this, Mani took some vibhoothi [sacred ashes] from the prayer room, and prayed “ O Lord! The boy’s confidence is actually his faith in you, while I am merely a conduit for your blessing, please do not let him down”. So saying he applied the ashes on the boy’s fore head and made some passes from head to feet. After some minutes when Mani was about to move out, a cry of great intensity escaped from the boy who immediately sat up and announced with tears ofjoy that he was completely healed! He had felt that an electric current of great intensity had escaped from him. That was when he had let out that agonizing cry. In this way the Lord is always with us helping, but we do not have the heart to realize this truth only because our devotion is fickle and wavering. The only way to develop strong faith is by chanting His sacred names regularly which would gradually lead us to unflinching faith in Him. In this Kaliyuga ordinary mortals like us cannot know when the Lord would appear to us and in what form and where etc. Therefore, it is necessary to greet everyone by His holy names-Narayana, Krishna and the like. In short, seeing the Lord in every being and object. What ever we behold is His idol, what ever we hear His glory, What ever we perform is his worship [archana] . “I behold thee in every being and object - I hear thy glory in every sound I hear - I worship thee through very action of mine.” Everything on the earth is transient except He. So, we should practice cultivating faith and devotion from the childhood itself and not wait till the death bed to call out to Him. Don’t we all know the human fascination for the new and the young? In the same way, it could be that God is also attracted more easily towards the young. If we do not invite Him in the summer of our life, He would not visit us in our winter. Our natural tendency is towards evil. We should try to resist falling victim to its temptations .We should avoid evil company and instead develop friendship with pious and good people. The above was a real experience of our Bhagavan’s grace narrated by a reader of the “Sri Guruvayurappan”–a monthly magazine of the Sri Guruvayurappan Sankeerthana Trust, founded by Thirunamacharya Shri Anjam Madhavan Nambudiri (1918-1988), a scholar devotee who held vast audiences spellbound by his inimitable discourses on Bhagavata and the Namasankirtan. I wish to make a website for sharing these blessings of Lord Guruvayurappan with the world. So, I request all our group members to send their divine experiences to me – in English, Malayalam or Manglish(Malayalam typed out in English). Please share how you were blessed by Lord Guruvayurappan - how He answered your prayers, how He saved you from danger, how He healed you, how His grace protected you, how He fulfilled your wishes, how He appeared before you etc. The Glory of Lord Guruvayurappan is such that all of us can be blessed by recounting His Leelas. I request all our group members(who are rs of the “Sri Guruvayurappan” monthly magazine) to provide me with the scanned pages of “Anubhava Katha” columns. I wish to translate it into English so that we all can be blessed by knowing more and more about our Guruvayurappan’s Karunyam. So, if any of you out there has any volume, any month, any year-old or new issues, kindly help me in this project by sending those pages to me.

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