Karkkidaka Masam Doubt in Reading Ramayanam

[Guest guest]

Thank u so much for the details

Pls clarify one more doubt .While reading ramayanam sis told to start pray from

ganapathi ,

saraswathi,anjaneya,vaalmigi rama then to start ramayanam is daily

or in the first day.

 

or is there any special slogas in malayalam forthat

 

 i am daily(32 days of karkidagam) doing  prayer to all above gods while

reading  ramayan

 

 

 

--- On Sun, 20/7/08, DILIP KUMAR RAVINDRAN <prdili wrote:

DILIP KUMAR RAVINDRAN <prdili

Sunday, 20 July, 2008, 3:18 PM

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Namasthe

Dear friends  Herewith I add some details about Karkkidaka month

specialities and Karkkidaka vavu . some of our friends may be dont know this .

So this is for them.( some of my friends send me mail to give some brief details

about this.)

 

 

 

The Month(masam) of karkidakam

 

Its changing traditions

 

 

 

 

 

         Long ago, and far away, for the farming community of rural

Kerala, the month of karkkidakam with its torrential rains was a period of

confinement and forced rest. While rains nourished the tender paddy in the

fields, the people took care of their houses and themselves. As Mother Nature

began her cleaning spree the women folk followed her habit. From among the

plants they gathered leaves that served like wet sandpaper and cleaned the dirt

from doors and windows, ritual objects and low wooden stool, their only

furniture. And the wooden things gleamed in its natural grains. For, painting

and varnishing was unheard of among rustic folk.  Most of the houses had

thatched roofs; only the rich lived in tiled ones. Karkkidakam was the month of

sacred rituals, ancestral worship and healthcare.

 

           Women and children gathered the customary herbs associated

with worship in temples and herbal medicine. It was a practical lesson too. One

learned to identify the herbs while hearing stories connected with their

beneficial use as home remedies. Ancient wisdom was handed over by word of mouth

from time immemorial.

           On the evening prior to the samkramam there was a ritual

ceremony of packing the Chetta, the presiding spirit over dirt, off. Women with

broom went around cleaning and dusting and driving out the Dirty thing that hid

in corners. Basically, it was a thorough cleansing before the twilight. For

children, the ritual meant a serious part of life. In olden times life was

ritual-driven. Women and children spent hours gathering sacred plants for the

special

offering.

         

      For the first ten days of the month of karkidakam,  Sreebhagavathy,

the goddess  received the traditional offerings. In front of the Machu, the

household shrine, there was a display of  dasapushpam, the ten sacred plants in

a gleaming brass plate, water in a bell metal pot with a spout, valkannadi, a

mirror of polished brass, sandal paste and  vermillion, before a lighted lamp.

The sacred corner glowed like the sanctum sanctorum at dawn. 

 

     The Ramayna was also kept there. In the mornings the oldest member of

the family sat reading the Ramayana in a singsong style. After their morning

bath girls and women would apply kajal to their eyes and have a bindi of

mukkutti chanthu, the juice of a crushed herb.

 

 

 

         Married daughters came home for their annual health care. A

medicinal porridge was specially prepared for the entire family. The old and the

middle-aged had their herbal concoction, an annual preventive doze for rheumatic

ailments. The bulls were given special diet as part of the agrarian economy and

past time.

 

    At twilight after the lighting of the bell-metal lamp, children sat

around reciting prayers. Night fell soon in those pre-electricity days.

 

  The dead were invoked on the day of the new moon. In kerala ancestral worship

is part of religion just as animism has prevailed, although in pockets. The

people were taught to sense the divine in plants, animals and spirits; to feel

the sacred thread that runs through Nature; to know that humans are part of a

divine design; to accept the need for harmony with their surroundings, to carry

on the heritage

of the past to the present.

          

           The end of karkkidaka would complete the reading of the

whole Ramayana. So Karkkidaka is known as the month of Ramayana as well. Even

now a few, who cannot root out their roots, follow the tradition. But, for the

majority, the ritual is a temple-centered community affair now.

           

          Dhanwanthari is the patron saint of Ayurveda, Indian

medicine.  In the month of Karkkidaka the prasad given here is mukkidi, the

juice extracted form medicinal plants. Having a doze of this juice daily for a

month in the rainy season was the traditional preventive antidote for a year’s

epidemics.

 

 

      Change inevitable, has affected kerala and its traditions. Today, a

wholesome   tradition is reduced to a ritual for the first day of the month of

Karkkidaka. The Ramayana resonates in the air because of the amplifier at the

temple. Herbal medicines are available in powder form in shops. The agrarian

life is replaced by consumer culture. And elephants enjoy Sukha-chikilsa. The

torrent has receded from the plains. Yet the Monsoon meditates in the rain

forests of the Western ghat that overlooks the Arabian Sea.

 

    Karkkidaka vavu

 

Karkkidakavavu bali( pitru tarpanam) is the ritual to propitiate the souls of

the ancestors, performed in Kerala on the vavu or new moon day of the Malayalam

month Karkkidakom (Cancer). These elaborate rituals of worship are performed

standing waist deep in the river or beach.

Karkkidakavavu bali is performed at certain places like the banks of the river

Bharathappuzha at Thirunavaya in Malappuram district, Varaikkal beach at

Kozhikode, Shankhumugham beach at Thiruvananthapuram and Varkala beach. Boiled

rice, turmeric, thulasi (Ocimum) etc are used for the rituals connected to the

bali.

Usually the bali is performed on the death anniversary of a person, but

Karkkidakavavu is a day common to all and performing the ritual on the day is

believed to be auspicious. This custom of ancestor worship is practised in the

hope that the soul of the beloved departed will attain salvation and be free of

any wordly bonds that might not give eternal rest. The Pujaris (hindu priests)

help and guide devotees in chanting the mantras and performing the rituals.

 

 

with regards

dilip

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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