Sri Periya Jeeyer's Arthi prabhandham-16

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Sri Parthasarathi thunai

Srimathe Ramanujaya Namaha

Sri Vara Vara MunayE Namaha

 

SrisailEsa dayA pAthram deebhakthyAdhi gunArnavam

Yateendra pravanam vandhE ramyajAmataram munim

 

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Now we have attained a huge wealth as ancestral property (Divine works of our

alwars and acharyas). Immediately our mind thinks of the way to spend our time

or entertain us. How do Srivaishnavas do that?

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Swamy manavala mAmunigal, due to his apAra karunyam on all of us answers each

and every question, which may arise in our minds without leaving us to struggle

without the answer. For the above question, immediately comes the answer in the

very next line of the Arthi prabhandam paasuram. The answer is, “MUZHUDUM

NAMAKKU AVAI POZHUDHU POKKAGHA PETTROM”. We have so many divine works of our

poorvacharyas with which we can spend our lifetime still not being able to

complete them.

 

Thirumazhisai Alwar says, “ThariththEnAgavE thArAganappOr viriththuraiththa

vennAgaththunnai*-therithezhudhi vAsiththum kEttum vanaggi vazhipattum

pUsiththum pOkinEn pOdhu” (Nanmugan thiruvandhAdhi-63) In this paasuram alwar

says that he spend his time by writing, reading, hearing about perumal and then

prostrating and praying and doing pooja to the same bhagavan. This is how each

one of our alwars and acharyas spent their valuable time. Swamy

PillailOkacharya while saying about Srivaishanava lakshanam says, ”irukkum nAl

vugandharuLina nilangalil pravanaNai ghuNanubhava kainkaryangaLil pozhudhu

pOkkai “(till the day we live in this world, a Srivaishnava has to have his

special affection on the divya desams sung by our alwars and spend his time in

listening and telling about the divine qualities of emperuman and in doing

service to the bhagavan) which has been in the minds of mAmunigal always, which

made him practice the same and advise the same to all of us.

 

 

The beauty in the words of our poorvAcharyas is that they never talked

contradicting statements. What the alwars talked will be repeated by the

acharyas in their works also. It is not copying of matter but they all had the

same state of mind and the intelligence they possessed was blessed by the same

bhagavan and hence there was no room for any contradictions. Mainly Swamy

manavala mAmunigal was very insistent that he followed the words of alwars and

the poorvacharyas without any shift. So whenever we read a line from the work

of Swamy mAmunigal, it is sure that our mind will recollect another verse from

the alwars and poorvAcharyas.

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Why should mAmunigal repeat the same, then?

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Swamy manavala mAmunigal, is praised as ‘vishadhavAksikAmani’ (one who’s words

are very clear). Many of the works of our poorvAcharyas are not easily

understood by less intelligent people like us today. Many works are in

manipravAlam (tamil and Sanskrit mix) and works of pillai lOkacharya and

Azhagiya manavala perumal nayanar are in the form of sutras, which contain great

indepth meanings in a few words. For sure without the commentary of mAmunigal

we will never be able to understand them. So mAmunigal took it as his atmost

duty to write commentaries in a very easily understandable form to all those who

followed him in future. If he had just given the meanings to his disciples then

as the days past the meanings will be lost but to make sure it is useful to all

even in the future for many many years to come, swamy wrote them as books, which

comes to our rescue to understand poorvacharya works even today.

 

So swamy spent time, in either delivering kalashepams, writing commentaries,

taking care of the temple affairs and his kainkaryam to Lord Ranganatha and

showed to the world how a Srivaishnava should spend his time. His practice has

been reflected in these words, “muzhudhum namakkavai pozhudhu pOkkAga pettrOm”.

The word kalashepam, actually means ‘spending time’ (kala=time

kshepam=spending). Time could be spent in any way but in our sampradayam, the

word kalashepam has only one meaning that is, spending time properly by telling

or listening to the divine anubhavams of alwars and acharyas.

 

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So now that we have got a good entertainment to spend time what next? We will

see in the next posting.

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(To Be Continued)

 

Alwar EmperumAnAr Jeeyer thiruvadigalE sharanam

 

Adiyen Ramanuja Dasyai

Sumithra Varadarajan

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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