Acharya vaibhavam - 56- Swamy Desikan-Nigamantha Guru- Vedanthacharyar- Sarvathanthra Swathanthrar-Kavithaarkika Simham- Thuppul PiLLai- Brief Life history of Swamy

[Guest guest]

SrI:

SrImathE Gopaladesika mahadesikaya nama:

 

We had seen upto Swamy Desikan earlier: Let us enjoy

Swamy Desikan and post Desika period hereafter.

 

The most significant development of Srivaishnavism

after Ramanuja period comes particularly from Swami

Nigamantha Mahadesikan, who is also known as

Venkatanatha [1268 CE- 1369 CE], an illustrious

successor to Bhagavad Ramanuja. Vedantha Desika is an

undisputed leader and master of Vedantha, logic,

prabandhams, verses, aesthetics, etc.. The dynamic

range of his works display his brilliance as a poet as

well as a scholar, a bhkatha, and a jnAna vairAgya

anushtAthA. He is one of the brightest stars in the

history of Vedantha.

 

A mere glance at the list of his granthas [works]

which is more than 100 [as existing and some of his

works are also lost to posterity.]

 

Thus the second and more significant development of

Srivaishnavam in the post Ramanuja period comes from

Vedanta Desika, an illustrious successor to Ramanuja.

In fact, his advent marks an outstanding milestone in

the history of VisishtAdvaita Vedanta and Srivaishnava

sampradaya. He was an intellectual giant and as a

distinguished scholar of all branches of traditional

learning [sarvathanthra swathanthrar]. All his 100

plus works touched practically all aspects of Ramauja

darshanam and echo the preceptor’s views in fullest

entirety. He wrote in Sanskrit, in tamil and in

MaNipravalam style [mixture of both tamil and

Sanskrit]. After Sri Ramanuja, Sri Vedantha Desika

shone like a star of immense brilliance.

 

Read here a brief biography of Swamy Desikan written

by Sri Mani Varadarajan USA, few years ago.

 

Quote

 

Sri Vedanta Desika, greatest of philosophers after

Ramanuja and the whom we adore as " Vedantacharya " .

Many of you are already aware of the details of his

saintly life. However, since it is always a source of

inspiration to read how the great ones lived their

lives, especially our acharyas, I offer a brief

biography below.- Mani.

 

---

SrImAn venkatanAthAryaH kavitArkika kesarI |

vedAntAcArya-varyo me sannidhattAm sadA hRdi ||

 

May the glorious Venkatanatha, the greatest of

teachers of Vedanta, and the lion among poets and

debaters, reside forever in my heart.

 

Sri Vedanta Desika was born in 1268 at Thooppul, a

village near Kanchipuram, to Totaramba and Ananta

Suri. Both parents came from very traditional Sri

Vaishnava backgrounds; Ananta Suri was a Vaidika Sri

Vaishnava belonging to the Yajur Veda, and Totaramba

was the great-granddaughter of Kidambi Accan or

Pranatartiharacharya, Ramanuja's cook and one of his

chief disciples. The day of Sri Desika's birth

happened to be purattaasi SravaNam, the tirunakshatram

of Lord Srinivasa, so accordingly his parents gave him

the name " Venkatanatha " . His titles soon eclipsed his

given name, however, and due to his mastery of Vedanta

and his ability to communicate complex topics easily,

he is universally known as Vedantacharya, Vedanta

Desika, or simply Desika -- the teacher.

 

Vedanta Desika's maternal uncle was the renowned

scholar Kidambi Appullaar, also known as Atreya

Ramanuja. It was under him that Desika studied all

the shastras. He writes that Appullaar taught him

with " as much patience as a man would teach a parrot

to speak. " Appullaar in turn had studied Vedanta under

Vatsya Varadacharya (popularly known as Nadadur

" Ammaal " ) along with Sudarsana Suri, the author of the

Sruta-prakASikA, the famed commentary on Ramanuja's

Sribhashya.

 

Tradition records that at the age of five, Desika's

precocious intelligence attracted the notice of

Varadacharya himself. The latter blessed him and

predicted that he would be a great scholar, eventually

firmly establishing the greatness of Ramanuja's

philosophy. The master's words proved prophetic.

 

Before the age of twenty, by his own account Desika

had mastered all branches learning current in his day,

both religious and secular. In particular, he had an

uncanny ability to compose poetry instantaneously that

combined philosophy, emotion, and devotion. This

combined with his expertise at the art of debate

earned him the title " Kavi Tarkika Simha " , or lion

among poets and debaters.

 

One can easily trace Desika's life by looking at the

stotras he has composed. In examining the list of his

Sanskrit and Tamil poems, we find a large number

dedicated to the deities in and around

Tiruvahindrapuram, a temple near the coastal town of

Cuddalore. It appears that shortly after his studies,

Desika moved to Tiruvahindrapuram. Always a devotee

of Hayagriva Perumaal, the fount of all knowledge,

Desika meditated here on this form of the Lord and is

said to have had a profound vision of Him.

Thereafter, he literally burst forth in poetry. Works

such as the Hayagriva Stotram, Raghu Vira Gadyam,

Gopala Vimsati (all in Sanskrit), Achyuta Satakam (in

Prakrit), Mummanikkovai and Navamani Maalai (in Tamil)

are among his hymns in praise of the deities enshrined

here. These works are remarkable for their poetic and

linguistic range, as well as for their deeply

emotional turns. In his Tamil love poems to Lord

Devanatha, for example, the influence of the Alvars is

transparent, as is his mastery of the Sangam Tamil

conventions. The rhythmic beauty of the Raghu Vira

Gadyam's prose and his touching descriptions of the

Krishna-lilas in the Gopala Vimsati are among the high

points of the entire gamut of India's religious

literature.

 

[interested readers are invited to peruse these

stotras at

http://www.ramanuja.org/sv/acharyas/desika/stotras ]

 

At some point, Desika returned to Kanchipuram to

continue his teaching and writing. He regularly

visited the many Divya Desams of this town, composing

poems on nearly all of them. One of them, the

Vairagya Panchakam or " Five Verses on Dispassion " ,

gives us a rare autobiographical insight into his

personality. Nominally addressed to Lord Varadaraja,

the Vairagya Panchakam is held to be a reply to a

friend, who, upon seeing Desika's abject poverty,

invited him to join the court of the king where he

could lead a more comfortable life. Desika's verses

here display a stern independence of spirit and utter

disregard for material wealth, particularly when it

distracts from the greater wealth of the company of

God. Tradition remembers Desika and his wife as having

led an " unccha-vRtti " life, where he would daily go

about begging for alms. This is evidenced by his

declaration at the conclusion of the Vairagya

Panchakam that neither he nor his father had any

wealth worth speaking of, save the continuous presence

of the Lord of the Elephant Hill, i.e., Lord

Varadaraja.

 

Near the end of the 13th century, it is recorded that

several Advaitins came to Srirangam and challenged the

Sri Vaishnavas to a debate. Being advanced in age,

Sudarsana Suri did not feel up to the task, so the Sri

Vaishnavas of Srirangam invited Desika to take the

challenge. He accepted the challenge and is said to

have vanquished his opponents, and thereafter took the

opportunity to settle down in Srirangam. Then, as

now, Srirangam was the center of Vaishnava culture,

with very active participation in religious dialogue

and temple festivals. Desika no doubt enjoyed his

time in Srirangam very much. In the Bhagavad Dhyana

Sopanam, a contemplative poem on Lord Ranganatha, he

describes Srirangam as a place where " great

connoisseurs live contentedly, their minds full of

delight " .

 

At this point Desika was in his thirties, and his

scholarly achievements in the service of God were

coming at an increasing pace. He summarized his

objections to Advaita in the polemic work Satadusani;

he clarified many aspects of Sri Vaishnava ritual and

practice; he constantly elucidated and clarified the

philosophical teachings of his predecessors. He

himself writes that he taught the entire Sribhashya at

least thirty times; the bulk of these must have

occurred during his long stay in Srirangam. It is

also during this period that he wrote many of his

" rahasya granthas " , or expositions of the more

esoteric doctrines of the tradition, including the

nature of self-surrender (prapatti), the meaning of

sacred mantras, etc.

 

Many of these works are clearly a product of long

discussions with senior scholars living in Srirangam

at the time, such as Pillai Lokacharya, Alagiya

Manavaala Perumaal Naayanaar, and Naayanaar Accan

Pillai. Many of the thoughts of these other acharyas

are indirectly recorded in Desika's works, even when

they occasionally disagree with his conclusions. In

this respect, he was very much a scientist, carefully

mentioning and arguing all sides of an issue, before

finally coming to what he saw was the most logical

conclusion. In examining these works as well as his

exhaustive commentaries on Ramanuja's and Alavandar's

compositions, one is struck by Desika's thoroughness,

and by his desire to discuss all possible meanings and

nuances of an interpretation, both in the course of

anubhavam as well as argument. Without Desika's

careful noting of the variety of interpretations, many

important meanings would have been lost to posterity.

It is no wonder that the title of " Vedanta Desika " was

conferred on him, as he himself attests to, by Lord

Ranganatha Himself.

 

It is also in Srirangam that Desika composed the

Paduka Sahasram,1008 verses on the sandals of the

Lord. It is said that Desika composed the entire lot

in a single night in response to challenge from

another pandit. In the course of the 32 paddhatis or

chapters, Desika makes countless allusions to the

Alvars, to Sri Ramayanam from which the idea of the

greatness of the sandals nominally comes, as well as

other aspects of philosophy.

 

When Desika was in his forties, a son was born to him

and his wife. Reflecting his love for his household

icon Lord Varadaraja Desika named the boy Varada, and

tradition remembers him as Nainacharya or Kumara

Varadacharya. Kumara Varadacharya also became a

scholar of some repute, and we are indebted to him for

recording some biographical details of his father in

his Desika Mangalam, Pillai Antaadi, and Desika

Dinacharyai.

 

In 1327, during this fertile period of Sri Vaishnava

scholarship and growth, Malik Kafur invaded Srirangam

from the north, with tragic consequences of which many

of us are aware. In the ensuing melee, hundreds if

not thousands of Sri Vaishnavas are said to have died,

and the very existence of Lord Ranganatha was

threatened. Led by Pillai Lokacharya, the seniormost

acharya at the time, a group of Sri Vaishnavas

hurriedly left Srirangam with Namperumaal, the

Ranganatha utsava-mUrti, and headed to Jyotishkudi.

There, an exhausted Pillai Lokacharya breathed his

last, unable to take the stress of the invasion and

journey. Meanwhile, the mUla-vigraham of Ranganayaki

Thaayaar was buried in the courtyard in front of Her

sannidhi, and Desika is said to have supervised the

building of a wall in front of the Ranganatha's

sannidhi to hide the mUlavar. The aged Sudarsana Suri

was also among those who died during the invasion.

Before his death, he entrusted his two young sons and

the only manuscript of the Sruta-prakASikA to Desika's

care. Desika, the boys, and others hid themselves

among the dead bodies to escape slaughter.

 

With the invasion of the temple came the need for

Desika himself to leave Srirangam, so he took his

family and the sons of Sudarsana Suri and headed

northwest, settling down first in Satyamangalam, in

present day Karnataka. He then made his way to

Melkote, where he attracted a bright pupil, later

known as Brahmatantra Svatantra Jiyar, the first Swami

of Sri Parakala Matham. From Melkote, Desika proceeded

to Tirupati/Tirumalai, where Namperumaal had

eventually gone, and then to a tour of North Indian

divya desams, including Mathura, Brindavana, Ayodhya,

and Kashi. In the course of this long exile from

Srirangam, seeing the devastating destruction caused

to the holiest of temples, Srirangam, he composed the

Abhiti Stava, or Prayer for Freedom From Fear. The

Abhiti Stava is a poetic request for protection from

all unholy forces, particularly those opposed to the

Vaidika lifestyle involving service of the Lord which

Desika practiced. Desika was perhaps 60 or so during

the composition of this stotram, as he mentions that

his hair has greyed by this time.

 

In 1360 [**], Gopanna Udaiyar defeated the Muslims,

and Sri Vaishnavas could once again return to

Srirangam. Namperumaal was brought back from

Tirupati, and temple servants who had survived the 30+

long temple closure were invited back. Sri Desika, as

the senior surviving acharya, was among those who

returned, and a verse of his composition is inscribed

in the temple, recording his presence at the reopening

of Koyil. With the restoration of Srirangam, Desika

now returned to his service of Lord Ranganatha.

Tradition records that he composed Sri Rahasya Traya

Saaram, an exhaustive work on the essence of Sri

Vaishnava philosophy, lifestyle, and the meaning of

the esoteric mantras, in these last few years of his

life.

 

[**] Inscriptions indicate that the date was 1371

( " bandhupriya " ). However, this has to be reconciled

with the recorded date of Desika's passing, 1369. Some

historians believe the inscription is in error and it

should be " bahupriya " , meaning 1360. This is still a

matter of research and debate.

 

In 1369, with his head resting in the lap of Kumara

Varadacharya and his feet with Brahmatantra Svatantra

Jiyar, Desika left his earthly body and ascended to

Parama Padam. He had lived the full Vedic lifespan of

100 years in an exemplary and humble manner,

tirelessly engaged in the service of the Lord and Sri

Ramanuja's sampradAya. Even given such a long life,

one can hardly imagine how someone can have

contributed so much with so much consistency, and yet

have lived such a simple life of complete poverty.

For these reasons, Sri Desika forever won the

admiration and reverence of all who where spiritually

inclined, and is rightfully recognized as one of the

foremost scholars and thinkers ever alive.

 

kavi-tArkika-simhAya kalyANa-guNa-SAline |

Srimate venkateSAya vedAntagurave namaH ||

Salutations to Sri Venkatesa, in whom all perfections

reside, who is the teacher of Vedanta and the lion

among poets and debaters!

---

[ Note: For brevity's sake, there are many more

details of Desika's life and works which have not been

mentioned. Many volumes can be written on the subject.

]

 

unquote

Swamy Desikan ThiruvaDigaLE SaraNam

Regards

Namo narayana

dasan

 

 

 

 

 

______________________________\

____

The fish are biting.

Get more visitors on your site using Search Marketing.

http://searchmarketing./arp/sponsoredsearch_v2.php