Paramacharya an Avatar of Lord Sankara Himself

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Namami Sankaraachaaryam, sarvalokaika Poojitham

 

With permission blessings and grace from HH Swamy Vijeyendra

Saraswathi garu of Shri Kanchi Kamakoti Peetham Paramacharya and

miracles

 

Paramacharya an Avatar of Lord Sankara Himself

C.N. Kuppuswamy

Sir Isaac Newton, said that he seemed to have been all his life

gathering a few pebbles on the shore, whilst a boundless ocean of

truth still lay beyond. Who can, on this earth, attempt even feebly

to scale the immeasurable, matchless mighty and the majestic

Himalayan glory and the grandeur of the Maha purusha, who occupied

and animated the whole century. I am honest fact an alpathma with a

limited knowledge, endeavoring to pay my humble obeisance to a

Paramatma, based on direct and intense personal experience.

Way back in 1972 to say precisely, on 8th January, I proceeded to

Kanchi to received the blessings of Maha Periyaval, for the

sathabishekam of my father-in-law and my mother-in-law accompanied

me. On the way near walajabad a small town my father-in-law, wanted

to relax and I escorted him to the other side of the highway. My

second daughter who was only 4 years old then, sneaked out of the car

and darted across to reach me, like an arrow released from the bow.

Being a highway a vehicle was coming at a great speed and my daughter

was knocked down and crushed under the wheels. Every one saw the

accident and was stupefied in sheer horror at the tragic accident. As

a result, my daughter sustained skull injury and her head was

drenched in blood. Virtually it was like potato mash. She was

bleeding profusely through her nostrils, ears indicating severe and

serious head injury. Her pelvis cracked, left leg fractured, left

jawbone gave way and was dangling down. Her left eye ball got stuck

up leaving a red blood streak. To crown all these external injuries

she sustained multiple internal injuries. My wife who was in the

advanced stage of pregnancy saw the accident and she swooned,

portending deleterious impact on her health. The child was rushed to

the Govt. Hospital at Kanchipuram and a team of doctors who attended

on her emphatically declared that her life was ebbing away. The child

was then brought back to Madras, without Mahaperiyaval's darshan and

admitted in the General Hospital.

Even here the specialist, Neuro surgeons unanimously said that the

child would not survive. It was a measureless shock to me, at the

drastic medical verdict on her condition. Immediately my wife

dispatched her brother to Kanchi to convey the news of the accident

to Paramacharya. Her intense faith in his blessings and grace

remained un-wavered and unshaken.

After patiently hearing the report of the accident, the great sage

closed his eyes for a few seconds, picked out an apple from a nearby

bamboo tray anointed it with holy water from his kamandalam performed

pooja to it and gave it to my brother-in-law directing him to keep it

by the side of the child in the hospital. He assured that the child

would survive the crisis through the grace of the Jaganmatha Devi

Kamakshi. The child was not responding to any treatment. The doctors

were much worried. The apple blessed by Paramacharya was kept near

her bed. In a week's time miracle took place. My child recovered

fully baffling the Doctors. She started telling me and others that a

small child with extraordinary beauty defying description, wearing

rich habiliments, with a golden crown on her head displaying divine

smile was guarding her day and night. Lord Tennyson said that " More

things are wrought by prayers than this world dreams of " . Here no

prayer was offered but the infinite mercy and the grace of

Mahaperiaval saved my daughter from death.

The second incident was after she fully recovered, I took her to

Mahaperiaval. Though he was laid up with high temperature he gave me

darshan, and enquired the health of my daughter. I burst into a

tempest of tears for his mercy, compassion, kindness and divine

blessings. He then instructed me to perform Sahasra Aavrti (1000)

Gayatri Japa, every Sunday and avoid discussing politics which would

invariably involve turning the mind away from things spiritual. He

said that my performance of Gayatri Japa alone would repay my

indebtedness. For some months afterwards I obeyed his command with

implicit faith and earnestness and switched over doing Gayatri Japa

every day instead of only on Sundays.

The third incident was that I went to Satara in Maharashtra, where

the Paramacharya was camping. Around 3.00 A.M.) in the wee hours) the

Paramacharya sent for me and asked me to recite Dhayana Sloka of the

sacred Gayatri, which I did it trembling within myself. For nearly 30

minutes, the great sage gave a rich annotation, and instructed me to

etch it in my mind while performing the japa. I however confessed

that being too small, mired in profound ignorance it would be

difficult for me to capture the picture of sacred Gayatri, as it was

expounded, but I enthroned the lotus feet of Mahaperiaval in the

inner recesses of my heart while doing the Japa. He displayed his

benign and divine smile. It was an epochal event in my life. He

aroused and awakened my sensibility and sensitivity to the glory and

greatness of sacred Gayatri.

Our Mahaperiyal was a living manifestation of Parabrahmam. Alexander

of Macedon said " I am indebted to my father for living, but to my

teacher for living well " . In an apparent reference to Aristotle who

molded and made him a man among men. If today, we claim to live well

in the words of Alexander, by cultivating our gardens, in the words

of Aristotle, by shedding our insularity, angularity, animosity,

antipathy, and acrimony it is due only to the grace of Mahaperiaval.

Whenever one went to Kanchi to have his divine darshan in a

turbulent, turgid, tempestuous or agitated mind, his placid features,

the brightness of his face, this ethereal charm his touching humility

the tenderness of speech and natural dignity calmed and quieten the

mind and one felt of having tasted ambrosia and returned home fully

recharged and invigorated.

Mahaperiaval was a greater promoter in the adherence by all of us to

traditional values, immemorial customs, sastric practices, prescribed

in our sacred scriptures. Through his numerous lectures, discourses,

he fulfilled the ends of information, reformation and transformation

and he promoted the development of an integrated and rounded

personality. he though that these observances are too sacred to be

tampered with or modified to suit the so called changed conditions of

life and changing times. He felt acutely unhappy that even the twice

born were apparently some what contemptuous of traditional practices

and values. He regarded this phase with dismay and anguish because in

his view we are seeking a rudderless, oarless and unguided course of

living which could end only in disaster. He risked being called an

obscurantism because of his intense and deep attachment to

traditions. Once can only hope that the present dangerous and

disastrous drift which is our present sad, sordid and sorry state of

affairs will be halted through his grace and compassion from his seat

of bliss at Kanchi.

Let us transform or lives into great harmony with the great teaching

of Adi Sankara Baghavathpada and our matchless Mahaperiaval, hailed

everywhere as an authentic Punar avatar of Adi Sankara, why even as

the great Lord Sankara, himself the great Nilankata, Brahadeeswara,

and Parameswara, whom it was our privilege to see in the flesh not so

very long ago.

Difficult as it may be for us to live up to the very high ideals

which our illustrious Paramacharya held out to us, it should be our

duty to him, at least to endeavour to live up to that.