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Re: Santhyavadanam and Gayathri mantra

From the Bhakti List Archives

Ram Gopalaswamy • December 11, 1998 


Mani wrote:

     > The other quote from Maamunigal suggests that Ramanuja
     > publicized the meaning of the mantras to anyone whom he saw
     > suffering, without looking at qualifications.

Only that much should be understood from the incident, nothing more - that 
SrI rAmAnujAcArya is a very compassionate AcArya, who freely
distributed the mercy of SrIman-nArAyaNa to any samsArin, regardless
of their varNa. But the sanAtana varNASrama-dharma SAstric restrictions 
are also there.  
Since the ashThAkshara is of vEdic origin and contains praNavam,
SrI rAmAnujAcArya would not have probably whimsically shouted it out,
contrary to the popular belief nowadays. 

According Your other quote from SrI Pinpazhagiya Perumal Jiyar's 
"aaraayirappadi" (6000) guru paramparaa prabhaavam, shows that rAmAnujAcArya
spoke only about the mantra-rahasyArtha-s.
That is the point I have been trying to get at.


     > In any case, as explained, the inner meaning of the mantra was
     > and is far more important than the mantra itself.

That is obviously true when one performs mantra-japa mentally (to oneself). 
But the situation in context is different, where SrI rAmAnujAcArya
is allegedly addressing a crowd .

     > tirukkacci nambi daasan Mani


SrI maNavALa-mAmunigaL tiruvaDigaLE SaraNam,

-aDiyEn,  Ram