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nAcciyAr tirumozhi IX - Sindurac cempoDi 3

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Kalyani Krishnamachari • July 17, 1999 


			SrI:
      SrI ANDAL samEta SrI rangamannAr tiruvaDigaLE SaraNam

             nAcciyAr tirumozhi IX - Sindurac cempoDi  
      pASuram 9.3 (ninth tirumozhi - pAsuram 3 karuviLai oN malargAL)

                     en kai vaLai paRittuc cenRu vittArE

karuviLai oN malargAL! kAyA malargAL! TirumAl
 uru oLi kATTUginrIr enakku uy-vazhakku onRu uraiyIr
tiruviLaiyADu tiN tOL tirumAlirumSOlai nambi
 varivaLaiyil pugundu vandi paRRum vazhakku uLadE

A. Meaning from SrImAn SaDagOpan's tamizh treatise:

godai addresses the beautiful kAkkaNam and kAyAm flowers:
"Your hue reminds me of the color of the tirumEni of 
emperumAn who is always with pirATTi. You have to 
tell me a way for me to hold on to my life.  Is it fair 
that this azhagar of tirumAl irum Solai with the 
beautiful and strong shoulders which are the sporting 
grounds of periya pirATTi, enters my house and 
confiscates my beautiful bangles by force?

B. Additional thoughts from SrImAn Sadagopan:

ANDAL is telling these queens of flowers, the kAkkaNam 
and the kAyA malargaL, that the injustice that has 
been caused to her was committed by none other than 
sundarabAhu, the nAthan or Chief of the "kulamalai 
kOlamalai kuLir mAmalai koRRa malai, nilamail nINDa malai 
tirumAlirumcOlai malai".

C. Additional thoughts (from SrI PVP ):

TirumAl uru oLi kATTUginrIr:  "You are reminding me 
of emperumAn's hue that appears when He and periya 
pirATTi are together".

An instance from the itihAsa-s is given by SrI PVP 
to illustrate how emperumAn gets His greatness from 
association with pirATTi.  He gives the example of 
how Lord rAma, the cakravartit-tirumagan, got His greatness 
by being the son of the great daSaratha.  

"During nanjIyar's time, there was a king named 
sundara pANDiya tEvar. He used to ask nanjIyar his 
doubts in SrI rAmAyaNam. One day, there was a discussion 
about the slokam in AraNya kANDam 1-9:

sa hi vIryOpa pannaSca rUpavAn anasUyaka:  |
bhUmAvanupamas sUnur guNair daSaratopama:  ||

"(That rAman is valorous; He is very beautiful; He has 
no jealousy; He has none equal to Him in this world; 
He resembles His father, daSarathan in His attributes)".

The key phrase here is "guNair-daSarathopamah".  How 
can emperumAn be compared to daSaratha in character?

NanjIyar's aRuLic ceyal was :   "emperumAn was born as 
rAmapirAn and had His own guNa-s such as svabhAva paratvam 
etc; but, His having even half of daSaratha cakravarti's 
guNa-s would have been enough to call rAma the 'cakravarti 
tirumagan".  Two reasons are given in support of this:  
1. rAma Himself said: "AtmAnam mAnusham manyE rAmam 
daSarathAtmajam (rAmAyanam yuddha kANDam 120-11);   
It is perumAL's tiruvuLLam that He feels pride in being 
the Son of daSaratha viz. This is adding to His Greatness. 
2. "guNair daSarathOpama:" - Here Lord rAma is compared 
to daSaratha, not the other way round, suggesting that 
daSaratha's association only adds to rAma's greatness. 
The analogy here is that, just as perumAL gets His 
Greatness because of His being daSarathan's son, 
perumAL gets His Greatness (here signified by 
"beautiful hue") because of association with periya pirATTi".

enakku uy vazhakku onRu uraiyIr: "Even though you have 
been created by Him just to make me suffer, you can try 
and help me too, instead of always remaining His loyal 
servants and torturing me.  When two of us are involved, 
shouldn't you at least feel sorry for me since I am suffering?"  

Why are these flowers so intent on making her suffer?  
The flowers, as His creation, were just following their 
dharma, that of following His tiru uLLam.  It is His 
Will that she should be tortured, and they are just doing that. 

An example of why these flowers just followed perumAL's 
tiru uLLam irrespective of the consequences, is again 
given by SrI PVP based on the conversation from SrI 
nanjIyar and sundara pANDiyan.   The discussion centered 
around vibhIshaNa AzhvAn. Sundara pANDian thought it 
inappropriate that vibhishaNa abandoned his brother when 
the latter was in danger.  NanjIyar's explanation was: 
"when an elder brother and father (here referring to 
emperumAn in the form of Lord rAma, who is the Father 
of all) have differences, a younger brother must follow 
only the father, not the elder brother. Since rAmapirAn 
is sarvalOka pitA, as declared in mahA bhAratam, 
sarveshAmeva lokAnAm pitA mAtA ca mAdhavah, the only 
appropriate action for  vibhIshaNa was to join Him". 

So these beautiful karuviLai and kASA malargaL were 
doing their duty of following His tiru uLLam, and did 
not have any problem torturing ANDAL. 

uy vazhakku:  ANDAL appeals to these flowers:  "All 
you seem to know is how to finish me off;  Why don't 
you learn to tell me how to live?  Why don't you tell 
me that you will keep away from my sight and stop 
contributing to my misery?  You have come as flowers 
(pU in tamizh), but you are performing the job of a 
tiger (puli)". 

onRu uraiyIr:  ANDAL is pleading to these flowers - 
just utter one word to me on which I can anchor and 
hold on to my hope that He will come to me one day.  

tiru viLaiyADu tiN tOL:  These strong shoulders of 
emperumAn are the place of sporting for peria pirATTi - 
godai is aware that this is not the emperumAn who is 
unkind to His nAyaki.  So she is wondering aloud why 
He is being unkind to her now.

tirumAlirum Solai nambi: In the ancient days, when 
the southern part of India was just a wild forest, 
daNDakAraNya, occupied by the asura-s, it was looked 
down upon by the Aryans from the north as the mleccha 
bhUmi.   But the tirumAlirum Solai nambi in the form of 
azhagar,  showed His soulabhyam by sharing His presence 
even in the midst of the malaik kuRavargaL.   periyAzhvAr 
sings about His souSIlyam in periyAzhvAr tirumozhi 
5-3-3: "inak kuRavar pudiyaduNNum ezhil mAlirum SOlai 
endAi - You who accepts gladly the prasAdam offered to 
you by the kuRavargaL of tirumAl irum Solai". 

vari vaLai il pugundu:  ANDAL's feeling of separation 
from Him is overpowering her.  She is telling these 
flowers:  "It is not as if I went to His place and 
got into trouble with Him.  If this was the case, at 
least it may be justifiable for Him to torture me and 
make me suffer.  I am just sitting in my place, and 
He is coming and occupying my mind and making me 
suffer like this.  Is this justified?"

vandi paRRum:  "Without our seeking Him, He is 
coming and taking a hold of me and my vaLai (here 
symbolically used to refer to our life or soul).  I am 
holding on to this vaLai because I know it is dear to 
Him, and He is now taking it away and making it His own 
involuntarily; Now you flowers! Tell me an alternate 
way of surviving, now that He has taken hold of my life".  

D. Additional thoughts from SrI PBA:

SrI PBA nicely depicts the scene of the "conversation" 
between ANDAL and the kAyA and kAkkaNam flowers.  The 
color and beauty of these flowers reminds ANDAL of 
emperumAn, and is destroying her even more.  She is 
asking them if the only thing they know how to do is 
destroy her, and instead asking them to tell her a 
way of survival.  They are asking her what it is that has 
happened to her so bad that she has to come and ask them 
for a way to continue to live.  She says she does not 
mind Him offering His tiN tOL only to peria pirATTi and 
enjoying Himself in the process;  all she was doing 
was deriving consolation by holding on to her 
vaLaiyal-s that He liked very much the last time He 
was with ANDAL, and now He has forcibly come into her 
house and taken away that also.  She is asking these 
flowers whether this is justified, fair, decent, proper.  

sarvam SrIman nArAyaNAyEti samarpayAmi.

adiyEn,
Kalyani Krishnamachari

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