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daya and its synonyms

From the Bhakti List Archives

M K Sudarshan • October 27, 1996 


SrimatE lakshminrsumha parabrahmaNE namaha
Sri vedanta desika guravE namaha


Sriman Tatachari vehemently protested a few days ago in his posting against
exclusion of "Kshama" in the list of most suitable synonyms for "daya" in
the sense in which Swami Desikan employs it in his Daya Satakam. I liked the
way Sriman Tatachari put it :"it takes 57 ounces of daya,27 ounces of
karuna,11 ounces of krupa and anukampa each to make one ounce of
kshama"!Well said, indeed!

The eloquent and forceful defence of kshama by Sriman Tatachari made me give
the matter a lot of thought during the day. I suppose it was at the back of
the mind in the night too. For this morning as I was flipping through the
Daya Satakam again Swami Desikan himself, so to say, seemed to have the answer.

I refer to verse No.72 of the daya satakam :

vrishagiripater-hridayA viswAvatAra sahayinee
kshapitanikhilAvadyA devi! kshamAdinishEvitAs  I
bhuvana janani pumsam bhogApavargavidhAyinee vitamasi padE
vyaktim nityAm bibharshi dayE! svayam   II

In the above verse Swami Desikan seems to suggest that other attributes of
the Lord like "Kshama" verily are subordinate to Daya in Her ministrations
to the Lord in His various avataras.("kshamAdi-nishEvitAs").

How does Sriman Tatachari propose to handle Swami Desikan's preference ?
Would kshama still qualify in the face of the import of this shloka ?

SrimatE srivan sri narayana yatIndra mahadesikAya namaha

humbly,

sudarshan