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thiruppavai day thirteen song thirteen

From the Bhakti List Archives

Ramani Naidu • December 27, 2002 


DAY THIRTEEN - SONG THIRTEEN - THIRUPPAVAI

Transliteration

puLLin vAyk kIntAnaip pollA arakkanaik
kiLLik kaLainthanaik kIrththimai pAtip pOy
piLLaikaL ellOrum pAvaik kaLam pukkAr
veLLi ezunthu viyALam uRankiRRu
pullum cilampinakAn pOtharik kanninAy
kuLLak kuLirnthu nIrAtathE
paLLik kItaththiyO pAvay nI nannALal
kaLLam thavirnthu kalanthElOr empAvAy.

Translation

He tore the monster crane by the beak.
He plucked by the roots the clan of the evil asura.
All the maids are on the arena of pavai singing His praise.
Venus is up and Jupiter has set.
The birds have started chirping.
Beautiful eyed with thin red lines running through!
The sculpturesque!
Will you lie abed deceiving us?
WonÂ’t you join us to bathe in the pond
And soothe the body through and through.

The thirteenth song of the Tiruppavai continues with the persuasion of the
previous songs.

The maids have already entered the arena of the pavai observance. They sing
in praise of Krishna who tore the monster Pakasura who appeared in the form
of a crane. Kamsa had despatched him to kill Krishna. He swallowed the child
Krishna on the banks of the Yamuna. Krishna started burning him from within.
The crane tried to peck at Krishna. Then Krishna held the beak and tore the
giant  crane diagonally. Such is the legend of tearing the crane.

The second legend relates to Ravana. It was not only Ravana the asura who
was annihilated by Rama. In a war of mammoth proportions, the entire clan of
asuras was liquidated. Therefore Rama is said to have plucked by the roots
the clan of the asuras. The maids during their pavai observance praise the
valour of Krishna and Rama, the manifestations of Lord Narayana. Their  song
is a sure indication of the advent of dawn.

The maids are in constant thirst for the experience of the Divine. They may
perhaps have started singing in praise of God even before dawn in their
zealous devotion. As if their assembly is not a sure indication of dawn, the
song proceeds further to cite other indications. The setting of Jupiter and
the rising of Venus in the eastern sky are a sure indication of the
approaching dawn. Perhaps even such an indication may be an unsure sign
insofar as the maids in their enthusiasm may have wrongly read the skies.
Therefore the reference to the third indication - the birds have woken up
and welcome the dawn with their chirping. The third reference may make the
maid withindoors even indignant. Is the human to take their cue of the
morning from the instinctive indicative acts of the birds?

When they fail to convince the maid of the opportune time to wake up and
take upon herself the pavai observance, the maids start appealing to her
almost in very flattering terms. “You have beautiful eyes. You have a
sculpturesque beauty about you.”

‘potarik kanninay’ can be variously interpreted. It may be a reference to
the thin red lines of blood vessels, which make the eyes at once beautiful
and sensuous. Alternatively, ‘potu’, taken to mean loitering about and ‘ari’
taken to mean the deer, can be understood to refer to the beauty of the eyes
of the maid compared to the beauty of the eyes of the deer. Thirdly, ‘potu’
taken to mean flower and ‘ari’ taken to mean deer, may be taken to mean that
the maidÂ’s eyes are as beautiful as the kuvalai flower and the deerÂ’s eyes.
Fourthly, ‘potu’ taken to mean flower and ‘ari’ to mean the gnat, the phrase
may mean eyes like a gnat in the flower. This is a graphic evocation indeed.
Fifthly, ‘potu’ taken to mean flower and ‘ari’ taken to mean competitor, the
maid can be said to have eyes exceeding in their beauty that of a flower.

Ritualistic bathing which is part of the pavai observance shall not be
associated with the routine washing of the body. It is metaphorically
getting immersed in the waters of bhakti, devotion to God. Therefore ‘kullak
kulirntu niratateÂ’ refers to a bath that is soothing through and through.
Those of us who are in India and take bath early in the morning in the
winter month of December in natural water resources like ponds, wells and
rivers know the subtle differences between them. The river waters, flowing
as they are, would be just cold and a bath early in the morning at the river
is not a very attractive proposition indeed. The water in the well will be
warmer and the cold body feeling the warm water in the well experiences a
certain pleasure which verges on stimulating. But a bath in the pond is
different. The upper layer of the still waters will be as cool as the cold
air. Dip yourself in and you will find the warmth of the lower layers of
water. This experience of taking bath in the pond is reinvigorating and has
been rightly celebrated in ‘kullak kulirntu niratate’.

Another curious word in the song is ‘kallam’ - deceit. The maid is said to
be deceitful in avoiding the other maids. Instead of leading the others
through the experience of the Divine, she continues indulging in the
experience of the Divine all by herself. The maid ipso facto becomes a
master and the other maids in various stages of spiritual cultivation. By
avoiding the maids, she denies them the privilege of being initiated into
the experience of the Divine. Therefore the appeal - ‘kallam tavirntu
kalantelorÂ’ - leave your deceit and join us Traditional interpretation will
identify the maid in this song with Thontaratippoti Alwar. ‘arikkanninay’
can also be taken to refer to the one with his eyes on the flowers.
Thontaratippoti Alwar had spent his days in making garlands to the God at
Srirankam. So he had his eyes always on all flowers to choose the best of
them for a garland to God. ‘pavai’ which is interpreted in the translation
as the ‘sculpturesque beauty’ can also be taken to mean the most loyal.
Thontaratippoti Alwar was so entirely devoted to the God at Srirankam that
he can be said to have been fastidiously loyal to God. Accordingly are his
songs found to celebrate the God at Srirankam and in no other temple of the
108 places of pilgrimage and divine manifestation in the arca form.

‘kallam’ is also a word that can be directly associated with Thontaratippoti
Alwar. He has reiterated his delusion in his songs. Having devoted himself
to the service of God, he had been deluded into lust for a courtesan. God
redeemed him foisting a charge of theft of a gold plate from the temple and
cured him of his lust. ‘sutanakik kalvanaki’ and ‘kallame katal ceitu’ are
such phrases to be found in his songs.

Another point of interest is that Thontaratippoti Alwar is supposed to have
been born in the month of margazhi - the holy month of pavai observance.

Thus the thirteenth song, beneath its semblance of a catalogue of
indications of the dawn, harbour much information and sensibilities in their
finest form.









[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]



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