Search:
Bhakti List Archives

The Significance of ANDALs Incarnation in This World Part II

From the Bhakti List Archives

Kalyani Krishnamachari • February 9, 2000 


                                                      
                        SrI:
      SrI ANDAL samEta SrI rangamannAr tiruvaDigaLE
SaraNam

The Significance of ANDALÂ’s Incarnation in This World
– Part II

4. tirukkaNNa maÂ’ngai ANDAn, who did kaimkaryam to SrI
bhaktavatsalap perumAL by cleaning the temple using
broomstick, has blessed us with a taniyan for nAcciyAr
tirumozhi by ANDAL – 

       alli nATTAmarai mEl  AraNangin in tuNaivi
       malli nADAnDa maDa mayil melliyalAL
       Ayar kula vEndan AgattAL ten puduvai 
       vEyar payanda viLakku


where he describes ANDAL as the priya sakhi of
SrIdevi.  We have seen several places where svAmi
deSikan describes SrIdevi and bhUdevi sitting on the
two sides of bhagavAn to ensure that He forgives the
cetana-s who have committed enormous sins.  He
essentially loses His freedom and independence to mete
out the appropriate punishment to the sinners -  if He
does not agree with SrIdevi to forgive the sinner and
turns His face away from Her, He only sees bhUdevi on
the other side who does not let Him get away without
forgiving the sinner either.  This is the kind of
friendship and intimacy that ANDAL has with SrIdevi. 
The term melliyAL in the above taniyan refers to the
extreme soft-hearted nature of ANDAL towards us, who
are her children.  SvAmi deSikan nicely describes
godai through the words “sAKshAt kshamAm, karuNayA
kamlAm iva” – In patience she is bhUdevi, and in
karuNA she is SrIdevi. 

5. SrI maNavALa mAmunigaL:  Reference was already made
earlier to “inRo tiruvADip pUram..”, where SrI
maNavALa mAmunigaL praises the greatness of the birth
star of ANDAL.  Another of his compositions on the
greatness of tiruvADip pUram is the taniyan 

                “periAzhvAr peN piLLaiyAi ANDAL
piRanda
                  tiruvADip pUrattin SIrmai – oru
NALaik
                  kuNDO manamE uNarndu pAr, ANDALuk-
                  kuNDAgilAppidaRkkumuNDu”

   “Only when someone else with the greatness of ANDAL
is born, will there be another day which can compare
in greatness to tiruvADip pUram, which is the birth
star of ANDAL.”  

While the above two sing the praise of the day on
which ANDAL was born, the taniyan 

                   “a’nju kUDikku oru SandadiyAi,
AzhvArgaL
                     tam Seyalai viÂ’nji niRkum
tanmaiyaLAi – pi’njAip
                     pazhuttALai ANDALai bhaktiyuDan
                     vAzhttAi manamE magizhndu”

praises the greatness of ANDAL herself.  The three
attributes of godai that are praised here are: “a’nju
kuDikku oru SandadiyAi”,  “AzhvArgaL tam Seyalai
vi”nji niRkum tanmaiyaLAi”, and “pi’njAip
pazhuttALai”.  Several anubhavam’s are given by
pUrvAcAryaÂ’s for these, but we will just list
high-level one-liners.  “She is a great and worthy
descendant of the lineage of AzhvArs;  she excelled
the AzhvArs in her accomplishment of climbing on to
the serpent-bed of Lord raÂ’nganAtha and becoming one
with Him through her immense devotion, and she matured
right in her very young childhood age without having
to go through the immense experience of several stages
of yoga etc.”.   

5.  svAmi deSikan:  The composition godA stuti,
consisting of 29 Sloka-s, is a well-known composition
praising the guNa-s of godA and pointing out how she
is instrumental, along with periya pirATTi, in
ensuring that bhagavAn forgives us no matter how much
we are bent upon committing aprAdham after aparAdham. 
 In prabandha sAram, svAmi deSikan again sings the
praise of godai and her SrI sUkti-s in the pASuram
“vEyar pugazh villiputtUr Adip pUram mEnmElum miga
viLanga viTTuccittan tUya tirumagaLAi…”.  
     
6. The greatness of tiruppAvai, one of the two
compositions of ANDAL, is again sung by the taniyan 

                “pAdaga’ngaL tIrkkum paraman aDi
kATTum
                  vEdam anaittukkum vittAgum - godai
tamizh
                  aiyyaindum aiyndum aRiyAda mAniDarai

                  vaiyyam Sumappadum vambu”

where  it is to be noted that ANDALÂ’s composition
tiruppAvai has the power to eliminate the greatest of
sins, take us to the Divine Feet of emperumAn so that
we get the bhAgyam to do nitya kaimkaryam to Him for
ever,  and in fact godaiÂ’s compositions are the very
essence and gist of what the veda-s teach us viz. that
the bliss of uninterrupted kaimkaryam to Him is the
ultimate object that the soul should strive for.   In
fact, this taniyan declares that  one who has not
learnt the essence of tiruppAvai is not worth being
supported by this earth!

7. The message from nAcciyAr tirumozhi:

godai has taught us how to reach our emperumAN:  just
as fish taken out of water would desperately try to
get into the water or someone who has been thrown into
water and is drowning would desperately be interested
in getting a breath of air, we, the jivAs thrown into
the samsAra pAlaivanam should strive to seek Him with
the same supreme intensity. It is this kind of
intensity in seeking Him that will qualify a person
for empeumAnÂ’s dayA.

8. Additional information:

Another perspective on ANDAL can be found in an
excellent write-up by SrI T. S. SundararAjan; please
read the bhakti archives at
http://www2.be.com/~mani/bhakti/archives/aug97/0002.html

For a biography on ANDAL, visit:
http://www.best.com/~mani/new/andal-bio.html

To read SRI AZHAGIYA SINGARÂ’s explanation of godaiÂ’s
tiruppAvai, visit:
http://www2.be.com/~mani/bhakti/archives/sep97/0088.html
and
http://www2.be.com/~mani/bhakti/archives/sep97/0092.html

Please also visit ANDALÂ’s home page created by SrI
venkaT iyengAr:
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Troy/7673/

A search in the bhakti archives will yield wealthy
information about our Dear Mother. A lot of our elite
bhakti members have contributed articles on godaiÂ’s
greatness.

The vAzhit tirunAmam on godai summarizes all the
attributes of ANDAL that we have discussed above in a
nutshell:

tiruvADippUrattu jagattudittAL vAzhiyE
tiurppAvai muppadum SeppinAL vAzhiyE
periyAzhvAr peRRedutta peN piLLai vAzhiyE
perum pudUr mAmunikku pinnAnAL vAzhiyE
oru nURRu nARpattu mUnRuraittAL vAzhiyE
uyar arangaRkE kaNNi ugandaLittAL vAzhiyE
maruvArum tirumalli vaLa nADi vAzhiyE
vaN puduvai nagark kOdai malarp padangaL vAzhiyE

sarvam SrIman nArAyaNAyEti samarpayAmi.

aDiyEn,
kalyANi kRshNamAcAri


__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Talk to your friends online with Yahoo! Messenger.
http://im.yahoo.com