Dasavatara Stotram of Swami Desikan

Sri N. Krishnamachari • TBF

This stotram was composed by SrI ved�ta desika when he worshipped the Lord in the daś�vat�ra sannidhi in śrīrangam. The first Slokam is introductory in nature, and SrI deśika offers obeisance to Lord rangan�tha and Mother rangan�y�ki whose ten divine incarnations he is going to cover in the stotram. The next ten Slokams are devoted to the ten incarnations, one for each incarnation. The twelfth Slokam summarizes all the ten incarnations in one Slokam, and the thirteenth and last Slokam is a phala-Sruti.

The most striking aspect of this stotra for me was the poetic side of SrI deÅ›ika that comes out so vividly in this composition. When this statement is made, it is not to diminish the importance of the devotional fervor in the stotra in any way. In praising the poetic gift of Sri deÅ›ika, one writer has remarked that SrI deÅ›ika could compose a thousand pÄ�Å›urams in praise of SrI á¹›anganÄ�tha’s pÄ�duka-s with ease in one night, whereas no other poet would have found it easy to compose more than a handful of Sloka-s on the topic of ‘sandals’. This is the poet that is revealed to us when we go through the daÅ›Ä�vatÄ�ra stotram. Especially in the description of the first few incarnations, this poetic expression is striking.

In his description of the matsya incarnation, the poet describes the beauty of the eyes of the Lord thus - wherever He goes as a fish in the waters looking for the lost veda-s, His eyes look like a traveling lotus garden. The huge waves that He creates as He travels collide with each other and this looks like a swing in the waters. And Our Lord is having fun enjoying this ride in this swing as He is looking for the veda-s.

In the kūrma avatara, SrI deśikan imagines the Lord in the form of a tortoise enjoying the massage by the mand�ra mountain as it is used in churning the ocean while supported on His back. This massage makes the Lord feel so comforted that He falls asleep. His deep breathing results in the huge waves which again serve the Lord as the water-bed on which He is present with His Consort, blessing all of us.

The poet describes the sound emanating from the nose of the Lord in the var�ha incarnation (ghur-ghuraih) as reverberating across the worlds and purifying them. The Lord takes this incarnation to retrieve the lost Earth from the ocean, and once He has retrieved Mother Earth, He has Her firmly seated on His canine teeth as He is rising out of the Ocean. She is enjoying the firm seating on His canine teeth and creating all the forms from brahma all the way down to the grass and all other beings as She is enjoying the ride.

When the Lord appeared as ná¹›simha in the pillar in hiranyakaÅ›ipu’s palace, the pillar became the ‘mother’ of the Lord, who Himself is the Father of brahma. Thus the pillar managed to lose its sterility, and now became the grandmother of brahma! Given that brahma himself is called the pitÄ�mahan (grandfather), now the pillar became the grandmother for the grandfather also. (How lucky is the pillar that had the good fortune to give birth to the Lord!). Since the Lord did not know He had to appear in the pillar (until prahlÄ�da so wished), He did not have His weapons for the slaying of hiraṇyakaÅ›ipu. This is just as well, because His nails obviously are more powerful than His other weapons!

As the foot of the Lord in His vÄ�mana incarnation keeps growing, SrI deÅ›ika imagines that His feet are carrying mahÄ�bali’s fame (for fulfilling His words to the Lord happily) like the soldier announcing a victorious king’s arrival. The Ganges river that resulted from brahma’s washing of the Lord’s Holy feet as it flowed down to earth looked like a white victory flag for the Lord.

The second aspect of the stotra that is noticeable is the description of the incarnations of the Lord using strikingly extreme aspects of the avat�ra as if to illustrate that the Lord is all extremes at the same time. In the description of the parasur�ma and r�ma incarnations, SrI deśika first points out the extreme capability or actions that they either did or are capable of, and then takes us down to the other extreme of their actions as if to contrast the two extremes. Thus he first points out that Parśur�ma destroyed 21 generations of kshatriya-s as a revenge for the slaying of his father, and captured the whole world for himself. At the other extreme, He sacrificed all his possessions in one swoop to Sage Kaśyapa. In r�ma incarnation, SrI r�ma was capable of draining the whole ocean with the heat of His arrows. The power of His arrows is far more, and is many times more tortuous than the agni that devours the world mercilessly at the time of pralaya. This same Lord r�ma has as His vow the protection of those who surrender to Him just once.

The above are some instances in the daś�vat�ra stotram where SrI deśika has lost himself intensely in the bhagavad-anubhava as he is describing the different incarnations. In addition to the descriptions of the above incarnations, the stotram also has one Sloka each that is devoted to the balar�ma, kṛshṇa and kalki incarnations.

Originally when I had the desire to go through each of the deśika stotra-s and share a high-level summary of each, I had planned not to include the samskṛt version of any Sloka or present detailed meanings. However, in the twelfth Sloka in this stotram sv�mi deśikan summarizes all the ten incarnations in one Sloka. So I am including this Sloka and its meaning briefly.

SrI deśika again gives vent to his poetic sentiments in describing these noble souls as shop-keepers from whom we can get all the puṇya that we want by associating with them. In the concluding Sloka, Sri deśika points out that even the desire to chant this stotram will lead to sarasvati-kat�ksham, in addition to the spiritual development, purity of thought, and all kinds fame.

As in the case of the previous write-up on SrI hayagrīva stotram, it is hoped that this high level description of the daś�vat�ra stotram gives the desire to look at the detailed meanings of the stotram, chant it regularly, and be blessed by our Lord and our �c�rya.

—dÄ�san ká¹›shṇamÄ�cÄ�ryan