Divyaprabandham THE WORLDLY AZHVARS Divyaprabandham Seven Azhvars Volume 1 You are the sweetness in milk. You are the brightness of precious gold. You are the freshness of green moss. You have the dark color of bees that drink honey and fly around the ponds. You are the four seasons. How is it that the world cannot understand the nature of the god Maal? (795) Introduction The Seven Azhvars in this volume are Periyazhvar, Aṇḍal/Thalaivi, Kulasekharazhvar, Thirumazhisaiyazhvar, Thoṇḍaraḍippoḍiyazhvar, Thiruppaṇazhvar, Madhurakavi Azhvar. There is much information about Vaishnavism and the Azhvars’ lives found on the internet. My concern in this book is to provide a good translation of the pasurams. I hope this work will be helpful for academic scholars, students who do research on the Azhvars and anyone who is interested in the Divyaprabandham. This is my own work and if there are any mistakes, they are my responsibility. I hope you will enjoy reading this great work of Azhvars. According to Tamil scholars the Vaishnava Bhakthi movement dates from the 5th century CE to the 10th century. 4000 poems (pasurams) were composed by twelve Azhvars who called their god Maal, Neḍumaal, Thirumaal, Kanṇṇan and Nambi. The name Vishnu is not found in the text. (The word Viṭṭu is found in one Pasuram. Does it mean the god is arguable? As much as I know there is no grammar rule for Vishṇu changing to Viṭṭu.). “The god” in this translation means Thirumaal. “Gods” in the plural refers to other gods. The word Shiva is not used by the Azhvars. Shiva is mentioned as, “the one who has a crescent moon on his jaṭa,” “the one who has Ganges in his jaṭa,” “the one who has three eyes,” “the one who has a dark neck.” etc. This translation uses the word “Shiva” so that the readers will understand who the god is. In a very few places the word Brahma is used, but more often i The Worldly Azhlvars the word “Nanmuhan” is used for Brahma. For Indra the Azhvars use the phrases like, “the king of the gods” and “the thousand-eyed one.” The translation may use “Indra” for clarity. The word Lakshmi is not used in the pasurams, rather, “goddess on the lotus,” “beloved of the god,” “the one who stays on the chest of the god” and similar epithets are used for her. I used the word for this goddess ‘Lakshmi’ for the sake of the readers. Nappinnai, who is considered as Lakshmi, appears in the Pasurams often. Other uses are as follows: “Maayan,” “Maayanar,” “Maayavan” and the like refer to Maal (Vishnu). Nambi is another name often used by the Azhvars for Vishnu. When the Azhvars say, “emberuman,” “embiran,” my translation uses phrases like “dear one,” “dear god,” “highest god,” “god of gods” and the like. At the end of a masculine proper nouns, many derived from Sanskrit, the Azhvars use the Tamil -an ending while Sanskrit uses just -a. In order to retain a Tamil flavor, I have used the -an ending on most of these (“Asuran”) but have retained the Sanskrit usage for some names like Rama to accord with common usage. Phonetics. For the names of gods, kings, Rakshasas, cities, plants, flowers and animals I have often transliterated Tamil terms, using the following scheme: The vowels a, i, u, e, ee, o, ai, au are used in the translation. ‘aa is used sometimes for clear pronunciation. Consonants. Tamil writing system has eighteen consonants. k,ch, ṭ, th, p, ng, nj, ṇ, n, m, (n), y, r, ṛ, l, v, ḷ and zh. Soft consonants hg, j, ḍ, d, and b are used for pronunciation. Pronunciation. Nasals and medial sounds have only one pronunciation: ng, nj, ṇ, n and m. y, r, ṛ, v, l, ḷ and zh. The stops k, ch, ṭ, th, and p are unvoiced when they occur initially in a word. In the middle of a word in between vowels, they are pronounced as unvoiced stops. In the middle of the word if they are unvoiced stops, Tamil writing indicates these with double letters. The soft consonants h/g, s, ḍ, d, b are voiced and occur in the middle of a word between vowels. The Tamil writing system indicates these with single letter between vowels. The soft consonants may also occur after a nasal: ngg, nj, ṇḍ, nd, and mb. Some proper names often used are as follows. ii Divyaprabandham Names of the gods: Kaṇṇan, Naraṇan, Narayaṇan, Kesavan, Govindan, Gopalan, Shridharan, Vasudevan, Baladeven, Madhavan, Nanmuhan (Brahma), Hanuman. Names of kings: Janakan, Dasharathan, Nandagopan, Ravaṇan, Vibhishaṇan, Mahabali. Names of Raksasas: Kamsan, Hiraṇyan, Sakaṭasuran, Thenuhan, Narahan, Muran, Ashṭasuran, Kabithasuran. Names of Rakshasis: Thaḍahai, Puthana. Names of goddesses: Thiru, Thirumagaḷ, Nappinnai. Names of women: Devaki, Yashoda. Vaidehi. The 10 avatharams are fish, turtle, boar, Vamanan, man-lion, Rama, Parasuraman, Balaraman, Krishna, and Kalki. Divyadesams: The Vaishnavaites believe that the Azhvars praised 108 temples, which are called the Divyadesams. Many of these are also names of cities. In other cases, one city might have two, three or more Divyadesams (temples) in it. The Azhvars also call these Thirupadis. The tradition says Thirumangai Azhvar praises the god Maal in 108 Thirupadis. The internet has a list of all the Divyadesams. 105 of the Divyadesams are in India, one is in Nepal and the last two are Thirupaṛkadal (the ocean of milk) and Sri Vaikuṇṭam (Vishnu’s paradise). Some of the stories of Vishnu in the Divyaprabandham are listed here. There are many others could be found in the Pasurams. 1. His fight in Lanka with Ravaṇan 2. Killing Sakaṭasuran who came in the form of a cart, 3. Killing Kalingan the snake. 4. Stopping the storm with Govardana mountain. 5. Killing Hiranyan. 6. Killing Kamsan, his uncle. 7. Taking the female form of Mohini to help to gods to receive nectar. 8. Killing the Asuran Kesi who come in the form of a horse. 9. Splitting open the mouth of the Asuran who came in the form of a heron.. 10. Killing the two Asurans who came in the form of marudam trees. 11. Killing an Asuran by throwing a calf. 12. Killing the evil elephant Kuvalayabeeḍam. 13. Saving the elephant Gajendra and killing the crocodile that came to kill the elephant. 14. Killing seven bulls for Nappinnai so he could marry her. iii The Worldly Azhlvars 15. Hurting Sukrachariyaar and Namusi in the sacrifice of Mahabali. 16. Helping Arjuna in the Bharatha war. 17. Bringing the earth goddess from the underground. 18. Straightening the hunch back of the kuni, the servant of a king. 19. Removing Shiva’s curse and helping to make the head of Brahma fall. 20. Saving Draupathi in Duriyodana’s assembly. 21. Killing Vali. 22. Killing Thadagai. 23. Killing Baṇasuran. 24. Killing Puthana I would like to thank Mr. Venkataraghavan for putting the Divyaprabandham in Tamil on the internet (http://srivaishnavam.com, [email protected]). His careful and exacting work has been of enormous help to me in preparing this volume. SUBHAM iv Divyaprabandham The Worldly Azhvars Periyazhvar Thirumozhi Thiruppallaṇḍu 1. Let us praise the god and say, “Pallaṇḍu! Pallaṇḍu!” You conquered your enemies with your strong arms. You have the color of the blue sapphire. We praise you forever, forever and forever and for many crores of years. Protect us as we are beneath your divine feet. 2. Let us praise the god and say, “Pallaṇḍu! Pallaṇḍu!” Let us live never apart from your devotees and you. Let us praise you. Let us praise the beautiful Lakshmi who lives on the right side of your strong chest. Let us praise the beautiful shining discus that you carry in your right hand. Let us praise the Panchajanyam conch that you blow on the battlefield. 3. Let us praise the god and say, “Pallaṇḍu! Pallaṇḍu!” O devotees, if you wish to serve the god come and carry sand and fragrance in his festivals. If you concern yourself only with food, we will not include you among our devotees. We are from families that have not sinned for seven generations. Let us praise the god who fought and destroyed the Rakshasas and their land Lanka. 4. Let us praise the god and say, “Pallaṇḍu! Pallaṇḍu!”. Come and join us to do service to the god. If you realize always that your soul is god there is nothing you need to think of to go to him. Praise, singing, “Namo, Narayaṇa!” in all towns and in all countries. O devotees, come and praise the god with us. 1 The Worldly Azhlvars 5. Let us praise the god and say, “Pallaṇḍu! Pallaṇḍu!” O devotees, worship and praise Rishikesa, the king of the whole earth. He destroyed the Rakshasas and their large clan. Give up your old ways and join us and recite the thousand names of the god. Bow to his feet and say, “Pallaṇḍu! Pallaṇḍu!” 6. Let us praise the god and say, “Pallaṇḍu! Pallaṇḍu!”. My father, his father and his grandfather, for seven generations they all worshipped him and served him. He took the form of Narasimha on the evening of Sravaṇa Nakshatram day and destroyed Hiraṇyan. 7. Let us praise the god and say, “Pallaṇḍu! Pallaṇḍu!” We brand our shoulders with the famous divine discus that shines like fire. We join the temple and serve the god for many generations. The strong god fought with Baṇasuran who had a thousand arms and a magical army and destroyed him with his discus making all his thousand arms bleed. Let us praise that strong god and say, “Pallaṇḍu! Pallaṇḍu!” 8. Let us praise the god and say, “Pallaṇḍu Pallaṇḍu!".