Re: Vamana Avatharam

From the Bhakti List Archives

• April 9, 2003


||Srimathe Ramanujaaya Nama: ||
 Sorry for not replying earlier. Meanwhile I got another mail saying that there is no proof in Vishnu Puranam or Bhagavatam that Lord put his Thiruvadi on Mahabali. If that is so, then our discussions may not be needed. However assuming that Lord put his feet on Mahabali's head, I still have the following doubts:
1) As per your argument these measures are not to be seen from a physical viewpoint but with a different perspective. If Lord's main reason for asking three foot measure is to show his might and curtail the ego of MAhabali, why did ne need three foot. Even in the first foot he could have said that I don't have enough land or space and embarassed him. what is the necessity for 3 foot
 
2) Bhumi or earth is infinitesimal compared with the universe and ofcourse Lord being the creator knows this equally well. Why did he have to waste the first foot on measuring the Bhumi - {MAhabali}. Instead he could have measured Universe - {Mahabali} in the first foot itself. Why did he need 3 foot of measure?
3) Why did Lord had to take the form of Vamana or Dwarf to beg yaachakam from Mahabali? Why didn't he come as a normal human being?
4) I still need clarification about Paadhaala loka. What is it and why was Mahabali pushed far down to Paadhaala loka?
5) In later avataras, like Rama and Krishna, the Lord gives enough chance to the opponent before attacking him. HAnuman was sent as an ambassador  and later Angatha to see if Ravana can be convinced. Similar thing happens also with respect to Duryodhana where Krishna himself takes that role. IT is to be noted that Mahabali is not a difficult person to handle, as like Hiranya Kasibu, and he was a worshipper of vishnu. He could have been easily convinced to stop the Yagna or so and explained the situation if his deed was wrong. But why was it not done?
Looking for convincing answers for my doubts. As Lakshmi Narasimhan pointed out Mahabali was not dumb. By the same token, Lord was not dumb enough to ask for 3 feet when he can perform the same feat in 1 or 2 feet.
Adiyen
Aravamudha Dhaasan
 Lakshmi Narasimhan  wrote:7AAF2FF2-2655-4795-AC4A-
 -------Original Message------- 
||Srimathe Ramanujaaya Nama: || 
Thanks for your explnation. Can you clarify to my further on the following: 
1) Why did Vamana left out Mahabali in the first measure. 
This was intentional. The lord wanted to place his feet after mahabali surrendered to the lord seeing his greatness. 
2) Assuming that he needed a foot of land, he didn't have to push Mahabali all the way into Paadhaala loka. He just had to push him at most 6 feet. why did he push him to paadhaala loka? by the way, what is paadhaala loka?? 
The lord did not want a foot of land. Bhali had mentioned to vamana that he could ask anything in this universe and bhali would be able to get it for him. When lord became Thrivikraman he exclaims to Bhali that, "I have used up 2 of my 3 feet measure, I don't have any other place now. But you promised me 3 feet. What shall I do now". Bhali realizing that the lord is all more powerful than him surrenders unto him and requests the lord to place the his holy feet on him(charanau charanam) 
3) Assuming that he left out Mahabali in his initial measure, Mahabali should have moved aside when vamana wanted to measure his third foot. what essentially vamana needs is a foot of land and does not have tocrush mahabali into paadhaala to get it. By moving aside, Mahabali cannot own that land as it had already been given to vamana.  What is the reason Vamana resorted to acquiring land in this odd way? 
This would have happened if bhali was dumb enough even after seeing the lord measuring the entire universe excepting him with just two feet:) I am sorry for that statement, but we should think from the appropriate personality's perspective. Even after seeing the power of lord why would bhali move aside and give the place for third foot? I did not mean anything against you. I just wanted to let you know of the way I thought. Please do not take anything wrong from my mail. By nature, I am humorous, but I lack expressiveness and hence may have sounded rude in this post. But I didn't intend to. So, please forgive me for any mistakes/misinformation.



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