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nAcciyAr tirumozhi XII maRRu irundIrgaTku 1

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Kalyani Krishnamachari • January 17, 2001 


                                                      
                          SrI:
      SrI ANDAL samEta SrI raÂ’ngamannAr tiruvaDigaLE
SaraNam

                           nAcciyAr tirumozhi XII–
maRRu irundIrgaTku 

pASuram 12.1 (twelfth tirumozhi - pASuram 1 maRRu
irundIrgaTku )

mathuraip purattu ennai azhaittuc celluÂ’ngaL

maRRu irundIrgatku aRiyalAgA mAdhavan enbadOr anbu
tannai
uRRu irundEnukku uraippadu ellAm UmaiyarODu SeviDar
vArttai
peRRu irundALai ozhiyavE pOip pErttu oru tAi il
vaLarnda nambi
mal porundAmal kaLam aDainda maduraip purattu ennai
uyttiDumin

A. From SrImAn SaDagOpan's tamizh treatise:

You canÂ’t understand the depth of love I have for
kaNNan.  All the advice and consolation that you are
giving me saying I should be more patient and wait for
Him, is like a conversation that happens between a
deaf person and a dumb person. 
mathurA is the dwelling place of kaNNan, who was born
to dEvaki but left her to live in nanda gOkulam and
grew up as yasOdAÂ’s son, and bravely arrived at the
fighting grounds ahead of the boxers who were deputed
to kill Him, and waited to face them. The only
fruitful service you can do for me now is to take me
anywhere close to mathurA.  I beg of you, please leave
me somewhere near mathurA.

B. Additional thoughts from SrimAn SaDagOpan:

This wonderful decad describes the heart rending plea
of ANDAL to Her Lord for samSlesham . All of the
cetanasÂ’ hearts should experience this anubhavam that
gOdai is demonstrating to us.  She starts
appropriately with vaDa  mathurai in search of her
Lord.  That is where it all started with His avatAram
inside a kArAgRham as the child of vasudEva and dEvaki
.. AyarpADi came next in His life ( orutti mahanAip
pirandu--).  The second pAsuram therfore shifts (
amazingly ) to AyarpADi. The third pASuram says,
please take me to the gates of nanda gOpan. The fourth
pAsuram takes her mind to the banks of yamunai.
brindAvanam is the place, where nandagopanÂ’s family
moved after pUtanA samhAram and other incidents, which
made the parents fear about staying in
gOkulam(AyarpADi). The fifth one takes her to yamunA
maDu , where kALiyan was conquered by kALinga
nardanan.The 8th and the 9th takes her to gOVardhanam
and dwArakA.  Final pAsuram refers to SrIvaikuNTham.
There is a logic in the flow of ANDALÂ’s thoughts in
tracing Lord kRshNaÂ’s life from His  childhood to His
bAla leelAÂ’s and then His life at a later stage at
dvArakA, and finally to His abode (“mama dhAmA”).

C. Additional thoughts from SrI PVP:

maRRu irundIrgaTku: “all of you, who are different
from me.  sudarSanam SrI kRshNasvAmi iyeÂ’ngAr points
out that the difference between ANDAL and the rest is
that the others are willing to wait for Him to bless
them based on their efforts, whereas ANDAL cannot bear
to live any longer without Him; such is the intensity
of her devotion to Him.

irundIrgatku aRiyalAgA: Even though you are living in
the same place as me, still you will not be able to
assess what my mind is going through.  My position is
like that of sanjayan in mahAbhAratam (uttara kANDam
68-5).  dhRtarAshTra asks sanjayan:  “I am as learned
in the SAstra-s as you are;  I am as intelligent as
you are;   and yet, it is only you who are able to
understand the truth behind things, and I always have
to learn the truth from you.   Why is it so,
sa’njaya?”  sa’njaya replies:  “I do not cheat anyone;
I do not indulge in any act that is contrary to
dharma, and am pure in my nature.  You try to
understand things based on the SAstra-s that you have
studied, whereas I try to understand based on SAstra-s
guided by devotion.  Your position is like that of one
who tries to see things that are hidden to the eye,
using the eye as the means; my situation is that of
one trying to see the things hidden to the eye by
applying the collyrium (aÂ’njanam) that reveals the
things that are hidden to the normal eye”.  Just like
that, gOdai has the intense devotion to Him that
cannot let her be separated from Him, and her folks
are ordinary and are not able to understand or
appreciate this special relationship. 

mAdhavan enbadOr anbu tannai: if I had fallen in love
with brahmacAri nArAyaNan, I might have reconciled to
my situation and consoled myself; but the One I desire
to be united with is mAdhavan -  SrIman nArAyaNan –
the One whom lakshmi Herself chose.  He is not just
the abode of Love, He is the personification of Love
itself.  He is Supreme in every respect.  nammAzhvAr
declares:  “kOla malarp pAvaikku anbAgiya en anbEyO”
(tiruvAimozhi 10-10-7).  He makes everyone fall in
love with Him, irrespective of whether they are
children, youths, adults, or older people, by
showering His love on them first.  rAmAyaNam
(ayodhyAkANDam 17-16) extols rAma as the one who
bestows His love on the four castes and the people in
four stages of life like childhood, adolescence, youth
and old age and to all others; so, they all love Him
intensely in return.

“sarvEshAm hi sa dharmAtmA  varNAnAm kurutE dayAm  |
  caturNAm hi vayah sthAnAm tEna tE tamanuvratA:      
       ||

It is emperumAnÂ’s nature to love His aDiyArgaL first
and create a love for Himself in their minds. 

anbu tannai uRRu:  it can be interpreted as “she wants
to reach mAdhavan who is the personification of love”,
or “She has matured into bhakti or devotion that is
the culmination of the intense love to Him”
(“niRandanUDu pukku enadu Aviyai niNRu ninRu urukki
uNginra” – tiruvAimozhi 5-10-1) – nammAzhvAr is
intensely suffering, and unable to bear that
suffering,  at the thought of how much trouble
bhagavAn goes through for our sake - such is the
intensity of his devotion.

irundEnukku:  “I am in a state where I cannot live
without Him, but I have no energy left to even walk to
His place; so I am staying fixed to this place”.

uraippadu ellAm; maRRu uraippadu ellAm – all the words
that you are all saying in order to keep me from
getting to Him, contrary to what I want. 

UmaiyarODu SeviDar vArttai: People who are dumb are
limited in their ability to communicate by word of
mouth, and people who are deaf are limited in their
ability to hear.  Since you all do not know my state,
you are unable to communicate meaningfully to me (or,
you are unqualified to talk to me), and so you are
like people afflicted with the limitation of being
dumb.  Nothing that you say is getting through into my
ears because this is not what I want to hear, and so I
am like one who is deaf when you talk to me.  So our
conversation is like a dumb person trying to verbally
communicate to a deaf person.  

peRRu irundALai ozhiyavE:  gOdai’s folks ask her: “How
can you say nobody knows your plight?  He who caused
you to be in this plight should certainly know”. gOdai
responds: “He did not even care about His own mother’s
plight, and left her as soon as He was born. How would
He know about His lover’s plight?”   dEvaki performed
intense penance to get this child; she gave birth to a
boy after much trouble.  The boy whom she gave birth
to, left her on the day He was born. 

pOip pErttu:  just as the saying goes “peRRa manam
pittu” (SrI Krishnaswamy Iyengar), dEvaki stood with
tears rolling down her eyes as her child was leaving;
and what did kaNNan do? Without ever drinking His
mother’s milk even once, He left her (“piLLai manam
kal”).

pErttu oru tAi il vaLarnda:  [“orutti maganAip piRandu
Or iravil orutti maganAi vaLarndu”]   He grew up in
another mother’s house – yaSodA’s;  While His own
mother, dEvaki, was grief-stricken that her child
parted from her, He just adopted yaSodA as His mother,
and let her tie Him up and beat Him up [“kaNNi nuN
SiruttAmbinAl kaTTuNNap paNNiya perumAyan”].  All
dEvaki could say was :: “tiru ilEn onRum peRRilEn –
ellAm deyva na’ngai yasOdai peRRALE” (perumAl
tirumozhi 7-5); and yasOdA enjoyed the ultimate
happiness (“yaSodai tollai inbattu iRudi kaNDAL” –
perumAL tirumozhi 7-8).

peRRu irundALai ozhiyavE pOipÂ…Â…Â…  His natural tendency
is to hurt especially those who cannot live without
Him.  kulasekhara AzhvAr in his UDal nilai says in
perumAL tirumozhi 6-4, “tAi mulaip pAlil amudu irukkat
tavazhndu taLar naDai iTTuc cenRu pEi mulai vAi vaittu
na’njai uNDu pittan enRE piRar Esa ninRAi”.  yasOdai
is very particular in making sure that kaNNan drinks
her milk, which sustains His body. Making her wait in
sorrow (by not drinking her milk), childishly He goes
and drinks the milk from pUtanai, who came to destroy
Him.  This led  people to mock at Him as one who does
not know the difference between those who love Him and
those who are only bent on doing evil to Him. 

nambi: Literally means “Eminent person among men”. 
Here it seems ANDAL is suggesting that He is “nambi”
because He makes this indifference to those who love
Him as a special quality of His. 

mal porundAmal kaLam aDainda:  Instead of choosing to
unite with me and embrace me when I am here waiting
for Him to embrace me with love, He leaves me and goes
to embrace the fighters in mathurai.  mal porundAmal 
means “not being together with me”.   Or, the words
could be read thus: mal porundA mal kaLam – meaning,
even before the mallargaL (fighters) came to the
fighting ground, He arrived there.   

 maduraip purattu ennai uyttiDumin:  Before He
embraces the fightersÂ’ bodies, please take me to vaDa
mathurai and leave me there so that I can go to Him
and embrace Him.

D. Additional thoughts from SrI UV: 

maRRu irundIrgatku Â….  The love I have for Him is such
that without Him, I cannot live even for a second.
When periya pirATTi tried to end her life in asOka
vanam, the word sent to her by emperumAn helped her
sustain for at least a month. He is ArAda amudam; That
is why I am in love with that mAdhavan. 

UmaiyarODu SeviDar vArttai:   SrI PVP had interpreted
ANDALÂ’s position to that of a deaf person, and the
eldersÂ’ position to that of a dumb person.  SrI UV
reverses the role, and interprets ANDAL as feeling
that the elders are like deaf people in not being able
to understand what she is trying to tell them, and she
is like a dumb person since she does not recognize
what they are talking (SrI UV remarks that a dumb
person does not talk, and does not recognize what
others talk).  

So, ANDAL tells them: “Instead of wasting my time,
please take me close to His place, in mathurai, and
leave me anywhere in that vicinity. If you object
saying – how can we leave you in such a far away
place?  How will we, who are like your mothers, live
separated from you, I have the answer for you.   He
left His mother and went to another place as soon as
He was born;  I, who am in love with Him, can I not be
separated from my mothers now that I am old?  DidnÂ’t
His mother have life? DidnÂ’t she have milk?  Why did
He leave her? Even that mother told Him that all she
wishes is His welfare and even though she doesnÂ’t have
the bhAgyam to see Him, all she cares for is that He
is safe and well.  In the same way, you should all
seek my welfare and growth.   Later on, when He is
reunited with His parents in mathurA, I might have the
bAghyam of seeing you all and living together also. 
He only behaved the way He did in order to do good to
His parents, being such a kalyANa guNa pUrNan; I am
also behaving like Him.

mathuraip puRam:  When He left AyarpADi and reached
mathurA, He got off at the outskirts of mathurA.  So
also, you can leave me at the outskirts of mathurai,
and I will find my way to Him. 

mal porundA mal kaLam aDainda:  When He returned to
mathurA frm AyarpADi, at least then, did He go
straight to see His mother?  Far from it.  He went to
the mal kaLam – fighting ground instead.  “mal porundA
mal kaLam” can be enjoyed in several ways:  a) He was
there even before the designated boxers had arrived;
b) The fighting ground was not appropriate because the
designated boxers were professionals, and kaNNan was a
little kid, and so there was no “poruttam” or match in
this fight; c) after the fighting was over, still it
was not a fair match because the designated boxers
were so much inferior to kaNNan, that there was no
“poruttam” anyway.   d) Before the boxers were going
to have a chance to be in an embrace with kaNNan
during the fight, godai wanted to go and embrace Him. 

maduraip puRattu:  SrI UV feels the correct pATham
should be maduraip purattu “in the city of mathurA”,
rather than “maduraip puRattu” – in the vicinity of
the city of mathurA [note the difference in the
spelling of the mellinam and vallinam for “ra” and
“Ra”, which results in the two different meanings].

Because of her pEr avA (great fondness) for kaNNan,
even though kaNNan lived during His vibhava
incarnation as Lord kRshNa there, gOdai thinks that
kaNNan is still living in mathurai, AyarpADi etc. 
That is the spirit of this tirumozhi. 

Abbreviations:
------------------
PVP= SrI periyavAccAn piLLai
PBA= SrI prativAdi bhayankaram aNNangarAcAriyAr
UV  = SrI uttamUr vIrarAghavAcAriyAr

sarvam SrIman nArAyaNAyeti samarpayAmi.

aDiyEn,
kalyANi kRshNamAcAri


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