You are here: SriPedia - SriRangaSri - Archives - Feb 2006

SriRangaSri List Archive: Message 00078 Feb 2006

 
Feb 2006 Indexes ( Date | Thread | Author )
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]


   The Story of Tondar-adipOdi: Conquest of ?kaama?
   ------------------------------------------------ 
   through Reduction (?unification?) of Desire --
   ----------------------------------------------
           ?karma yOga?  (continued from Part 18)
           ----------

The events in the life of Vipranarayana are a grim and
graphic reminder to us of what happens when ?kaama?,
our Desires in life, are kept ?unified? -- on a tight
leash, as it were -- and what might happen too when
they swerve away from such unity of purpose. 

So long as Vipranaryana?s only passion in life, or
predominant ?kaama?, remained ?bhagavath-kainkaryam?
(resolute service to a cause far higher than his own
narrow individual interests), it was possible for him
to attain and experience the Elysian pleasures of an
entirely different sort of ?kaama? -- that which only
a true ?karma-yOgi? feels and savours in life. The
moment that singleness of Desire was disturbed by the
onset of other desires, carnal and other ?- i.e. the
moment his ?kaama? became ?maRRu Oru kaaamam?, to use
the TiruppAvai paraphrase -- the perfect ?yoga? he had
all along engaged in, and which had all through life
sustained and inspired him, was immediately shattered.
(We find a striking similarity here in the life of the
Christian medieval saint, St.Augustine who wrote
poignantly of his mortal struggle with the problem of
?kaama? in life in a celebrated autobiography entitled
?Confessions?). To what terrible extent such
destruction was wrought upon the AzhwAr?s life and
personality is told with frightening vividness indeed
in the annals of SriVaishnava hagiography.

                ************

Having triumphed over Vipranarayana?s virtuous nature,
the femme-fatale, Devadevi proceeded next to humiliate
him. Slowly and surely, one by one, step by step, she
divested Vipranarayana of all his material means and
household effects too. Soon enough she rendered him a
virtual pauper. She took away his family heirloom of
gold and precious gems that were used in the worship
of the household deity; she took away his silverware;
his fine silks; his stock of rice and grain intended
for the SriRangam temple-kitchen; she took away all of
the crop his fruit-orchard yielded and the
flower-garden too?. She took it all away --- ripping
him thereby off every vestige of self-respect and
personal dignity. 

Vipranarayana, now an abject slave blinded by sheer
lust for Devadevi (?kaama?), surrendered everything of
worth he possessed unto the villainess whom he now
held to be his very life-breath. After ruthlessly
reducing him to utter penury, and satisfying herself
that the conquest of the pious Vipranarayana was now
well and truly complete, Devadevi finally left him,
high-and-dry, in the lurch, so to say, and returned
home to her own former station in life. 

Poor Vipranarayana, sunk now in the lowest depths of
depravity, had really nowhere else to go. He had no
kith and kin, no sympathetic friends in SriRangam, no
land, no property, no well-wishers, none. It was a
pathetic, desperate situation. In his classic work of
Tamil verse, the ?tirumaalai?, he alluded to his
abject condition in a single, truly moving line
(Stanza 29):

   ?UrilEn kaaNi illai* uRavu maRRoruvar illai*

Vipranarayana thus followed Devadevi to her doorsteps
and beseeched her to let him live with her, swearing
he would serve her as life-long slave if only she
would deign to share her bed with him. Devadevi, being
the consummate ?dEvadaasi? she was, had no use for
Vipranarayana. She promptly turned him out of her
house, slamming the door upon one she now regarded as
nothing but contemptible wretch.

Still Vipranarayana would not learn his lesson. He
slunk lower and lower. He hung around Devadevi?s
doorsteps, languishing there for days without food or
drink, crying out to her to let him in?? Finally,
after weeks of such self-debasement, he collapsed in a
pitiable heap at her doorsteps. Exhausted, he lay
slumbering there like a wasted, rotting piece of log.
Again, in the ?tirumaalai?, there are a couple of
verses of heart-rending pathos that allude to his
sordid state in that unfortunate phase in his life:   
        

?peNdiraal sukankaL uyppaan* periyathOr idumpai
pooNdu*
uNdiraak kidakkum pOdhu* udalukkE karainthu nainthu,*
(5: ?tirumaalai?)

              **************

When one reads the life-story of Tondar-adi-podi
AzhwAr one cannot help tears welling up to choke one?s
heart. Every reader would silently ask, ?Why should
one so noble and virtuous of heart have to undergo
such pain and travail in life? Why should such a
terrible and cruel stroke of fate befall one who was
so utterly blameless and undeserving of it? Why would
the Almighty choose to sit back and do nothing about
it? If God forsakes even one as good, pure-hearted and
devoted as Tondar-adipodi had been, can we expect Him
to act any differently in respect of mere mortals like
us whose sins in life are probably a hundred times
more witting and heinous?? 

It is seen to be in the nature of God that He comes to
the rescue of Man not a second sooner than in the
latter?s direst moment. It is often said, and truly
too, that ?Man?s extremity is God?s opportunity?. The
Almighty rushes to redeem Man only when almost all
hope of redemption for him is written off. And sure
enough, for Vipranarayana too, the Divine revealed its
Hand at the very moment when all seemed lost for the
poor, wretched soul. 

It is in the life of Tondar-adipodi that we see the
Almighty go about playfully re-writing that old,
commonplace quip, ?It is better to have loved and lost
than never to have loved at all? into the much more
profound one, perhaps re-phrased as: ?It is better to
have loved and lost than never to have lost at all!?. 

If we contemplate upon and truly understand
Vipranarayana?s ?lost? plight, we would surely be led
into believing that our own souls, with all its
imperfections, venality and ugliness, may be utterly
?lost? indeed, and our spirit may flounder out too in
the tempestuous sea of life, but there will yet be
some ray of hope perhaps for Divine redemption at the
very end?

              ************

             (to be continued)
Regards,
dAsan,
Sudarshan












                
__________________________________________________________ 
Yahoo! India Matrimony: Find your partner now. Go to http://yahoo.shaadi.com





------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> 
Join modern day disciples reach the disfigured and poor with hope and healing
http://us.click.yahoo.com/lMct6A/Vp3LAA/i1hLAA/VkWolB/TM
--------------------------------------------------------------------~-> 

 
Yahoo! Groups Links

<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SriRangaSri/

<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
    SriRangaSri-unsubscribe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
    http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
 



[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next] [Date Index ] [Thread Index ] [Author Index ]
Home Page
http://www.ibiblio.org/sripedia
srirangasri-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
To subscribe to the list