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Ramanuja List Archive: Message 00124 Jan 2004

 
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Sri:
Srimathe Ramanujaya Nama:

There are several pramANas for Sriman Narayana having white
color.

Some examples are:
1. Varaha purANa records that Sriman Narayana when taking 
the boar form was of the color white.

2. In Bhagavatam, it is said that Sriman Narayana takes on 
different forms, different colors, different names and
worshipped differently in each of the four yugas. In this,
it is said that in the Krta Yuga, He is of the color white.

3. In Pancharatra samhita, the Lord in the Sankarshana form
is said to be the color of lotus. It also describes the Lord 
having the color of molten gold. 

4. Since the Vedas describe Him as "krshNapingaLam", He has 
both the dark color and golden color. One shade of melting 
gold can be a shade of white. 

5. In the Skanda purANa, vAmana purANa etc, in the 
description of Sriman Narayana, it is said that His face 
is like that of the moon - shashi (and also that His divine 
body is dark blue).

Coming to the shloka in question, I have heard from Shaivites
that they address it to Ganesha, because of the ending which
says "sarva vigna upa shAntaye" and Ganesha is considered as
Vigneshwara.

However, there are two other things to consider: one is the
word "vishNum" denoting all pervasiveness. This, I don't
believe, is a quality associated with Ganesha by even
Shaivites, except perhaps by some folks in Tamilnadu who
consider Ganesha to be the para Brahmam. Considering that 
purANas state that Ganesha was created by Shiva, I can't 
follow the logic behind that idea.

The second is "catur bhujam" - I am not 100% sure on this,
but I don't believe that this is a typical feature of Ganesha,
except again in Tamilnadu, or that Ganesha is often refered
to by this phrase. On the other hand, catur bhujam is used 
quite often to refer to Vishnu.

adiyEn


--- In ramanuja@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "amshuman_k" <amshuman_k@xxxx> 
wrote:
> Dear bhAgavatAs,
> I stumbled onto an old sri-ranga-sri discussion regarding the 
s'lOka 
> shuklAmbaradharam vishNum... A proposition was made that this was 
> addressed to vinAyaka which was countered by lot of srI 
vaishNavAs. I 
> request a pramANa for vishNu being described as a 'sashi-varNa' -
> 'moon-colored'.






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