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periyAzhwAr thirumozhi >> Second Centum >> Tenth decad
avathArikai (Introduction)
There is no specific avathArikai for this pAsuram.
ARRil irundhu viLaiyAduvOngaLaich
chERRAl eRindhu vaLai thugil kaikkoNdu
kARRil kadiyanAy Odi agam pukku
mARRamum thArAnAl inRu muRRum vaLaiththiRam pEsAnAl inRu muRRum
Word-by-Word Meanings
ARRil irundhu – from the sands, on the bank of river yamunA
viLaiyAduvOngaLai – on us, playing with our friends
sERRAl eRindhu – throwing mud
vaLai – our bangles
thugil – saris
kaikkoNdu – gathering
kARRil – more than wind
kadiyanAy – galloping (very hurriedly)
Odi – running
aAgam pukku – entering house
mARRamum thrAnAl – due to kaNNan [krishNa], who is not responding despite our pleading to him
inRu muRRum – we will perish today (word spoken out of frustration, meaning that they will give up their lives today)
vaLaiththiRam – regarding bangles
pEsAnAl – by the one who did not say “I will give” or “I will not give”, we will perish today.
Repeating the phrase inRu muRRum is due to excess of anguish
Simple Translation
We were playing among ourselves on the sands, on the bank of river yamunA. krishNa threw mud on us, gathered our bangles and saris, ran away faster than wind and entered his house. Despite our calling out to him and pleading with him, since he did not respond, we will perish today. We will perish on account of the one who did not speak about whether he will or will not return our bangles.
vyAkhyAnam (Commentary)
ARRil irundhu – Did we stay on the land which some could claim us “This is ours”? Wasn’t it on a land common to all, that we remained! The meaning conveyed here is that “We remained in a place where people were roaming about and not in a secluded place where he [krishNa] could come and carry out mischief”.
thiruvAimozhip piLLai says, in his svApadhESam, that the women say “We were in a place where people were coming and going; it was a common place where you would not come normally”. What is the connection between the place where we remained and your coming there?
viLaiyAduvOngaLai – we, who were playing. Were we not engaging in things other than him? Did we engage with him? Did we carry out any mischief on him earlier? Did we look at him through the corners of our eyes? There was none amongst us who thought of him.
thiruvAimozhip piLLai says here: We were engaging with one another in that river. Did we enter it, expecting any benefit? Was it not for playing among ourselves? Is there any benefit for playing? Isn’t that, in itself, the benefit? When we were playing in the sand, building houses, cooking food with sand, building castles etc, krishNa came there and asked us to include him in their game. When we refused, taking our Implements for playing and turned our faces away [from him], he threw mud on us. He gathered our bangles and dresses…
sERRAl eRindhu – threw mud on us. Couldn’t he have touched out, directly with his divine hands, without anyone noticing? Should he throw mud on us such that others, who were seeing this, would ask “What is this?”
vaLai thugil kaikkoNdu – gathering the bangles and saris which we had removed, prior to taking a bath [in the river]. Since they are herd-women, they remove their bangles and dresses before taking a bath.
kARRil kadiyanAy Odi – without getting caught, even when we ran behind him, running faster than wind. If he could take things which sustain his life, should he also take things which sustain us? For him, the sustenance is through their [the girls’] bangles and dresses. For them, sustenance is through his divine form.
thiruvAimozhip piLLai says here that the women say “We could have caught the blowing wind, but not krishNa”
agam pukku – even while chasing him, he ran and entered his house, where we couldn’t enter. He stole things from a public place but went into a private place.
mARRamum thArAnAl inRu muRRum – despite our calling out to him by his name, he is not responding to any of our calls. Is his word too like the bangles and dresses [not to be given]? Due to the person, who did not respond with even one word, we will end our lives. They would survive if he had uttered a word.
thiruvAimozhip piLLai says here that had krishNa responded to their calls, they would have sustained themselves, after sensing the clarity and the bewilderment in his voice [clarity on account of the fact that his followers have come to him and bewilderment due to feeling sad that he had not gone to them to help them out but that they had to come to him].
vaLaiththiRam pEsAnAl inRU muRRum – Since he did not respond with a word regarding the bangles, saying either that he will give or he will not give, we will perish today. The word muRRudhum has got shortened here as muRRum. muRRudhum refers to an end, viz. we will perish.
thiruvAimozhip piLLai says here that the herd-women say that despite their pleading with krishNa many times, should he not respond even once? Since they say that krishNa did not speak to them a word about returning the bangles, their focus is on his speaking to them more than on their bangles being returned to them. These women are expressing their desire [for krishNa to speak to them] when they speak about bangles, dress etc. They say that even if they stood the whole day, calling out to him, it was rare to get even a word out of him. It is enough for them if he says “I will return your bangles”. He could tell us “You return to your respective house. I shall enquire whose bangle belongs to whom, come to the respective house and return that bangle to that person”. Even if he doesn’t do one among these, they say that they will perish. inRu muRRum – either they will sustain themselves at the end of the day or they will perish. Even if yaSOdhAp pirAtti had told them “You go to your houses; I shall get the bangles and dresses for you” they would not go. If she had gone to him and told him “Return these to them” he would have said “Is it for this that I had taken this much of efforts and brought all these here?” Listening to him, yaSOdhAp pirAtti would appreciate the logic in his words and tell them “See, there is truth in what he says”. SrI nandhagOpar too would have agreed with his [krishNa’s] sense of justice, saying that it is the most apt.
thiruvAimozhip piLLai summarises his svApadhESam for this pAsuram, at the end, with the following: It is clear that emperumAn engages with those who do not consider any benefit other than himself as their benefit and who do not consider any means other than himself as the means to attain him. Those, who have knowledge [about emperumAn], think that not having anything with us [to attain emperumAn] is the reason for emperumAn’s infatuation with us. The term sERRAl eRIndhu indicates that the women engaged with him because of his simplicity and easy approachability [he came down to where they were playing]. The term eRindhu affirms that he was not happy with them and hence threw [mud] at them [he could have smeared it on them with his hands gently; he did not do that. Instead, he threw mud at them, since he was angry that they had come to the river, in the open and did not stay put in their respective house]. He left behind a mark by taking away things from them. The term vaLai thugil kaikkoNdu [taking away their bangles and dresses] refers to removing their [lowly degrees of] servitude and total dependence towards him [lowly degree of servitude is when serving emperumAn, we think of ourselves. Here, it refers to the herd-girls wearing bangles as a decoration for themselves. By removing the bangles, he removes their thought about themselves when serving him. Similarly, lower degree of dependence is when they dress themselves with saris; this indicates their efforts in protecting themselves. emperumAn, by removing their dresses, removes this lower degree of dependence on him]. Through the term kARRil kadiyanAyOdi [kARRu – wind, could not be seen, but could be felt], it is emphasised that emperumAn is beyond the sense of touch too. The term agam pukku refers to emperumAn reaching his abode where he enjoys the jIvAthmA as the total svathanthran [totally independent entity]. The term mARRamum thArAnAl indicates that he is avAkyanAtharAmrutha bhOgi [he enjoys the jIvAthmAs as nectar, without the need to speak or the need to sustain]. The term vaLaiththiRam pEsAnAl refers to his being the vishyAnurUpa prApya prakASakan [he shows the entity to be attained, based on the person who approaches him for enlightening; if the person who approaches emperumAn is his follower, he offers himself to that person; if the person is inimical, he offers all the other wealth to that person, but does not offer him]. In this case, he hints to the herd-girls that bangles are not the entity to be attained for them; they have to attain him. Hence, he removes the bangles from these girls and makes them to think of himself. The term inRu muRRum indicates that there are only two stages when it comes to attaining emperumAn – either one attains him or one goes on taking births repeatedly, in samsAram, and that there is nothing in-between these two stages. The herd-girls say that if emperumAn does not shower his mercy on them, they will perish. This is in line with thiruvAimozhi 2.5.3 “thannuL kalavAdhadhu epporuLum thAn illaiyE” (there is no entity which exists, which is not related to him)
We shall next consider the 2nd pAsuram of this thirumozhi.
adiyEn krishNa rAmAnuja dhAsan
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