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Subject: thiruvempavai 17 english
Date: Mon, 31 Dec 2001 21:00:33 +0530
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From: "Ramani Naidu"
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THIRUVEMPAVAI – DAY SEVENTEEN – SONG SEVENTEEN
Transliteration
cenkanavanpAl thicaimukanpAl thevarkaLpAl
enkum ilAthathOr inpam nam pAlathAk
konku uN karunkuzali nam thammaik kothAtti
inku nam illankaL thORum ezuntharuLic
cenkamalap poRpAtham thantharuLum cEvakanai
ankan aracai atiyOnkatku Aramuthai
nankaL perumAnaip pAti nalamthikazap
pankayap pUmpunal pAynthu AtElOr empAvAy.
The seventeenth song of Thiruvempavai is in the form of a speech by one of
the maids on her way to the pond for the ritualistic bath. The speech is
addressed to the other maids accompanying her.
She addresses her counterpart as the one endowed with sweet-scented-haired.
God has endowed them with a certain consciousness of the divine which has
not been accorded even to Thirumal, Brahma and other gods. God makes a home
of each of the hearts of the devotees. He has granted us His grace. Let us
sing in praise of our Servant then. He is very much in our eyes. Let us sing
the praise of such a King. He is like elixir to our souls. Let us sing of
Him. He is our Lord and let us sing of Him. With such a virtue about us, let
us go and bathe in the pond.
That is the speech in short. Let us now go to Thiruvacakam.
He is beyond any limit and I am a dog at His feet.
He has immersed me in a flood of rapture.
The feet that had thus immersed me in the flood of rapture
Are difficult to experince even for those who dwell in heaven.
These lines imply that the Limitless has bestowed limitless rapture upon
Manickavacakar.
In another song, man is compared to a baby who has caught hold of a golden
cup. Just as the child is ignorant of the worth of what is held on hand, is
man ignorant of the nature of the Grace that has been bestowed on him by
God. The awareness of the grace in itself becomes a virtue.
Such sentiments have been expressed in other religions also. Grace is not
something that man can earn - that is the Christian concept of grace.
Elsewhere I had written the following about the issue:
“Theologically grace is a free personal bestowal of unmerited favour upon
man by God. Phenomenologically it is a strength from beyond oneself, an
unexpected gift, a reneweal of spirit and response of deep gratitude. It is
a powerful guard against degeneration during desolation. Something from
beyond keeps one going. Also strength is provided against specific
temptations and evils. Patinece and love are instilled by grace and the
sustenance of the individual against the evil and despair is looked at not
as an indication of self heroism but as a manifestation of the divine
action. Grace again teaches man to find purposes at work even in one’s
suffering. One such purpose which is immediate is the acquisition of the
ability to discover God afresh or in a deeper way. Grace works through
sufferings and privations to scorge the barriers of guilt and
hardheartedness, bringing patience and other virtues, turning man away from
passing frivolities to lasting goods, hammering out the true self to become
a return presentation to God. If these are the inward impacts of the divine
purpose, the outward accomplishment is God’s will in man, such a will being
love and most worthy of being accomplished. Such a prospective of divine
purpose offers a totally altered perspective of man, of himself, his mission
in life, his vocation, so much so, any worthy vocation can be a vehicle for
the grace of divine calling...... Grace also contributes to a growth in
spiritual sanctification. A deepening awareness of God’s presence and
steadfastness in spite of trials, tribulations, discouragements and setbacks
makes life more meaningful in that God with His grace is patient in spite of
our indifference, merciful in spite of our follies. ... He becomes the
sustenance of the whole natural order. He reaches out to us in the depths of
oceanic darkness.”
The seventeenth song of Thiruvempavai expresses the same truth in the form
of a poetic experience.
Another word in the song also deserves our closer attention. The maid calls
herself a dog. Let me quote my own words written elsewhere. “It is the most
notorious on the part of the most virtuous to consider themselves the most
vicious”. I had elaborated on it saying that the sin that such great
devotees like Gerard Manley Hopkins, St.Thomas of Assissi, Loyola had felt
is one of elemental nature. It is not the one of a particular act of
commission or omission. Man’s present is the sum of the accumulated merit
and sins of mankind and it is the elemental sin of Man that these people are
ascribing to themselves. I refer the readers to the powerful poem, “Man with
the Hoe” by Markheim to appreciate the point.
Yet another word of significance is the word ‘cEvakan’ which in effect means
‘Servant’. It is surprising that God is called a servant here. It only means
that God is determined to redeem man and therefore is it obtained that God
is in man’s service.
Nammalvar, right at the beginning of his Thiruvaymoli says the following:
Prostrate and worship my heart!
Him who possesses a virtue that is beyond all the best virtues!
Him who has bestowed on us the acumen to get rid of misperception of
life!
Him who remains the King of heavenly gods.
Him whose feet cure us of our distress.
The second and the third lines of the poem are to be related. Whatver
virtues He bestows on man, man by himself cannot get rid of despair that is
elemental to human life. It can be dispelled only by the bright feet of God.
Scripture is intellectual by nature. It analyses reasons with a finesse. But
all such analysis has as its basis the experienced aspects of devotion in
hymns. Thirugnanasampanthar explains a statement in Sivagna Siththiyar
citing the seventeenth song of Thiruvempavai and identifies it as an example
of how experiential aspects of devotion become the basis of scriptures.
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