Short Excursions, Temple Administration, and Kuresa's Prayer for Sight

After twelve years of absence (some say fourteen), Sri Ramanuja was back at the center of his mission. Love and reverence for him had multiplied. His disciples said, "Worshipful master — by the loss of Mahapurna a vacuum has opened in our hearts, and by the loss of Kuresa's eyes a wound. You are the balm for both.

"Listen, master. The traitor Chola did not only harass us and our leaders; he pushed his vandalism to the point of destroying Vaishnava temples everywhere. He had torn down the Vishnu images at Chithrakuta, of which you shall hear more, and was marching toward Srirangam to do the same. But he halted one night in a village, was seized by a fatal sore on the neck, and died in terrible pain. Srirangam, the center of our faith, was miraculously spared.

"At Chithrakuta (Chidambaram) — a town filled with Saivas — the Chola tore Lord Govindaraja from His seat, both the main image (mula) and the processional one (utsava), and ordered them thrown into the sea. But a courtesan named Tilya (or Tillai), a staunch Vaishnava, contrived to distract the king long enough for the devotees to save their Lord from the sea. They secretly carried Him north to Tirupati."

Ramanuja heard this tale with a troubled heart; hot tears rolled down his cheeks. "Beloved disciples, take heart — I will set matters right." Old and exhausted as he was, he girded himself for action again. "Let us go to Venkatesa."

They journeyed to Tirupati. At the foot of the hill, with the help of a Yadava-raja (Kattiyadeva), Ramanuja built a temple and installed Lord Govindaraja from Chithrakuta, naming Him Tillai-Govindaraya. A town grew up around the temple — Govindaraja-pattana, now Padapuri — which still flourishes today.

He then ascended the Holy Hill of Tirupati to pay homage to Lord Venkatesa. There he imparted the art of worshipping God in His images — the mode of Aradhana, called the Nitya-Grantha — to his two disciples Kuresa and Hanumad-dasa. Another disciple, Vangippurattu Nambi, had long been promised this teaching, but the moment had never arrived. Just as Ramanuja was finishing with Kuresa and Hanumad-dasa, Vangippurattu Nambi appeared. Ramanuja felt awkward: he had revealed the secret to some before one to whom he had promised it first.

He explained to Nambi, "Listen, Nambi. Until today I could never understand how Lord Krishna — God all-powerful — allowed Himself to be bound by a rope by an ordinary cowherd woman, Yasoda. Now I see it. By the persistence of my disciples Kuresa and Hanumad-dasa, my own firm will bent so far as to teach them before I taught you, though I had promised you first. My own experience — how pleading melted my resolve — is the key. Even God lets His resolve melt before the fire of His devotees' love." And he gave Nambi the promised teaching.

He then took leave of the Lord, descended the hill, and returned to Srirangam by way of Kanchi, preaching to crowds along the way — received, it is said, like pleasant showers that soothed parched souls into heavenly rest.

Kulottunga Chola II (1128–1158?), or Vikrama-Chola (1113–1128) — who may also have been called Kulottunga, and who was the son of Krimikantha-Chola — was a friend of the Vaishnavas. He had tried his best to argue his father out of his schemes, warning him that he might demolish temples on earth but he could never suppress the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. He had also suffered reverses of fortune on account of his father's sins.

On hearing that Ramanuja had returned, this king hastened to Srirangam, taking with him the Pandya and Chera kings. He fell at Ramanuja's feet and begged pardon for his father. The large-hearted Ramanuja granted it at once, received Kulottunga into the Vaishnava fold with the due sacraments at his request, and made him the disciple of Dasarathi.

"Swami," said the king, "I will not exercise any jurisdiction over the temples hereafter. I pray you to assume the entire control yourself from this day."

Ramanuja agreed. Calling Dasarathi, he formally bestowed the whole administration of the temple upon him as a gift, in the manner prescribed by the Sastras. It is written in the chronicle Koil-ozhugu that a stone inscription to this effect was set up at the Arya-bhattal gate. Ramanuja by this time was more than a hundred years old.

Ramanuja's heart still ached at Kuresa's blindness. One day he called him and said, "Son — beloved. Lord Varada of Kanchi, as we know, is quick to grant wishes. Sing a hymn to Him asking for your sight back."

"Sir," Kuresa replied, "material sight I do not desire."

"Beloved, do as I wish," Ramanuja urged again and again.

Kuresa finally composed and sang the hymn known as the Varadaraja Stava — one of the five Stavas — beginning:

In the twenty-third stanza he prayed:

That very night the Lord appeared in his dream and said, "Granted."

The next morning Kuresa rose with a joyful heart. After his ablutions he finished the Stava, went to Ramanuja, recited the whole of it, and said, "Sire — last night the Lord appeared in my dream and has granted me spiritual sight — such sight as is able to enjoy His Beatific Vision forever, the sight that is had in Vaikuntha:

"My beloved — that is not what I want," said Ramanuja, annoyed. "Come, let us go to Lord Varada." They went to Kanchi, and he bade Kuresa recite the Stava again.

Kuresa began. As he was going through it, Ramanuja was called away for a few minutes on some other business. Before he could return, Kuresa had finished, Lord Varada had appeared and asked him to name his wish — and Kuresa, absent-mindedly, had prayed that Naluran (the one-time enemy who had once betrayed Ramanuja) might be saved even as he himself would be saved. "Be it so," the Lord had said.

Just then Ramanuja returned. Learning what had happened, he chided Kuresa: "Son, you have acted contrary to my wishes. You have spoiled matters. O Lord, please grant my prayer that Kuresa regain his sight."

Moved by Ramanuja's earnestness, the Lord spoke: "We grant him sight; but except Me and you, he shall see no other material object."

Ramanuja was at least content with this. He at once tested Kuresa: "Look at Lord Varada. Describe Him." Kuresa did so. "Now describe me." And Kuresa, his face lit up with heavenly joy, described his master's person accurately, in all detail. Satisfied, Ramanuja took leave of the Lord and returned to Srirangam.

After his return Ramanuja was reading Andal's hymn-book, the Naycchiyar Tirumozhi, with his disciples. Coming to verses IX.6 and 7 — Narunarum and Inruvandu — where the saintess vows to place before Lord Sundararaja of Tirumalirunjolai a hundred vessels of nectarous pudding, and, if He should come and eat them all, another hundred thousand more —

Ramanuja stopped. "Why do we not go to the holy shrine at once and carry out her wish?" So they rose, journeyed there, and spread a great feast before the Deity.

From there Ramanuja went to Srivilliputtur, Andal's birthplace, and stood lost in devotion before her. Speaking through the voice of her priest on duty, the saintess conferred on him the title Koil-annar.

He next visited Tirunagari, the birthplace of Nammazhvar. From there he went to Tirukkolur, about two miles north, the birthplace of St. Madhurakavi. On his way he met a woman coming from that town.

"Where are you coming from?" he asked.

"From Tirukkolur," she said.

"I am surprised, lady," Ramanuja said gently, "that you should leave a holy place into which, according to the verses of Nammazhvar, everyone should be entering." She gave the following long reply, known ever since as Tirukkolur Ammai's list:

(Dadhibhanda was a curd-seller, said to have given shelter to Lord Krishna during a game of hide-and-seek; when Krishna offered him any reward, he asked for Moksha for himself, his household, and even the curd-pot in which Krishna had hidden — which was granted.)

(Nallan was a Brahmana disciple of Ramanuja and a devotee of Lord Varada of Kanchi. He saw a corpse floating down the Vaigai river bearing the Vaishnava marks of the discus, and dragged it to shore to perform funeral rites. The Brahmanas of Kanchi refused to eat with him — so Lord Varada Himself, in Brahmana disguise, attended the funeral meal. The Lord then bestowed on him the title "Nattukku pollan, Namakku nallan" — "Though the whole world may be against him, we are for him.")

Ramanuja was thunderstruck. He took Ammai back to Tirukkolur, rested under her roof, and ate the food she had prepared — as a token of his admiration for her spiritual depth and the astonishing learning shown in her discourse. Before returning he blessed her and saw to the proper performance of all the festivals connected with Lord Nikshepavitta and Madhurakavi. Then he returned to Srirangam.

An incident is recorded from this period. The washerman who laundered the clothes of the Srivaishnavas of Srirangam one day also washed Lord Ranga's garments, and brought them to Ramanuja to show his work. Ramanuja was so pleased that he took him to the Lord in the temple and prayed: "Lord — see how carefully this washerman has cleaned Your garments. With these wrapped around You, You look wonderful."

Lord Ranga accepted the recommendation. "For the loving service this washerman has rendered Us today, We forgive the offence of his ancestor, the washerman of Our Krishna-avatar."

To this day it is the custom for the Lord to receive the clothes directly from the washerman, exactly as he brings them, and to wear them so — a significant privilege, since in Indic society the washerman's clothes normally had to be rewashed before a Brahmana would wear them.

There was also a disciple of Ramanuja called Pattini-p-perumal, said to be of low caste. He lived in a far-off hut outside the town and lost himself singing the hymns of the Azhvars. Ramanuja's path from the Kaveri to Srirangam ran past his hut. One day, returning from his bath with the usual large company of followers, Ramanuja stopped at the hut. He sent the others on to Srirangam, entered the hut, and stayed as long as the sweet ecstasy of the hymns pleased him.

Had an ordinary man done what Ramanuja did, he would have been cast out of his caste. But no one dared utter a syllable of reproach against Ramanuja. The practices of great souls become illustrations of the rules of the Dharma Sastras; no reproach can touch them. Such incidents, trivial as they may seem, shaped the very character of the new community then taking form among the Aryan-Dravidian peoples.

This new Sri Vaishnava community was not confined to Brahmins. It was universal, welcoming every man and woman regardless of caste or color. It grew rapidly and counted millions — of whom a definite number carried on the doctrine established by Ramanuja.

The king of ascetics — Ramanuja — had in his following seven hundred yatis (ascetics), seventy-four episcopal seats (acharya-purushas), twelve thousand ekangis (monks of all classes), three hundred kotti-ammais (nuns), many kings, and countless others — both those of the holy thread and the threadless (sattadavar). A fuller list is given separately. Here only the chief members with their assigned duties are noted: