Adhika Skanda Sashti falls on May 21, and brings sweet thoughts of Murugan, meaning ‘the beautiful one’ in Tamil. The main Skanda Sashti occurs in October or November and is celebrated as a major festival in Tamil Nadu and across the Tamil diaspora. But there are also monthly remembrances of his feat of defeating the asura Surapadman and his brothers to restore cosmic balance and peace on Earth.
Murugan’s various lilas, or sacred games, have shaped the contours of Tamil culture since ancient times, and he remains an abiding source of spiritual strength, emotional security and courage in adversity for many. After all, whose son is he? Besides his own powerful shakti, he additionally combines the strength and blessings of his divine parents and elder brother in his radiant self. Even in Delhi, his abode, the Uttara Swami Malai or Malai Mandir, affords a heartening glimpse of ‘gopura darshan’ and typically southern red-and-white base stripes as one passes by. It elicits the instinctive murmur of the Shadakshari or six-syllable, Murugan mantra ‘Om Saravana Bhava’, with Om as the general mantra prefix.
Murugan’s six-temple circuit in Tamil Nadu is like an energy grid holding the land together, and it has an old tradition of kavadiyas who wear green dhotis and walk in peaceful, orderly files from temple to temple. The six temples are Tiruppurankunram (kunram means hill, where Murugan temples are usually built), Tiruchendur by the sea, Palani, Swami Malai, Tiruttani and Pazhamudhirsolai. His consorts, the Tamil beauty Valli (possibly the oldest love story of the Tamil land) and Lord Indra’s daughter Deivanai, represent his Ichha Shakti and Kriya Shakti, and also symbolically unite North and South into one force-field of energy.
My father’s ancestral temple is Tiruttani, and I was taken there as a child for mottai or mundan, the ritual shaving of the head. Going back as an adult merely out of cultural curiosity at the height of my ‘Left-liberal Khan Market gang’ phase, I nevertheless felt such a strong tug of attachment and such an overwhelming sense of having come home that I was taken aback. I see it now as Murugan’s grace. It dawned on me that some earthly songs go deep, that the gods are in our very marrow, and we should accept that with gratitude and respect, and not be led unnecessarily astray.
Perhaps it’s also because the things we hear that ‘speak to us’ can subconsciously form deep layers of identity. I was exposed to world music from childhood because my parents had very eclectic tastes and bought all kinds of records that they played all the time. There was Carnatic, Hindustani and Western classical, old Tamil and Hindi film songs, Bengali geet and Urdu ghazals, Western pop and musicals, you name it.
But in this garden of sound, Murugan bhakti songs bloomed like sudden, sweet grace notes of malli (jasmine). So, along with all that other music, I listened to various melodic compositions on Murugan. They were in Tamil, and I found them very powerful and energising, renewing your spirit each time with their good vibrations. They are all available online today, rendered by various gifted singers.
They range from the immortal 14th-century Tiruppugazh by the reformed rake Arunagirinathar, the 19th-century Kanda Sashti Kavacham, composed by Devaraya Swamigal, which is a hypnotic power chant in mellifluous Tamil with built-in bijaksharas (‘seed syllables’ valued as distilled mantras), to the thrilling 20th-century devotional songs by T N Soundararajan. I was also taken to Bombay’s Aurora theatre on Sunday mornings to see the then-powerful genre of Tamil devotional films, which featured unforgettable songs with moving lyrics. So, along with English films like The Sound of Music, The Singing Nun and The Man Who Knew Too Much with its evergreen song ‘Que sera, sera’, I was lucky enough to get a regular dose of bhakti films in my childhood.
The biggest take-home from all this was the electrifying realisation that ‘being Indian’ was like being given a giant box of chocolates, an akshayapatram of many wonderful and delicious things. That you were not forced to eat only one kind, that it was possible to have it all. All.
And since the gods are some of the most beautiful intuitions of mankind, you could rightfully, honourably and openly have the gods, for they are not going anywhere. This is their home, as much and even more than it is yours and mine, for you and I will pass away, but they have been here for millenniums. The only gods still around from ancient times are those that live eternally in our hearts and in our land, testimony to the master craftsmen and artisans who wrought their images and temples, and to the poets who sang of them, whereas the gods of other ancient civilisations have mostly vanished into museums. Saying which, I realise that I echo an ancient promise. That of Sivaperuman (Lord Shiva) at Chidambaram, where he promised to dance eternally “there and in the hearts of mankind” as Nataraja.
Here, the inspiring legend of Swami Malai comes to mind. It is revered as the place where the child Murugan explained the meaning of the Pranava Mantra (Om) to his father, Lord Shiva. It was not as though Shiva, the very embodiment of Om, did not know. But it illustrates the younger generation re-examining and refreshing knowledge, thus owning it and taking the culture forward. Another reason to love Murugan, for showing us our rights and duties as inheritors.
Renuka Narayanan | FAITHLINE | Senior journalist
(Views are personal)
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