Please read the Chidambaram post again. i added some at the end (on May 30th).
I heard this Temple's name mentioned by my Tamil friends in the USA. The first offering of the hair (Tonsuring – the act of shaving your head to propitiate God) is a family tradition for some here. In my family, we do it in Tirumalai. Also, this town is famous for the Naadi shastra and we saw signs along the road advertising this. I was very excited because not only that I had interest, but also I had experienced the truth of this Naadi shastra in 1995 in Tirupathi (same Agasthya Naadi). Our driver's eyes brightened and wanted to know whether we would like to stop for a reading. I knew we needed a whole day for that - so, we said "no".
This Temple is very ancient, dedicated to Shiva. Vaideeswaran literally means the divine provider of cures (vaidya in Sanskrit meaning doctor). The main deities are Shiva as Vaideeswaran, Parvathi as Taiyal Nayaki and Subrahmanya as Muthukumara.
In addition there is a Temple for Mars (Kujaor Angaraka) which I was surprised to see there. Due to my interest in Astronomy and Astrology, I was overjoyed.
All the Carnatic music lovers know about Sri Muthuswami Dikshitar and his compostions. It is said of Muthuswamy Dikshitar that when his vision was impaired, Lord Subrahmanya appeared in his dream and told him to go over to Vaideeswaran Koil and seek the blessings of the Lord. You can hear this in his kriti, ``Muthukumaraiyane...'', written in Tamil.
In one corner of the compound, we saw Jatayu gundam where supposedly Rama cremated Jatayu (whose wings were cut off by Ravana). Of the 63 shrines along the banks of Kaveri, Vaideeswaran Temple attracts most visitors.
The interesting part I noticed was Vaideeswara faces West, the Goddess faces South. The painted figures of Vrishabha, conch etc, are exquisite carvings. There were several theerthams around this Temple, but we did not take a dip in any. The only name I remembered was Kodanda theertham. In the Southern enclosure, we had darsan of Ganapathi (Karpaga Vinayakar) whom we worship first before worshipping the presiding deities. As we did the pradakshinam (going around the prakaram) and as we approached the Eastern gopuram, we saw the famous Neem tree (Sthala Vriksha) and we did go around that tree also. There are innumerable statues in every Temple and I did not even attempt keeping track of all of them.
More coming................
1 comment:
i found your blog after googling.. good post.. i was looking for specific days in a calendar year, when the sun rays fall directly on the linga.. anny idea??
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