srI:
srImathE satakOpAya nama:
srImathE rAmAnujAya nama:
srImadh varavaramunayE nama:
In the previous post we saw the birth of krishNa and the wonderful celebrations at gOkula. periyAzhvAr describes even more celebrations at gOkula and how every person in gOkula comes and enjoys the wonderful, beautiful baby krishNa, the love of all. In periyAzhvAr’s words:
muththum maNiyum vayiramum nan ponnum
thaththip padhitthu thalaip peithArpOl engum
paththu viralum maNivaNNan pAthangaL
oththittirunthavaa kANIrE oNNudhalIr vandhu kANIrE
முத்தும் மணியும் வயிரமும் நன்பொன்னும்
தத்திப் பதித்துத் தலைப்பெய்தாற் போல்எங்கும்
பத்து விரலும் மணிவண்ணன் பாதங்கள்
ஒத்திட்டிருந்தவா காணீரே ஒண்ணுதலீர் வந்து காணீரே.
periyAzhvAr thirumozhi – 1.2.3
periyAzhvAr is inviting everyone to come see the soft and beautiful krishna, whose 9 toes denotes the 9 different gems, also called navarathnams, and then 10th toe is coated with gold. periyAzhvAr is comparing the toes of krishNa to the marudhANi (henna/mehendi designs) that people use to decorate hands and feet and is saying that krIshNa is perfect in every way, inviting everyone to enjoy him, in his beautiful cradle.
krIshNa was not only celebrated by people in gOkula, but also blessed by the many different Gods, as described in the mANikkam katti padhigam, sung by periyAzhvAr.
While krIshNa was celebrated in gOkula, kamsa was still very frightened for himself and decided to end the life of all the children born in the past 2 weeks, around the time krIshNa was born. kamsa started to gather his evil forces and sent them in all directions. One such evil force was pUthana. pUthana was a female asura who would turn herself into a beautiful damsel and try to feed krishNa with poisoned milk, smeared on her breasts. Make the puzzle below to see how beautiful pUthana was when she tried to attract the kids to herself.
This beautiful pUthana, took away krIshNa and started feeding him milk. krishNa, the all knowing sarvEshwaran not only sucked the milk from pUthana, but also her life, mainly because pUthana came all the way to gOkula, just to give krishNa something. krishNa has the power of knowing what was in pUthana’s heart and therefore, took everything that pUthana could offer – that is her life! Make the puzzle below to see the final form of pUthana and how she was taken by krishNa.
pUthana is one of the most popular asuras, that have been sung by our AzhvAr’s. Every AzhvAr has reference pUthana, mainly because she shows us that if you want to give something for krIshNa, krishNa will take everything that we have and make us his. One of the phrases describing the pUthana episode in periya thirumozhi is –
uyirai vaRRa vAngi uNda vAyAn vadari vaNangudhumE – periya thirumozhi 1.3.1
உயிரை வற்ற வாங்கியுண்ட வாயான் வதரிவணங்குதுமே
Meaning, krishNa completely sucked out pUthana’s life, without a second thought or giving her an opportunity to escape.
Even though kamsa knew that nandhagOpa’s son krishNa was causing some mischief and had killed pUthana, kamsa kept sending more asuras, hoping that one of the asurAs could overpower this mere kid. The next in line was chakatAsura. chakatAsura came over to gOkula, changed himself into a wheel and hid near krishNa’s cradle. chakatAsura’s plan was to topple over krishNa’s cradle and crush him with his own wheel form. However, all krishNa did was to kick chakatAsura to end him. Make the puzzle below to see how krishNa kicked chakatAsura and won over him.
chakatAsura vadham (the killing of chakatAsura) is again a very popular story quoted by AzhvArs, specially praising the lotus feet of little krishNa that AndAL pirAtti celebrates in tiruppAvai:
pondrachchakatam udaiththAi pugazh pORRi – thiruppAvai 24
பொன்றச் சகடம் உதைத்தாய் புகழ்போற்றி
AndAL pirAtti praises the greatness of krishNa’s lotus feet in this pAsuram and quotes chakatAsura vadham, saying, the greatness of krishNa’s feet is such that, the mere touch, a small kick of the kid krishNa resulted in the mOksham of chakatAsura!
We will continue enjoying krishNa’s childhood in the upcoming posts.
Full series can be viewed at http://pillai.koyil.org/?p=593