Thiruppugazh is a collection of poems written by Saint Arunagirinathar on Lord Muruga. Arunagirinathar lived in the 15th century. We could get this authentic information from his own Thiruppugazh – adhala sEdanAr Ada (அதலசேடனார் ஆட). Here, he has mentioned the name of King Prabuda Deva who belonged to 15th century. This song describes an event that is associated with Arunagirinathar and Prabhuda Deva. Thus Arunagirinathar’s period is fixed as 15th century.
Thiruppugazh is a generic term if you look into the exact meaning. Thiru – Auspicious and Pugazh – Fame, translating to – Singing the fame of the auspicious. Who is the auspicious? It’s none other than the supreme one – Brahman. Then why do we call the songs on Lord Muruga (Subrahmanya) written by Arunagirinathar as Thiruppugazh? Because, for him, Lord Muruga is the supreme one.
One may ask, why don’t we call the songs on other deities like Shiva or Ambal or Vishnu or Ganapathy as Thiruppugazh? The word Thiruppugazh appears in Thevaaram (songs on Lord Shiva) too. But after Arunagirinathar’s time, the word Thiruppugazh is widely used to refer only to his songs.
Another interesting aspect in Thiruppugazh is that we can find the information related to various other deities too. Arunagirinathar sings the praise of Vinayaka, Shiva, Vishnu, Parvathi, Surya and relates them to Lord Muruga and finally places his prayers at the lotus feet of Lord Muruga.
He sings the praise of Lord Vinayaka and addresses Muruga as the younger brother of Vinayaka (கரிமுகவன் இளைய கந்தப் பெருமாளே – karimugavan iLaya kandha perumalALE). Similarly he sings the praise of Lord Shiva, Lord Vishnu, Goddess Parvathi and at last comes to Lord Muruga and describes him as Son of Shiva (சிவ சுத – Shiva Sutha), One who is revered by Tripurantaka (Lord Shiva) for teaching the meaning of Omkara (திரிபுர தகனரும் வந்திக்கும் சற்குருநாதா – tiripura dhahanarum vandhikkum sargurunAthA), Nephew of Vishnu (அரி திரு மருகோனே – ari thiri marugOnE), Son of Parvathi (சிவகாமசுந்தரி தன் வர பால – sivakAmasundari than vara bAla) etc. He has also praised Lord Muruga as the one who is like Dinakaran and dispels the darkness in our mind (திமிர மலம் ஒழிய தினகரன் எனவரு பெருவாழ்வே – dhimira malam ozhiya dinakaran ena varu peruvAzhvE). On the whole, we could experience the six ways prescribed by Shri Adhi Shankara namely Gaanaapathyam, Saivam, Vaishnavam, Shaaktam, Sauram, Kaumaram – the worship of Lord Vinayaka, Shiva, Vishnu, Parvathi, Surya and Muruga respectively in Arunagirinathar’s works. He calls out Lord Muruga as “aru samaya sAsthirap poruLOnE” (அறு சமய சாத்திரப் பொருளோனே) in one of the Thiruppugazh.
Thiruppugazh is one of his works. It has songs following certain pattern or meter called Chandham (சந்தம்) (originating from சந்தஸ் (chandas)). It is a form known as chandha paadal or vaNNap paadal. A song comprises of four lines and the pattern gets repeated twice in each line.
Apart from this, he has composed Vel viruttham, Mayil viruttham, Seval viruttham, Tiruvaguppu, Kandhar Alankaram, Kandhar Anubhuthi, Kandhar Andhadhi and Thiruvezhukootrirukkai.
- Thiruppugazh – Collection of songs in various chandams, sung at different places. It is believed that Arunagirinathar has composed nearly 16000 songs in more than about 1000 different chandams. Of this we could get roughly around 1300 songs.
- Vel viruttham – Collection of ten songs in praise of Lord Murugan’s spear (vEl).
- Mayil viruttham – Collection of ten songs in praise of Lord Murugan’s mount – the peacock
- Seval viruttham – Collection of ten songs in praise of Lord Murugan’s flag (the cock). It is said that, apart from the ten songs, there is a kaappu or introductory song and a nool payan or conclusive song telling the benefit one gets on reading the virutthams.
- Tiruvaguppu – Individual songs focussing exclusively on various aspects of Lord Murugan – like his feet, vel, mayil, shoulders, upadesa, his abode like Pazhani, Tiruchendur, Tirupparankundram etc., We have got 25 vaguppu as below:
- seer paadha vaguppu
- dEvEndra sanga vaguppu
- vEl vaguppu
- tiruvELaikkaaran vaguppu
- peruttha vachana vaguppu
- bhoota vEdhaaLa vaguppu
- poru kaLatthu alagai vaguppu
- seru kaLatthu alagai vaguppu
- pOrkkaLatthu alagai vaguppu
- tirugnaana vEzha vaguppu
- tirukkaiyil vazhakka vaguppu
- vEdicchi kAvalan vaguppu
- sEvagan vaguppu
- vEl vaangu vaguppu
- buya vaguppu
- sitthu vaguppu
- kadaikkaNiyal vaguppu
- sivalOka vaguppu
- mayil vaguppu
- kolu vaguppu
- veera vaaL vaguppu
- sivagiri vaguppu
- tiruchchendhil vaguppu
- tiruppazhani vaguppu
- tirupparangiri vaguppu
- Kandhar Alankaram – A collection of 108 verses sung in praise of Lord Murugan.
- Kandhar Anubhuthi – A collection of 52 songs (number equivalent to rosary-japa maala), a classical text much applauded for the highest expression of divine experience.
- Kandhar Andhadhi – A collection of 102 songs in andhadhi format (last phrase or letter or word of a verse becomes the starting phrase or letter or word of the next verse and so on). This Kandhar Andhadhi is called as yamaka andhadhi as the first two seers (phrases) in a verse are same, but gives different meanings when split in different ways.
- Thiruvezhukootrirukkai – This is a kind of pictorial poem (Chithira kavi – சித்திரக் கவி) having the form as a chariot. Sung at Swamimalai, this is a eN alankaram (எண் அலங்காரம்) or poem written using numerical patterns. The Tamil names of numbers from 1 to 7 appears in the poem first in ascending order and then the same in descending order. Since this happens seven times (seven layers or kooRu), it is called as ezhu kootru irukkai (ezhu – எழு – seven). Maaran alankaram says –
ஒன்று முதலா ஓரேழ் ஈறாச்
சென்று எண் ஈரேழ் நிலந்தொறும் திரிதர
எண்ணுவது ஒன்றாம் எழுகூற்றிருக்கை.
[onRu mudhalA OrEzh eeRAchenRu eN eerEzh nilandhoRum thirithara
eNNuvathu onRAm ezhukoottrirukkai]
எழு+கூறு+இருக்கை = எழுகூற்றிருக்கை. [ezhu + kooRu + irukkai = ezhukoottrirukkai]
There is another interpretation for this kind of poem Thiruvezhukootrirukkai. This song is a placeholder of (irukkai – இருக்கை) the words (kootru – கூற்று) that raises (ezhu – எழு) the jeevan (soul) to attain mukti (the real wealth – thiru – திரு) and hence the name tiru ezhu kootrirukkai. Thus Thiruvezhukootrirukkai translates to a song with words that raise a soul to attain the Lord.
The format of the song is as below.
1
121
12321
1234321
123454321
12345654321
1234567654321
All these nine are collectively known as navamani maalai. But due to the dominant count of Thiruppugazh songs available today, we call all these nine collectively as Thiruppugazh itself.
In this series with His grace we will experience them in various angles like stories from puranams and ithihasams in Thiruppugazh, the shanmatham, different paths of bhakti like vaatsalyam, daasyam, sakhyam, guru sishya bhavam, nayaka nayaki bhavam, nava vidha bhakti in Thiruppugazh and so on.
To start with, we will see a song on Vinayaka, kaitthala niRai kani, which describes the importance of offering prayers to Lord Vinayaka before starting any activity. In the second half of the song, Arunagirinathar describes three stories as mentioned below:
- Lord Vinayaka writing the Tamil grammar in Meru mountain (mutthamizh adaivinai muRpadu girithanil muRpada ezhuthiya mudhalvOnE)
- Breaking of Lord Shiva’s chariot wheel’s pivot into pieces when He started for Tripura Samharam without offering prayers to Lord Vinayaka (muppuram yeri seitha achchivan uRai ratham acchathu podi seitha athi dheerA).
- Lord Vinayaka coming as a huge elephant in front of Valli and thereby facilitating the wedding between Valli and Murugan (atthutar athu kodu subbiramaNi padum appunam athanidai ibamAgi akkuRamagaLudan acchiru muruganai akkaNam maNamaruL perumALE)
(to be continued)
