A Divine Prophecy- Sri Nammalvar's Predictions on Lord Caitanya

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In his vision of the future, Sri Nammalvar sees that the ill-effects of Kali-yuga have ceased to exist, because the devotees of Lord Krsna, in great numbers all over the earth, are engaged in hari-nama-sankirtana of ecstatic singing, dancing, and jumping accompanied by tumultuous playing of musical instruments.

The 5000 year old predictions on the yuga-dharma of Kali-yuga, prominently manifested in the hari-nama-sankirtana movement inaugurated by Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, five hundred years ago.

The Divine Prophecies of Sri Nammalvar are herein analyzed and compared to similar prophecies in other scriptures and by great acaryas which shows its veracity in the form of the worldwide sankirtana-yajna of Lord Sri Krsna Caitanya.

Sridhara Srinivasa Dasa was born in a traditional Sri Vaisnava lineage and was brought up in a traditional Tamil Nadu Iyengar family. At the age of nine his parents performed the upanayana samskara (sacred thread ceremony). His grand father trained him to perform the daily sandhyavandana and samita-danam (fire sacrifice) which he continued to perform until the age of thirteen. However, like the majority of populace drowned by the onslaught of the tsunami of materialistic modern civilization, the author went about securing a bachelor's degree in electronics and communication engineering, a successful lucrative career in computer software industry and lived for more than ten years in Seattle, Washington, in the USA. While working he also earned a Master's degree in business administration from a reputed university in Seattle and served in the positions of Software Manager and General Manager in several software firms.

However, while living in the USA, he was inspired by the teachings of His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, founder-acarya of ISKCON and on September 27, 2006 was initiated into the Gaudiya-vaisnava sampradaya by His Holiness Bhakti Vikasa Swami, a sannyasi disciple of Srila Prabhupada. Following the instructions of his spiritual master, to preach the glories of Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu in Tamil Nadu and among the people of Tamil origin in native Tamil language, in 2012 the author moved along with his family to his home town Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu and since then he has dedicated himself to serving the mission of Srila Prabhupada on a full-time basis by distributing Srila Prabhupada's books among the general populace and also preaching the mission of Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu. Sridhara Srinivasa Dasa has also authored articles on a variety of topics of Krsna consciousness ranging from philosophical debates to describing the holy places and pastimes of Lord Krsna that were featured in the Tamil edition of "BACK TO GODHEAD" magazine.

Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu appeared in Bengal some 500 years ago and by His mercy, delivered via His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, the worthless wretch that is myself, born far from the shores of Bharata, has been able not only to participate in the devotional cult of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, but to spend most of this life in this sacred land, where I have visited many holy places and met innumerable saintly devotees of various sampradayas and even, by the grace and on the order of Srila Prabhupada and Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, initiated Indian people into the Gaudiya-vaisnava sampradaya that stems from Lord Caitanya.

One such devotee of Indian designation is Sridhara Srinivasa Dasa, the author of this book. Sridhara Srinivasa Dasa was born in a traditional Sri-vaisnava family and while working in USA, became inspired in devotion by ISKCON. While simultaneously relishing the gifts of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu and those of his Sri-vaisnava background (between which, rightly, he found no substantial contradiction), he became fascinated upon coming across some poems of Sri Nammalvar that appeared to predict the coming of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu and the wide spreading of the sankirtana movement. He investigated further and the result is this book.

May both Sri Vaisnavas and Gaudiya Vaisnavas relish and ponder upon its contents, that are significant for the ontology of both and that can serve to bring yet closer these two already mutually friendly manifestations of Bhagavan's mercy within this world.

I still remember my first visit to the simple, aged wooden structure with a small signboard that read 'ISKCON temple,’ (International Society for Krishna Consciousness), in Sammamish valley located 15 miles to the east of Seattle, Washington state, USA. There were no active Hindu temples in that area except for this place where some Gujaratis regularly performed bhajans.

It was Friday, April 14, 2000 around 6:00 PM, when we entered a quiet temple hall, empty but for a Western pujari. The main altar with three partitions and the two altars against the side walls on each side appeared simple, yet very elegant. Deities of Sri Sri Radha Nilamadhava occupied the center of the main altar, while Sri Sri Sita Rama Laksmana Hanuman, Sri Sri Jagannatha, Baladeva, Subhadra-devi, Sri Sri Gaura Nitai, Srila Prabhupada Deities occupied the other altars in the temple hall.

Within a few minutes, the curtains closed on the altar and we began to leave the temple hall. However, as we were exiting, I heard the sound of a blowing conch just outside the temple's sanctum sanctorum. The sight of a Western pujari and the blowing of the conch inside the temple hall is uncommon in Indian temples and hence, was peculiar to me, but we still rushed back into the temple hall. Then, as the pujari started to perform the arati, some Westerners and a few Indians who had just entered, started to sing devotional hymns accompanied by loud playing of cymbals, mrdarigas, and graceful dancing. While expecting the arati to end in a few minutes, I was standing still, with my hands reverentially joined and having darsana of my favorite Deities of Sri Sri Radha-Krsna. I gradually observed that the singing and dancing became louder with the rhythm moving to a faster pace. Facing the Deities, as the devotees started to sing, dance, and play their musical instruments intensely and vigorously, the old house started to shake.

As the chanting and dancing intensified, a devotee from that group, with a pleasant smile gestured me to join them in their dance. In his ecstatic mood, he even attempted to pull me by my arms to join their A Divine Prophecy Preface party.' found it strange and reflected that it was not traditional to dance or sing in such a frantic manner in front of the Lord and so I stayed put in my position.

The arati continued for more than 20 minutes, post which we started to exit the temple hall. As we were leaving, the devotee who had invited me to dance came running behind me with two cups of warm sweet rice prasada. The prasada was so delicious that my wife and I made it a point to visit the temple every Friday, just for honoring the warm sweet rice prasada.

As we regularly visited the temple we were attracted to the discourses on Srimad Bhagawld-gita by a Western devotee in devotional attire; for we had never heard of the detailed philosophy of that sacred text before in our lives. Although I did not understand much, I observed that throughout the discourse he repeated a few sentences - Krsna is the Supreme Personality of Godhead" and "Hare Krsna, Hare Rama" chants. I recollect those statements being repeated several times by my parents, grandparents, and other relatives since my childhood. It was not only rare and astonishing to hear these statements from a person of Western origin, so for away from Vedic culture, but also encouraging, and satisfying to hear that devotee discourse it with thorough understanding and conviction.

I had never witnessed such a phenomenon in my life, and at the time I thought that these methods of worship were upstart, non-traditional, and cultish. Besides this, another unusual but a pleasant event was that these devotees always fed the visitors with full-fledged meals as Krsna-prasada. Growing up in the traditional Sri-vaispava sampradaya, I had observed that the rules of worship and reciting mantras were strict and that only when instructed by the priests could a devotee or a visitor can sing or recite traditional songs glorifying Lord Visnu. Throughout the duration of worship, visitors maintained total silence and every other activity like singing and dancing would happen at the temple courtyard.

Now, one may wonder how this narration is connected with the subject matter of this book.

I realized while composing this section that those events that had happened sixteen years ago in that Sammamish temple hall, indeed serve as the preface to this book. Little did I know that those events were predicted five thousand years ago by Sri Nammdlvar, the great devotee of the Sri-vaisnava sampradaya. In his poems of Tiruvetimoli (5.2.1-11) Sri Nammalvar presents his divine vision of the future Vaisnava practices of Kali-yuga, that of ecstatic singing, dancing, and congregational chanting of holy name all over the world. In another set of poems (3.5.1-11) he states that sankirtana-yajna is the recommended method of worship to be followed by devotees of all Vaisnava sampradayas.

In yet another decad (10.5.1-11) that glorifies the power of the chanting of the holy name, Sri Nammalvar states that the loud chanting of the holy name of Lord Krsna is the panacea for all people infected with the material disease, irrespective of their background. According to Sri Nammalvar, the practices of sankirtana-yajna by devotees are indeed most beneficial. Now I can see that the devotee who tried his best to encourage me to take part in the Hare Krsna sankirtana-yajna in that temple hall, was doing the greatest favor to me in this lifetime by administering that miraculous medicine which I had foolishly refused.

I now realize that refusing that panacea by hesitating to join the sankirtana-yajna was due to my ignorance of the conclusions of the Vedic scriptures and traditions. Hence, I would consider it a grand success of this writing effort, even if one person were to shed their hesitation, and whole heartedly join the sankirtana-yajna to begin their journey on the path of perfection.

Nalayira-divya-prabandam is a collection of transcendental songs composed in Tamil (one of the oldest Indian languages) in glorification of Lord Visnu, by twelve of His great devotees known as Alvars. They are referred to as Alvars because they were always deeply immersed in meditation on Lord Visnu's transcendental name, form, qualities, and pastimes. They are greatly revered by the followers of the Sri-vaisnava sampradaya of South India. The Alvars, twelve in number, appeared in different parts of South India, especially in the regions around Tamil Nadu at different times, from the end of Dvapara-yuga to the early part of Kali-yuga. In Tamil, Nalayira means 'four thousand' and Divya-prabandam means 'transcendental hymns' and therefore, this scripture (also known as Tamil-veda or Dravida-veda) consists of about four thousand poems on the Lord's glories. Sri Nammalvar, the chief among the Alvars, appeared sometime at around the dawn of Kali-yuga, in Tirukurugur (also known as Alvar Tirunagari), a village located on the banks of river Tamraparni, about 30 km to the east of the city of Tirunelveli, in South Tamil Nadu, India.' Sri Nammalvar never moved from his place under a transcendental tamarind tree located in the courtyard of Lord Adinatha's (Lord Visnu) temple at Alvar Tirunagari since his appearance.

Sri Nammalvar had composed 1,296 of these 4,000 transcendental poems of which 1,102 poems are categorized as Tiruvaimoli. In these poems he has presented the Vaisnava philosophy in addition to glorifying various presiding Deities of different Divya-desams. This book presents a commentary to selected poems of Tiruvaimoli (thirty three poems) contained in three decads, based on the statements from sastra, guru, and sadhu.

When one studies these poems of Tiruvaimoli, with rapt attention in conjunction with sastra, guru, and sadhu-vakya(s), the five features (Panca-tattva) of the Supreme Absolute Truth, Lord Krsna, will be revealed immediately to that student. As Srila Prabhupada explains in his purport to a verse from Sri Caitanya-caritangta (Madhya 20.352), the appearance and activities of the Supreme Personality of Godhead must be accepted based on statements from sastra, guru, and sadhu, with sastra as the center. Hence, even the statements of guru and sadhu should be accepted only after due verification with sastra. The glories of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu's appearance and activities of sankirtana-yajna has its roots in the prophecies recorded in sastras such as grimad-Bheigayatam, the Puranas, and Mahabharata by great mahajanas such as Sri Karabhajana Muni, Sri Prahlada Maharaja and Sri Bhismadeva. It is indeed surprising to see how the authentic words (sadhu-vakya) of yet another highly exalted devotee, Sri Nammalvar, seem to confirm those prophecies on the appearance, activities, and teachings of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, in these three decads of Tiruvaimoli.

These specific poems of Tiruvaimoli clearly declare that hari-nama-sankirtana-yajna, being the sole prescribed dharma for the Age of Kali, is alone sufficient to achieve the perfection of life. The purport to these poems are explained in three separate parts, in conjunction with Srimad-Bhagayatam, Sri Caitanya-caritamrta, and other Gaudiya Vaisnava literature to demonstrate the synergy between the statements of Sri Nammalvar and Sri Karabhajana Muni. In addition, the first part presents a comparative study between the prophecies contained in other Vedic scriptures and the prophecies of Tiruvaimoli. Thus, this authoritative study establishes that the characteristics of appearance and activities of the Supreme Personality of Godhead in Kali-yuga, confidentially identified as maha-purusa by Sri Karabhajana Muni and Sri Nammalvar, were prominently exhibited in the appearance and activities of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Through the widespread propagation of the transcendental chanting of the holy name of Lord Krsna, Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu bestowed upon the most fallen conditioned souls, the highest perfection of love of Godhead, something which has not been awarded by any other incarnation till date.

The English transliterations of the poems of these three decads of Tiruvaimoli are presented herein, along with word to word English meanings, translations and purports. Wherever appropriate, comments of Sri Kanci Prathivadhi Bhayangaram Annangaracarya in the lineage of Sri Pillai Lokacarya of Sri-vaisnava sampradaya have also been incorporated in this presentation.

It is hoped that these purports, based on srimad-Bhagavatam and Sri Caitanya-caritamrta, to the select poems of Tiruvaimoli will unveil the inner meaning contained within these decads. It is also a humble prayer that this effort may assist all Vaisnava sampradayas in joining the performance of Lord Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu's hari-nama-sankirtana-yajna, the yuga-dharma of congregational chanting of the holy name of Lord Krsna.