Dear V., I'd read about poor KamaDeva. I don't know any of the legends of Nayanmars or Azhars. . . You must educate me. How was Murugan born? what is ThiruPuram? Sacred City? so many . . . which town does it indicate? Does anyone know who 'got it' when Parvathi Devi covered His regular 2 eyes? Kathie
Thirupuram - If I remember the legend correctly, are three flying palaces of an Asura(forgot his name) wrecking havoc across the world. Shiva burnt all the three palaces with his third eye.
The tripurA signify the three components(impurities) of bondage (pAsam) namely aham (ego), karma(deeds and their effects), mAya (illusion). When God shows His grace all these impurities are burnt, bliss remains and Lord Shiva dances there. (padhi aNukiR pachu pAcha n^illAvE - thirumUlar)
Three demons kamalAkshan, tArukAkshan, vindhumali got a boon from the Lord that they can not be destroyed unless all three of them come together, and attacked by a single arrow. Then they created forts in different areas and ruled the world. dEvAs who were disturbed by them complained it to the Lord. But Lord Shiva said as long as the three demons pray Him He won't destroy them. So mahA vishNu took the form of a sage, and taught the three demons mAyAvAtham, resulting them to stop praying the Lord, praising themselves and torturing dEvAs. Since all the good qualities of them were lost the Lord came for the destruction of the purAs. The three demons came together to fight against the Lord forgetting their boon.
The earth became the chariot for the Lord, brahma the charioteer, vishNu the arrow, sun and moon the wheels, the mountain mEru as the bow and the serpent vAsuki as the string in the bow. Thus all the gods were present in some form in that chariot. But the fire and god of death were in the wheel instead of the arrow. vinAyaka broke the wheel to put them in the arrow. Finally when everything was ready dEvAs were proud that only with their help God is going to destroy the tripuras. But Lord Shiva didn't use any of them. He smiled and in that smile the three purAs were burnt down.(The rudhrAksha appeared from the three eyes of Lord Shiva during tripurasaMhAra) The thought of dEvAs that without their help the Lord wont be able to destroy the tripuras proved foolish.
The purpose of destruction by Lord is only for purification. Lord gave life to the three demons. Though they went wrong they initially were devotees. They repented for their mistake. The Lord forgave them and gave one of them the great work of fanning Him with chAmaram, andthe rest two as His security in His abode. (Moovar purangal eriththa andru moovarkku aruL cheydhaan - sambandhar).
> > He burnt up a devotee? how sad. > > not a devotee. shiva comes to the pandyan court as a poet and the poet laureate nakeera finds fault in his poem. angered shiva burns him up > > can someone post the youtube of this scene. > >
hi venkatesh,
not able to find in youtube. but the details are in below link ( kathie -sorry its in tamil )
Just fyi youtube cracked down rather harshly on all copyright violaters and over 90% of old movie songs and videos are gone from there. Real big loss to those of us who wanted to play a song on whim.
One birth of Kumara sambhavam is due to the opening of 3rd eye, which is the post event of burning of Kama followed by Tiripura burnt (It is said in tirupugazh (song on Kathirgamam) that - poruthar parithar sirithar erithar nuthar parvaiyile pin) going by that it is on his glance with a smile which burns down the Tiripuram. I am not sure how the Lord does that, physically the opening of third eye with a smile is not known else where and if Shiva did burn it using his glance and not the third eye, it is a point to ponder.
All of the above are interconnected though.
Interestingly, my theory is that all ancient civilizations were burnt to dust by Molten Lava or By oceanic eruptions of Tidal waves. Tiripuram looks like burnt down Mahendrapuram - burns and sinks Lanka - burns so on... and so forth...
The parvati covering up the eyes is just a theory, its the energy bottling up into a focus point, The energy gets dissipated by an outlet, apparently the Third eye.
Murugan birth: The six cosmic sparks that come out of the Lingam, was the concentrated force of cosmos. Unbearable heat that was generated by the sparks were held by none other than Wind and Fire themselves and were contained into a Sharavana pond. The sparks take a human form and are united into one Murugan by Shakti herself.
This Tripura is different from the Original Tripura constructed by Maya sura.
Interesting events in the episode a. Sons of Tarakasura - Slain by Karthikeya - are the owners of Tripura b. Vishnu avataram was taken to restore the earth balance when Tripuram was pushing her out. c. Nandi rescues Maya prior to being destroyed by Shiva's Pinaka.
If Pinaka was used to destroy Tripura and He also used his 3rd eye, is Pinaka a component of the 3rd eye ?
That is what happens when we try to analyse mythology like history, what came before, what came after etc. Myth is not time oriented, it is only meant to impart spiritual lessons. As Thirumoolar quote goes
Ravi, the converse is also true - myths become 'real' stories over time also!! I think knowledge is more about accepting these things for what they are and not insisting on them being real in a literal way.
We live in a time where knowledge and definitions of knowledge are changing rapidly, just yesterday we had a discussion at my work place of the difference between facts, knowledge and information. There is a fourth category also, allegorical truths. Instead of using the much mis interpreted word 'myth' it is better to use that instead. BTW people educated in world myth hardly regard it as a dichotomy between a lie or a factual truth, just the much misunderstood area of psychological and allegorical truths.