Who is Andal?
(Conjeevaram)
‘C.R.’
contributed an article to the September 1946 issue of Triveni maintaining
that Andal, the well-known South Indian Vaishnavite Saint, was not any real
girl or foster-daughter of Perialwar but a creation of his own poetic
imagination. Though ‘C.R.’ disclaims any originality for this novel
interpretation and attributes the same to an esteemed friend of his, the
following facts will clearly indicate that such an interpretation is quite
untenable.
It
is true that some South Indian Saints have been led in certain moments of their
darkness and despair to modify the usual mode of Bhakti poetry, in which
religious experiences are cast in the figure of a love-sick girl’s anguish, but
they have always left no room for doubting the real authorship of such songs.
For instance, Saint Sadagopan (Nammalwar) and Kalian (Thirumangai
Mannan) attained to the state of a bride on many occasions and gave vent to
the overflow of their excessive devotion in the words of a mother or a daughter
or a girl-mate, but they invariably concluded such songs with the words ‘sung
by Sadagopan’ or ‘sung by Parakalan Kalian’ and thereby made explicit the real
authorship. In such songs, any reference to the daughter will be a reference to
the state of the Alwar himself who is the author.
Taking
Perialwar himself, he too has sung two sections (about twenty stanzas) in the
guise of a mother complaining against her daughter’s celestial love for the
Almighty as her sweetheart. The first of these sections begins thus:
“She
has not yet left her playing in sand,
Nor
has she learnt yet to speak well, nor to dress properly;
Such
playthings as toy-buckets and baskets are still in her hands.
Yet
she seems to have had a hand in the love-affair with the Eternal Bride-groom,
Who
is reclining on His Cobra-seat.”
The
object of this section is to illustrate that Bhakti in the case of this
Alwar had begun to assert itself even from the days of his childhood. The first
stanza of the next section runs thus:
“Like
a full-blossomed beautiful lotus in a resplendent lotus-tank,
my
daughter lived;
As
the tank will lose all its beauty by its only flower being blown off by a dew
storm,
My house looks all deserted; for I find her
nowhere in the neighbourhood;
Has
she run after the great
Hero
and taken to His residence?”
In
the fourth stanza of this section Perialwar says:
“An
only daughter have I and she is of universal fame,
I
nursed her as such, as the great Goddess herself;
And
it is He himself that has, by the beauty of His lotus-eyes,
enticed
her away.”
These
stanzas really indicate the ‘bereavement’ and the conflict between the critical
faculty and the intuition or grace that takes one to God, referred to by ‘C.R.’
in the article in question, though there are some who would interpret the
‘daughter’ mentioned here as a reference to Andal herself. But that it is not
so, and that the reference is only to the child of Perialwar’s own poetic
imagination is made clear at the end of this section by Perialwar himself, for
he has explicitly stated that he has sung these songs attaining to the state of
a mother complaining against her daughter’s romance.
These
sections express Perialwar’s own mental state and there is no reference to
Andal here. Here we are in agreement with ‘C.R.’ that the reference is not to
any separate entity as Andal, but it is only to the daughter of Perialwar’s own
poetic imagination. But the case is different with the songs of Thiruppavai and
Natchiar Thirumozhi sung by Andal. They clearly end with the words ‘sung
by Battarpiran Kothai’ or ‘sung by Villipuduvai Vishnu Chittan Kothai,’ i.e.,
Perialwar’s daughter Andal. If these songs also were by sung by Perialwar
himself, there is nothing to prevent him from acknowledging his own authorship
of them, as he has done in the case of his songs sung in the feminine garb.
There
are other clear indications in the poems of Andal that she was a distinct
person other than Perialwar, who was her father and spiritual teacher
(Acharya). In one of the stanzas in Natchiar Thirumozhi she addresses,
her mate thus:
“My
true friend, our Lord, who is reposing in all His divine splendour
On
His transcendental Cobra-seat high up above, is rich; He is great.
And
we are but little earthly creatures devoid of the least virtue.
Thus
there seems to be no way at all for us to approach Him:
Only
if Vishnu-chitta, who is such a stout devotee as to have
Him
at his beck and call, should manage
to get Him,
We
too will have a chance to see Him!”
In
another stanza she says:
“Our
Lord, who now resides in Srirangam, is the self-same God,
Who
once gave the great words of assurance to Arjuna;
The
same words would make Vishnu-chitta too to rest fearless;
If
the saying ‘He who loves shall in turn be loved’ proves false,
Who
can achieve anything?”
Though it will take volumes to bring out the full import of the subtle religious truths enunciated by Andal in these stanzas, it is enough for our purpose to point out that she here refers to two great virtues of her father and spiritual teacher, viz., strong devotion to the Almighty and unshakable confidence in getting his salvation. These stanzas cannot fail to convince us that Andal here refers to her father Perialwar as a distinct Saint other than herself, for whom she has the greatest respect.
If
stronger proof of the existence of Andal as a separate Saint is required, the
same will be furnished in the following stanza in Natchiar Thirumozhi itself.
Obsessed with an intense feeling of separation from her sweetheart and pining
in a mood of soul-killing anguish, she sees a plant of jasmines in full blossom
and addresses it thus:
“O
Jasmine damsel, that shineth in all thy splendour in the prime of thy life, I
surrender to thee and implore thee not to hurt me with thy smiles in my present
state; but, if the words of assurance given by that Prince of Princes who cut
the nose of that Demoness Surpanagai prove false, then can the fact of my birth
too be proved false?”
The
words with which this stanza ends would appear, in the light of the present
controversy, to be in the nature of a dramatic irony, as if Andal had
anticipated the doubting of her very existence by some future historians. But
the point she wishes to emphasise here is that, even as the truth of her birth
cannot be denied, the truth of Sri Rama’s words too cannot be denied. Or she
may mean thus: “At the time of Vibhishana’s surrender Sri Rama vouchsafed that
He would never reject a devotee, even though he should take to Him as a
pretender. I am really pining from the depths of my heart to get at Him. But I
see so far no sign of His coming. Even though His words may fail in my case,
and even though, contrary to his own assurance given then, He should reject me
on the ground that my devotion is false, the fact cannot be denied that I am
born as a daughter of Saint Perialwar. By virtue of this relationship at least,
He cannot afford to dismiss me.” Either way, the note of optimism struck by
Andal here, in her mood of despair, is on the strength of her own birth. She
swears, by her very birth as a daughter of Perialwar, that she will never miss
her salvation. This stanza coupled with those cited above should carry the most
fastidious critic beyond the limits of doubt regarding the birth of Andal and
prove that the authoress of Natchiar Tirumozhi could not have been the
same person as Perialwar. It would be too much to assume that Perialwar himself
has here identified himself with the states expressed by Andal, by a stretch of
his own poetic imagination.
Certain
facts handed down to us by tradition also bear out the fact that Andal must
have been a distinct figure in history. Srivilliputtur, the birth-place of
Andal, is to this day known as Natchiar Thirumaligai, the residence of
Andal. In commemoration of the well-known ‘garland episode’ the garland worn by
Andal in Srivilliputtur is to this day being taken with due pomp and ceremony
to the temple of the place for the decoration of the presiding deity
(Vadaperunkoiludayan) as the first act of worship every day. There are
allusions to this episode in the earliest records dealing with the lives of the
Alwars, such as ‘Divya Suri Charitam’ and ‘Guru-parampara Prabhavam’. Vedanta
Desika, with whom no false tale could pass muster, refers to this more than
once in his ‘Kotha Sthuthi’ and Pillai Perumalaiyengar quotes this in his works
very freely.
In
a stanza of Natchiar Thirumozhi, Andal has sung that it was one of her
heart’s desires to dedicate one hundred vessels full of butter, and one hundred
vessels full of rice cooked in milk with sugar, to the presiding deity of
Thirumalirumcholai known as Alagar, but she was so poor that her desire could
be fulfilled only by word of mouth. When Sri Ramanuja first came to know of
this stanza, he took a few of his disciples with him to Thirumalirumcholai and
fulfilled Andal’s desire by actually dedicating to the deity what she expressed
in the stanza. Immediately after this he took a trip to Srivilliputtur to pay
his homage to the idol of Andal there, and tradition has it that the image
actually embraced Sri Ramanuja addressing him as Annare (Art thou my
elder brother!) and thereby transcended even the limits imposed on her idol
state. In evidence of this miraculous incident, Andal is being praised in all
Sri Vaishnavite temples from that time onward as the younger sister of the
great sage of Sri Perumbuthur (Ramanuja), though Sri Ramanuja came many
centuries after Andal in actual history.
‘C.
R.’ ends his article with the words, “A figure of poetry was vitalised into a
separate legend so effectively that, perhaps, now this sort of interpretation
would be put down as heresy, as if it were more pious to keep an additional
Saint going than to make Perialwar both himself and his daughter.” It may not
be heresy against piety to take two Saints as one, but it will certainly be
heresy against Truth to merge a separate and distinct historic entity into
another, in the absence of any clear and reliable proof, and contrary to the
long cherished belief based on strong and authentic evidence.
If
a similar doubt had been raised in respect of certain works of other Alwars,
which make no mention at all about their authorship, the point would not admit
of easy clarification. For instance, the songs of Poigaialwar, Perialwar,
Bhuthathalwar, Thirumalisaialwar and Thirupanalwar are silent about their
authorship. The same is the case with two of the four poems of Nammalwar, viz.,
‘Thiruvasiriyam’ and ‘Periathiruvanthadai’. Similarly, three of the six
poems of Thirumangaialwar, viz., ‘Thiruvelu Koorrirukkai’ and the two
‘Thirumadals’ contain no reference to their authorship. If the authenticity of
any of these works is questioned, we have to rest content with the only
argument that, in the absence of strong proofs to the contrary, there need be
no change in the version handed down to us by tradition and maintained by our
great elders and ancient teachers (Poorvacharyas), whose zeal for truth
was no less than ours. But the poems of Perialwar and Andal leave no doubt as
to their authorship and the proofs given above should clear all clouds in the
matter. Even dismissing all other evidences, the one stanza quoted above, which
ends with the words “Can the fact of my birth too be proved false!” is enough
to establish Andal’s case that she was a separate and distinct Saint other than
Perialwar.