511 Part 2 of Tirumala Venkateswara, Veerabhadra, Neminatha भाग २ तिरुमल वेंकटेश्वर, वीरभद्र, नेमीनाथ, భాగం 2 తిరుమల శ్రీవేంకటేశ్వర, వీరభద్ర, నేమీనాథ.

Clarification: No illwill intended against any caste/community/sect/sub-religion/cult/clan/religion. Kindly tolerate and bear with me.

In the part I, (post No. 508), I have quoted from the book of Shri Survarapu Pratapa Reddy, Social History of Andhras, and from Shripati panditA, a Kakatiya period author i.e. 12th and 13th Century author of Srikara BhAshyam. From that evidence, there was an indication, that Venkateswara's idol and temple at Tirumala-Tirupati was a Veerabhadra Temple. Veerabhadra was another form of Lord Shiva.

Link to Part 1: http://problemsoftelugus.blogspot.com/search/label/508.



STORY OF VEERABHADRA
The story of Veerabhadra is a part of Daksha's Sacrifice. Story Briefly: Daksha was first father-in-law of Lord Shiva. Daksha's daughter was 'Sati'. Sati married Shiva, against the wishes of her father. Once when Daksha came, Shiva didn't get up, though he was a son-in-law, and was expected to show courtesy towards his father-in-law. Daksha took it as an insult to him from his son-in-law, and commenced a big sacrifice, to which he didnot deliberately invite Shiva. Daksha's daughter, much against the wishes of her husband Shiva, attended the sacrifice, uninvited. Daksha, seeing his daughter, uninvited got furious. An oral verbal altercation took place between them, and unable to bear insult from her father, Sati self-generated a fire (this is called yoga - agni) and self-immolated herself. Hearing of the untimely death of his wife, Shiva came to the sacrificial arena. Seeing the ghastly scene at Daksha's place, Shiva got enraged, plucked a small hair from his head and dropped it on the ground, from which arose the Great God Veerabhadra. Veera = warrior, valiant; bhadra = secure. Veerabhadra beheaded Daksha. Broke the teeth of Lord Vishnu. Subdued every God present there, including Brahma and Indra. At the request of sages and Daksha's wailing wife, Veerabhadra fixed a goat's head to Daksha's neck and revived him. From then, Daksha did not disrespect Shiva. What happened to Shiva then, is a separate longer story.

Question: There is a claim, that Tirumala Tirupati Venkateswara Temple belonged to Jains. This discussion, you can see at: Click .

Reply

Ans: The discussion there, seems to have a little unilaterality in it. For example, they have not mentioned about Veerabhadra. This seems to be because, the blogger seems to be a Jain follower. The blog attracted 43 comments, most of which supported him.

One of such comments by one reader by Shri Krishna Rao S.T. is valuable and worth examining, I am quoting it:-

Krishna Rao. S T said... i am Hindu historian I ve read a old inscription named "bukkaraya sandi" available with archaeological dept. Karnataka. (you can visit city central library at bangalore for the copy)This is originally an agreement between jains and vaishnavas in 14th century stating jains have to leave thirumala neminath temple to vaishnavas and vaishnavas will not destroy Shravanabelagola bahubali statue as a good gesture. otherwise king buukkaraya (one of the founder of vijayanagar Empire?)will punish all jains in his kingdom ..... June 26, 2012 at 4:21 AM

Buddhist Shrine?



There is also another claim. Here is a link to a pdf book which says that "Tirupati Balaji was a Buddhist Shrine, by K. Jamanadas". This book has some quotations from Late Shri B.R. Ambedkar.

Click to download pdf book

ybrao a donkey's comment about Tirupati Temple being a Buddhist shrine: This book needs in depth studies. Prima facie the arguments given in the book, as far as Tirumala-Tirupati are concerned, do not provide things of solid evidence. ‎

ybrao a donkey's comment about Tirupati shrine being a JAIN / Buddhist shrine


I could not procure a copy of the Bukkaraya Sandhi, mentioned to have seen by Shri Krishna Rao above, either from Archaeology Dept., Karnataka, or City Central Library, Bangalore. I request any of interested readers to upload a scanned copy of this Bukkaraya Sandhi to internet, and place a link to it, in the comments section below.

The explanation that Tirupati Jain Neminath Temple was handed over to Ramanuja Vaishnavas, in exchange for royal patronage and protection to Shravana Belagola GomaThEswar Temple is understandable.


But the idol of Shri Venkateswara does not seem to have the features of a Jain idol , whereas it seems to have features of a Shaiva idol-- viz. third eye, serpant, hairlocks, a Shiva linga below hands. TTD authorities have prohibited photography or video-filming in the sanctum sanctorum.


 The priests seem to attribute a funny reason: A photographed, the idol loses its divine protective qualities. This does not appear to stand reason. All over the country, most prayer houses allow photographs and video-filming of the chief idol/shiva lingam of the temple. None of them seem to suffer any gain or loss from the photographs and video-filming. Recently, I have seen one such live TV relay of the proceedings of the bathing ceremony of Lord Vishwanath, Kasi (Varanasi).

Humans are not losing their powers of intellect or any other capabilities, faculties when they get photographed.  How can then Gods, who are supposed to be superhuman, lose their powers by human actions?


Human can neither empower Gods or un-power Gods, if Gods exist conforming to  the general definition of Gods as creators-protectors-and destroyers of all the cosmos, including humans.   Humans are too small-a-fry(ies) to empower Gods.  This idea, we can probably apply even to samprokshaNams (cleansing a place with sacred water and sacred chants) during grahaNams (eclipses).



By not agreeing to photo/video of the original deity or at least to show it to an Independent Committee, the Temple Administration, Priests, Monks will be giving room to believe that the claims of Jains, Buddhists, Saivaites could be true.


Just as "the richest person" does not mean the "greatest person" in the world, "richest God" need not mean the "Greatest God".


Of course there is no definition of Greatness. It is an attribute which has no dimensions, form, color, smell etc. and defies definition. 


We have to keep in mind that, except one or two scriptures, other scriptures do not have any references to God Venkateswara.  Most scriptures refer only to VishNu, his ten incarnations (why Venkateswara was not included as the 10th incarnation in the place of Kalki?) , Siva and many other deities, but never to Lord Venkateswara (Veerabhadra is also not very popular in many scriptures and in many temples of India, including Siva and Shakti temples).


COVERING FOREHEAD OF SHRI VENKATESWARA WITH VERY LARGE V OR U SIGN
The forehead of the deity is always covered with VishNu's nAmam (V or U sign). Chest is also, always covered with many ornaments. Besides, the idol does not contain the essential features of traditional Vishnu idols found all over the country. Particularly, the Conch (Sankham) and Disc (Chakram) are conspicuous by their absence in the original stone idol.  These two are being added by getting them made with gold.


EXPLANATION STORY FOR ABSENCE OF CONCH & DISC (SANKHAM & CHAKRAM)
A book by name Venkatachala Mahatmyam SAYS, that Venkateswara gave his weapons to King TonDaman, to enable them to use against his (Tondaman's)  enemies.


This story does not appear to be tenable, because of questions like

a) Do Gods need weapons like disc, at all?  Gods by their very thoughts, they should be able to destroy enemies including Malik Kafer, Mohammed Ghazni, Mohammed Ghori,  Ghiyazuddin Tuglack, Robert Clive, Warren Hastings, Bussey, Vasco De Gama.  No need to send discs.


b) Even if Gods want to give some weapons to their devotees, and Gods need weapons, such weapons can be "multi-present", i.e. present at several places at a time, like Lord Krishna who was said to have simultaneously resided in the gynesia of all his eight wives!


Yoga VASishTham also speaks of , one soul taking rebirth in two different bodies (one soul need not confine itself to only one body.).    Same way one weapon need not confine itself to only one place.

If this argument is not correct, what Lord Venkateswara would have done, had Muslims invaded his temple during Malik Kafer period or during Vijayanagara period?  Would he have run to Tondaman, keeping the Muslims waiting at the Main Gate,  entreating Tondaman to return his conch and disc or alternatively defend the Temple?




TTD authorities, if they believe in the concept of Satyam (truth and dharmam), have to, at least once show a washed  bare and unadorned idol of the God to a Committee of independent- respectable persons, which includes one representative from Saiva culture, one representative from Buddhist culture, one representative from Jaina culture. This verification, will once for all, close all imaginary hypothetical questions.


Right now, I can present one view: Near Tirupati, there is a great place called Kancheepuram, which includes a Shiva Kanchi, a VishNu Kanchi, and a Jaina Kanchi, a Triveni Sangamam like confluence of all the three cultures. There is a temple called Tiruparutikundram, Jina Kanchi on the South-Western peripheries of Kancheepuram. This place has Jain temples for Chandraprabha and Vardhaman Mahavir. At this place, there might have existed a temple for the 22nd Tirdhankar Neminath also. Tirupati might not have been a Jain Temple.

Another possibility:  As Jain culture was a non-violent culture, Saivaites might have occupied the shrine and installed a statue of Veerabhadra in the place of Neminath.  But this possibility may not be correct, because the Tirupati Temple structure, sculpture, do not reflect a Jain culture.

Note: This is not a devotional blog. No need of praising me. Abuses are welcome. (To continue, with more information).

TAIL PIECE
As per news reports, The Chief Information Commissioner or the concerned Union Ministry, are said to be unable to define the words "Satyam" (Truth) and Isvar (or Eswar) (Supreme God), in response to a query under RTI Act. The Chief Information Commissioner, as per the reports, is said to have re-asked the question to the applicant, who also could not define it. Strange , isn't it?



ybrao-a-donkey's humble perceptions वैबीराव गधे के विनम्र अनुशीलनाएँ और भावनाएँ వైబీరావు గాడిద వినమ్ర అభిప్రాయాలు

Of course law may not be able to define Satyam and Isvar.  But then, according to Jurisprudence, the duty of the Court is to find out truth!  Lawyers are also employees of court to assist it, though paid for their services by clients.  They are not employees of court.  Mr. Madabhushi Sridharacharya is a reputed Lawyer and was a Law Professor.   He has to clarify how, a Court will find truth, without having a definition of Satyam (truth?).

Truth and Facts do not vary.  Facts are part of the Satyam, and they constitute the truth (Satyam).  Therefore, it may not be correct to say that Satyam-truth is not definable.  Probably Isvar (God) may not be definable.  But for the purpose of analyses, we can take the generally accepted definition of God , all over the world.  Actually there are not many disputes about the definition of God.  There are disputes about whose God is great, and whose God is pagan, and who are KAffirs, mlechchas.
 

Both Satyam and Iswar are same. "Sat" means what is eternal, permanent, and everlasting.  Iswar is a part of the Satyam.  Iswar cannot be independent of Satyam.  By its indestructibility, Satyam becomes capable of including Isvar in itself.  If Isvar holds all the worlds in his tummy (this is figurative usage)--Isvar has no tummy, Satyam possesses Isvar (if he-she exists at all) within itself.


 Telugu Potana's following verse (Sanskrit SlOka may be available in Mahabhagavata, we have to search, I shall take it up later).

Verse 75, Chapter 3, Canto 8, of Andhra MahabhAgavata of Bammera Potanamatya

lOkambulu lOkESulu
lOkasthulu tegina tudi alOkambagu pen
chIkaTi kavvala evvadu
EkAkriti velungu ataDi nE bhajiyintun. 8-3-75

English gist: After the destruction of these worlds, the rulers of these worlds, the residents of these worlds, are all destroyed (in the apocalypse), beyond the darkness that pervades everywhere, who glows with a single glow, I pray and worship him. This particular verse highlights the characteristic of eternal nature of Satyam and ISvar.

There are nearly ten other verses which try to define Isvar. Though these ten verses do not provide a perfect definition of Isvar (God), they give a reasonable indication of the Almighty. (Note: As an atheist and Marxist, I do not believe.)

The foremost of these is the verse:--

Evvani cE janimcu jagamu, evvani lOpala nundu lInamai,
evvani yandu dindu, paramEsvaru DevvaDu, mUlakAraNam
bevvaDu, anAdi madhya layuDevvaDu, sarvamu tAne aina vA
DevvaDu vAnin Atma bhavun, IsvarunE SaraNambu vEDedan.

From whom is this world born, in whom does this world remains (well protected),
into whom it will get merged, who is the Greatest of all the Gods, who is the foremost reason for this creation,
who has no beginning, middle and end, who is everything (omnipresent, the word VishNu also conveys this meaning of all pervasiveness),
Him, who is born in one's own self & soul, I take refuge in that God.

This is not just a wailing of an elephant (gajEndra). Through him, Potana expressed his clarity of mind about the God. In today's world of digital photography and internet, we want photos for everything. Actually, sometimes, even words can define with equal efficiency something which photos can depict, with seeming accuracy. Of course, both photos and words can mislead. But let us not doubt the sincerity of POtanAmAtya.

(Incomplete).   Shall complete shortly.  शीघ्र संपूर्ण करने के लिये कोशिश करता हूँ। త్వరలో పూర్తి చేస్తాను.