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Oppiliappan List Archive: Message 00062 Oct 2004

 
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SRIMATHE RAMANUJAYA NAMAHA.

Respected Sri Rajagopalan swami,
Pranams.
I have taken a long time to reply to your mail in
which you have commended my views on ?guest as god?.
Please pardon me. The real reason for  the delay is
that something in your mail struck me so much ? making
me not even react to  your kinds words of praise
showered on me which I accept with all humility as I
consider them as though they have been said by  my own
father ? that it took such a  long incubation time to
come to be spelt in writing. It is the mention of
(among other sthothrams) Sri Sookhtham  that you have
taught girl-children. Even I learnt it by hearing from
my father who used to recite it everyday as part of
daily Aradhana.

It all started with a jolt I received in a Ram temple
- continued with my mails on whether woman are
entitled to chant vedas and then with a ?muraiyeedu?
to Bhagavad Ramanuja, and a ?theLivu? upon further
reading which I got authorised by Rama  in the same
Ram temple (where it all started) a few days ago. It
took a few more days for me to decide whether I can
put down everything I felt in this mail or just
confine myself to text-based views. Since I found few
other readers evincing interest in this subject and
since there is no direct textual pramana in existence
to say ?yes? or ?no? to women taking up recital of
vedas, I thought it fit enough to present it as I
felt. 

There is this component of certain mental feelings or
views which inevitably find their place in this mail
to substantiate how I arrive at the conclusion. I
request the readers to take them in their face value
and not think that this reader is boasting or have
lost balance. After all,  Ramanuja based his theories
more on religious experience, metaphysics and ethics,
rather than on epistemology. Epistemology came in to
substantiate the conclusions of metaphysics arrived at
through psychology. He recognised this (religious
experience) as the core part of perception that have
come to be seen / felt in having its roots in
sruti-pramana.

Now on  to the journey (dis-quieting one) that I
underwent?
It was a fore-noon when I reached this temple of Rama,
situated some 30 km from Mysore, in a village called
Kembhal. No one knows the history of this Rama because
the temple was not here some 5 years ago. It was to
the credit of some Keralite-astrologers who, through
?sozhi-josyam? said that a Ram temple was buried in
this area. An intense search was undertaken and it was
after a year,
 the mollavar thirumeni of Rama, Sita and Lakshmana
(Anjaneya was not found till today) were found buried
in an abandoned well in the fields. A very small
uthsavar vigraham of all the 4 moorthis mounted on a
single base (usually found in Thirumaligai) was also
unearthed. The moorthys were eventually consecrated in
the same place where they were found, as per sasthric
ways. Adiyal had the first opportunity to get His
dharshan in January this year and was blessed by Him
soon when He gave me the opportunity to sit for the
sankalpam along with my husband for the annual
sahasra-kalashAbhishekam in the month of Chithirai.

The area is very much isolated, lonely that whenever I
come to visit Him during evenings/nights, I won?t be
feeling like going back. How can I leave Him alone in
this vayal-kaadu ? (agyaanam!!) Immediately I would
think, ?no no. He is enjoying yEkAntham here with
Sita. This is His panchavadi. This Panchavadi is not
in vanam: it is in vayal (field).?  ?Hey Ram, enjoy
your time here. Sita had always wanted to spend her
time in vana with you in yEkAntham. You never got a
chance to fulfil her desire after vana-vasa in
Ramavathara. Now you have got the chance. Spend your
time with no one to disturb you. Show Sita Arundathi,
next to Vasishta,  who looks brighter in this  dark
sky and make Sita happy by telling her how she  too is
always close to you. Enjoy your time Rama, enjoy.?
Such is the dialogue I used to have with Rama of
Kembhal thinking that I have a rapport with Him in
understanding what each other thinks. (!!!???)

On that particular fore-noon, contrary to usual
practice, His sannidhi was closed before the
stipulated time. The archagar had to leave on some
chores it seemed. I was disappointed wondering how
this could happen. I have always stuck to temple rules
and had been in time. Even on occasions when I was
held up due to unforeseen reasons, I used to think
that this rapport works! I have  found that He had
never disappointed me  (not only in Kembhal, in other
temples too) whenever I had been late,  allowing me to
have dharshan at least for a second before the screen
is drawn. Wondering whether I had committed any 
apacharam, I remained there for some time. 

Another devotee, an elderly person arrived then and we
came to know that he was a scholar in sanskrit. He
said that he would recite entire Valmiki Ramayana in
sanskrit if he is invited to do so in our home and he
has done recitals for umpteen number of times in his
life. I was too happy to have met him and wanted to
clarify some doubts. My first query was about Sri
Sookhtham. I asked him whether there is any
stipulation of time for reciting Sri Sookhtham, like
Brahma muhurtham or fore noon etc.

Flash came his reply, ?Women should not recite Sri
Sookhtham, because that is vedam.? I felt an acute
pain as though I have been whipped. What I asked and
what he says. Hey Rama, is it so that I should not
recite Sri Sookhtham? I instantly turned to my side to
look at His sannidhi. Only the closed doors were
staring at me. No.  Raman is not a saakshi (witness)
for what happened here. He is not a saakshi for what
this elderly person had said. Raman is not part of
this conversation, nor does He approve this statement.
That is why He had the doors closed even before I came
in. Knowing that this conversation is going to take
place, He had closed His doors. If He had stood there
as a witness for the talks, I don?t know how I would
have reacted. I would have either given up chanting of
this sthothram  and  others too, thinking that I do
not have His sanction. Or I would have grown sad that
I have  been prohibited from reciting that beautiful
sookhtham which invites Lakshmi to our side. 

But I would not have remained quiet. Ramanai summa
vittirukka maattEn. I would have asked Him how He made
such rules.. He had to answer me. Poosugira manjaLum,
thongugira charadum, nettriyil edum thilakamum, make
the woman herself an embodiment of Sri. How can she
then be considered unfit to invite Sri in the form of
Sookhtham?  If the woman is not entitled to say this
sookhtham, no one else is. And I would have also asked
Him ? don?t you know that such prohibition makes me
sad? Can you, whose name itself means giving happiness
to others, make me sad?

But the closed doors of Rama provided a consolation
for me. Yes, Rama closed His sannidhi  ? only to shut
Himself off from this unseemly predicament. He doesn?t
subscribe to this view. He made this understood by me
by closing His doors even before I arrived.

With this thought, I came home. By strange
coincidence, I read the first salvo on this issue in a
sister-list (in reply to a question from a female
devotee from Bangalore) that very evening itself on
the net. And the mails that I sent after that were all
known to the readers. 

 But all through, there was a nagging thought in my
mind. How this thought came to gain currency even in
the absence of any textual pramana. Another thought
that was slowly sinking in my mind was whether Rama
refused to stand as saakshi only with reference to Sri
Sookhtham or with reference to vedas in general. How
should I interpret it? Did I do enough analysis of the
whole issue? Or am I reacting in this way because I am
a woman? Did I do the analysis impassionately and
unemotionally?

I began looking for clues and I found something in the
Raamanuja bhashyam to the very first verse of Brahma
sutras. That will be discussed in the next mail.

--- Jayasree saranathan.





                
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