Thiruvalaiyadal: Manikavacakar

The Story of the great Shaivite Saint Manikavachar

In the banks of the Vaigai river there existed a great kingdom of the Pandiyas. This river gave birth to the great Saints of Lord Shiva. One such person was Mannikavacar (Literally one whose voice/utterance are like gems). His story comes in the Thiruvalaiyadal Puranam (story 58 -> 62). This saint was born in the city of Vadavoor (his exact date of birth is subject to controversy, but it is accepted to be around 882 - 885 C.E.) As he was born in Vadavoor, his name became Vadavoorar.

Upon his birth Vadavoorar was put to study very early, and he mastered all the religious texts and scriptures from a very early age. As he was educated in the art of morality, love and truth, (as these are the core components of Shaiva Gnaana or knowledge of Shivam) he became well known for his love for all beings, and his ardent love for Lord Shiva. Soon the King of Madurai came to know of his greatness and quickly made him the prime minister of his kingdom giving him the title Thennavan Brahmanan (the greatest of Brahmins).

 He performed the duties of a minister with perfection second to none, and the king was thoroughly pleased with him, but he had no desire for material wealth. His mind was constantly engrossed in loving Lord Shiva the god of all beings. He desperately wanted Lord Shiva as a guru. He felt that only lord Shiva could grant him gnaana (divine knowledge) and constantly kept his mind focused on his godly feet. 

One day, the King, desired to increase his cavalry and hence wished to buy some of the best horses. He tasked this job to Vadavoorar. Vadavoorar saw this as an excellent opportunity to do some travelling and search for his master, Lord Shiva while enquiring about horses along the way. He visited many temples dedicated to Mahadeva, and made many stops to holy sites. One his trip, he came to a village called Tiruperundurai. Lord Shiva, having realised the maturity and intellect of Vadavoorar came to this village a year early and began teaching as a school teacher to children anxiously awaiting his for his prema-sishya (loving student). Finally when he saw Vadavoorar he changed his form to that of a Ascetic Sage with many sages, and sat under a Kurundai (Cinnamon) tree behind a temple. As suspected, Vadavoorar went to the temple and saw the Lingam inside. Then he went around the temple, and as he did, he saw the Ascetic Sage and instantly tears of joy filled his eyes. His bliss knew no bounds and he fell at the Sages feet. He begged the Lord to take him as his sishya. As the lord had come only to do just that, he gave him enlightenment (divine knowledge) by merely looking at him. As he felt like singing in praise of the Guru, he sang some devotional songs, which were like gems. Iswara was pleased, and addressing him as ‘Manikkavacakar’ (one whose voice are like gems) After doing so, he vanished. Manikkavacakar cried like a toddler, "oh lord why have you left me thus?!?" The villagers, too were surprised to see that their school teacher had vanished. The whole village searched for him but to no avail.

After consolidating his great loss, Manikavacar, the great saint sat on the very spot he got mukthi and began tapas. Giving all the money he got to purchase horses (for the cavalry) to the reconstruction/renovation of the temple he was sitting in. The King soon came to hear of this action and flew in a terrible rage. He order him to come to the city and deposit the money for the horses. Manikavacar prayed to Lord Shiva with ardent devotion and that night Lord Shiva came to him and gave him a Gem of priceless beauty and told him give this to the king and tell the king to wait for the night of the Moola Nakshatra Sravana Maasa (Star of Moola and the Month of Sravana). The King will have his horses. Manikar did as asked and King imprisoned Manikar until the month of Sravana, Moola Nakshatra.

Sure enough on the night of Moola in the month of Sravana, Mahadeva disguised himself as an equestrian and transformed (using his maya-shakthi) a bunch of jackals into horses, and waited facing east. Sure enough the greedy king (after taking the precious jewels) came for the horses. He gave away the horses and the King freed Manikar. 

The next day, the Horses turned back into jackals and killed every horse in the stable. The King flew into a rage and demanded that it was Manikar's Maya that killed the horses and he had Manikar flung in the dungeons. Manikar started worshipping Hara Hara, with ardent devotion. Shiva became terrible angry and decided to flood the Vaigai River. The River overflowed and started drowning the citizens. The king ordered that one person from every family should be donated to build a dam. 

It just so happened that in this village, Puttu Ammaiyar, a widow, had no one but Lord Shiva as her family. She knew that she did not have the strength or the endurance (being over 60 years old) to lift the logs and stick the mud in between them for the dam. She sold Puttu, an Indian traditional dish made of powdered rice, and made her livelihood selling this. She immediately prayed to the Lingam she had in her shop, and sure enough the lord decided to play. 

Puttu & Idly: Full without cracks

He went to Ammaiyar as a handsome, well built (six-pack sporting, bicep curling) vagabond and told the lady, "do not worry, I will go in place of you if you can feed me some food. I love to eat puttu, I will not eat the Puttus that form whole cylinders, just the cracked, broken ones" Ammaiyar was overjoyed. She is a perfect professional, and in all her life puttu has never cracked, she thought she will make the first few as perfect and as charity offer them nevertheless. She took the rice powder and placed it on the bamboo cooker.

Cracked and broken puttu, delicious, but not sellable

Each and every puttu that came out, cracked. Soon she ran out of powder and the adolescent Shiva ate the whole stock of puttu for a week. She was stunned, but even still a weeks worth of puttu would be enough if she did not have to work in the dam. The vagabond thanked her and assured her that she need not work in the dam.

The boy wandered to the place of the dam and fell fast asleep snoring loudly. It just so happened that the king was patrolling the area and saw this vagrant adolescent sleeping without work. The rest of the workers were enviously looking as the adolescent was fast asleep snoring loudly, while they work in back breaking labour. This was too much for the king, he told his strongest body guard to take the largest whip and slash his large back. The body guard only too happy to discipline the dallying loafer, took the whip and with all the might he could muster, slashed the whip with a loud cackle on the vagabond's back. Instantly, the King, the Body guard, all the labourers, the ammaiyar, the whole kingdom including the animals, from cows to deer howled in pain. 

The adolescent had disappeared and there was a huge whiplash scar on the back of everyone in the kingdom. A loud voice, from the sky, (Sarveshwara, The lord of all beings) thus spoke "Foolish King, force not your subjects to work for you, pay them and extradite labour, free Manikavacar and fall at his feet for all the trouble you have caused him I myself did all this to show you his greatness . . ." 

The King fled on all fours to the prison to free him, and on the way he went to visit to Puttu Ammaiyar (as she had served the lord of all beings) and wished to obtain her grace. However, a chariot from heaven had already descended and it was about to carry her to the heavens. The king saluted her and went to the prison. The king told "My dear Manikar! Take my Kingdom, I will go to a forest and meditate on the holy feet of Mahadeva" Manikar humbly hugged the king and told him not to apologise. He refused the throne and decided to visit more holy sites dedicated to Mahadeva, and finally settled in Chidambaram