SrI: SrImathE satakOpAya nama: SrImathE rAmAnujAya nama: SrImath varavaramunayE nama: SrI vAnAchala mahAmunayE nama:
SrIrAma leelAs and their essence
Once sIthAp pirAtti’s location was identified, they started the efforts to rescue here. First, sugrIva sent a message to boars, monkeys etc in various directions and gathered them in kishkindhA. As they all arrived there, they all marched towards the southern tip to the ocean shore. At that time, SrI rAma and others remained seated at the ocean shore and were contemplating on how to cross the ocean.
At that time, vibhIshaNa instructed rAvaNa to unite sIthAp pirAtti with SrI rama. Hearing that, rAvaNa and indhrajith harshly scolded him. Immediately he rose to the sky, along with four of his rAkshasa associates and reached the shore were SrI rAma was waiting. Seeing his arrival, sugrIva and others desired to kill him. At that time, he informed that he came to surrender to SrI rAma. Having heard about that, Sri rAma discussed with sugrIva and others about the situation. sugrIva et al told that he should not be accepted and that he should be killed. hanuman told that he was a good person and hence he must be accepted. Having heard all of these, SrI rAma told that even if he was an evil person, since he came to surrender, he must be accepted. He then sent sugrIva to bring him there and then gave him refuge. Not only that, SrI rAma accepted him as a brother and also coronated him as the king of lankA.
After that vibhIshaNa advised SrI rAma to surrender unto samudhrarAja (king of the ocean). As per that, Sri rAma, performed ritualistic bathing and then surrendered to samudhrarAja and lay on the seashore for three days. Since samudhrarAja did not come out, SrI rAma asked lakshmaNa to bring his bow and arrow and vowed that he will empty out the ocean and took an aim towards the ocean. Seeing that, samudhrarAja trembled and came out running and requested for forgiveness. SrI rAma then shot the arrow towards the enemies of samudhrarAja. samudhrarAja agreed to facilitate the construction of a bridge on the ocean. SrI rAma then got the vAnaras to build a bridge using rocks. All of them crossed the ocean using that bridge and reached lankA. They informed their arrival to rAvaNa and got ready for the battle.
The battle began. Sri rAma showered a rain of arrows and caused great damage to rAvaNa’s army. One by one demons such as kumba, nikumba, indhrajith, kumbarakrNa et al were killed. After that, as per the advice of vibhIshaNa, Sri rAma severed rAvaNa’s heads and killed him. As SrI rAma became victorious, dhEvathAs such as brahmA, rudhra et al arrived and showered flowers on SrI rAma and joyfully glorified him.
SrI rAma brought sIthAp pirAtti through vibhIshaNa, and along with all of them, boarded the pushpaka vimAna and flew towards SrI ayOdhyA. On the way, he reached bharadhvAja ASramam. He sent hanuman to bharatha who was waiting for him and consoled him with the news of his arrival. After that he reached SrI ayOdhyA and eagerly embraced bharatha and eliminated his sorrow.
After that, vasishta made arrangements for the coronation. Sacred water was brought from all the holy rivers in all directions. sIthAp pirAtt and SrI rAma were decorated with beautiful clothes, divine ornaments, garlands, sandalwood paste etc and were seated on the throne. vasishta coronated SrI rAma as the emperor of the kingdom. The coronation happened beautifully in the auspicious presence of bharatha, lakshmaNa, Sathrugna, sugrIva, hanuman, vibhIshaNa, many sages, dhEvathAs et al. At that time, SrI rAma honoured all the guests with apt presents.
After that, SrI rAma remained in SrI ayOdhyA and conducted rAma rAjya which was pleasing for all the citizens.
Essence
- In our sampradhAyam, “kadaRkarai vArththai” (Seashore words) is very famous. A SrIvaishNava named vElvettip piLLai asked nampiLLai “SrI rAma performed all necessary rituals and performed SaraNAgathi. But vibhIshaNa did not perform any rituals and performed SaraNAgathi. Which is correct?”. nampiLLai said “Neither our anushtAnam (performance of rituals and putting efforts) nor the lack of them is significant here. One who has good anushtAnam should surrender with such anushtAnam. One who lacks that should surrender as it is. SaraNAgathi does not expect any of these”. In othr words, bhagavAn does not expect anything in us while we surrender unto him.
- While SrI rAma granted abhaya pradhAnam (refuge), though both vibhIshaNa and his elder brother rAvaNa had a lot of defects, SrI rAma accepted him without any hesitation. This demonstrates his quality of vAthsalyam, nicely.
- Since vibhIshaNa’s surrender towards SrI rAma succeeded, he insisted the same method to SrI rAma. But since SrI rAma is sarvESvaran and samudhrarAja is not filled with auspicious qualities, that surrender did not succeed.
- Due to the abundant nature of apachArams carried out by rAvaNa, SrI rAma greatly tormented him, killed all his relatives and friends, isolated him and finally killed him. Due to his offenses towards bhagavAn’s devotees, he became the target of SrI rAma’s anger and died a cruel death.
- Since SrI rAma left lankA as soon as the battle was over, by boarding the pushpaka vimAna and reaching bharadhvAja muni’s ASramam which was near SrI ayOdhyA, immediately, the fake story of SrI rAma worshipping linga in rAmESvaram can be easily understood as baseless. Since the whole purpose of SrI rAmAvathAra is to kill rAvaNa, the argument of killing rAvaNa will lead to sin, is a completely inapt argument.
- rAma rAjyam means a regime where justice prevails always. Everyone joyfully lived without crossing the limits of dharma.
Source – https://granthams.koyil.org/2024/11/28/srirama-leela-yudhdha-kandam-tamil/
adiyen sarathy ramanuja dasan
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