Translated by Sri Ramanan Rajagopalan

Are Brothers Our Saviours? Are son our saviours

Brothers

"braathAkkal rakshakargal allar enbathai vaali pakkalilum rAvanan pakkalilum kAnalaam..".

Swamy Pillai Lokacharyar takes the example of vaali and ravanan from Ramayanam to show that brothers cannot protect one soul completely.

1. vaali

After getting wounded by Rama and just before getting killed vaali throws an arrow of questions at Rama. Rama answers each of his questions patiently. Finally, when justifying the reason for killing vaali by hiding, Rama offers following explanation:

" Oh vaali! I could have let you off for all your deeds but one. At one point of time, Sugriva had surrendered to you completely to let his wife off. Still you did not give any heed to that. When a person completely surrenders to you, you are supposed to protect that person at any case even if he is an enemy to you. But you have failed to adhere to this sAstra. Hence, I had to take this hard decision."

2. Ravanan

This case scenario resulted in Vibishana Saranagathi. When Ravanan wanted to go for a war with Rama, Vibhishana tried to prevent that and also warned him of bad time influencing his bad action. Ravana was not ready to listen to his brother's words, and hence Vibishana had to leave the kingdom. After this Vibhishana surrendered to Rama. Despite the fact that he was from the arakkar kulam and also the enemy group, Rama offered to protect him without a second thought.

Sons

"putrargal rakshakargal allar enbathai rundran pakkalilum kamsan pakkalilum kAnalaam.."

Swamy Pillai Lokacharyar takes the example of rudran and kamsan in explaining the incapability of son to protect his father.

1. Rudran

piNdiyAr maNdai Endhip piRar manai thirithanthuNNum,
uNdiyAn sAbam theerththa oruvanoor, ulagam Eththum
kaNdiyUr arangkam meyyam kachipEr mallai enRu
maNdinAr, uyyal allAl maRRaiyArkkuyyalAmE?
(Thirukkunthaandagam pasuram 19)

Thirumangai Azhwar talks about the story of Rudran (Paramasivan) in the above pasuram. Rudran, because of the pride of killing Tripuram considered that he was superior to even his father, Brahma. Hence, he plucked one of his father's heads, which got struck in his hand as a vessel (brahma kapaalam). In order to get rid of this, he started to roam around all the places to get that filled with biksha. Finally, Perumal sprinkles his sweat from his chest and the vessel breaks in to pieces. Azhwar refers to this Perumal in Thirukkandiyoor. HarasApavimOcanan is the Perumal's ThirunAmam in this Divya Desam. Here is another beautifu reference to this incidence by Kaliyan. Azhwar sings on the Perumal in SalagrAmam:

venNdhaarenbum sudunNeeRum meyyil poosik kaiyagatthu, Or
sanNdhaar thalai koNdulagEzhum thiriyum periyOn thaan senRu, en
enNdhaay! saabam theer ena ilangkamudhanNeer thirumaarbil
thanNdhaan, sanNdhaar pozhil soozhnNdha saaLakkiraamam adai nenjchE!
(Periya Thirumozhi 1.5.8)

The above incident clearly explains that Brahma, the father was not protected by his son Rudran.

2. kamsan

The story about kamsan is very well known. He imprisoned his father Ugrasenan and also his sister. In fact, he is a glowing example for a bad element in all aspects.

Let us look at how other reationships also fail to protect the soul caught up in samsara in the following posting.