Introduction to Section 1.5

In each of the preceding four decads, the Āḻvār has highlighted a particular trait of the Lord. These are exaltation (transcendent glory), Worship-worthiness, easy-accessibility (saulabhya) and forgiveness, respectively. In this decad, the Saint brings into focus the Lord’s condescension (sauśīlya), mixing freely with the lowliest, the crowning trait of the Lord, heading the list of sixteen traits mentioned by Śrī Vālmīki, in his poser at the very beginning of Rāmāyaṇa^[1]. Śrī Rāma’s rapport with Guhā, the hunter, and intimate association with the monkeys, Vibhīṣaṇa etc., illustrate this.

When, in response to the heart-rending, rather, heart-warming appeal of the Āḻvār, in the preceding decad, the Lord presented Himself before the Āḻvār, in all His grandeur, betokening the enormity of His grace unto the Āḻvār, one should have expected the latter to just jump in and get himself locked up in the Lord’s sweet embrace. But what did he do? The Āḻvār beheld, with bewildering amazement, the Lord, in His full splendour, in dire contrast to his own littleness, a very picture of oppressive contrast indeed, oppressive because he dared not defile and desecrate the Great One, taking undue advantage of His condescending love. And so, he attempted to run away from the Lord, a very strange behaviour for which the only possible explanation is that he just got drifted into such a mental complex at the mere thought of the Lord’s transcendent glory. Such alternating extremes of behaviour are, however, noticeable in Saint Yāmuṉa, Kūratṭāḻvāṉ and his illustrious son, Śrī Parāśara Bhaṭṭar also. As a matter of fact, the draw-backs in us serve as the foil against which the Lord’s ‘Sauśīlya’ (condescension) shines all the more.