Pasuram 10.9.11

Tamil text and transliteration:

வந்துஅவர் எதிர்கொள்ள மாமணி மண்டபத்து
அந்தம்இல் பேரின்பத்து அடியரோடு இருந்தமை
கொந்துஅலர் பொழில் குருகூர்ச்சடகோபன் சொல்-
சந்தங்கள்ஆயிரத்து இவைவல்லார் முனிவரே. (2)

vantuavar etirkoḷḷa māmaṇi maṇṭapattu
antamil pēriṉpattu aṭiyarōṭu iruntamai
kontualar poḻil kurukūrccaṭakōpaṉ col-
cantaṅkaḷāyirattu ivaivallār muṉivarē. (2)

English translation of verse 10.9.11:

Those that can recite these songs ten,
Out of the thousand Veda-oriented songs of Caṭakōpaṉ
Of Kurukūr, abounding in many a flower garden fine,
Recounting his enjoyment in Heaven of beatific bliss eternal,
In the company of the devotees great, in the gem-set hall,
Greeted by the Lord Supreme and the Divine Mother,
Will become sages, steeped in the Divine, for ever.

Notes:

(i) This end-song sets out the benefit, accruing to the chanters of this decad, as being their elevation on a par with the sages in the high Heaven, immersed in incessant contemplation of the auspicious attributes of the Lord.

(ii) Oh, what a glorious ascent! How exciting, exhilarating and entertaining is this special Heaven-bound route, exclusively earmarked for the ardent devotees of Lord Mahāviṣṇu! And there, at the other end, what a glorious reception by the Celestials, en masse, headed by their Chief, the Lord Himself, accompanied by the Divine Mother! And then, sitting in the grand gemset hall of Heaven, of incomparable excellence, in that august assembly, presided over by the Lord and the Divine Mother sharing His throne, is indeed the very acme of that inexhaustible bliss and beatitude.

Well, the Āḻvār has, at long last, achieved what he had pined for, all along, namely, the enjoyment of the Lord in Heaven, in the holy company of the great ones.

(iii) The Āḻvār has now entered the second stage, namely, ‘Para Jñāna’, in the ascending scale of God-love, which falls into the three distinct compartments of ‘Para Bhakti’, ‘Para Jñāna’ and ‘Parama Bhakti The first of these three stages became pronounced when the Supreme Lord, with lotus eyes, got into the Āḻvār’s eyes, (1-9-8) and thus blessed the Āḻvār with His glorious vision. This ‘Para Bhakti’ gathered momentum and got intensified to its farthest limit in X-8-7, where the Āḻvār referred to the Lord’s continuous stay in his full view, for his eyes to feast upon. The intensity of divine love, surging within, is such that it seeks to break its bounds and launch into external perception and enjoyment of the Lord, the grand vision, outstripping the narrow limits of mental comprehension (Darśana). And now, this glorious darśan, given expression to, by the Āḻvār, by way of referring to his blissful participation in the grand galaxy of the ‘Nityas’ and ‘Muktas’ in Heaven, the eternal land of inexhaustible bliss, marks the second stage of his Godlove, namely ‘Para Jñāna’, in full swing (vide aphorisms 230 and 231 of Ācārya Hṛdayam).

(iv) The bliss eternal: The eternal land (Heaven) is the abode of unalloyed bliss interminable, the diametrically opposite of Earth, the harrowing abode of endless misery and nothing but that. The so-called enjoyment, resorted to and indulged in, by the folks over here is nothing but misery under the cloak of enjoyment, pain in the garb of pleasure. When King Pāṇḍu aimed an arrow at a deer, the dying deer exclaimed: “A Rṣi that I am, my wife and I could snatch just a little time for sexual enjoyment and we disguised ourselves as deers, for this purpose. And this rare moment, one in a thousand, alas! You didn’t allow us to avail of. So, this is life!”