Hariprasad’s Weblog

Namaskara,

I am moving all my spirituality and religion related content to a dedicated site. Please click here for this article.

Regards, Hari

Today is the auspicious day of Madhva Navami, the day when Sri Madhvacharya left Udupi for Badari in order to stay with, and serve, Sri Veda Vyasa. It is believed that he is in Badari even to this day. It is a very important festival for Madhvas and grand programs are held in Udupi, Pajaka and other places.

According to some sources, this day occurred in 1317 A.D. Others attribute it to Magha Masa – Shukla Paksha- Navami – Pingala Samvatsara. This occurs on Sunday, January 19, 1318 A.D (and not 1317). In either case, it has been nearly 700 years now since Sri Madhvacharya proceeded to Badari.

On this auspicious ocassion, I am happy to let people know of a small project that I have undertaken during the past two months. It has been a while since I have been dreaming of building a comprehensive portal on Vishnu Sahasra Nama – the thousand glorious names of Lord Vishnu. Finally, I was able to get started with the work and the result is

http://vishnusahasranama.wordpress.com/

The goal of this portal is to build a comprehensive site on the great Stotra. It will have a separate page (and possibly more than one page) for each of the thousand names. In addition, it will have various resources connected with the stotra such as downloadable texts, audio files and so on. The portal will also give the meanings of the various names. The eventual aim is to provide multiple meanings to each of the names, as explained by the various Acharyas. In fact, Sri Madhvacharya has made it clear that there at the least, 100 meanings for every single name in the Vishnu Sahasranama!

I have managed to complete the pages for the first 100 names and thought it would be a good enough milestone to let people know. I have also put together some “meta data” pages which explain the idea behind the project, the to-do list items, pointers to resources on the net, some guides and so on. There is also a “random post” link on the portal. Clicking this will take you to a random page on the portal. I think this is a very good way of reading about a particular name – whenever one has time. “One Nama a day – keeps all evil away”

Please go through the portal and let me know your feedback and suggestions. Since the work is very much in initial stages, it becomes easy to incorporate feedback and implement the same for all pages.

Best wishes to all on Madhva Navami.

|| Sri Krishnarpanamastu ||

I have uploaded the “Saswara” Navagraha mantras in Kannada to my mantras page. These include the mantras for the Adhi Devata and the Pratyadhi Devata for each of the nine grahas.

The Graha – Adhi Devata – Pratyadhi Devata list is as below.

1. Aditya – Savitru – Agni
2. Angaraka – Prithvi – Kshetrapala
3. Shukra – Indrani – Indra
4. Chandra – Apa – Gowri
5. Budha – Vishnu – Vishnu
6. Bruhaspati – Indra – Brahma
7. Shani – Prajapati – Yama
8. Rahu – Sarpa – Nirruti
9. Ketu – Brahma – Chitragupta

Of course, the list of Adhi Devatas and Pratyadhi Devatas is slightly different in different traditions. Hopefully we can cover the other lists through comments

I have uploaded the kannada transliteration of the Argala Stotra and the Kilaka Stotra to my Mantras page. Both the stotras are part of the initial stotras recited as part of the Devi Saptashathi Parayana.

Recently, a Sama Veda Samhita Yaga was conducted at my “Mula Mane” or ancestral home at Nellitheertha. My uncle had conducted the Rig Veda Samhita Yaga two years ago and the Yajur Veda Samhita Yaga last year. And yes, next year he plans to conduct the Atharva Samhita Yaga.

Sama Veda Samhita Yaga

Yaga

This Yaga was very different from the last two years’ Yagas. The people who did the Yaga came from a very small community in Honnavar, Karnataka who still practice the Sama Veda. Their rhythmic and melodius chanting of the Veda Mantras was a treat to the ears.

The Yaga was conducted for 7 days and involved chanting every single Samhita shloka of Sama Veda and offering oblations through fire to Veda Narayana.

Mandala

Yaga 2

P.S: My uncle uses a “Arani” which is a small instrument made out of a special wood to “create” the fire needed to conduct the homas and Yagas. This is just like the good old traditional days when fire used to be created for these rituals using two Arani sticks.

Arani

The Palayachyuta Stotra, also known as Krishnaashtaka or the Krishna Stuti is another great composition by Sri Vadiraja Swamy. It has only 9 stanzas and very easy to chant. It praises Lord Krishna as the one adorning Udupi (Raupyapeeta pura).

This stotra praises Krishna starting from his face and then goes on to describe his neck, hands and so on. It may be recalled that the first stotra of Sri Madhvacharya’s Dwadasha Stotra praises Vishnu starting from his feet and moving upwards. Therefore, some people consider it equivalent to a Mangalarathi if the first stotra of Dwadasha Stotra (Vande Vandyam….) and the Palayachyuta Stotra are narrated one after the other.

I have uploaded the Kannada transliteration of this beautiful shloka to my mantras page.

In addition, I have also uploaded a second version of Sri Rama Raksha Stotra in the same page.

I have uploaded the Kannada transliteration of Sri Rama Raksha Stotra to my mantras page today.  As usual, comments and corrections are welcome.