आगमे विश्वासटिप्पन्यः

Hagiographical account of the lives of
the sixty-three Nayanars, written by the
twelfth-century figure Cekkilar. The
Nayanars were a group of Shaiva poetsaints, who lived in southern India
508
Paush
between the seventh and ninth centuries. Together with their Vaishnava
counterparts, the Alvars, the Nayanars
spearheaded the revitalization of Hindu
religion within Tamil Nadu, which was
mostly Buddhist and Jain. Both the
Nayanars and the Alvars stressed passionate devotion (bhakti) to a personal
god—Shiva for the Nayanars, Vishnu for
the Alvars—and conveyed this devotion
through hymns sung in the Tamil language. According to tradition, Cekkilar
was a minister at the court of the Chola
dynasty king Kullottunga II (r. 1130–50).
Cekkilar, distressed by the king’s admiration for a Jain epic poem, composed
his text in an effort to wean the king
away from it. His text portrays these
saints as models of devotion to Shiva
and as salutary examples to others
although at times extreme in their devotion. One example of this intense devotion is Kotpuli Nayanar, who killed his
entire family when he discovered that,
in order to save their lives in a time of
famine, they had eaten rice that
belonged to Shiva’s temple. Although
this is an extreme case, the message is
clearly that devotion to God must
eclipse all other loyalties.