Sambandar

(7th c.) One of the earliest of the
Nayanars, a group of sixty-three southern Indian poet-saints who were devotees (bhakta) of the god Shiva. Along
with their contemporaries the Alvars,
who were devotees of Vishnu, the
Nayanars spearheaded the revitalization
of Hindu religion through their passionate devotion (bhakti) to a personal god,
conveyed in hymns sung in the Tamil
language. Along with his contemporary
586
Samavaya
The four Vedas in Sanskrit. The Sama Veda is the second of the four Vedas.
Appar, Sambandar actively opposed the
unorthodox sects of the times, particularly the Jains, whom he reviles in his
poems. The depth of his hatred can be
seen in a well-established tradition
that, after converting the king of
Madurai, of the Pandya dynasty, from
Jainism to Shaivism, Sambandar was
instrumental in having eight thousand
Jain ascetics executed by impalement.
The collected hymns of the three most
important Nayanars—Appar, Sambandar,
and Sundaramurtti—comprise the
Devaram, the most sacred of the Tamil
Shaivite texts. See also Shaiva.