Swami Malai

Temple and sacred site (tirtha) on a hill
in the Tanjore district of Tamil Nadu,
just outside the temple-town of
Kumbhakonam. Swami Malai is part of
the network of six temples in Tamil
Nadu built to honor Murugan, a hill
deity who has been assimilated into the
larger pantheon as a form of the god
Skanda, the son of Shiva. Five of these
temples have been definitively identified, and each is associated with a particular region, a particular ecosystem,
and a particular incident in Murugan’s
mythic career. In the case of Swami
Malai, it is said to be where he taught the
meaning of the sacred syllable (Om) to
his father Shiva, and thus presents him
in the aspect of a teacher, which is one of
his identifying features in Shaiva
Siddhanta (a series of fourteen texts, all
completed by the fourteenth century
C.E., which reinterpret the ideas about
Shiva found in Nayanar devotional
poetry). The sixth of these temples is said
to be every other shrine to Murugan in
Tamil Nadu. This belief seems to stress
Murugan’s presence throughout Tamil
Nadu and sacrilize the entire landscape,
giving mythic significance to every
Murugan temple, no matter how small.
The cult of Murugan is thus a symbolic
vehicle for Tamil pride and identity, and
since the number six has connotations
of completeness—as in the six directions, or the six chakras in the subtle
body—it also suggests that nothing outside is needed. For further information
see Fred Clothey, “Pilgrimage Centers in
the Tamil Cultus of Murukan,” in the
Journal of the American Academy of
Religion, Vol. 40, No. 1, 1972.