Har Har Mahadev.....

Tryambakam yajaamahe sugandhim pushti-vardhanam |
Urvaarukam Iva bandhanaan mrityor muksheeya maamritaat ||

is the Trayambaka Mantra popular as the Mahamrityunjaya Mantra from Yajurveda.  

Roughly translated it means we bow with respect to the One with a natural fragrance, one who is benevolent to his devoted, and one who is three eyed and we pray Him to maneuver us from this cycle of life and death and guide on to the path of salvation.

With this prayer on our lips we were on our way to Tanjore to visit the Brihadeeshwara Temple.  All that we heard about this temple and read through the net did not prepare us enough to what we found there. It was the sunny midday of 7 January 2012 and we were proceeding from Tiruvannamalai after visiting the Lord Arunachaleshwara and reached the Brihadeeshwara Temple by 1pm. Our trip was meant to visit Lord Siva pilgrimages in advance to Shivaratri which is on 20 Feb 2012. The idea was to to avoid huge crowds thronging in all Siva temples and have a peaceful darshan of the Lord.  

The moment we looked at the entrance was magical.  The entire structure including the boundary wall seemed to possess a great and ancient charm.  We felt as if we were walking into past in a time machine. Only a divine intervention or co-operation would have made such massive structure to be built centuries ago. We were not at all in a hurry and had no energy to run across the vast expanse of the temple premises after a 17km long walk around the Arunachalam Hill or Tiruvannamalai the day before.  We left our footwear at the entrance with the keeper and moved on.  

We stopped by the Temple History displayed and moved slowly across. The beautiful green and soft lawns of the temple premises were very inviting and we all went to relax for 30 minutes as the temples were closed and were to open only by 4pm.  In the meantime we looked around the huge premises and looked around the statue of the Bull.  The platform on which the Bull stands has a roof adorned with beautiful murals in bright blue colour. It is amazing to notice the fast colors not fading till date. Please zoom in to the image of the write up to read all the historical details of the temple.    

The entire length of the temple boundary wall has several small Shiva Lingams and little bulls (Nandi) placed one behind other forming a beeline.  We walked around the temples and found many scriptures in Devnagari and Tamil languages.  There were students from Chennai who were perched up on the walls making notes of the scriptures.  I asked them if they understood what is written on, one of them said that it was their project that each one of them must copy one line from the wall inscriptions and provide meaning.

Time went by so quickly and we realised it was 4pm and the temples were all open.  We went in the queue to visit Lord Ganesh first.  We noticed that these temples were architectural marvels in terms of the beautiful and intricate carvings on every wall and entrance.  Even the idols of the Deities were so lively and attractive.  The beauty of the deity was competing with the divinity in all the temples of Lord Ganesh, Lord Murugan and Goddess Parvati. The peacock on which Lord Murugan was seated looked marvelous with each feather carved with great care to make it appear real.

After all the above deities we lined up for the Darshan of Lord Shiva (Brihadeeshwara) the main deity of the temple.  Though it was very crowded no one was in hurry or pushing.  The interiors of this ancient temple were peaceful and cool with very highly perched roofs.  The wait in the queue was peaceful and we were for a change enjoying the waiting and appreciating the delay. The main deity is in the form of a 3 ft tall Linga which is placed on a high platform.  Serene and holy surroundings added fervor to the Darshan we had of Lord Brihadeeshwara and we left the temple with great satisfaction. Our next destination on the trip was Srirangam temple at Trichy and calls for a detailed blog for itself which will follow.