Nammakal temples

We do like to visit places of historical or spiritual intrests whenever we are near to one in our travels on off.
It was so a month back when we went to Rasipuram near Salem to attend marriage of my classmates .
We had reached by morning and had the day before us as reception was only in evening .
My wife told me Nammakal a few km away had two famous temples Narasimhaswamy temple and Anjaneyar or Hanuman temple so we took a cab and went there .
The story behind our temples are rich and intresting .of course its the fashion to dismiss all such temple stories as myths these days and many find it politically correct and intellectual to take that position .
Its also the habit of some these days to label one as fundamentalist if one has a special intrest in temples !!
But i am fair in that respect that my intrests go beyond religions when it comes to history
I love exploring old churches and mosques too and love thier legends and stories too
Having said that lets get back to our temples in Namakkal .
In Krutha yuga there lived Hiranya kasapu who a demon by his hard penance pleased devas and got the boon of being invincible and not being killed by a himsn being in day or night or in ground air or water
Armed with this fool proof boon he showed his arrogance on earth and on fervent prayers by his victims lord Vishnu first gave him a son Prahalada an ardent Vishnu devotee who angered his father by continuing to pray to Narayana and not Hiranyanana .
The fathers fury extended in trying to kill his son by poison or snake bite or trampling by elephant but all in vain .
Hiranyakasapu finally challenged his son to tell where this blessed narayana wasfor which prahalada replied in pillars or walls or anywhere.
At that time a pillar broke and Vishnu in his fierce avatar as Narasimha half man and half lion sprung forth and laid Hiranyakasapu in his lap and ripped open his entrails with his claws thus killing him .
The boons Hiranyakasapu had couldnt save him for Narasimha wasnt a human he was a human animal
It was neither day ir night when he was killed it was dusk or twilight
It was not in air or water or earth he was killed but in his lap .
Lesson never try to be smart with your boons 😁

And now all were afraid to approach the fierce Narasimha expect Prahalada who prayed to him.
Lord Narasimha took the form of a saligrama stone and was prayed by Prahalada .
During Thretha yuga Hanuman found it as he was travelling to Lanka in his mission for Sree Rama .
He took care of it
On his way he kept it for some time on bank of a pond where he went for his dusk prayers
When he came back he found the saligramam had grounded itself there and couldnt be lifted from there .
On his prayers Narasimha told him to finish his work in Lanka and on way back be with him .
Thus we have Namakkal Hanuman near Naramiswamy temple there.
Godess Lakshmi too was given place on her pleas there and called Lakshmi narsimha or thaayar .

The Narasimhaswamy temple was on side of a rocky hill with ancient carvings while Hanuman temple had an 18 foot Hsnuman statue made of a single stone

Gratitude

Among all the trips we had made i would rate our trip to Mount Kailas as something unique .
There is an air of mystique in the peak .to think no man has ever set foot on its lofty peak when higher peaks have been repeatedly conquered makes us wonder .
A supernatural Milerepa may have flown on to its top but the rest have only circumnavigated its base .
Deep in the table top Tibet it was no mean feat to reach its foot .
Long days of bumpy and risky rides in mountainous terrains from Katmandu made us reach Tibet border under Peoples republic of China .
Crossing over after formal immigration we still had days of cold empty plains with occasional muddy slushy roads in which our buses sank to be extricated on off .
Those long waits those walking in knee deep slush the community pushing of our vehicles the silent treading of avalanced hillsides of Nepal where an inadvertent noise would have us tumbling down to roaring brooks deep down the mountains primed us for its sight .

And then we reached the shores of the pristine heavenly Manasarovar where gilden golden swans floated in its serene facade as described in the epics.

As the gentle waves lapped up the shore the blue lake reflected the snowy solitude of a towering Kailas the very object of our travel .

The first sight of kailas brought tears rolling down our cold cheeks in something that would be difficult to explain with logic.

The emotions were not at all religious it was way above that it was spiritual something touching your soul and searing it .

The journey closer to kailas would take many more hours from Manasarovar for in those dusky plains time and distance were surrealistically unreal .

Man cannot fathom the supernatural though to dismiss it as superstitious without experiencing it is his loss .

In lofty Drachen breathless trekking with sticks on the eve of our journey closer to kailas gave us a glimpse of the parikrama ahead and the alighting on horses from Yamadhwar to trod along the granite sheerness of a mountain that went beyond geography and geology.

To me it stopped with seeing the north face of mount Kailas in Dera puk from where i retraced back to Drachen but for those who did complete the circumambulation it was a heavenly retreat to climb up the Dolma pass at 19000 feet to reach dizzying hallucinating breathless sights of a placid serenity incomparable to terra firma .

And then the steep rocky descent back to Drachen and return back to Katmandu exhausted but strangely filled .

At the end of it all there was just one emotion left ...
GRATITUDE