The Saint thaws down in gratitude over the Lord’s enormous grace in getting hymnals sung through him, duly equipping him for this assignment. Indeed, the outpourings of Saints are all inspired by God and therefore it is that the Āzhvār does not claim authorship for the hymnal, sung by the Lord through him as His mouth-piece. This hymnal is claimed to be sweet because the

The Āzhvār is indeed at a loss to find words to express the boundless grace of the Lord, who weaned him away from his waywardness and chose him as His mouthpiece to repeat the words dictated by Him and then glorified him as the great author of this grand hymnal. This is just like His discharging the cosmic functions through Brahmā, Rudra, Indra and the whole hierarchy,

(i) The Āzhvār gratefully acknowledges the Lord’s assignment to him of the role of redeeming the worldlings, sunk in sorrow and despair, by instilling in him, as a preparatory measure, clarity of knowledge and understanding that He is the Supreme Lord of the Universe, the Sole Refuge of all His subjects. Bent upon redeeming the subjects in the ‘Līlā Vibhūti’ (Sportive

(i) It is not a matter for any wonder if the Lord sang poems of His great glory Himself. But the real wonder is, He chose Caṭakōpaṉ, ill-equipped for hymning, to sing the songs and ensured, at the same time, their perfe-ectin [perfection?], eliminating the risk of contamination through his association. “It is because of His omniscience and omnipotence that He could achieve

The Āzhvār says that he was not qualified to compose poems, as he did not have any poetic talent worth the name, and even assuming that he could compose poemṣ, he was hardly eligible to sing the Lord’s glory, as he didn’t know a wee wit of His greatness and grandeur. But what has the Lord done? He has instilled in the Āzhvār the requisite knowledge and qualities and elevated

There have indeed been many sweet-singing poets combining poetic skill and piety, like Vyāsa, Parāśara and Vālmīki, the great Sanskrit poets and the first three Āzhvārs and ‘Tirumaḷicai Āzhvār’ who have many sweet, soul-stirring hymns in Tamil to their credit. The Lord could have got the ‘Tiruvāymoḻi’ also sung by these super-eminent poets and yet He deigned to shed His

The Lord of the Universe, Chief of the exalted Celestials has condescended to shed His limitless grace on a great sinner, and cleanse him throughly, making him pure like Him. And what more? The regenerated Āzhvār, of immaculate purity, is made by Him to sing His spiritual worldly glory and grandeur to His great delectation. It is indeed amazing that the Lord should feel

Yet another way of interpreting this song could be as follows: Even if the Āzhvār acquired the combined power of speech of the denizens of Earth, spiritual world and the Milk-ocean, and expressed his gratitude for the Lord who chose him as His instrument for singing ‘Tiruvāymoḻi’, he can never reach the end of exhaustion. This is so, because the Lord not merely made the

In the preceding song, the Āzhvār mustered the combined power of speech of the denizens, currently on Earth, spiritual world and Milk-ocean but now he invokes the aid of those who dwelt in those places in the past as well as the future inhabitants; with his insatiable ardour, he feels that all these agencies, put together, would still be inadequate.

There’s no question of repaying the Lord’s extraordinary kindness; even otherwise, there is nothing the Āzhvār could call his own, which unto the Lord be could offer. Even the soul is not his but belongs to Him as His vassal from time immemorial. At least, in this land of dark nescience, people with their erronerous notions of ‘I’ and ‘Mine’ might commit the mistake of

This decad, whether sung with devotion or otherwise, will breed joy. The Āzhvār, who heads the clan of ‘Prapannas’ looks upon the Supreme Lord, the Spouse of Mahālakṣmī, as the Sole Refuge, both here, in the state of supplication and in spiritual world, after attaining the final state of bissful union with the Lord. These songs, whether sung mechanically or with the ardour