The narrative of the Tenkalai sect with regard to their claim to legitimacy in asserting that the Kanchi Varadaraja Temple belongs — lock, stock and barrel — to their “sampradaaya“, tradition and custom is based mostly on the version of 15th-16th century CE history that they have constructed and posit.
The Vadakalai sect, however, on its part has a reading of that very same narrative of history that is completely different and poses several outright challenges to the veracity and credibility of the Tenkalai version.
It is not my intention here to “compare and contrast” the two narratives with the view to persuade readers to accept one or the other as representing the Truth. I propose to simply recount the narratives of both sects, as they are both found today in the public domain, in as bare and uncomplicated a manner as possible so that readers can decide for themselves where Truth — how much or how little of it — lies where, and why.
The main purpose of my presenting only a bland summary of both the Tenkalai and Vadakalai narratives is two-fold:
Firstly, I would like readers to realize that this sectarian feud cannot, and ought not to be ridiculed or trivialized by making it appear as though it pertains only to obscurantist theological skirmishes within a prominent Sri Vaishnnava temple. Nor can the conflict be reduced to mere bathetic display of ill-temper between two sects of priestly communities who are needlessly agitating the courts of the land over trifles as ludicrous as which design of “naamam” should be applied on the heads of temple elephants, which particular religious litany or chants must be allowed at festive public processions in Kanchipuram. Nor is it just about two sectarian fan-club camps embroiled perennially in an unseemly tug-of-war to prove whose lineage of Achaaryas is superior in representing the true doctrines and ethos of “ubaya-vedaantam”.
To understand the truth behind why the Tenkalai-Vadakalai feud that first emerged in the 15th century continues abated perhaps but still undying to this day, we must look beyond the local incidents that aroused the rancor between the two camps and try to understand the deeper, more sincere urges and motivations that make both sides claim what they believe are their rights of heritage in this great and ancient temple which none has the right to snatch away or cancel. Once we have properly understood the truth of the situation as it has long existed on the ground, … maybe then… it might be remotely possible for both sides to cease their petty enmity and seek reconciliation.
The intention behind my recounting the narratives of Tenkalai and Vadakalai here is not to reopen old wounds of the past and aggravate them in the present. The intention is rather to correct the popular misconception in the minds of even educated young Sri Vaishnavas in our community today that the sectarian feud in Kanchi is only about “naamam” on an elephant’s head, about who is the greater Acharya, Desikan or Manavala Maamuni, and who gets precedence in seating inside the sanctum to be able to offer congregational worship to the Deity….
When these small issues of protocol and minor priesthood privilege are looked at purely as sensational court-room cases agitated in the past and present times by several clever attorneys pleading for their brief before utterly exasperated judges, they do appear to outsiders as indeed silly, petty-minded and spiteful … But actually when when they are viewed objectively by keeping in mind the bigger picture of long historical events that I have taken the pains to explain so far, and which led eventually to the feud, the rancor between the Tenkalai and Vadakalai does seem to have arisen out of reasons far more serious in nature since they involved issues of historical truth, legitimacy, cultural pride and political power-play.
Many young modern-minded Sri Vaishnava boys and girls in our families, and in the community at large today, are ignorant about and hence impatient with what they call this anachronistic Tenkalai-Vadakalai rift. They do not understand what this “sampradaayam” is really all about… or else, their knowledge is limited to the most superficial features and aspects of it. They believe, however, that they all are piously practicing the Sri Vaishnava “sampradaayam” inside their own little homes and private worlds and that’s really the end of the matter ….as it should be… Little are they aware that they do not actually live the “sampradaayam“.
Yet, it is this young generation of Sri Vaishnavas that has chosen to distance itself from the central issues and problems of the “sampradaayam” and its unique ethos, by thinking to itself, “What is all this nonsense?! This sectarian hullabaloo which is much ado about nothing! Of what significance is it to me personally so long as I can continue to visit the Kanchi temple whenever I wish, I am able to offer prayer to the Deity there and exit without any further ado? If it is a priestly turf-war between the two sects, what does it matter to me? I am not a Sri Vaishnava priest. My identity is determined no longer today by whether I am a Tenkalai or a Vadakalai. My identity in the modern world is shaped by the educational qualifications I have attained and by the professional status I enjoy in the secular, “loukeeka” society. The Tenkalais and Vadakalais can continue to wage their court-room “slug-festivals” for as long as they want to… but I wish to have no truck with it because I don’t really care!”
Such indeed is the typical and almost cynical reaction of most present-day Sri Vaishnava young men and women both in India, and abroad too in the Sri Vaishnava diaspora! They have nothing else to fall back upon to be deeply informed and appreciative about what really goes on inside the larger community other than what they read about it in newspapers and media-accounts of what the Kanchi or Sri Rangam temple conflicts are about.
Unwittingly thus, they simply become ill-informed participants in the kind of laid-back agnostic or apathetic arm-chair herd-thinking public-discourse that is buzzing around them. That then only reinforces a great misconception about their very own self-identity which they feel that if they were to acknowledge it, they would somehow be made to feel ashamed or apologetic about it! It all therefore rankles deeply within them. It is what really drives them to wish to disassociate themselves from their innate identity that birth, upbringing, familial history and cultural tradition has bestowed upon them as “ubaya-vedaantins”. Without knowing it, they discard and forswear it.
One might characterize such an attitude to be that of the proverbial ostrich sticking its neck into the ground in the belief that what it cannot see, does not really exist.
Such misconception — which predisposes one into thinking that the Sri Vaishnava community is only fighting about either trivial matters of temple ritual and privilege, or else, is engaged in nothing but an endless, internecine and egotistic “power struggle” for control over temple real-estate, wealth and social influence just to gain sectarian dominance — therefore, results only in sheer trivialization of the conflict of Kanchipuram. Which then again, in turn, in the eyes of the rest of Tamil society, has resulted in the entire community of “ubaya vedaantins” becoming a “laughing stock” .
Truth is so elusive indeed to realize in our world where much of Untruth generally rules… But then, once we have at least some clear sight of even just a small glimmer of it, it will by itself perhaps free us from all our prejudices and atavistic angst and animosities …
As it was said, “Seek the Truth for the Truth shall set Ye free!“….. and as our own Upanishad too, long, long before the Bible did, has already said, “Sathyam vadha…. Dharmam chara…!”: if you know and speak the Truth, then your deeds that follow will certainly be righteous.
The second main purpose of my presenting only a summary of both the Tenkalai and Vadakalai narratives of their historical experience in Kanchipuram is to underscore the point that the sectarian clashes have little to do with any great or significant difference of doctrine, philosophy, scriptural exegesis, hermeneutics or inquiry into “tattva” or “siddhaantham“. The quarrel is founded wholly on establishing, as true and conclusive, each its very own version of history as it believes happened in the 15th and 16th century CE during the lifetimes of Sri Vaadikesari Azhagiya Manavaala Jiyar (1420 to 1468 CE) and Sri Kotikannikadhaana Lakshmikumaara Thaathaachaari (1571–1643 CE) whose life-stories in brief will be told in the ensuing pages.
Sudarshan Madabushi