The very first 3 Alwars among them are called Mudhal Alwars. They were born even before the commencement of kaliyuga, that is in Dwapara yuga itself.
The very first is Poigai Alwar. He was born with the Amsha of Lord’s Conch shell, Panchajanya. There is a holy place called Yadhothakari (Lord Vishnu’s temple), 1 km away from Kanchi Varadaraja temple. It’s one amazing and interesting temple. We shall read about it when we see the life story of Thirumalisai Alvar. He was born in a golden lotus flower in a pond present at yadhothakari temple. He was named Poigai for the same reason (poigai means pond in Tamil). He was called Kasara yogi/Saro yogi in Sanskrit as he was born in a pond.
Here is the picture of the same pond where that great personality took birth.
Now let us move on to 2nd Alwar whose name is Poothathu Alwar. He was born with the Amsha of Lord’s club called Kaumodaki. He was born at Sthala sayana Perumal temple which is at a walkable distance from Sea shore temple in Mahabalipuram. Sthala sayana Perumal temple is also one of the 108 Divya Tirupatis. He was born in a Sanna jaji (a type of flower) bush present by the side of that temple. That’s the reason why he was named Poothathu Alwar. These 3 Alwars are Ayonijas (not born from the womb).
3rd Alwar is called Pey Alwar. He was born with the Amsha of Lord’s sword Nandakam. It is little difficult to find his birthplace. There is a famous temple called Kalapaleeshwar swamy temple in Mylapur near Chennai. There is a temple called Madhava Perumal Alayam near to it (Kapaleeshwar temple). There is a well beside it. He was born in that well.
He has extreme devotion towards Lord since his childhood. He used to incessantly cry for the Lord. Seeing him cry for the Lord like a madman, people mistook him to be possessed by some evil spirit or to have gone insane. So they called him Pey Alwar.
Vishwaksena descended from Vaikuntha and performed Pancha samskaras for these 3 Alwars. Vishwaksena is the army-chief of Lord Vishnu. There is something called Pancha samskaras for every Vaishnava. I shall explain what that is when we read about another Alwar. By doing Pancha samskaras, mind will automatically turn towards Lord Vishnu. Pancha samskaras can be done to both men and women. They are performed by Vishwaksena for these 3 Alwars.
Lord sent them (Mudhal Alwars) to Earth to write Dravida literature and keerthans. But they always used to be in devotional trance being connected with the Lord. In order to turn them towards world and get them to write, Lord created an incident and brought them together at one place.
In Kaliyuga “selfishness” is the most horrible thing. If you see any horrible incident, it is because of selfishness in the background. Lord created an incident to show us how to conquer selfishness.
The 3 Alwars were born at different places. Once they all started for pilgrimage (obviously separately). By the time Poigai Alwar reached a place, there was a heavy storm and trees were falling over. He became worried. There was one house nearby. He knocked at the door and asked the owner, “Could I stay here for this night?” The owner smiled and replied, “There is one small room at the end. You can sleep there. But the room has a space just enough for one person to sleep.”
Poigai Alwar replied, “Ok, Sir. Thank you”. He went and slept in the room remembering Lord.
Meanwhile Poothathu Alwar came to the same place, went to the room and asked “Sir, I am getting drenched in rain. Can I come inside?”
Poigai Alwar replied, “There is space just for one person to sleep in this room. But you may please come inside, we both could sit and sing glories of the Lord.” They both sat in that room.
Meanwhile Pey Alwar comes to the same place. He asked the same question if he could stay there. Then the remaining two Alwars replied, “There is space for three people to stand in this room. Please come inside. We three can share by standing and can together sing glories of the Lord.”
While the three of them were standing and remembering the glories of the Lord, suddenly they heard another voice from outside.
“I am shivering in this cold. Can I come inside?”
All three of them unanimously replied, “Because you have to come inside, I will come out.” All three of them immediately came out at once. Then they saw Lord Vishnu appear in front of them in the form of Trivikrama (expanded throughout the whole world). Then the three Alwars glorified Lord with 300 Pasuras and merged into the Lord.1
Look at their selfless act. The lesson we should learn from this incident is “Selflessness”. Selfishness is very prevalent in Kaliyuga. Any horrible act, be it murder or anything is done because of selfishness in a person. Lord explained us through this sensitive incident that if we leave selfishness, we would be able to see Lord everywhere.
📑Next Article: Thirumalisai Alvar
Footnotes:
- This incident happened at a place called Thirukoilure. You would touch it when you travel from Bangalore to Pondicherry. There is a Vamana avatar temple of Lord Vishnu there (In fact there are very few Vamana avatara temples on Earth). ↩︎