By Kambar (Kavichakravarthy Kamban)
Translated in English by P. R Ramachander
Kamba Ramayanam-Bala Kandam 3 (Padalam 9)
9. Ahaligai padalam(The chapter on Ahalya)
( Rama along with the sage enters the pretty Mithila. Near the gate of the town they had a strange experience in giving redemption to Ahalya. Ahalya was created as the most pretty lady by Brahma and given to sage Gautama in marriage. Indra fell in love with her. So when the sage was away he came to his hermitage he made love to Ahalya. She too realized that it was not her husband but permitted it. Sage Gautama came back , caught them red handed and cursed that Indra should have 1000 woman’s private parts on his body and Ahalya would become a stone. When Rama was walking that way , the dust of his feet touched that stone and she regained her form. Sage Viswamithra took Ahalya to the hermitage of sage Gautama and reunited Ahalya with him. Then they proceeded to MIthila , the capital of king Janaka. In Valmiki Ramayanam , sage Gautama curses that Indra should loose his testicles and Ahalya would become invisible and be in her house . Rama enters her hermitage and she regains her original form. The devas attach a testicle of a Ram to Indra. When Ahalya regains her form, sage Gautama comes there and gets reunited with her.)
452. hey reached the river Sona which had sand dunes ,Which are washed by best of gems and sandal and Akil,Which had breasts which wore ornaments giving great joy,Which had thin waist resembling the climbing plants of Vanchi Nadu,Which wears Mekala , the belt like ornament , which has black sand looking like haris,And which had canals going round the hill as its anklets going round its legs,
453. When they all reached the river Sona , the sun which had thousand rays ,Thinking that till it would rise the next day , and provide cool atmosphere for them,And to Reduce its normal boiling nature giving heat , went more speedily ,Than the eyes of his charioteer Aruna and along ,With the horses drawing his chariot bathed in the sea,
454. The scented lotus flowers with long stem ,Which had only opened on that same day, Which grow in the water bodies with cool water ,Which are the temples of Dharma giving charity became closed andGoing away from that attractive forest of lotus flowers The male bees which become happy on drinking honey during dayWent away to search and settle down with female bees for night.And in one of those gardens they settled for night.
455. The Sun who was having large number of rays . After removing the dark black colour of the night , Along with his chariot started from the blue sea ,And looked like the huge lotus flower and ,Appeared as if it had risen from the belly of Vishnu along with Brahma.
456. Those three who were like trinity Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva,Departing from there reached a river which drags the yellow,Ixora flowers along with honey from the forest like matted hair,Of Lord Shiva who rides on the red eyed bull and also keeps him in his flag,Which was similar to the golden Cauvery and which was called GangaWhich was pretty , great and lashing on both its shores.
457. The good crane which has just woken up from sleep in the lotus forest,Those former girls who were plucking weeds from water filled fields,With shining eyes , which the cranes thought were fish and plucked by their nose,But later they felt ashamed and such was the cultivable lands of Mithila ,And the three people lead by sage Viswamithra reached there.
458. In the gardens of that country , where huge water storages give out the sound of drum,With Asoka trees giving out new flowers daily which appeared like lamps held by the tree,With bees singing in the Yaazh of good flowers,From where honey drips looking like a srting of the Yaazh, The peacocks were dancing in these gardens.
459. When in those fields, using their sight as emissary and wishing to join with their lovers ,Who are wandering here and there , was sent by the ladies with lustrous forehead Making the minds of the ladies hate the cultivators in the fields,Who throw the weeds of the blue lily plants which look like eyes, on the round pretty lotus flowers Making those ladies think that some other ladies were looking at their lover and become sad.
460. In that land , the swans which are in the water storages ,After seeing the pretty walk of the ladies there ,Under the impression they are their mates follow them.IN the cold water after ladies with nightingale like voice take their bath,Making birds come in to contact with the Kumkum left by them,Those outside fight with them, thinking they are some other birds,Leading the birds not to sleep even though lotus flowers sleep.
461. In the rivers of that country apart from clear cool water flowing,The milk from the udder of the buffaloes which follow each other The juice of mango fruits fallen from the tall growing mango trees on both banks,The juice of cut sugar cane which turn like nectar when shaken in the factories,And the honey from the broken bee hives also flow.
462. In the dancing stage where ladies who have waist as thin as a cotton thread ,Bending backward due their mountain peak like breasts and their rain drop like cool eyes danced,When the players of drums were playing their big drums loudly,Hearing that pretty music the big young bullocks run greatly scaredAnd go and mix the water in the streams with their horns ,The fish in those streams get very scared and jump on ,The leaf sheaths of betel nut tree growing on its shores.
464. When the ladies of that country put their sword like eyes,In those sword case like eye lids and close them tightly ,And take bath in widely standing water bodies ,And rise from there after taking a dip , they look like Goddess Lakshmi,Rising up from the ocean of milk when it was churned ,And those ladies along with their densely worn bangles ,Again sink in the water creating sound of their bangles,The bees bore in to the flowers and drink honey from that.
464. After reaching such a great country of Mithila with joy,They stayed outside the boundary walls with many flags,There they saw the big hill and over that a granite stone ,Which was the wife of great sage Gauthama ,Who was cursed due to her losing her virtue,Which is against the proper tenets of family life.
465. When the feet of Rama belonging to the Kakustha clan,Touched that stone , like the one who got true wisdom,Was removed from the darkness of the mind affected by ignorance,And as a result got his real true form and joined with the feet of God,That Ahalya got back her old form and stood there,And sage Viswamithra who saw it , told Rama like this.
466. Oh son who was born in the family of king who brought river Ganges from the sky,She who is standing with great joy and with shyness , who is like a streak of lightning,Is Ahalya , the wife of Gautama who gave one thousand red eyes ,To the king of Devas who made love another’s wife willingly.
467. When Rama , who is the lord of earth heard this from the one with golden matted hair ,Asked, “What is the nature of this event ? How did this happen ?How did it end?“Did it happen due to Karma done in previous birth?Is there some reason for it to happen?Please tell me how this happened to this lady who is looking like my mother.
468. When Rama told these words , seeing at him that sage told,“Oh Rama who has all good qualities, please hear .Once upon a time ,Lord Indra who had the lustrous weapon called Vajrayudha ,Wanted to join with the pretty breasts of the doe eyed lady Ahalya ,When the great sage who did not have qualities like jealousy ,Was not there in his hermitage.”
469. Due to the spear like eyes of the lady and the arrows of Love god hitting him Indra started searching for a method to love her and one day,Due to the great love , he lost his brain and he made that great sage,With a mind without deceit Go away from there ,Took the form of the sage and entered his hermitage.
470. When he entered there and when both of them were enjoying ,The fresh scented honey like love play , she realized her mistake,And after wards though realizing that act , which was like new honey was not proper ,
And when she was continuing it with full consent,That very able sage who was in no way less angry than Lord Shiva with three eyes, Very speedily came back to his hermitage.
471. By the time that sage Gautama, who has capacity to give boons as well as ,Capable of cursing which was unlike arrows which can be stopped,Reached his hermitage , that lady who had earned a bad name,Which will stand in the world permenantly for all time to come,Stood there greatly nervous due to great fear and the shivering Indra,Started his efforts to go away from there.
472. That sage who had a very clean mind , getting angry , spitting fire from his eyes,And understanding about the sinful act done by both of them ,In words which were hot like the arrows leaving your bow ,Told Indra, “let you have thousand private part of women in your body”,And within no time all those thousand came and joined the body of Indra.
473. That Indra became matchlessly ashamed due to that in his body,Which made others laugh at him went back to heaven and then the sage,Seeing that tender lady and cursed her too,”You please become a stone like the courtesan,And she immediately became a black stone and has been lying here ever since.”
474. That lady while becoming a stone told the sage ,“Oh god like sage who showers fire from his eyes, It is told that to excuse the fault of younger ones is the duty of elder ones, And so please tell me how this great curse will end in me,And that sage who wears a flower garland frequented by bees told,When the dust of the feet of one called Dasaratha Rama falls on you ,You would get rid of the form of stone and become your normal self,”
475. Viswamithra continued and told , “this is what ,happened earlierFrom now on , all the beings of the world would get rid of all sorrow only,As they should not suffer any more sorrow , Oh Lord of the colour of the cloud ,While coming , when you killed the black Rakshasi in war, I saw greatness of your hand,And here in this place I saw the greatness of your feet.”
476. That black Rama who has provided Ahalya help without evil,After hearing and understanding all that was told by Viswamithra,Told Ahalya, “Oh mother , to get the mercy of the saint with great penance ,You serve him and do not be sad, thinking about what happened in the middle ,”And Ahalya after saluting the golden feet of Rama went away.
477-478. When all of them reached the hermitage of Gautama of very great penance,That sage who was greatly surprised to see his guests , hospitably received them,And treated without any shortcoming of hospitality and then Viswamithra ,Who was the son of Gadhi told him, “as soon as the dust of the feet of this black coloured Rama touchedThat lady with a climbing plant like waist regained her old form and stood up,Please call her who has not done a sin willfully “and sage Gautama,Who was similar to Lord Brahma born out of lotus , consented to this.
479. That charitable Rama who was great in all the good qualities,Saluted the lotus like feet of Gautama , went round him clockwise,And entrusted that lady with great virtuous character in his hand,And immediately along with Viswamithra of great penance ,Came out of that garden with scent of flowers And all of them saw the outer gem studded boundary wall of Mithila.
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About Kavichakravarthy Kamban
Historians place him in the 9th century CE, But surely Kamban belongs to the third great wave of Tamizh literature that started with the Sangam period (dated before the Common Era), followed by the widespread impact of Bhakti literature of the Alwars (vaishnavite saints) & Nayanamars (shaivaite saints). Kamban Authored Ramanaya in Tamil…Known as Kamba Ramayanam..
Kambar has been the milestone for the Tamil scholars that none had reached. He was also known as “Kamba Naatazhvar” at his time. Many Tamil authors from the modern world have written the books on the poet Kamban.
FAQs
Kambar or Kavichakravarthy Kamban (1180–1250) was a medieval Tamil poet and the author of the Ramavataram, popularly known as Kambaramayanam, the Tamil version of the epic Ramayana.
Valmiki Ramayana and Kamba Ramayanam are two versions of Ramayana written in the Sanskrit and Tamil languages respectively. … Kamba Ramayanam is originally called as Ramavataram. Although Valmiki Ramayana is the original version of the story of Rama, Kamba Ramayana is believed to be based on the work by Valmiki.
The Kamba Ramayanam, is a Tamil epic that was written by the Tamil poet Kambar during the 12th century. Based on Valmiki’s Ramayana (which is in Sanskrit), the story describes the life of King Rama of Ayodhya.
The book is divided into six chapters, called Kandam in Tamil. The Kandams are further divided into 123 sections called Padalam (படலம்) in Tamil. These 123 sections contain approximately 12,000 verses of the epic.