SRI MURUDESHWARA KSHETRAM
BHATKAL TALUKA, KARNATAKA
Murudeshwara is another name for Shiva.
Once, Ravana prayed to Shiva to get his powerful Atmalinga.
Pleased by his penance, Shiva gave him the Atmalinga but warned him not to place it on the ground before reaching destination
To prevent Ravana from becoming all powerful, Sri Vishnu covered the Sun with his chakra. As Ravana always did Sandhya prayers, he needed to put the Atmalinga down. Sri Ganesh appeared as a child and agreed to hold the Atmalinga for Ravana. @DubeyYash1911
However, Ganesha put down the linga before Ravana’s return. Vishnu also uncovered the Sun.
Furious Ravana tried to lift the linga but failed. It’s shape now looked like a cow’s ear. This place is known as Gokarna (Go means Cow and karna means Ear in sanskrit).
The case of linga fell 23 miles away at Sajjeshwar. He threw the lid to the south 27 miles away at Guneshwara in the form of “Vamdev Linga”. The thread winding the linga was flung to south at Dhareshwara and it came to be known as “Tathpurusha Linga”.
The cloth wrapped on the linga fell at Kanduka hills and took the form of Aghora at Murudeshwar.
The word Mrida comes from trampling of cloth and also means happiness.
So Murudeshwara is the Lord of happiness.
Praying to Shiva at these Panchkshtras frees one from all sins.
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Ahobilam is the place where Prabhu appears in his fierce form, called Ugra Narasimha, who is Svayambhu (self-manifest).
Ahobilam is one of the 108 Divya Desams. It has 9 shrines for different forms of Narsimha.
Ahobilam was the exact place where Sri Narasimha appeared and tore apart Hiranyakashipu to save Prahlad. At that moment, all the Devas appeared and praised him as Ahobala (Aho is mighty and bala is strength). So the place came to be called Ahobilam.
Out of the 9 shrines, most famous is the Ahobila Narasimha Swamy where Prabhu is seen as Ugra Narasimha.
In another shrine, Prabhu appears as Malola Narasimha Swamy. Malola means beloved of Lakshmi. Here Prabhu is in peaceful mudra with his consort Ma ChenchuLakshmi.
The divine abode of Mallikarjuna Swamy (Jyotirlinga) and Devi Brahmaramba (Shaktipeeth).
When Ganesha was married before Kartikeya, he left in anger to Kraunch mountain. Shiva and Parvati also followed him there.
Shiva assumed the form of Jyotirlinga and resided on the mountain by the name of Mallikarjuna. Mallika means Parvati while Arjuna is another name of Shiva
It is also said that once, a princess Chandravathi, saw a cow shedding milk on a rock resembling a shivlingam. @DubeyYash1911
She started praying to the lingam daily and used to offer jasmine (mallika pushpam) daily. Pleased Shiva appeared before her and agreed to wear jasmine garland (mallika pushpmala) on his head permanently. Since then, Shiva became known as Mallikarjun Swamy.
There was an Asura, Kaumasura, who was doing penance to please Shiva and get a boon. To prevent him from asking for a boon, Devi Saraswati made him dumb (hence called Mookasur)
Later, Adi Parashakti slayed him and came to be called Mookambika.
It is said that Adi Shankaracharya had a vision in which Devi agreed to follow him provided he did not look back. He kept walking and was assured of her presence due to the sound of anklets. When he reached here in Kollur, he turned back as the sound of anklets had stopped.
So Devi stayed here and merged with the lingam. The place came to be called Mookambika Kshetram.
The linga has integrated on it’s left side MahaKali, Maha Lakshmi and Maha Saraswathi and on the right side- Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva.
ARULMIGU SRI PARTHASARATHY SWAMY KSHETRAM, CHENNAI (TN)
Divya Desha where Perumal appears with moustache of a Sarathi (charioteer) to conduct Arjun’s Rath in Kurukshetra war.
Here, Venkatkrishna-Parthasarthy is present with his entire family.
He is flanked by Sri Rukmini, Sri Balarama, Satyaki, son Pradyumn and grandson Anirudha.
It is said that on the request of Raja Sumathirajan, Sri Perumal appeared and stayed here as Arjun’s charioteer (Partha-sarathi).
He is without chakra as he had promised not to wield weapons in Mahabharata war.
The face has scars caused by Bhishma’s arrows on Arjun. Prabhu took the arrows on himself to protect Arjun.
In the Kotirudra Samhita of Shiv MahaPurana, there is a story of a hunter, Gurudruh (गुरुद्रुह). The hunter was a cruel man who knew no mercy.
One day, he kept roaming in the forest but could not kill any animal. @RatanSharda55
It so happened that it was Shivratri that day.
At night, he took some water with him and climbed a bilva tree near a pond hoping to find an animal. Soon, he saw a roe (female deer).
As he was going to kill her, some water and bilva leaves fell on a Shivlinga below the tree.
The roe begged for mercy and asked him to let her go and meet her kids one final time. The hunter agreed.
After sometime, another roe came. Again, some water and bilva leaves fell on the shivlinga as Gurudruh tried to kill her.
She too asked him to give her sometime.
Known as Dakshin Badri, Thiru Narayanapuram is one of the four famous Swayambu Kshetrams, the other three being Srirangam, Kanchipuram and Tirupati.
The presiding diety is Cheluva Narayana Swamy/ Selva Pillai/ Rama Priyan.
Once, Sri Rama gave his aradhana murthi of Sri Ranganatha, to Raja Vibhishana on his request. So he was left without a murthi for his daily pujas. Brahma is said to have provided the murti of Selva Pillai to Rama who later passed this on to his sons, Lava and Kusa.
When Kusa’s daughter married a Yadava prince, this murthi moved to the lunar dynasty from solar.
It is said that the utsav murthi got the name Selva Pillai due to Sri Ramanuja.
Once, a Sultan took away this murthi and Sri Ramanuja went in its search to the Sultan’s palace.