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shlokam:

The terrific Lord, yellow in color, with hands like yugAs (four), in the right hand holding axe, deer, with a hand in boon giving posture, pArvati to the left, blessing chaNdEshvara by keeping His hand on his body, to the right, Three eyed, with all decoration, wearing crescent, with ga.nga, to Him salutations.

purANa of the deity :

chaNdEsha anugrahar : One blessing chaNdEshar (bhOga mUrti)

chaNdEshvarar is one of the 63 saints - nAyanmAr. He is one of the heads of Shiva gaNas, who owns whatever is used for Lord Shiva after His acceptance. He sits to the left of Lord Shiva and the final offerings are done to him in any pUja in the temples.

chaNdEshvarar (his original name is vichAra charmar) was born to echcha dattan. The man in the village, who used to take the cows for grazing, used to beat them and torture them. chaNdEshvarar being an ardent devotee and full with love, took over that job. He used to leave the cows in the morning in the grounds and sit in meditation. By the fall of the evening he brings them back to their houses. Under his supervision cows started giving plenty of milk. When chaNdEshvarar sits in worship of the Almighty they used to come near and start giving the milk on their own. He used that milk for anointing the LiN^gam he makes out of the sand and worships it. One day some ignorant, who was passing by mistook him and thought chaNdEshvarar milked the cows to pour it into the sand. He reported this to chaNdEshvarar's father. The next day his father followed chaNdEshvarar without his knowledge and hid behind a shrub. As usual the cows gave the milk and chaNdEshvarar started performing anointing to the LiN^gam with the heart flowing with bhakti. echcha dattan without realizing his bhakti hit him with a staff. But he continued his worship without any effect. He was fully involved in the offerings. Irked echcha dattan kicked away the pots having milk disturbing the worship. chaNdEshvarar got angry at the disturbance to shiva pUja, took a staff lying nearby and threw it and didn't bother that the irked echcha dattan was his father. That staff became axe and cut off the legs of irked echcha dattan. In the complete neutrality he was not partial to look into whether the person disturbed the worship was his father or anybody else. The Lord pleased with his devotion, appeared before him, wound the garland of konRai that he was wearing to his head, made him sit next to Him in the left, and owner for all shiva prasAdam.

Read the more detailed story of chaNDIshar from periya purANam.

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