Nalayiram Pillaiyar Temple, Nangur – Legends
According
to Ramayana, Vali was the king of Kishkinda. He was the husband
of Tara, the elder brother of Sugriva and father
of Angada. His subjects were the Vanaras. He was blessed with
the ability to obtain half the strength of his opponent due to a boon given by
Lord Brahma for his intense penance on Brahma. Vali was extremely powerful with
his power almost equal to that of 75000000 elephants. Thus, Vali became
invincible. It was said that no one could defeat Vali in head-on battle.
Vali was
invincible during the Treta Yuga. Vali defeated some of the greatest warriors
like Ravana. A raging demon known as Mayavi came to the gates of Kishkinda
and challenged Vali to a fight. Vali accepted the challenge. When he came
forth, the demon got terrified and the demon fled in terror into a deep cave. Vali
entered the cave in pursuit of the demon, telling Sugriva to wait outside. When
Vali did not return and upon hearing demonic shouts in the cave and seeing
blood streaming from its mouth,
Sugriva
concluded that his brother had been slain. With a heavy heart, Sugriva rolled a
boulder to seal the opening of the cave, returned to Kishkinda, and assumed
kingship over the Vanaras, taking Tara, the wife of his brother as his
queen. However, inside the cave, Vali killed the demon and returned home. Upon
seeing Sugriva act as a king, Vali thought his brother had betrayed him. Though
Sugriva humbly attempted to explain himself, Vali would not listen.
As a
result, Sugriva is exiled from the kingdom. To exact his vengeance, Vali
forcibly took Ruma, the wife of Sugriva for his own and the brothers became
bitter enemies. Sugriva ran off to Rishyamukha mountain, the only place
Vali would be unable to enter because of the curse of the sage Matanga. In
exile, Sugriva made the acquaintance of Rama, the avatar of Lord Vishnu,
who is on a quest to rescue his wife Sita from the demon Ravana, king
of the rakshasas.
Lord Rama
promised Sugriva that he would kill Vali and would reinstate Sugriva as the
king of the Vanaras. Sugriva, in turn, promised to help Rama with his quest.
Together, Sugriva and Rama went to seek out Vali. While Rama stood back,
Sugriva shouted a challenge and dared him to battle. The brothers rushed at
each other, fighting with trees and stones, with fists, nails, and teeth. They
were evenly matched and indistinguishable to the observer, until Hanuman,
stepped forward and placed a garland of flowers around the neck of Sugriva.
It is
then that Rama emerged with his bow and drove an arrow through Vali's heart.
After the death of Vali, Sugriva reclaimed the Vanara kingdom, took back his
first wife, Ruma, and also reclaimed Vali's primary wife, Tara, who became
his queen. Her son by Vali, Angada, became the crown prince. However, Lord Rama
was afflicted with dosha for killing Vali. To get relief from dosha, Lord Rama
reached Nangur and made an image of Vinayaga with the sand of Manikarnigai
river and performed pooja.
A divine
voice instructed him to conduct a Yagna with 4000 vedic priests for relief.
Lord Rama invited vedic priests to attend the Yagna but only 3999 priests came
for his Yagna. Lord Rama felt bad about the absence of one priest. Seeing the
condition of Lord Rama, Vinayaga himself came as a priest and attended the Yagna.
Thus, Lord Vinayaga came to be called as Nalayirathil Oruvar (Tamil) / Chathur
Sahasra Ganapathy (Sanskrit). Later, the name got corrupted to Nalayiram Pillaiyar.
