Thevaram: Songs With Meaning

Appar (formerly a Jaina monk named Dharmasivachariyar) was tortured by a Pandya king. He was forced to lie on a stone bed heated from below, yet he smiled. This song is his manifesto.

Describing Shiva’s various dances.

Before these saints, worship was largely the domain of Brahmins, locked in Sanskrit rituals of fire and flower. The Thevaram poets broke every rule. They walked dusty highways, sang in the chaste Tamil of the common folk, and proclaimed that God was not in the distant Devaloka but in the burning ground, the potter’s street, the mind of the suffering devotee. thevaram songs with meaning