Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple, Srirangam

Deity

Ranganathar in yoga nidra with Ranganayaki

Where

Tiruchirappalli, Tamil Nadu · 10.86N 78.69E

Usual hours

4 am – 12.30 pm, 4 pm – 9.30 pm — hours change with festivals and the season; check before travelling. Were these right when you went?

Grahas

Guru Sukran

Visited for

The first of the 108 Divya Desams and the largest working temple in the world, seven prakarams inside the Kaveri. Vaikunta Ekadasi and the Paramapada Vasal are its great days.

The sthala purana traces the vimana over the sanctum back to Brahma, and from him through the line of Ikshvaku down to Rama. Rama is said to have given it to Vibhishana after the war as a parting gift.

Vibhishana carried it south towards Lanka and set it down on this island in the Kaveri to perform his evening worship. When he came to lift it again it would not move. The sthala purana has it that Ranganatha chose to stay, and turned his head south towards Lanka so that Vibhishana could still see him — which is why the Perumal reclines here facing south rather than east.

Srirangam is the first of the 108 Divya Desams and is sung by almost all the Azhwars. The temple enclosure, at seven prakarams, is the largest functioning one in the world; the outer prakarams are ordinary streets with houses and shops in them.

Ramanuja lived, taught and administered here for much of his life, and the Ramanuja shrine in the temple is where his body is held by tradition to be preserved.

The temple was sacked during the Delhi Sultanate raids of the early fourteenth century. The processional image was carried away to safety and brought back years later, and the temple’s own histories record the episode in detail.

The great southern Rajagopuram was left unfinished for centuries and was completed in 1987. It is the tallest temple tower in Asia.

Twenty-one gopurams and seven walls. The outer two enclosures are lived in; the temple proper begins several gates in, and non-Hindus are admitted as far as a stated point.

The vimana over the sanctum is gold-plated and shaped like the syllable Om. Ranganatha reclines inside on Adisesha, facing south.

The thousand-pillared hall and the Sesha mandapam, with its rearing horses cut in the round, are the best carving. Ranganayaki has her own shrine in a separate enclosure, and worship there is taken separately.

The twenty-one-day Adhyayana Utsavam in Margazhi is the great season, and Vaikunta Ekadasi in the middle of it, when the Paramapada Vasal is opened, is the single largest day.

The Chithirai Brahmotsavam, the Jyeshtabhishekam in Aani and the Panguni float festival are the other full weeks. Purattasi Saturdays bring their own crowd.

Also called

Thiruvarangam, Bhoologa Vaikuntam, Periya Koil

Period

Very old foundation, built up in stages under the Cholas, Pandyas, Hoysalas, Vijayanagara and the Nayaks

Reaching it

Srirangam is on the island between the Kaveri and the Kollidam, about 8 km north of Tiruchirappalli Junction. Srirangam has its own railway station, and city buses run to the east gopuram.

• Jambukeswarar Temple, Thiruvanaikaval 2.5 km · Saiva
• Purushothaman Perumal Temple, Uthamar Kovil 2.5 km · Vaishnava
• Uchi Pillayar Temple, Rockfort 3.5 km · Ganapathi
• Samayapuram Mariamman Temple 9.5 km · Sakta (Amman)
• Vayalur Murugan Temple 10.8 km · Murugan
• Pundarikakshan Perumal Temple, Thiruvellarai 11.3 km · Vaishnava

Been to this temple? The things that change — whether the hours on this page were right, whether the sannidhi was open, how long the queue was on a Saturday — are exactly what no printed source keeps current, and what the next person travelling here needs.

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