Vadakkunnathan Temple - Legend

Legend

The story of the origin of the Vadakkunnathan Temple is briefly narrated in Brahmāṇḑa Purāņa and there are references to it in some other works also. Though there are small differences between these accounts as regards details, all agree on the central fact, namely, that the temple was founded by Parasurama. Parasurama exterminated Kshatriyas twenty one times. In order to expiate the sin he performed a yajna at the end of which he gave away all the land to Brahmins as dakshina. He wanted to retire to some new land to do tápasya and so he requested god Varuna to throw up a new piece of land from the sea.

According to another version, some sages approached him at the end of the yajna and requested him to give them some secluded land. Parasurama then made the request to Varuna for their sake. Varuna gave him a winnow (surpa) and asked him to hurl it into the sea, as he did a large territory of land was at once thrown up by the sea; this territory that rose out of the sea was Kerala. It was then known by the name "Surparaka", from the word, "Surpa" meaning winnow.

According to some other accounts Varuna asked Parasurama to hurl his axe into the sea. Parashurama now wanted to consecrate this new land. So he went to Kailasa to his guru Shiva and requested him to take abode in Kerala and thereby bless the region. Shiva accompanied by Parvati, Ganesha, Subrahmanya and his parashadas went along with Parasurama, to satisfy the desire of his beloved disciple. Shiva stopped at a spot, now Thrissur, for his seat and later he and his party disappeared and Parashurama saw a bright and radiant Shiva linga at the foot of a huge banyan tree. This place where Shiva first manifested his presence through the linga came to be called the Sri Mula Sthana.

For sometime the linga of Shiva remained at Sri Mula Sthana at the foot of a huge banyan tree. The ruler of Cochin Kingdom then decided to shift the linga to a more convenient place and enclose it in a good temple. Arrangements were soon made to reinstall the idol in the new place. But there was an initial diificulty. The linga could not be removed without cutting off a large part of the banyan tree. While cutting the branches of the tree there was the danger of a piece of it falling on the idol and damaging it. When the ruler and the others did not know what to do, the Yogatirippadu came forward with a solution. He lay over the idol so as to cover it completely and asked the men to cut the tree. The cutting began and to the wonder of all not a piece of the tree fell anywhere near the idol. The idol was removed with all due rituals and installed in the new place where it has remained till now. Then a beautiful temple was built according to the rules laid down in sastras.