Place · Vishnu temple · India
Varadarāja at Kānchī
The Vaishnava Divya Desam at Kanchipuram, Tamil Nadu, where Vishnu is worshipped as Varadaraja ('king of boons') on an elephant-shaped hill in the eastern half of the city. One of the 108 Divya Desams of the Alvar hymns and listed with Srirangam and Tirupati as the three Dvayavastagattrai or 'Beloved Places' of Vaishnava devotion. The temple's hundred-pillared mandapam (16th-c. Vijayanagara) is one of the great works of Dravida architecture. Ramanuja served as acharya here before moving to Srirangam. Every forty years the deity Athi Varadar, kept submerged in the temple tank, is raised for a 48-day darshan — most recently in 2019.
- Function
- Sacred site & pilgrimage
- Tradition
- Shrivaishnava tradition
- Confidence
- Established / referenced
- Location
- 12.819, 79.725
Connections (1)
- Shrine within cityKānchī / Kānchīpuram / Kanchipuram
The Varadaraja Perumal temple is Kanchipuram's principal Vaishnava sanctuary and one of the 108 Divya Desams, named with Srirangam and Tirupati as one of the three especially important places. It gives the city its Vaishnava vertex, balancing the Shaiva Ekamranatha and the Shakta Kamakshi within one liberation city — and the balance was not always peaceful, since the town's Shaiva and Srivaishnava establishments have quarrelled over precedence, land and processional routes for centuries.
Sources
Wikipedia, “Varadharaja Perumal Temple, Kanchipuram”. Archaeological Survey of India and State Archaeology monument records, and the standard regional literature.
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