To establish dharma, save pious people from the clutches of demons / ill minded people, Sriman Narayana manifested into several avatars and Sri Narasimha Avatar is one among them; most of us knew that Narasimha had killed Hiranyakasyapu, the demon king and blessed Prahlada his great devotee; due to His furious nature as Narasimha, no one could control his anger, Brahma and other mini gods were afraid of his rage.
Brahma, accompanied by other mini gods, approached Siva and described the Narasimha Avatar. Siva took it lightly and said this is a tiny issue and he can sort it out with ease in no time; he instructed Vinayaka to subdue Narasimha; when Vinayaka approached Narasimha, Narasimha severely warned and drove him away; Nandi, Aghora Veerabhadra were sent to subdue Narasimha, one after the other, after Vinayaka failed in his attempts, Nandi, Aghora Veerabhadra were severely attacked by Narasimha and they reported severity of their experience to Siva; ego and arrogance entered Siva’s mind and he took the form of Sharabeswara with 5 heads, 16 arms, 8 legs, Kali and Durga as his wings and was accompanied by his parivara devatas and he reached the spot to fight with Narasimha.
Narasimha’s blazing fury reached peak, he took the form of Ashtamukha Gandabherunda Narasimha – the 8 faces are: 1] twin headed Gandabherunda facing East, 2] Adi Jvala Narasimha facing SouthEast, 3] Vyagra facing South, 4] Hayagriva facing SouthWest, 5] Varaha facing West, 6] Hanuman facing NorthWest, 7] Garuda facing North and 8] Bhalluka facing NorthEast. Here we have to note the power and secret of the name. Many of us knew very well that Hanuman also has 5 faces and in that form he is called / worshiped only as Panchamukha Hanuman but whereas here the name is Sri Ashtamukha Gandabherunda Narasimha and not Ashtamukha Gandabherunda. There is a significance of the name Narasimha added as suffix to the name i.e. all the 8 faces not only have their individual, specific grandeur and strength but it is combined form, i.e. gets double effect, fortified with the grandeur, strength of Narasimha and that is why this avatar gets the name as Sri Ashtamukha Gandabherunda Narasimha. [SAMGBN]
SAMGBN immediately attracted the strength of Kali and Durga from Sharabeswara by akarshana since they are Vishnu Mayas, they left Sharabeswara and entered centre of the chest of Narasimha as Ashta Kali and stomach as Ashta Durga [Sri Tattvanidhi, a silpasastra grantham describes these details in the dhyana slokam on SAMGBN's roopam] i.e. first Sharabeswara lost the supportive strength of both Kali and Durga and they multiplied into 8 forms and strengthened Ashtamukha Gandabherunda Narasimha.Here also a secret is hidden i.e. why should one form of Kali and Durga multiply into 8 forms and enter the physique of SAMGBN. i.e. all 8 forms of Kali and 8 forms of Durga are supportive strength to all eight and individual faces of SAMGBN. This event also has a specific purpose and Vishnu knows very well when, where and how to act i.e. in war one should know the strength of the opponent and attack on his strength first so that he looses courage as well as strength and that is what SAMGBN did first.
SriDevi occupied SAMGBN’s right chest and BhuDevi occupied his left chest. In this posture, he already had Hiranyakasyapu’s body on his lap and SAMGBN’s arms started multiplying and reached 32 crores in count. SAMGBN caught hold of Sharabeswara and placed him on His lap and started his furious act on Sharabeswara. Sharabeswara realised his mistake and prayed to Sri Mahalakshmi to rescue him; Lord Mahalakshmi took the form of SIMHALAKSHMI also known as NARASIMHI / SIMHAKALI / PRATHYANGIRA with lion’s face and female body from neck to toe.
Here we have to look into one important aspect i.e. Simha is powerful among animals, Sharaba is powerful than Simham and Gandabherundam is the most powerful than sharabam. Logical analysis reveals that Sharabeswara took a powerful form than Narasimha and Narasimha took the most powerful form than Sharabeswara as Ashtamukha Gandabherunda Narasimha. But Mahalakshmi did not took the form as Sharabeswari or any other form as powerful than Narasimha to support Sharabeswara, but simply took the form as Narasimhi / Simhakali / Simhalakshmi i.e. a combined form of the energy of Narasimha / Lakshmi / Kali and Durga since Kali and Durga have already entered the physique of Ashtamukha Gandabherunda Narasimha and proved to the world that she is the female form of Narasimha known as Narasimhi. When Narasimhi / Simhakali manifested, she did not fight with SAMGBN but just sat on his lap as SIMHALAKSHMI and absorbed the blazing fury of Narasimha.
Saivite’s likely to say that Pratyangira was released either from one of wings or from his thirdeye; their arguement is illogical since if Sharabeswara can release Pratyangira from his wing or thirdeye, he could as well done it even before he took the form of Sharabeswara i.e. in his Siva form he could have released Pratyangira from his thirdeye but that did not take place.
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