Sri Rangaraja Stavam: Uttara Satakam
by Parasara Bhattar · Sanskrit · 105 slokams
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Meaning
Out of compassion the Lord gives us the scriptures as a valid means of knowledge, like a lamp, to remove darkness and to tell the real from the unreal. Those who have merit see by this lamp and enjoy him. Yet some restless people fall into that same lamp like moths and destroy themselves.
Meaning
O treasure of Srirangam, there are teachings outside the Veda, such as those of the Jainas, and there are wrong views that claim to stand on the Veda. Manu has said that all of these only blind sinners on the path that leads to you.
Meaning
O Lord found in Srirangam, the elders reject the systems outside the Veda for four reasons. They deny even what we perceive, they quarrel with the flawless Veda, they grow from faulty reasoning, and they carry the defects of their human authors.
Meaning
The body is made of parts and is seen by the outer senses as 'this'. The self is without parts, is known as 'I', and is beyond the senses. Because the two are so close, people fail to tell them apart. O Lord of Srirangam, that is why the scriptures, which speak of the world beyond, are needed to teach the difference.
Meaning
O beloved of Srirangam, hearing scripture is itself a direct perception, and the knowledge of its meaning is free from defects. What it teaches, such as right and wrong, the higher and lower worlds and the Lord, cannot be contradicted by sense perception. So even by the materialist's own standard it is valid like perception, and in any case a yogi whose vision is opened can directly see those very things.
Meaning
The Buddhist nihilist says the world is not real, not unreal, not both, and not beyond both, refusing every position without any limit. O Varada, giver of boons, this thief who steals the very ground from under every claim deserves to be cut down.
Meaning
If knowledge is accepted, then not everything is denied, and if it is not accepted, who is left to deny anything? So a denial without limits cannot stand. Any denial points to something real, just as a broken pot leaves its pieces. And if one claims there is no valid knowledge at all, the Veda still stands, since nothing remains to oppose it.
Meaning
Among the Buddhists, the Yogacara denies the outer world, and the Sautrantika says the world can only be inferred from the variety of our ideas. The Vaibhashika accepts that it is perceived, but says it lasts only a moment. O Ranganatha, all three say that everything is mere knowledge and breaks up every instant, so we set them aside.
Meaning
If the world is fleeting, the mind is fleeting and the self is only that passing mind, then there is no real knower, and the known and the knowing become the same. And if everything perishes in an instant, there could be no memory and no recognition. O moon of Srirangam, such a world would be empty.
Meaning
When we say 'I know this', the self that knows and the object known plainly appear as different. If they could still be one, then all outer objects might as well be one too. And if the objects of knowledge were false, the knowing would be false as well. If our opponents can accept all this, our own doctrine will live long indeed.
Meaning
May this weapon of Rama, the Kali age, cut down those who claim that Brahman is pure consciousness, shining yet whirling about in its own ignorance, and that some soul who has learned non-duality then removes that confusion. These unwise people teach that whatever is seen is unreal.
Meaning
The Jainas follow the twisted path of their 'seven possibilities' (it may be, it may not be, and so on) and say that the world, which is your glory, is never one thing for certain. In the same way, those who say the world is both different and not different from Brahman are like someone saying 'my mother is barren'. O lord of Srirangam, let these new knowers of Brahman keep this great secret to themselves.
Meaning
O Lord of Srirangam, the Upanishads plainly teach that you are the cause of the world. Yet Kanada and Gautama go begging with poor reasoning. They make space and everything else come from atoms and declare that your creation does not need you.
Meaning
The Veda is strong because it has no human author, and when it is read correctly it leads to you. Every other teaching is valid only to the extent that it rests on the Veda. So Sankhya, Yoga and the Pashupata teaching are accepted only in some parts, while the Pancharatra, known from the 'fifth Veda', the Mahabharata, is valid in every part.
Meaning
Sankhya does not accept you as Lord and counts you among the souls. Yoga accepts only some reflection of lordship. The Shaiva, out of too much love, imagines a beggar to be the king of gods. But you, O Ranga, have described yourself alone: Vishnu, rich with the supreme form, the vyuha forms and the avataras.
Meaning
I count as worthless as straw the outer creeds that you yourself spread on a misleading path. But O Lord, what shall I say of the wrong views of those who wear the armour of the Veda?
Meaning
At each dissolution you keep the impressions of the Vedas within you. At each new creation you recall them, give names and forms to all beings fit for them, teach Brahma and the others who wake as from sleep, and command what is good for each. Because you carry them in this way and they have no remembered author, the Vedas are valid.
Meaning
O Ranganatha, Shiksha teaches the sounds, grammar and etymology give the words, prosody gives the metres, and astronomy fixes the times. The Kalpa texts teach the rites, Nyaya and Mimamsa give sound reasoning for the meaning, and the Puranas and Smritis make the meaning plain. Helped by all these, the Vedas search for you.
Meaning
The Vedas come first as authority, and the Smritis with the Itihasas, the Puranas and logic help them. The first part of the Veda teaches the rites by which you are worshipped. The later part teaches your will, qualities and glory, so that one may reach your feet. O Lord, you yourself declared, 'I am the one to be known through all the Vedas.'
Meaning
Those with wrong views say that the reward of a rite comes from the act itself, from its hidden power, from some unseen force, or from the pleasure of the ancestors and gods. O Lord of Srirangam, those grown old in the Vedas say that the fruit of sacrifices and good works comes from your pleasure, and that even the command to do them comes from you.
Meaning
The daily and occasional duties are your orders. Rites for heaven and other wishes are things you only permit. Hymns for harming enemies are a concession you make for crooked minds. O Lord of everything, ruler of all, this scripture shows your wish to protect, and so it is your eternal command.
Meaning
Just as the words 'there is treasure here' are meaningful because they point to something useful, statements in the Veda about your qualities, form and deeds are meaningful even though they give no order. O Lord of Srirangam, they all lead to you. It makes no difference whether they are joined to commands about worship and its fruits.
Meaning
A body belongs to its soul, effects belong to their cause, and class, quality and action belong to a substance, so our ideas and words about them rest finally on what they belong to. In the same way, this whole world rests in you, and you rule it as your own. That is why you are 'without a second'. What need is there, O Lord of Srirangam, for stories of maya, limiting adjuncts and mixed-up changes?
Meaning
You support, create, move, take back, control and pervade everything, so the whole world is your body and wholly serves you. That is why the great Vedic teachers have explained the texts of oneness, such as 'all this is Brahman', 'all this has him as its self', 'I am all this' and 'you are that'. O Lord who loves Srirangam, they explained them in this way.
Meaning
Foolish people have said that this world has a ruler, has none, has many, or has whatever ruler one likes. O Varada, the scripture sings that the world's variety and its levels of high and low show it is not self-ruled, and that conscious and unconscious beings always have you as their good king.
Meaning
Brahma and the others are counted among created beings, and they rose to their posts as soldiers of your eyebrow. They are not named among your avataras. So neither they nor anyone like them is you, and the world is under your single umbrella with Sri Mahalakshmi. O moonrise of the ocean of Srirangam, with the words of the scriptures and sages that point to you, we offer a fitting farewell to the debaters who come from nowhere.
Meaning
O Lord of Srirangam, six qualities adorn you: knowledge, lordship, power, unchanging strength, the strength to bear all, and splendour. They are untouched by any defect or limit, nothing equals or exceeds them, and they pour out a stream of auspicious qualities. They make you priceless, as rays make a gem priceless.
Meaning
O King of Srirangam, you see everything at once and at all times, whether through your senses or directly by yourself, with or without any fixed rule. You see it all as clearly as something held in your palm. The Vedas call your knowledge self-luminous, unobstructed and never failing.
Meaning
O Lord of Srirangam, supreme ruler, your eyes can serve as ears, so you hear with your sight. Since you use your senses as you please, it is natural that your vision reaches in every direction.
Meaning
Because you know everything, those who say the world comes from an unconscious cause are refuted, along with the Sankhya view of the Lord as a mere witness. O Lord who lies at Srirangam, your lordship shows you are the true cause. No one directs you, you are free, and nothing blocks you. With a mere touch of your will you brought out this world, varied by the good and bad deeds of beings, all at once and without effort.
Meaning
The wise call you the material cause of the endless universe, which comes out of your own body, and that is your power. It goes beyond all limits, so nothing is hard for you, and your will plays freely, needing nothing else. O King of Srirangam, this power, which makes you supreme, can be pictured through the spider that spins its web from itself.
Meaning
O Lord, you stand in your own greatness. Though you work without rest, you never feel tired, and you carry this whole universe as easily as your own body. That is your strength, which rules out any need to depend on others.
Meaning
Like musk that fills everything near it with fragrance while staying itself, you change all things just by being near them, yet you remain unchanged. O lover of Srirangam, this is called your virya, and it shows that you are a cause who does not change in the process.
Meaning
Even when helping causes are present, you can do without them. You act without needing anything else. O treasure of Srirangam, this is your tejas, your splendour. It wins over the sufferings of those who bow to you and overpowers those who oppose you.
Meaning
The Ananda Valli of the Upanishad tries to measure your joy and qualities, starting from the joy of a young, healthy man and rising step by step beyond Brahma. But it cannot reach its goal. It stumbles on the way and falls silent. O Lord of Srirangam, if even the Veda fails, how could mind or speech ever count or set a limit to your qualities?
Meaning
The qualities that the Upanishads hide like treasure buried in a forest, such as tenderness, skill, love for those who bow, forbearance, compassion, victory and beauty, are laid out in the jewel market of Srirangam. O Varada, there they can be used by everyone, like heaps of gems on sale.
Meaning
Your good qualities shine because they rest in you, as though they nourish themselves by depending on you. You are endless, self-ruled, full, and in a state of perfect calm. O Varada, only you know yourself, like a still ocean without waves, filled with a joy that you alone can know and that is doubled by being known.
Meaning
Indra and the other gods get only a faint smell of lordship, then think they are equal to you and lose their heads. You have boundless greatness and yet you stay calm, untouched by pride. This does not surprise us, O lover of Srirangam, because you are beyond even your own greatness and greatness is simply your nature. What is there that does not suit you?
Meaning
As Vasudeva with all six qualities you are the Supreme, enjoyed by the liberated, and as Sankarshana, with knowledge and strength, you withdraw the world and teach the scriptures. As Pradyumna, with lordship and virya, you bring about creation and dharma. As Aniruddha, with power and splendour, you protect and teach the truth. In this way, O King of Srirangam, you divide yourself into the vyuha forms.
Meaning
O Master, you take each of the four vyuha forms in four ways, with their own attendants, to suit those who meditate in states like waking, dream, deep sleep and the fourth state. So you are worshipped in a way that matches each kind of meditator.
Meaning
At the end of dissolution, souls lie mixed with matter and cannot be told apart. Moved by compassion and wishing to give them senses and bodies, O Varada, you by your own will made primal nature serve you. It burst forth like a bud into the great principle, the sense of self, the elements and the senses.
Meaning
The world is varied, with high and low and suffering, because you create according to each soul's karma. O Lord of Srirangam, that is why you cannot be accused of partiality or cruelty. The Upanishads, supported by the Brahma Sutras, say so.
Meaning
A worker with his own tools, a soul with its own body, a king who rewards obedience and punishes offences, or a giver who looks at those who ask, stays free even when they take things into account. O Lord who holds Srirangam as his all, in the same way, when you take note of the state of the beings you create, it only shows your freedom.
Meaning
At dissolution, the conscious and unconscious beings lie asleep in one corner of your body. O Varada, by your own will you spread them out again and play before Sri Mahalakshmi, like a peacock opening and shaking its jewelled tail before its mate.
Meaning
You always seek our good, yet we keep sinking in currents that lead us away from you and harm our own selves. Hoping that we will turn back, you still lead us on the right path. Like a mother who drinks bitter medicine herself for her sick baby, you take on trouble, O King of Srirangam, giving the rules for each class and stage of life.
Meaning
O Lord of Srirangam, you act for the whole world in the hope of helping even the most foolish people. If that were not so, how could you, the tireless one, keep the seasons, their signs and the flow of creation and preservation always running so faithfully?
Meaning
Like a friend who chains a madman, O Lord of Srirangam, you punish the cruel with hell and other penalties, and you protect others from harm. Just as the stick that guards the cake also guards the cake's owner, your punishment shows that you are a friend to all, the one who grants both enjoyment and liberation.
Meaning
You support, control, protect and watch over beings, and you give them the scriptures, yet many cannot be cured. Seeing this, you come down again and again as god, human and animal, taking the very nature of each, even though you are the unborn Lord whose nature never changes.
Meaning
In every birth Sri Mahalakshmi was born as your match, in a form and with a way of acting fit for you. If she had not joined you, O King of Srirangam, your play in the avataras would surely have been without taste, or even unpleasant.
Meaning
The wise know your great supreme nature, which shines even in human and other births. The foolish, not knowing it, look down on you. O Lord, your birth and deeds give themselves to those who love you.
Meaning
Your first avatara was as Vishnu, between Brahma and Shiva. If you meant to hide your true nature by appearing equal to them, O Lord of Srirangam, why do you show qualities like sattva, compassion and protection, which only reveal your supremacy?
Meaning
Remember, O Ranga, how as the horse-faced Hayagriva you drove off the obstacles Madhu and Kaitabha and gave Brahma back the Vedas, his divine eyes. In that way, without any reason of your own, you gave life to the whole world.
Meaning
O Lord of Srirangam, as the Swan (Hamsa) avatara you rose like a cool, clear moon that swallows darkness. With the light of the Vedas you blessed suffering souls and filled them with the nectar of the sacrifice of knowledge.
Meaning
O Lord of Srirangam, you lay on a banyan leaf like a baby of the ocean and put your lotus foot in your mouth. Was it to measure whether the worlds you had swallowed were all inside your belly? Or was it because you wanted to taste the sweetness that your devotees enjoy in your feet?
Meaning
'Pull up Mount Mandara and bring it, tie it with this serpent, and churn the ocean like curd with arms whose garlands swing. O Lord of Srirangam, take the moon, the Kaustubha, the nectar and the rest.' All this effort of yours bore fruit only when you won Sri Mahalakshmi.
Meaning
When the king of elephants cried out, the Lord of Srirangam pulled his tender feet out of the lotus hands of the goddesses who were pressing them, threw off the coils of Adisesha, quickly opened his fluttering eyes, and tore his chest away from Sri Mahalakshmi's saffron-marked bosom. May that troubled Lord stand before us.
Meaning
He ignored the hand that his tireless commander Vishvaksena held out. He did not put on the jewelled sandals that were brought. He left the anxious queens asking, 'What is it?' Without waiting for the bird to be made ready, he jumped onto Garuda. Salutations to the Lord's haste when the elephant king cried out.
Meaning
Garuda knew the minds of all and flew faster than thought, yet you felt he was slow. You drove him on with shouts, slaps and kicks. Then you jumped down from him as the elephant's cry grew louder. O God, kinsman of Srirangam, when a devotee calls, you are so lost that you do not know which way to run.
Meaning
O Lord who lies at Srirangam, you are my refuge. You rushed to the elephant like a lotus pond tossed in a storm, with your garlands, ornaments and garments all out of place, crying 'Shame on me!' as you answered the elephant's cry.
Meaning
O Lord, as the Fish you placed the boat with all moving and unmoving beings on your horn. Entertaining the sage with your own words, which were close to the Vedas, you carried him so that he felt not even a little fear of the flood.
Meaning
Your fish form was long, broad, lovely, clean and cool, shining like the eyes of Sri Mahalakshmi. You moved about happily, swallowing and spitting out the great ocean with your fins, playing in water and on land.
Meaning
O Lord of Srirangam, as the Tortoise you supported the whole world and set up dharma, and you held up the mountain for churning the nectar. Lovely on your emerald seat, you made it easy for Sri Mahalakshmi to rise from the waters and set her tender feet down. In this way you brought about the world's good.
Meaning
As the first Boar, you hurled the waters of the deluge into the heart of the gods' enemy that your tusk had torn open. You decorated the slope of the earth with the demon's blood like saffron, and you shook your mane and grunted joyfully toward Brahma's hymns. O Lord of Srirangam, you are my refuge.
Meaning
If people saw only a man or only a lion, they would be frightened. So the Lord joined the two forms in a wonderful natural union, like sugar mixed into milk. We worship the lion of Srirangam with his tossing mane and great fangs.
Meaning
His blazing eyes burned with hatred for the demon, and Sri Mahalakshmi, moving close, sprinkled them with the sweet betel juice from her mouth to cool them. His mane and shoulders were soaked with the blood of the enemy torn by his nails. May the man-lion, the one with five faces among men, block our sins.
Meaning
Even when the enemy who hated your devotee was already in the grip of your nails, your anger was so great that your body swelled to twice its size as Vishnu. O Varada, you held together the opposite natures of man and lion in one form with ease, and so you protected the world.
Meaning
To answer both Bali's generosity and Indra's begging, you became Vamana and asked for alms. When you strode, your lotus foot made the three worlds as small as a speck of dust. Your navel lotus stood ready, as if to create other worlds that you could measure. O Lord of Srirangam, at that event the Veda was the drum loudly proclaiming your victory.
Meaning
You became Parashurama of the line of Bhrigu, axe in hand. You cut down the kings, satisfied the ancestors with their blood, and lightened the earth weighed down by her burden. O faultless one, though you look fiercely at your enemies, do not count my sins.
Meaning
O Lord, you took birth as a man with Sri Mahalakshmi. If she then played a game of hiding in a forest, was it right for you to bridge the ocean and leave the rakshasa, made proud by the boons of Brahma and Shiva, to be the leftovers of the monkeys? Were you not ashamed?
Meaning
In a game of dice you counted your wins by knocking out the teeth of the king of Kalinga. Even a short separation from you caused an uproar for Kaliya's people. Through your mission as a messenger, the cowherd girls forgot Krishna's faults. O Lord of Srirangam, we worship you as Balarama, the ploughman who brings well-being.
Meaning
Dark like a cloud slowed by the weight of water, wearing yellow silk, lotus-eyed and holding five weapons, Brahman itself became a nursing baby. Devaki asked you for exactly this. O beloved of Srirangam, what other woman has longed for a son in such a way?
Meaning
When you played your flute, rocks and fire turned to water, sages became dazed and dull things became wise. Snakes became nectar for the cowherds, cows and tigers became brothers, and everyone else became quite different. O Lord, you yourself became one of them, lost in your own music.
Meaning
As Kalki you will one day lighten the earth and cut down the evils of Kali. O Lord who lives at Srirangam, why wait? Cut down every hurtful thing today itself, saying, 'Cut it down, cut it down!'
Meaning
Let your avataras be, as countless as your qualities and overflowing with them. O Lord of Srirangam, even in temples on earth and in small huts and groves, you are worshipped as the archa form. You bear everything, you place your whole existence in the hands of your priests, and you are pleased by loving hearts. That is why your simplicity makes us helpless with wonder.
Meaning
Your blessed Paramapada lies beyond speech and thought, and your avataras happened only at certain times. Thinking 'this form is for the good of the whole world', you lie in Srirangam. With looks that welcome the suffering and are moist with compassion, you melt us. You sleep with a wakefulness that is lost in thought about saving the world.
Meaning
Brahma, whose wisdom grew wide through practice in creation, knew you as the one who lies on Adisesha. Joined with Sarasvati, his partner in dharma, he praised you freely. For many ages, drenched by the Ganga flowing from his water pot, he worshipped you with his faces, eyes and folded hands, offered like lotuses.
Meaning
O Lord, the light from the fish-shaped jewels on the bowed crowns of the kings of Manu's line waved like lamps before your lotus feet. Then, in Srirangam, you yourself received worship fit for you through your own form as Sita's beloved, Sri Rama.
Meaning
You passed over the line of Manu and even the blessed Brahma and honoured Vibhishana instead. O Lord who lives between the rivers, in this way you give joy to people like me who have no good qualities.
Meaning
The Vedas speak of the supreme, adorable light of the sun, the golden person who is gold from head to toenail and whose eyes are like lotuses. They mean you. May I worship that Sri Ranganatha.
Meaning
You are the soul of all that moves and all that stands still, the eye of Mitra, Varuna and Agni, and Sri Mahalakshmi is joined to you by a deep and natural bond. May we see you in Srirangam for a hundred autumns.
Meaning
I am the servant of the Lord who lies in the lofty temple of Srirangam, and I will never separate from him. Being what I am by nature, his servant, I will worship him with sacrifices made of knowledge.
Meaning
You are the life of all beings and the nectar of the gods. O Lord of Srirangam, I take refuge in you. For your sake I offer myself, this inner self, to you, the great and supreme Brahman.
Meaning
O Lord of Srirangam, in the Gita you praised as generous all four who come to you: the distressed who want relief, those who seek wealth, those who seek their own self, and the wise one who longs only to serve you. You counted them alike, as people who have done you a favour by coming to you.
Meaning
O moon of Srirangam, some people of right understanding, free of selfishness and attachment, offer to you all their daily, occasional and even desire-based duties and perform them as ordained. Yet they do not really perform them for themselves at all.
Meaning
Some separate their own inner self, the twenty-fifth principle, from the mass of outward things and see it clearly. Fixing it in a mind that holds only truth, O Ranganatha, they reach either their own self or you.
Meaning
Others, whose impurities are worn away and whose hearts melt and hurry toward you with service that is their very nature, spend their days singing your glory, thinking of you and bowing to you. Overcome by devotion, they reach you, the far shore. O Lord of Srirangam, they say you belong to them even more than they belong to you. What can be said about that?
Meaning
The Upanishads say that the Lord with Sri takes hold of conscious and unconscious beings through their existence, support and control, all for his own purpose. So being the means and the goal is your very nature, not just a quality you have. That is why, O Lord who lies at Srirangam, I have taken refuge in you without any other motive.
Meaning
A clever ruler can decree that a single cowrie shell is worth a copper coin in one place and a crore of gold in another. In the same way, O treasure of Srirangam, you alone decide whether a soul stays bound or is freed. So you alone must protect me.
Meaning
I have no wealth of knowledge, action or devotion. I do not know desire, eligibility, ability or even regret. O Lord of Srirangam, I am full of sin, and I say 'Be my refuge' only with my mouth, while my mind is still disturbed by sense objects.
Meaning
O moon of Srirangam, you are the goal of life and you care for me completely. Yet I put my faith in deceitful things that destroy the self. Full of ego, I deceive the whole world by posing as a teacher, as though I were like those wise devotees who belong only to you and are like your own self.
Meaning
I cross your commands about what to do and what to avoid. I hurt you and your devotees in word, thought and deed. Knowingly or unknowingly I keep on doing the offences you cannot bear. O lover of Srirangam, only because of your patience have I not become a burden too heavy for you.
Meaning
The cool shade of your arms, like wish-granting trees, is there for me. Yet, O life of Srirangam, I seek shelter in the shade of sense pleasures, which are like the hoods of angry cobras.
Meaning
O kinsman of Srirangam, it seems the power of a worm like me is greater than your almighty power. Like a silkworm trapped in its own cocoon, I escape even your mercy and destroy myself.
Meaning
O Lord of Srirangam, no one can find the end of my faults, just as no one can find the end of your qualities. Like someone who stays thirsty in the middle of a flood, I am not a fit vessel for the rain of your qualities that should fill my thirst.
Meaning
Out of mercy you take birth among humans and other beings and go through the results of their karma. If so, O Lord who lies at Srirangam, why should we be overcome again and again by our good and bad deeds?
Meaning
Forgiveness is meant for an offender who repents. How can it reach me, who offends and is proud? Even so, O Lord of Srirangam, may your boundless forgiveness overlook even my lack of repentance.
Meaning
Your forgiveness shrank in the case of the crow and of Shishupala, sinners like me, because they had at least a little good quality. O Varada, may that same forgiveness rule freely and always over me, who has not even heard of the smallest good quality.
Meaning
Mercy removes the suffering of others, but the pain of worldly life feels like pleasure to me, so I am beyond the reach of mercy. Yet mercy also shows that pain is pain. So, O Lord of Srirangam, full of good qualities, have mercy on me.
Meaning
Tossed by the six waves of womb, birth, old age, death, suffering and karma, I still desire you, who are fit only for Sri Mahalakshmi. It is like a dog wanting the offering meant for the gods.
Meaning
O treasure of Srirangam, all this humility of mine may only be an imitation of the great elders. If it is mere show, then my enjoyment of the riches you give me is no better than a dog's.
Meaning
To anyone who surrenders even once and begs, 'I am yours', you vowed to give freedom from fear. O Lord of Srirangam, yet I, lacking trust and understanding, set even you aside and remain stuck in my own 'I'.
Meaning
The righteous elders have placed me in your care as your burden, and I too have said the words 'you are my refuge'. With these as witnesses, O Lord of Srirangam, bearer of all burdens, make me your burden today itself.
Meaning
Mercy means being unable to bear the pain of others, but no one is other to you, so you are not merciful in that sense. You do not even know the faults of those who bow to you, so, O moon of Srirangam, you are not really forgiving either. Nor are you generous, because you think that the wealth you give already belongs to the one who asks.
Meaning
O Lord of Srirangam, by the height of your qualities lift up this person who has sunk very low. To give fully what a needy person asks for is the true mark of the Lord's lordship.
Meaning
Supporting those who follow the paths of karma, knowledge, devotion and detachment is like giving water to fish. O Lord of Srirangam, if you protect me, who has nothing at all, that is like setting up a water booth in the desert.
The text is checked verse by verse against prapatti.com, sanskritdocuments.org, sadagopan.org, Stotra Mala (1949). The meanings are simple ones to help the reader; learn the recitation from an adhyapaka.
These are short introductions to help the reader; the works themselves are best studied under one's acharya.
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