Thirumoolar in his Thirumandiram pays obeisance to Uma Devi, whose penance was blessed in Thiruvavaduturai. Thirumoolar stayed in Thiruvavaduturai, and he says that he had been reciting the many names of Lord Siva. Sitting under a peepul tree there, he acquired Siva jnana, he says. He calls the tree ‘Siva bodhi.’ Steeped in meditation, he did not notice the passage of time, said R. Narayanan in a discourse.
Thirumoolar then poses a question. If one has not done good in one’s previous births, how can one attain good in subsequent births? Considering that he has been blessed enough to praise Lord Siva in Tamil, he says it is obvious that he must have done good in his previous birth. Here, by previous birth, Thirumoolar means his life before he entered the body of the cowherd Moolan.
Thirumoolar was originally called Sundaranatha, and he came to the earth to meet sage Agastya. Chancing upon a dead cowherd, and his agitated cows, Sundaranatha entered the body of the cowherd, who was called Moolan.
Sundaranatha could accomplish this because of his powers. He had the power of the eight siddhis. His idea was to take the cows to their shelter and return to re-enter his body. But when he returned, he found that his body was missing. And so he stayed on in Moolan’s body, and came to be called Thirumoolar. It is these events that he is referring to here.
It was Lord Siva’s will that he should continue to live on in this world for many years, so that he could write the Saiva Agamas in Tamil. He is referring to his life as Sundaranatha as his previous birth and his present life as Thirumoolar as his next birth. He was chosen by Lord Siva to propagate the Saiva Agamas, which are as sacred as the Vedas.
