Thiru van vandoor Mahavishnu temple

Thiru van vandoor  Mahavishnu temple

(Built by Nakula the fourth Pandava brother and one of the 108 Divya Kshetrams)

Compiled by

P.R.Ramachander

       This temple is situated 7km from Chenganoor and is believed to have been built by Nakula, the fourth brother among the Pancha pandavas. The God is also called Pambanai appan(Lord who sleeps on serpent) or Kamalanathan ,. People believe that Panchali the wife of Pandavas got the Akshya Pathra   in this temple and in memory of this daily anna dhanam is carried out in this temple. Some people are of the opinion that  this   place was called “ Thiru Pandava oor”      and this name became over years as  Thiru van vandoor. Others believe that due to heavy population of   Bees(Vandu in Malayalam) which make sound  around  this place. But one of the old inscriptopna call this place as Thiru van Mandur.

     This temple has been mentioned in Narada Purana. It seems once Narada was cursed by Lord Brahma who was his father and that sage came to this place and did penance addressing LKord Vishnu. It seems Lord Vishnu came  and gave him the boon of wisdom and as a result sage Narada wrote the Narada Purana  consisting of 25000  verses in this place. It seems sage Narada also wrote a book detailing the worship procedures   at this temple. Devotees also believe that sage Markandeya was able to see Lord Shiva in Thiruvandur. Nammalvar one of the great Azhvar saints has written poem with eleven stanzas extolling the greatness of the God here. Because of this  Thirvandoor is one of the 108 Divya Kshethram of Vaishnavas.,

     The Lord Vishnu is consecrated here facing the west unlike the other four Pandava temples in Kerala. In a inscription by king Vallabha kodha, this God is addressed as  “Thiruvan mandur Pattara”. Here also the God Vishnu is in the standing posture with four hands holding conch, wheel, Lotus and mace. Near Lord Vishnu , statues of Lord Ganapathi    and Lord Dakshinamurthy   is specially  consecrated.. At the entrance of the sanctum sanctorum , there are two huge Dwara Palakas and on the , over the door , There is a statue  of Lord Vishnu sleeping on the snake . This possibly musyt have lead   to the name Pambanai appan.  There are sub temples of Sastha, Shiva and Ganapathy out side the main temple. There is another remarkable Krishna temple in the temple compound. Here Lord Krishna is in his baby form   standing on two folded legs and one hand and showing the left  hand containing curd rice..He is seen holding the   rice with two of his fingers .  It seems in the year 1325, the king of Ambalapuzha send his  emissaries to bring this Krishna statue to the temple at Ambalapuzha  as there was some defect in the statue there. ,. Jnazhapalli Nambudiri   who was priest of Thiruvanvandur did not want to happen  and threw the statue in the river flowing on the east of the temple and disappeared. In 1960  One Damodaran who was an art teacher in the local school  saw a dream , in which he was told that this statue   was in the temple pond of Thiruvanvandur.  He was instructed to recover the statue and consecrate it.Damodaran with the cooperation of local people dug the pond for 47 days but still could not find it. A Christian family   whose house would be affected if the digging continued    warned Damodaran and others to stop the digging next day. The next day they found this great pretty idol of Balakrishna. It was  again consecrated in a very grand manner  . In memory of this the local people started a festival lasting for 51 days. On the fifty first day , a huge   procession starts from Thiruchithat temple   and reaches here. A feat in which about 1000 kg of rice is cooked   greets the devotees on that day.

    In the month of Kumbham there is a eleven  day Ashtami Rohini festival in this temple. The temple is open from 5 Am to 11.320 Am and  5 Pm to 8 pm.