Plans were being made to attend the Swarna Garuda Bhagawan
Prathistapana at the ParaShakthi Temple in Michigan in April (above photo from that temple); at the very end,
due to unforeseen circumstances, the trip had to be cancelled. The heart felt
very bad and the mind was constantly thinking of Garuda. Then a thought came
that the least that can be done is a Garuda Homam at home. To do that, a
Sahasranama for Garuda was sought for and Sri Muralidharan Iyengar had
gracefully put up the only one of its kind on the internet. The heart felt
happy; but the next moment, upon quickly perusing, found that this particular
hymn does not follow the same meter as the other Sahasranamams do and the
recitation become very difficult at the outset. The decision was to proceed
further with the Homam comprising of the Sahasranamam ( even though it would
not sound melodius ) and the Garuda Gayathri. At the end of this post is a
short clip from the second half of the ritual, and one can hear the birds
singing in the background; it felt very powerful !
That night, the mind was being still focused on Sri Garuda;
suddenly a thought came as to how to recite the hymn nicely; immediately made a
voice memo on the cell phone; next day recorded the recitation and here is the
presentation of Sri Garuda Sahasranamam – one of the MOST beautiful
recitations one comes across. Co-incidentally, that evening, after work,
having tea in one hand, the television sound muted, as chatting went on with
Srimathy regarding Garuda Sahasranamam recitation and the beauty It
encompasses, she kept nudging with elbows to watch the television screen and lo
and behold, there was the Eagle from the USPostal Service advertisement! The
heart felt Garuda’s presence in the conversation between the two earthly beings
!
The key in the rendering is to club the tail end of each
line; because it may not be obvious as to where to club, a copy of the original
shlokam with the clubbed areas underlined has been scanned and a link to the
same given for everyone to use; this is in the Sanskrit version only. One can
use this audio and/or the marked up lyrics to do the same in other languages.
Of course, one can add “Svaha” at the end of every couplet and offer in a
Homam.
Sri Garuda Bhagawan represents the “All-Seeing-Eye” of Lord
Maha Vishnu and from the initial “occurances”, it is felt He is “quickly
approachable." It is felt that may be Sri Garuda wanted this recitation to reach
others first so all can benefit and then He will grant His darshan to this
humble soul and that is why the trip to Michigan got postponed; for this
desparate desire may not have risen otherwise. The Divine accomplishes Its
mission in mysterious ways.
As far as “Phalasruthi” or benefits, listening to this
Sahasranamam is especially helpful for those that are going through Rahu Dasai
and Kethu Dasai. Additionally, most couplets throughout the body of this stotram ask Sri
Garuda for specific benefits ( something not normally seen in Sahasranamams )
from removing fear, gaining wealth, destruction of poisons, gaining a
physically attractive body, acquiring Divine Knowledge (Brahma Vidya), removal
of attachments, removal of pains and the list goes on. It might be interesting
for some to note that these specific requests mostly match the clubbed words
! And now one can imagine the depth of knowledge of the Rishi ( Sri Krishna
Bhattachaarya ) who composed this Absolutely Wonderful Hymn !
This is a long hymn. 29 MBAnd now the audio: 31 minutes 24 seconds long.
( Mobile devices: click download; then play.)
NOTE: BECAUSE THIS IS A VERY LARGE FILE ABOUT 29 MEGABYTES, YOU WILL HAVE TO DOWNLOAD AND THEN LISTEN. On mobile devices and some computers, you may get the message -- This file is too large for Google to scan, download anyway? -- You will have to answer "YES" and then listen after download. On some computers, when you hit the play button, if nothing seems to happen, click the Download arrow at the top, click download anyway and then listen. Sorry for the inconvenience -- but this is a big file and praise to Sri Garuda Bhagawan -- His Grace is magnificent !
There are 3 errors in the audio:
Verse 10/Line 1: Audio should be "Mathiman" not "Mathimaan"
Verse 15/Line 2: Audio should be "Chaarna" not "Chaarnaa"
Verse 100/Line2:Audio should be "Dayathaam" not "Dhayithaam"
The Marked Up Sanskrit lyrics can be found at :
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5yrewH-M1zndHZCTnZVX0VoaUk/view?usp=sharing
For those interested in lyrics in other languages, they can
be found at:
http://www.bharatiweb.com/?p=6978
Additional information on Garuda worship can be found at:
http://knramesh.blogspot.com/2013/08/garuda-panchami-part-2-garuda.html
The original shlokam put forth gracefully by Sri Muralidharan
Iyengar can be found as an attachment to the post at:
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/sathvishayam/9IMclvcZSxY
And here is a short 1 minute 47 second video clip from the
Garuda Homam at home on April 23, 2017. One can hear birds chirping at 2:50 pm in the afternoon !
