The Munnesvaram Priest

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Names are given in the text. Women are in brackets.

Underlining indicates the working priests, 1985-6.

The main officiating priests are Maniswamy (28), Somaswamy (33) and Seeniswamy (34). Seeniswamy is the senior of these, being fully trained as a kurukkal both in Jaffna and by his father, Subrahmaniam (21) who was the

senior officiating priest until his retirement in the early 1 9 8 0 's. Seeniswamy is qualified to wear the large wooden necklace indicating his position and it is he who performs the priestly roles in the annual Adi Utsavam festival. With Maniswamy and Somaswamy, Seeniswamy shares the daily temple duties on a three week roster; but he and his father hold more senior positions. They both receive a percentage of the annual temple income on top of a monthly salary, whereas Maniswamy and Somaswamy only receive a monthly wage. Seeniswamy increments his income through his private astrological consultancy while Maniswamy and Somaswamy earn commissions from the private rituals they accomodate within their daily schedule. That is, from accepting offering baskets and performing such private rites as the consecration of motor vehicles between the usual periods of temple r i t u a l .

Seeniswamy and his Subrahmaniam are the only priests who wear their hair in the customary priestly manner of shaved at the front and long at the back tied in a knot. Their position is additionally reflected by the location of their house immediately north of the temple wall, the original priests' housing built in the 1 8 7 0 's, and the housing occupied by Ratnakailasanathan whenever he comes to Munnesvaram. Maniswamy lives on the other side of the temple, and Somaswamy lives in Negombo, staying in the northern housing during his week's shift.

The more senior priests are closer kin to the incumbents. Seeniswamy's father, Subrahmaniam (21), is a

parallel cousin of Ratnakailasanathan (26) the chief incumbent; their mothers are sisters. Moreover, Subrahmaniam's wife was R a t n a k a i l a s a n a t h a n 's parallel cousin (FBD). Consequently they speak of each other as brothers, as do their sons, Seeniswamy and Karthikkeyan

(30). Somaswamy (33) is similarly related but other factors account for his relative distance.

Although retired, Subrahmaniam still assists w ith special rites. He is a widower and as a result he should not perform the full duties of a kurukkal. That is, technically he should not perform any duties, because only married priests should officiate. This rule is, however, not strictly applied. The explanation for the rule is that the male Brahmin only becomes, as it were, whole through m a r r i a g e . Through establishing a household with a female Brahmin, the male Brahmin gains a complement of creative energy (jsakti), rendering him complete and able to act as a priest. Fuller (ibid:30-31) describes the same rule and theory for the Madurai priests, but notes that the rule is not everywhere the same and is not formally orthodox (or Agamic) . This too is the situation at Munnesvaram: the priests know the rule but are not especially strict about it and so Subrahmaniam helps out with r i t u a l .

Laxity about rules is especially evident in the case of the younger priest, Somaswamy (33). He is similarly related to Ratnakailasanathan as his classificatory brother, Seeniswamy (F B S ) , but he is not qualified to act in the senior position because he is married to a Sinhalese

Catholic woman and lives w i t h her in Negombo. Entering such a marriage is tantamount to renouncing his caste position. In the very least he should be excluded from any position in the temple. But neither course has been taken. Rather than outcast him or deny him a role in the temple, his family treat him as a bachelor. But this poses the additional difficulty, of being regarded as without access to the sakti of the female Brahmin. The tension is resolved through his bachelorhood not being considered as problematically as the question of his marriage to a non- Hindu, non-Brahmin. So he is there, acting as a priest, all of the considerations being subordinate to another factor: the importance of the kin group of priests and their control of the temple. Treating Somaswamy as if he were a bachelor, is to treat him as if he had never left the kin group, a group whose sanctity overrides factors that threaten its Brahmin s t a t u s . T h u s , though it might appear as if the priests flaunt the issue of caste purity, they are actually quite concerned about it as it manifests in their control of the temple.

Both of Subrahmaniam's other sons were university students (35 & 36) while I researched at Munnesvaram, but they stayed at Munnesvaram and worked in the temple during their holidays. Seeniswamy, the eldest, had also wanted to go to university and had successfully attained his A le v e l s . His hopes were curtailed when the role of temple priest fell to him and he commenced full time kurukkal training upon finishing school. His choice as priest stems from where he is in the network of relations.

Maniswamy (28) lives w ith his family and his mother away from the other priests. At the front of their house they have a small shop where they sell items for offering baskets (coconuts, flowers, etc.) as well as soft drinks. Thus, in addition to priest's duties, Maniswamy is a petty entrepreneur. Maniswamy's father, Vaitheesvaram (22), was also a temple priest until he died in 1985, causing the temple to be closed (see Chapter 7). Both Vaitheesvaram and his brother, Subrahmaniar (23) (also deceased), worked at the temple on wages and were related to the controlling family through S u b r a h m a n i a r 's marriage to the ex-incumbent Balasubrahmaniam's (16) second daughter, Sivahamasundari (24). Balasubrahmaniam's eldest daughter, Paramesvari (25), was married to Ratnakailasanathan (26) and it was Ratnakailasanathan who subsequently inherited the incumbency from his father-in-law. The younger daughter and her husband do not seem to have been so well provided for; but importantly, Ratnakailasanathan is Balasubrahmaniam's cross cousin (MBS) as well as being his daughter's husband and having other affinities (i.e., W F Z H S ) . It seems, therefore, that Balasubrahmaniam's first daughter's marriage was more carefully arranged than the second to Maniswamy's father's brother; since the second daughter's husband was not related, or at least not closely enough related for m y informant, Karthikkeyan, to know. This explains the subordinate position of Maniswamy and his family in the strata of temple priests and suggests that prescriptive marriage rules have also been conditioned by the issue of temple ownership.

The Brahmin married to Ratnakailasanathan7s daughter (31) works sometimes at Munnesvaram although he is employed full time as an assistant postmaster at the Chilaw post office. Earlier he was the postmaster at Kalpitiya, but transferred to Chilaw in order to live at Munnesvaram. Generally, he could be found working at the temple on w e e k e n d s .

Living next door to Subrahmaniam and S e e n i s w a m y 7s house is another Brahmin family who are related to the senior Brahmins but are not indicated on the genealogy. The father is very old and long retired from working at one of the major orthodox temples in Colombo, the Ramanathan Temple. His son works in the Chilaw court as a reporter and also works at Munnesvaram, specialising in the chanting of texts and singing of devotional Tamil hymns from the T h e v a r a m . When he is unavailable, Seeniswamy and Karthikkeyen will chant. In other words, there is no special priest for chanting (castiri). This accords with B a n k s 7s observation about the limited ritual specialisation of Brahmin subcastes in Jaffna (Banks ibid:66-69). What is evident at Munnesvaram is that ritual specialisation is organised in terms of relative proximity to the nucleus of the controlling family.

Four other salaried Brahmins constitute the rest of the Brahmin workforce, m o s t l y performing non-priestly a c t i v i t i e s . One is distantly related I was told and he works as a helper. His m ain duty is to keep the temple machinery operating. This is the water pump, generators,

public address, and lighting. I often saw him leaning over a car engine in Chilaw town. He also performs rituals every Friday at the Manuweriya Siva temple, a few kilometres north of Chilaw (the temple of the cast out linqam mentioned in Chapter 2) . The second priest keeps all the accounts and takes bookings for special rituals. He is unrelated to the owning family and comes from South India. The third is also unrelated and only recently arrived at Munnesvaram. His labour is not so specialised and he helps everyone, particularly w i t h the rituals. The fourth is described as an apprentice and prepares all the temple food in the kitchen in the south-east corner of the temple. His younger brother, crippled by polio, also lives at the t e m p l e .

Finally, there is Karthikkeyan (30) whose incumbency is inherited from his father Ratnakailasanathan and mother Paramesvari. With his elder brother, an accountant living in London, and his father, Karthikkeyan is the legally listed temple trustee. He has resided at Munnesvaram since 1968 when his father was named a trustee, but his father lived in Jaffna until early 1985 when he moved to Colombo. He works mostly with his private astrological consultancy which is patronised by many members of the Sri Lankan elite, including the ex-prime minister, Sirima B a n d a r a n a i k e . Occupied w ith this, he is rarely at Munnesvaram and the temple management is left to Karthikkeyan, a bachelor in his m i d - t h i r t i e s . Unmarried, Karthikkeyan does not perform ritual but does assist with the large, privately sponsored rites, w hich are described

in Chapters 8 - 1 1 , usually doing recitations. His other activities include private tuition classes to a group of village children and the running of the village cricket team. Karthikkeyan does not seem especially interested in performing ritual and sees himself more as a manager.

Ratnakailasanathan (26) was named as co-trustee with his wife's father, Balasubrahmaniam (16) shortly before the latter died in 1968. Similarly, Balasubrahmaniam inherited the chief owning position through marriage to Somaskanda's (3) daughter (15) when Somaskanda died in 1940. In this way, temple control has passed to affines in the absence of male heirs on two occasions. Somaskanda inherited the position from his father, Muttuswamy (2) in the 1920's, and Muttuswamy from his father, Kumaraswamy in 1919. Patrilineal succession is the norm and affinal the second a l t e r n a t i v e .

Two significant factors emerge from description: firstly, the temple operates with a large Brahmin workforce whose importance to temple life extends beyond mere ritual performance; secondly, most of these Brahmins belong to one family, and this family effectively owns the temple. A kin nucleus constitutes the temple trust and the senior priestly positions, while the extended kin perform other duties. Munnesvaram, therefore, can be characterised as a 'closed-shop' with a large Brahmin presence. The kin nucleus of owners is protected by the w a y senior positions are kept within the family. Brahmins continue to hold senior positions when technically they should give them up

(the case of the widower and of the priest marrying out of caste being treated as a b a c h e l o r ) , and non-priestly Brahmins hold relatively senior positions on account of their relatedness to the owning family (the court reporter and p o s t m a s t e r ) .

Asking the Brahmins themselves about this unusual situation and they responded that it is appropriate for there to be so many Brahmins as this ensures a better ritual service. They also referred to the temple's links with kings and the need for there to be so m a n y Brahmins in a king's temple. They thus articulate a v ery hierarchical argument in the strict sense of Hindu hierarchy. But it is important to see this situation as a result of the unusual fact that Munnesvaram temple is controlled by its priests as a consequence of two major court cases. The priests' hierarchical views are contingent on their circumstances.

The 1873 Case

The 1873 case for which Kumaraswamy Kurukkal came to Munnesvaram was brought by a group of eleven Munnesvaram villagers who were farming on Munnesvaram temple lands. The rapidly developing plantation economy, with its land- grabbing and haphazard land-sales by the colonial authorities of anything remotely resembling wasteland, necessitated the vindication of title over existing holdings. Documentary evidence, real or otherwise, was regularly tabled in the courts and some scholarship was

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often necessary to determine its authenticity . W ith a stone inscription recording a 15th century land-grant by

Parakramabahu VI, Munnesvaram had a piece of solid evidence, but the group of villagers needed a scholar to interpret its contents. So they hired Kumaraswamy. The group, which included the local police and irrigation headmen, powerful men in the local context, defined their use rights over the temple lands through their association w ith the temple as self-proclaimed "trustees". The senior of them was the Munnesvaram incumbent, Sinnetamby Kapurala, by then an old and feeble man (The Ceylon L a w Recorder

[abbrv. C . L . R . 1 Vol. VII, 1925:16)4 .

According to Sinnetamby Kapurala's great great grandson - the current owner of the Bathrakali temple - Sinnetamby's father, Narayan, was the adopted son of a Brahmin, Ratnasinghe Giri Aiyar, who died sometime in the 1 8 2 0 's. I suspect that Ratnasinghe Giri Aiyar and his father, Mayasinghe Giri Alakoon Aiyar, who founded the Bathrakali temple, were related to the Brahmins incumbent at the Munnesvaram temple. These Brahmins are last m e ntioned in

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any known official document in 1804 (Sarma 1968:59-60) . It is stated that there were no Brahmins to officiate at Munnesvaram after 1804 (C.L.R. i b i d ) . M y information indicates that Brahmins were in the area up to the 1 8 2 0 's, but it is known that by 1819, Ratnasinghe Giri Aiyar was feeble and in debt. In that year he handed over some of his village land to his debtors and formally adopted Narayan. It was probably through Ratnasinghe that Narayan's son, Sinnetamby, became incumbent of M u n n e s v a r a m . But he did nothing about the temple which by 187 3 was in ruins. The name "Aiyar" denotes a Brahmin status, as does "Kurukkal".

"Kapurala" denotes a Sinhalese Buddhist deity priest.

Kumaraswamy Kurukkal, had emigrated to Colombo in the 1850's from Kanchipuram, South India, and was at Munnesvaram by 1871. Because of S i n n e t a m b y 's ill-health, the group of villagers nominated Kumaraswamy as the temple incumbent and in 1875, in a letter from the Ceylon Governor, he was formally recognised as the Munnesvaram chief priest (ibid). His appointment and his commencement of ritual at Munnesvaram reconstituted the temple as a functioning temple with legitimate claims to its lands. Doubtless, if Kumaraswamy did not already know of the historical significance of Munnesvaram when he first arrived, his translation of the documents for the land claim would have informed him. Beginning his involvement with Munnesvaram as an adviser, Kumaraswamy quickly took an active role, spending a large sum of his own money in the 1 8 7 0 's rebuilding, and by performing rituals or having another Brahmin perform them when he was in Colombo where he usually resided. In 1878, he named Muttu Aiyar as his full attorney with respect to Munnesvaram temple. Stipulated in the document naming Muttu Aiyar was the use of temple income in the repair and improvement of the temple buildings (ibid:17).

The villagers supported Kumaraswamy w h e n he set about the temple renovation in the 1870's, importing artisans from Ramanathapuram, South India. The renovation further rendered the temple's legitimate claims to its lands. The new temple, however, was more than what had been rebuilt in

the 1750's. It was built closer to the principles of Agamic Hindu orthodoxy at the direction of Kumaraswamy and at the hands of the South Indian artisans. The stone inscription of Parakramabahu Vi's land-grant was built into the sanctum wall during this renovation. It was thus from the outset of K u m a r a s w a m y 's incumbency a significant part of the temple a e s t h e t i c .

Fowler, translating the inscription in the m i d 1 8 8 0 's, notes that the priests were using the inscription as evidence in the land claim they were then making (Fowler 1887:118). This was another claim made by Muttu Aiyar in 1886. Thus the stone inscription was, as it were, in fairly continuous use in the early years of the modern Munnesvaram in the midst of expanding estates, increased population, and the associated pressure on land. The association of the temple with its past was paramount in the context of the priests grappling with the conditions of the present.

This link with the past is also a link with the p r e ­ colonial state. It shapes the Munnesvaram priests' perception of the temple as a king's temple, the only one of its kind in Sri Lanka. The link with kings, discussed already in relation to the temple origin myths (Chapter 2), is constantly noted by the priests in several contexts especially in the anomalies they perceive in the ritual aesthetic (discussed in Chapter 8). It also relates directly to their understanding of temple ownership.

The following is Fowler's translation of the stone inscription which is written in Grantha script, a form of Tamil. Emphasis is added.

Let happiness be! On the tenth day of the waxing moon in October, in the thirty-eighth year of his reign, His