Lord Uchinathar - The One Who Took Care Of His Devotees' Mid-day Meal!



This article is dedicated to Sivapuri Uchinathar temple which is situated at Cuddalore district of Tamil Nadu and lies about 5 kms away from Chidambaram. The presiding deity of this temple is Lord Shiva, referred to as Shri Uchinathar and His consort is Devi Uchinayagi. The lingam is considered to be swayambhu (self-manifested). Behind the deity of the temple, there is a sculpture of Lord Shiva and Devi Parvathy decked for their wedding.  There are other shrines to deities like Lord Vinayagar, Lord Subramaniam, Kaala-bhairavar, Dakshinamoorthy and so on. 

There are many legends surrounding this temple.

It is also referred to as Thirunelvayil (nel meaning rice) as there used to be many paddy fields surrounding it at one point of time. The temple is associated with the legend of Thirugnana Sambhandar, one among the 63 devotees of Lord Shiva who called themselves as Nayanmars. Sambhandar was born to Shivapada Hrudayar and Bhagawati who were staunch devotees of Lord Shiva. Once, when Sambhandar was 3 years old, he accompanied his father to a temple in Sirkali. The father left the child on the steps of the pond where he went to take a holy dip. The child was hungry and started crying. It is said that Lord Shiva requested Devi Parvathy to feed milk to the child, and the Devi obliged. When the child's father finished his ablutions, he came and saw that there were milk droplets on the child's face. When the father asked the child about who fed him, the child pointed towards the direction of the temple and uttered the first words of the hymn that he would write in future. It is said that Devi Parvathy fed wisdom milk to the child who grew up to be Thirugnana Sambhandar, a great devotee of Lord Shiva. 

When Sambhandar's marriage was fixed, a large party consisting of all the devotees of Lord Shiva set off to attend the wedding. The party halted at Sivapuri. It is believed that Lord Shiva, in the form of a priest, served food to all the devotees and satiated their hunger during mid-day. Because of this, he came to be called as Uchi Nathar (The Mid-day Lord) and also, Maadhyaneswarar ( Madhyanam meaning afternoon). 

It is in this temple that Lord Shiva and Devi Parvathy are said to have blessed Sage Agasthya with divine vision. Devotees perform Anna-prashan (first serving of rice) to their children in this temple as it is believed that the children who are fed here first will never go hungry in their life. 

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