KANAGADHARA STOTRAM

KANAGADHARA STOTRAM

Kanagadhara Stotram

This stotram was one of the early age works of Adi Sankara Bhagavatpada.   What prompted Adi Sankara to sing in praise of Goddess Lakshmi?       Sankara, as was the practice of Brahmacharis those days, begged for alms as a young boy.  When he did that in the house of Ayasida Dikshitar with the normal request of "bhagavati bhikshandhegi", only Dikshitar's wife was in the house.   Dikshitar had gone out to beg for alms himself.  The Dikshitar was so poor, there was nothing in the house to offer as Bikhsa to Sankara.    After all her search, she was so sad that she felt what was to be offered when there was nothing in the house.  Then she realised, that she had kept two gooseberries (Nellikkai or Amla) for her and her husband and keeping one for her husband, offered the other one to Sankara, pleading to him, to take the same, as there was no other thing to offer.   Realising the poverty of the house, Sankara in compassion, decided to bestow his all and sang there itself, on Goddess Lakshmi.   That was Kanagadhara stotram.  As he sang the stotram, Goddess Lakshmi appeared before him, asked what he wanted from her.  He told the poverty of Dikshitar's house had to change for the better. The Goddess told the lady did not do charities in her previous life and deserved no mercy.    Sankara while agreeing with the Goddess said that in the present life, though there was nothing in the house, the lady had given whatever she had, and that too with all the reverence requesting him to take it.   Hence she deserved the help to which Goddess Lakshmi said it would be done.   Immediately it was raining of gold gooseberries in Dikshitar's house.   The lady of the house, wondered what had happened and stood in reverance.   

The Kanagadhara stotram was sung in Sanskrit.   Kanaga meaning gold and dhara is rain.