நாயதுவும் நட்பதனால் மேன்மை கொள்ளும்
நயமறியா மானுடனே நலிந்து சாவான்
பேயதுவும் மந்திரத்தர்ல் வசப்பட் டுப்போம்
பேயாசைப் பித்தரடா மனித வர்க்கம்
தாயதுவா மீசனுக்கே கோயில் கோயில்
தலைணங்கான் தான்தோன்றித் தயவற் றோனே
நாயறியும் பேயறியும் நாய கன்பேர்
நாரணனார் பாதத்தை நம்பு வோமே
naayathuvum natpathanaal maenmai kollum
nayamaraaiya maanudanae nalinthu saavaan
paeyathuvum manthiraththarl vasappat tuppom
paeyaasaip piththaradaa manitha varkkam
thaayathuvaa meesannukkae koyil koyil
thalainangkaan thaanthoandri-th thayavar rroanae
naayariyum paeyariyum naaya kanbaer
naarannanaar paathaththai nambu vomae.
Even a dog, by forming friendship, attains a kind of elevation.
O human who does not know what is proper/apt (nayam), you will wither and die.
Even a ghost can be brought under control through mantra; we can subdue it.
Humankind—madmen—are crazed for “ghost-desires” (peyai-āśai).
As though (it were) an amulet/talisman, for the moustached Lord there are temples upon temples.
O one with the head bowed/hanging (or: headless), self-arisen, one without compassion.
Dogs know; ghosts know; (they know) the Lord’s name.
Let us trust in the feet of Nārāyaṇa.
Even the lowest creature can be ennobled by true companionship; yet a human lacking discernment and ethical tact wastes away.
Inner “spirits” can be bound by disciplined mantra, but people instead become possessed by craving itself—mad for phantom pleasures.
They multiply external protections—talismans and temples for the god they favor—while remaining inwardly unruled.
What even dogs and ghosts recognize—the Lord’s true name—humans forget.
So the verse turns the seeker away from mere outer religion toward surrender: hold fast to the feet (refuge) of Nārāyaṇa.
The verse uses deliberately mixed registers—ordinary animals/spirits, mantra-technique, and temple devotion—to critique misplaced human priorities.
1) Moral psychology (nayam): The opening contrast is sharp: a “dog” can rise through loyalty/friendship, but a human without nayam (discernment, propriety, tact, virtue-in-action) collapses. In Siddhar idiom, this is not sentimental; it is a diagnosis that intelligence without right conduct is self-destructive.
2) Mantra as yogic control: “Ghosts” (pēy) are not only external spirits; they can also signify obsessional forces—restless mind, compulsions, addictions, intrusive drives. “Vasappaduthal” (bringing under control) by mantra points to a technology of attention: sound, repetition, and will can bind what otherwise possesses the person.
3) ‘Ghost-desire’ (peyai-āśai): The phrase implies desires that are insubstantial yet tyrannical—cravings that feed on the person like a spirit feeding on a host. The verse calls the human species “piththar” (mad/possessed), suggesting that ordinary life is already a kind of possession by appetite.
4) Ritualism vs refuge: “Tāyatu” (amulet) and “koyil koyil” (temple upon temple) caricature externalized religiosity—building or wearing protections as substitutes for inner transformation. The mention of “Meesan” (moustached Lord) likely points to Śiva in local idiom, but the rhetorical function is broader: sectarian symbols are invoked to criticize reliance on externals.
5) Name and surrender: The concluding turn—“dogs know, ghosts know, (the) Lord’s name”—shames human forgetfulness. The proposed remedy is not more external architecture but “nambuvōmē” (let us trust): surrender to “the feet of Nārāyaṇa,” i.e., taking refuge in the sustaining divine principle (whether read theistically or as the ground of consciousness).