The word ‘Udupi’ means the ‘moon’ or ‘the lord of the stars’, because at this place the demigod of the moon Chandra, who was cursed by Daksha, came to worship Lord Mahadev for the purpose of being relieved from that curse.
5000 years ago when Lord Krishna manifested His pastimes in Dwarka, His mother Devaki expressed to Krishna in the inner chambers of their palace “I heard so many beautiful lilas about your charming childhood activities in Vrindavana. Yasoda, as Your mother, was a witness; she could be part of those childhood activities. I heard stories where You would just be a naughty little boy and You’d steal butter and You’d completely conquer everyone’s hearts. By the time You came back to me, You were a prince! I want to see those pastimes that as Your mother, I never saw You as a little child.”
Krishna fulfilled Devaki’s desires. He manifested Himself as Bal Gopal, little Krishna. He jumped on her lap, drank her milk and then He started breaking butter pots, He was stealing, He was performing all his little childhood pastimes. He was holding a stick, and a rope for churning butter. As He was stealing, Devaki was completely mesmerized. She was thinking in her heart, “I have never experienced such happiness as this, seeing your Vrindavana lila.”
Rukmini, Lord Krishna’s queen, was watching; she also had never experienced such happiness as she did when seeing Krishna’s Bal lila of Vrindavana. She requested Krishna, “I want to worship You in this form as Bal Gopal stealing butter. Please give me a murti that I could worship.”
Krishna called Vishwakarma to carve that identical form that Rukmini was seeing of Krishna of Vrindavana as the butter thief. He carved, out of a pure Saligram Sila, that form of Krishna, in one hand holding a stick and in another a rope. Rukmini Devi, although she was personally serving Dwarkadisa Krishna day and night, her greatest happiness was in worshipping this deity form in the temple in her inner room of Gopal.
Years later, when the Yadu dynasty went back to the spiritual realm, Arjuna, Krishna’s dearest friend, put it in Rukmini’s garden after Rukmini had already left. Over the years this deity was covered by gopi chandan along with the deity of Balarama, and was completely lost.
The sailors didn’t know there was anything inside that lump of gopi chandan. But it was Lord Krishna’s and Balarama’s wish to come here to Udupi to be worshipped by Madhvacarya, and later to be visited by Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu.
How Deity of Krishna came to Udupi
The amazing pastime of how the Bala Krishna deity (Krishna in child form) crossed the ocean from faraway Dwaraka to Udupi in the south is narrated in Madhva-vijaya, the biography of Madhvacarya. Madhva wanted to have a temple of Lord Krishna in Udupi so that the devotees could then worship and serve the Lord. It so happened that in Dwaraka, one of the main places of Krishna’s pastimes on earth 5,000 years ago, a Deity lay concealed within a large mass of gopi-candana clay. No one knew the Deity was there, but because the lump of clay was exceedingly heavy, some sailors loaded it onto their merchant ship as ballast. On the ship’s southward journey, just off the coast of Udupi, a tempest blew the ship aground on a sandbank.
On that very day, Madhvacarya absorbed in composing Dvadasha-stotra, his famous twelve-part poem praising Lord Krishna, had gone to the beach to bath or, as some say, to receive the Lord. And as he was composing those prayers, there was a heavy windstorm. There was a boat of merchant who was coming from Dwaraka and he put so much of his life savings into the goods that he was taking to south to sell. But the storm was so turbulent that his boat was sinking. He was helpless and was about to die. And right at the last moment, he happened to see Madhvacarya sitting in meditation on the seashore. And he cried out because he saw, he is a yogi, a saint, maybe he could help me. He was taking shelter.
Merchant saw the beautiful form of Madhvacarya and in such a helpless state, he cried out “Help!”. Madhvacarya had a saffron chaddar on and he took that cloth and just waved it, and the storm disappeared and the ocean became calm. And then Madhvacarya just turned and waved, and the wind took his boat to the shore and everything was fine. So this merchant had full realization that this yogi saved his life, wealth and everything! And he came down with deep gratitude and bowed down to Madhvacarya and said, “I have so much wealth on this boat, I will give you anything you want. What can I give you; I will give you the whole boat!” Madhvacarya said, “I don’t want anything. What do I need?”
“Devotees who have Lord Krishna in the hearts are atma rama, they are self-satisfied. If you are not satisfied with Krishna in your heart, no matter what you have, you will never be satisfied.”
But the merchant really wanted to serve Madhvacarya and said, “I have gold, pots, boat! Anything, I will give you.” Madhvacarya said, “You are coming from Dwarka?” He said, “Yes.” He said, “Do you have any gopi chandan?” Gopi chandan is clay! In those days, that clay was easy to get in Dwarka, and sailors, in order to balance their ship would have gopi chandan because it didn’t cost anything. For a devotee, gopi chandan is very important. Near Dwarka, there is a place called Gopi Talav, where Gopis came and bathed. The dust from the feet of all of the gopis became that clay. So from a businessman’s perspective in those days, it was worth nothing; but for Madhvacarya, it was worth everything! It is the dust of the feet of Krishna and Radha and Gopis, and we put it on our bodies, it is called tilak. We put it on our foreheads, 12 parts of our body, and it’s the way of consecrating our body, mind, words and life to Krishna.
So he said, “Please give me, you have some gopi chandan?” He said, “Yes, I have two mounds of gopi chandan!” Madhvacarya took two mounds of gopi chandan. Madhvacarya had just started back to Udupi with the large lump of clay when, but a short distance from the beach, the lump broke in two, revealing the handsome deity of Lord Bala Krishna and the deity of Balarama. But now the combined effort of 30 disciples of Madhva’s could not budge the deity. Only when Madhvacarya himself embraced and lifted the deity as if He were a child did the deity consent to be moved. In great transcendental ecstasy Madhva carried the Lord four miles back to Udupi. On the way he completed the remaining seven parts of Dvadasha-stotra, reciting the verses out loud. Madhvacarya consecrated Lord Balarama’s deity in the Vadabhandeshwara temple near the Malpe beach. In Udupi, Madhva bathed the Lord Bala Krishna in the lake known as Madhva-sarovara and enshrined Him in the Sri Krishna Matha. Srila Madhvacarya instituted rigorous standards for worshipping Sri Krishna, and whenever he was in Udupi he would personally perform the 13 daily worship ceremonies for the Lord.
Kanakadasa was a staunch devotee of Lord Sri Krishna in the 16th century. When Kanakadasa came to the temple to worship the deity of Lord Krishna, he was not allowed to enter the temple because he was of a low caste. At that time only the higher castes could go in the temple to offer worship. It did not upset him when he was not allowed inside, but he went to the back side of the temple and prayed with intense devotion. The deity of Lord Krishna was so pleased that He turned Himself in the direction of Kanakadasa and also made the wall to crack, forming holes in the wall so that Kanakadasa could still see the Lord. In this way, the Lord reciprocated with His devotee and allowed Kanakadasa to see Him. Even today, it is the tradition that when pilgrims first come to the temple, they go to the side of the temple and view Lord through the same holes in the wall, now known as Kanakakhindi.