Nagalapuram, Vedanarayana Temple - One of the Two temples in the World where we can see Lord Vishnu in Matsya Avatar

This temple is one of the very rare temple. Sri vedanarayana or Matsya narayana temple is a temple dedicated to Lord vishnu in the form of Matsya ( fish ) avatar and is referred as matsya narayana or veda narayana. There are very less temples for this avatar ones including the Shankhodara temple in Bet Dwarka and Vedanarayana Temple in Nagalapuram. Another temple in Koneswaram Matsyakeswaram temple in Trincomalee,srilanka is now destroyed. Matsya Narayana Temple, Bangalore also exists. Here we can see lord vishnu in matsya avatar. The upper half is a four armed man and the lower half is a fish. The upper half represents Lord vishnu. The temple is around 70kms from tirupthi and is on the way to surutapalli. This temple can be visited after the Narayanavanam temple.

Astronomical marvel - The temple is famous for Surya pooja utsavam and is considered as an astronomical marvel. During the days of march 26,27 and 28 the sun rays travel a distance of 360 feet starting from temple tower towards the garbha griha in the evening from 6:00 pm to 6:15 pm. On the first day the rays stop on the foot of deity, second day on the navel and third day on the crown.

Temple History - Mythology says that Lord vishnu waged a relentless war to get back the vedas. It is said that the load vishnu is in frozen state due to his long time stay on water. the temple is the representation of the matsya avatar. This is an ancient stone temple built either by cholas or pallavas. there are many beautiful sculptures around the huge pillars around the prakaram.

The story of matsya avatar is, Along with Brahma, the creator and Shiva, the destroyer, Lord Vishnu is one of the three main male deities in Hinduism and they are together known as the TRIMURTI. Being a part of the Trinity, He has taken ten incarnations and the ten Avatars of Lord Vishnu or the Dashavatara are the several forms He took whenever the universe was in turmoil. Each of Vishnu’s Avatars had the same purpose which they achieved by different means. This divine purpose was the restoration of Dharma or righteousness and to save the planet and the good people from the hands of evils, demons or Asuras.

It is said that, during the Satya Yuga, the people on earth had become irreligious and disorderly in the way they lived their lives. This is when the Gods collectively decided to flood the earth and prepare it for the process of renovation. Lord Brahma, the creator, had been given the guidelines to remodel the earth by Lord Vishnu. These guidelines were the Vedas, the four principle books of Hinduism. Lord Brahma decided to rest before this grand task as he was quite tired from the process of creation.At this time, a horse-headed demon named Hayagriva ( not to be confused with Lord Hayagriva, the avatar of Vishnu who is considered as a symbol of wisdom and knowledge) came out of Brahma’s nose and stole the Vedas from him. 

The demon Hayagriva with the face of a horse, who stole the Vedas from Brahma, the creator and had disappeared into the oceans. During those times, there was a highly virtuous and pious king named Satryavrata or Vaivasvata Manu who ruled over the southern part of the Bharatvarsha.

One day, the king went to Krithamala River to do his morning prayers. When he took some water from the river in his cupped palms, he found a tiny fish in it. When he wanted to drop the fish in the waters, it requested him to give shelter for fear of being eaten away by bigger fishes in the river. The King obliged and carried the fish to his palace and dropped it in a vessel.

With the fish growing in size rapidly, Vaivasvata Manu had to change the container to bigger ones, finally when none of the containers was enough to contain the fish, it was eventually transferred to a pond, then to a lake , then to river Ganges and then finally to the ocean. The fish was growing even bigger in the ocean and once it thanked Vaivasvata Manu for giving shelter till then and assured the king that it would appear back after a while to rescue the king from the great floods.

Meanwhile, the fish instructed the king to collect the best of seeds from the flora and the best of representatives from fauna. It also advised that a huge ship be built and kept in ready condition. The great floods started swallowing the earth. The King had by then gathered all the collected seeds and representatives in the huge ship. The huge fish Matsya Avatar appeared and brought with it the huge snake Vasuki.

The ship with Manu and his collections aboard was tied to the horn of the fish with the snake Vasuki. The fish swam over the floods pulling the ship to safety reaching the top of the Mighty Himalayas. All through the voyage, the Fish discoursed the King on the entire gamut of Sacred literature.

Once the great floods subsided, the demon Hayagriva was exposed. Matsya killed him and rescued the Vedas handing them over once again to Brahma. All the seeds gathered in the ship were thrown on the earth. All the representatives of the different animal species started procreating once again.

As the flood swept over the land, Manu asked Vishnu why mankind had to meet such a deadly fate to which Matsya Vishnu told Manu that he was the only moral man alive and that he would be the father of the future generations of men.

Vaivasvata Manu performed a huge sacrifice or Yajna to propitiate the gods. With the blessings of the gods, a beautiful damsel named Ida appeared from the fire and married Manu. Both of them gave rise to the human race once again.