Smartha's and Sri Vaishnavaites

Malayappa swamy's[processional deity of Srinivasar at Tirumala]Vasantho utsavam photo

In any temple of any sect in Tamilnadu one can see Iyers viz Saivaite Brahmin priests performing archana,abhishekam aarti of the deity as well as preisde over homams in  temple festivals. They are also in great demand for performing marriages , homams at home and at shradha ceremonies.Whilst  Srivaishnavaite [ayengars ]brahmin priests presence is negligible  iyer priests presence is simply all prevasive.One can find them presiding over nearly all deities be it Siva, murughan shakthi , vinayagar and even ayyanar--village deity except in Vishnu temples , in Sri vaishnavaite households,ceremonies  and marriages.One can never find aSriVaishnavaite priest performing pujas or officiating in temples dedicated solely to Siva or Murughan or Vinayakar or Shakthi .
Being a Sri vaishnavaite i was puzzled by iyers flexibility. Siva, parvathi[shakthi,] Murugha and Vinayakar belong to one family so nothing out of the ordinary in officiating over these deities but to officiate over Vishnu and his avatars is altogether a different matter.It is another sect !  Don't they adhere to only one deity and one sect like us or are they being purely professional and are making a livelihood?.

An elderly man  whose forehead is always  smeared completely with vibhuthi  -sacred ash with a spot of kumkum  and who lives in  my neighbourhood and spends his days attending classes on Hindu philosophy , Bramha sutras ,gita and so on invited me to attend the classes and also to his house  to see the images of various gods like siva,vishnu , shakthi and so on, when i met him on the road .I asked him having noted the prominent vibhuthi on his forehead smeared with all three fingers .Aern't you a saivaite ? So you must be worshipping only Siva .

He replied " I am a Smartha brahmin and we worship all deities."Then he left for his class

Curious to know more about Smarthas i looked up Wikki in the net.It was just like as he said.
Smartha brahmins worship all six deities whom  Adi Shankara had divided as the prominent sects of hindusThese deities are Vishnu, Siva, Shakthi, Surya, Vinayakar and Murugha.They perform pujas of all deities every day  but have one favorite deity.
On reading this i was quite taken aback As Sri vaishnavas have no such flexibility.They strictly worship only Vishnu and his avatars and none other.Being a Srivaishnavaite i did find the flexibility of Smarthas unique.We too have images of gods of other sects in our house and in puja room We also chant the names of Siva, shakthi or Murugha or Vinayakar   when they occur in the slokas dedicated to Vishnu and Lakshmi.But a Sri Vaishnavite [specially after performing pancha samaskara ] should not recite slokas wholly dedicated to any other deity  or perform pujas , archanas .abhishekams of other deities regularily.

However on reading aazhwars pasurams i came across Tirumangai aazhwars description of sri Varadharaja perumal at Kanchipuram where he says Sri Varadhar[vishnu] is bearing Siva on his left side along with parvathi in siva's left side .In Raghuvira gadyam Desikan  the Srivaishnavaite acharya concludes his slokas on Rama by saying that Rama and Sita are Mahavishnu and Lakshmi and thier son is Bramha whose son is Siva whose son is Murugha and says therefore Srimannaryana 's family is big and all of us  are one big family.Both aazhwar and acharaya were strict Sri  Vaishnavaites so i can only interpret it to mean that if one worships Vishnu/Srimannaryana  one is also offering salutations to his son. grandson and great grand son and therefore it is suffice to worship Vishnu alone.

So iyers or smartha brahmin priests are not officiating over all deities for sake of making extra money .My conclusion was erroneous.They have no bar or curbs or restraints to worship gods of any sect hence they are officiating over all deities.But their Moola viz main mantra used in japa would be only on Siva or Shakthi and not on Vishnu/Narayana.
One can find a Smartha priest in a Vishnu temple like at Srinivasar temple at Tirumala where they recite vedas regularily.They may even perform archanas abishekam and so on in Vishnu temples if allowed by Sri vaishnavaites.Sri vaishnavaites will never allow them .The onlyexception being   Badrinath  temple.
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 Whist one can find a smartha priest/veda pandits  in a Vishnu temple one   can normally  never   find a Srivaishnavaite priest  in a Siva temple or in  temples of  the other sects.