The alwar or azhwars (Tamil: ஆழ்வார்கள், āzvārhaḷ [aːɻʋaːr], ‘those immersed in god’) were Tamil poet saints of south India who lived between the sixth and ninth centuries A.D. and espoused ‘emotional devotion’ or bhakti to Visnu-Krishna in their songs of longing, ecstasy and service. Sri Vaishnava orthodoxy posits the number of alvars as ten, though there are other references that include Andal and madhurakavi, making the number twelve. The devotional outpourings of Alvars, composed during the early medieval period of Tamil history, helped revive the bhakti movement, through their hymns of worship to Vishnu and his Avatars. They praised 108 of this deity's holy abodes in their hymns, known as the Divya Desams. Together with the contemporary sixty three Saiva Nayanars, they are accounted as South India's 75 Apostles of Bhakti because of their importance in the rise of the Hindu Bhakti movement. The collection of their hymns is known as Divya Prabandha.

The Bhakti literature that sprang from Alvars has contributed to the establishment and sustenance of a culture that broke away from the ritual-oriented Vedic religion and rooted itself in devotion as the only path for salvation. In addition they helped to make the Tamil religious life independent of a knowledge of Sanskrit. As part of the legacy of the Alvars, five Vaishnava philosophical traditions (sampradayas) have developed at the later stages.

Eli Parish (28 February 1808, Teignmouth, Devonshire, England – 25 January 1849, Vienna) was an English harpist and composer. He changed his name to Elias Parish Alvars, and sometimes used the pseudonym Albert Alvars in his publications.

The baptismal record found at St James’s Church, West Teignmouth, reports: "Eli, son of Joseph and Mary Ann Parish". His father, an organist, voice teacher and book dealer in Teignmouth, gave him his first musical instruction.

Eli gave his first concert in Totnes in 1818. In 1820 he was sent to London to study with Nicolas Bochsa. In 1822 he applied to the Royal Academy of Music, where Bochsa had been appointed harp professor. However, he was not accepted as a student there, probably because of his family’s inability to pay the tuition. (Joseph Parish had to declare bankruptcy in 1818.) In any case, Eli Parish continued his lessons with Bochsa thanks to the help of a local landowner.

After the Dresden concert, Hector Berlioz wrote: "In Dresden, I met the prodigious English harpist Elias Parish Alvars, a name not yet as renowned as it ought to be. He had just come from Vienna. This man is the Liszt of the harp. You cannot conceive all the delicate and powerful effects, the novel touches and unprecedented sonorities, that he manages to produce from an instruments in many respects so limited. His fantasy on Moses (imitated and adapted for the piano with such happy results by Thalberg), his Variations for harmonic notes on the Naiads Chorus from Oberon, and a score of similar taste, delighted me more than I can say…" (Mémoires de Hector Berlioz, Paris, 1903);