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Re: Idol worship and Vedas???

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kuntimaddi sadananda • November 1, 2002 


No body in the right mind worships idols - What is worshiped is the
ideal behind the idols.  When we salute a piece of cloth with colors
pained on it, and chant National Anthem, we are saluting the nation
that is symbolized by the flag.  It is not the piece of cloth that we
are saluting.  When Lord is all pervading, evey form is His form and
any form can be his symbol for those who have the right vision of the
Lord.  What is worshpped is Him not the symbol per sec.  In any puja,
we do aavaahanam and once we invite the great Lord and we offer
everthinig that makes his stay comfortable - paaniiyam, aasanam,
aarghyam, vastram and naivedyam, madhye madhye paaniiyam to drink,
taambuulam and after the puuja is over visargam - saying bye bye. If
we do all this when we invite to some chief politician coming to the
town, with how much care and devotion one has to do when we invite
the Lord of the entire universe. 
 
It is unfortunate Arya Samaj or Brahma samaaj have not understood the
significance of what Idol worship means.  I am sure Dayananda
Saraswati who started this meaningless samaj, must have had some
reverence to his parents.  Was he not a idol worshiper when he was
respecting the photos of his parents. When simple piece of painted
paper invokes so much love and respect, idol consecreted with due
pratishhTa should invoke reverse to that great Lord that is
symbolized in that idol. Vedas teache us how to do proper worship. 
But what is needed is Bhakti - devotion to the Lord.  Without that
Bhakti, it becomes some mechanical exercise.  

Hari OM1
Sadananda 

[ I think Sri Sadananda's explanation differs significantly
  from the Pancaratra and Sri Vaishnava idea of the arcAvatAra.
  It is a misreading of our religious practice so say that the
  Pancaratra concept of the arca mUrti, denoted as "idol" for 
  the sake of writing in English, is merely an "ideal" or "symbol",
  or a means of concentration, as is so often declared by 
  modern interpreters.  No doubt the rejection of idol worship by
  the Arya and Brahmo Samaj is also a modern development, a reaction
  to outside criticism and internal hypocrisy in the wider Indian
  context; however neo-Vedantins such as Swami Vivekananda and 
  Swami Chinmayananda who categorically pushed the arca mUrti into 
  the realm of mere symobology have also erred and unfortunately 
  did a great disservice to the ideas and concepts implicit in this 
  form of religious devotion.

  To both lay and scholarly Sri Vaishnavas, the arca or idol
  is indistinguishable from God.  God manifests Himself or 
  Herself as the temple image to grace those who worship the
  image in the most convenient way possible. It reflects the
  supreme desire of God to be accessible to His devotees that
  makes the idol at one with the highest principle of Godhead.
  To borrow terminology from Western religious tradition, one
  can say that the very stuff of the idol is transsubstantiated
  so that seeing the idol as a mere symbol, mere stone, or
  mere metal is considered a grave sin.

  There is a difference between worship of symbols, denoted in
  Vedanta as 'pratIka', and worship of a manifestation of God.
  The former are temporary conveniences for the sake of meditation.
  Commandments such as "worship the mind as the Supreme", "worship
  the life breath as Supreme", "worship desire as the Supreme",
  etc., are pedagogical techniques described in Upanishads to take the 
  student slowly but surely to the eventual meditation on the Supreme 
  Itself.
  
  Temple and home-based image worship, however, is very different.
  The Pancaratra Agamas and other scripturs that prescribe the 
  use such worship specifically state that image is a manifestation 
  of God.  In this sense, the image itself literally *is* God; this 
  is what lends meaning to the term "arca-avatara",
  an _incarnation_  of God in the form of an idol.  (This is a concept
  that even thinkers outside the Pancaratra school have accepted
  wholeheartedly. Sri Sankaracharya writes several times in his
  Brahma Sutra Bhashya, "yathA sAlagrAme hariH", "sAlagrama iva vishNoH",
  "yathA sAlagrAme vishNuH sannihitaH, tadvat".) Learned members
  who are well versed in Sri Vachana Bhushana and other works of
  our acharyas are invited to wax eloquently about the greatness
  of the idea behind the arcAvatAra to illustrate these concepts further.

  Because of Western and Semitic criticism, we as middle class, English
  speaking moderners have become scared of the term "idol" and afraid of 
  the grand concept of arcAvatAra and idol worship. Such fear is absent
  in followers of our religion who are blissfully unaware of such
  criticism.  One can only look at the average, common, non-English
  educated worshipper at any of the Vishnu and Siva temples in South
  India.  To a person such as this who has worshipped at, say the
  shrine of Lord Ranganatha in Srirangam, a question such as "Have you 
  seen God?" that has made at least one neo-Vedantin famous would seem 
  patently absurd.
  -- Moderator ]


  


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