Guest guest Posted July 18, 2001 Report Share Posted July 18, 2001 All religions in some form or the other have got symbolism hidden in their systems. Muslims turn towards the Holy Kaba and pray. Kaba is nothing but a symbol. Hystory says that Holy Kaba has been destroyed, due to natural causes, for almost 7 times. Everytime it is destroyed it is rebuilt! I think, the last time it was reconstructed was in 13th century. There is a blak egg shaped stone (looks like our Bana Linga) Kept on the ground, almost attached to the Holy Kaba Wall. Muslims who go there first touch their head to that stone and kiss it! Again that is symbolism. And one more thing which brings them close to accepting symbols, is their Hajj! People who closely follow their Hajj knows that there is a Stone Throwing ceremony. Muslim pilgrims, as a part of their Hajj, have to pelt 3 huge pillars which are standing in Makkah. They say those pillars are Satan and they are throwing stones at satan condemning Satan. All is good, but when you ask Muslim Scholars whether these stones are really Satan, then they deny that saying these pillars merely symbolize satan :-) There comes the art of symbolism in to their religion. It is irrespective whether you worship (symbolze) a few stones, or a thousand stones (like Hindus) acceptance is there. Same is the case with Christians. They symbolize the cross! They kiss the cross and take good faith in it. So I believe, every religion believes in Symbolism. Only thing is that Hindus publicly acknowledge that they are symbol worshipers, where are others deny it... And I believe, truth always stands as a truth, but it makes sense to you when you start understanding it with an open mind. Yours, Madhava -----Ursprungliche Nachricht----- Von: Ram Chandran [rchandran] Gesendet: Wednesday, July 18, 2001 1:32 PM An: advaitin Betreff: Symbolism in the Worship of God All religions including Hinduism emphasizes that as humans, we cannot comprehend the image of God! But human mind does have the capacity to build a mental image of God and create that image in physical form. The Tamil expression, `muppaththu mukkodi devas' represents millions of such representations of the mental image of Nirguna Brahman. In mathematics also, the non-comprehensible infinity has been conceptualized in infinite ways! It is a fundamental fact, that which can't be comprehended are represented by a symbol. In Hinduism, the symbol of OM represents the Brahman. The religious symbolism is further expanded in other fields: A country is symbolized by a flag, love for a country is expressed by the national anthem etc. The physical images of Parvathi, Saraswati, Lakshimi, Ganesa, Karthikeya, Shiva, Vishnu and others help us focus and concentrate our mind on the Nirguna Brahman during meditation or prayer. Worships and Prayers are impossible without a ` mental image' of the noncomprehensible Brahman. The question: whether a physical image (idol) is necessary for prayer can never be resolved because the very question goes beyond human perception. Any form of worship implies some mental comprehension of God. Such comprehension could come either from physical image of God or other symbolic expressions of God such as the Bible (Cross) or Qu'an or other such symbols. Muslims believe (rightly) that God has written Qur'an and for them Qur'an implicitly represents the God. Similarly the Christians believe that the words of the Bible represents the expressions of God. This may explain why the Hindu implicitly worships the God while chanting the Vedas. The reading of Qur'an or Bible are also forms of mental worship of God using the physical means. warmest regards, Ram Chandran Discussion of Shankara's Advaita Vedanta Philosophy of nonseparablity of Atman and Brahman. Advaitin List Archives available at: http://www.eScribe.com/culture/advaitin/ To Post a message send an email to : advaitin Messages Archived at: advaitin/messages Your use of is subject to Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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