Worship of Idols - Check on previous discussion on Idol Worship

[Guest guest]

Namaste:

 

The question on the significance of Idol worship for Vedantins is

often raised by members at various times. There are over 200 postings

on this subject matter in this list during the past 8 years of its

existence. If you go to the archive site:

advaitin/

 

and use the search engine for the key word <Idol Worship>, you will

get over 200 postings. ProfVK, me and others have provided detailed

answers to several aspects of Idol and temple worship in the

following message #s - 591, 1640, 1861, 1933,1946, 1964, 2431, 2463,

3344, etc., etc.

 

Before the establishment of these organized discussion lists, many of

the senior members of this list used to discuss under the Hindu forum

organized through Usenet. The earlier discussions were conducted

under the Usenet using the discussion group known as

Social.religion.hindu. I had long conversations with a Catholic from

Prague and an Tamil Muslim on the relevance of 'Idol Worship.' Both

those two individuals questioned the relevance of the presence of

Idols (physical image of God) for conducting mental prayers. Both

those individuals were quite sincere to know why we need the idols

for conducting prayers and worship. Several of those conversations

are also included in the message numbers that I have noted above.

 

We as Hindus somehow failed to communicate the religious symbolism

behind conducting rituals and idol worshiping in black and white. As

Vedantins we have to take the responsibility to educate those who do

not understand the symbolism of religious and temple festivals.

Hopefully, this discussion forum will be able to provide insights to

all those who sincerely want to understand their significance.

 

With my warmest regards,

 

Harih Om!

 

Ram Chandran

 

advaitin, "shyam" <konandurs wrote:

>

>

> I am hereby thank sri shyam MD and sri ganeshan for clarification

> regarding idol worship and removed my confusion to great extent

>