Guest guest Posted September 5, 2005 Report Share Posted September 5, 2005 IDOL WORSHIP: quote by Swami Chinmayananda when your dear son is away from home, and you cannot see him whenever you want, do you or do you not get solace by looking at his photograph? You do know that the photo is not your son, but only a piece of paper with various tones of gray, but it reminds you of your beloved boy and his great love for you. So, also the idols in temples are to remind the devotees of the ideal, the Supreme. Since the human mind cannot conceive of a formless Supreme, God is conceived of in the form as represented by an idol. Through a symbol or idol, we come to adore and be aware of the ideal. Whether the symbol on the flag is Sickle and Hammer, the Wheel, or Stars and Stripes it does not matter. They represent the ideals of each country stands for, and thus can invoke certain feelings and consciousness in those who salute them. The piece of cloth is not my country. The idol is not the ideal. The wedding ring is not my wife. All these help to remind me of the noble ideals, which they symbolize. To the earnest devotee, the idol appears as a living embodiment of his Lord, and he goes into ecstasy of its sight. But alas! We usually forget the ideals and hug on to the idols. This has happened in religion, in its temples, rituals, and ceremonies. Most of us have not been educated in the ideals behind all these apparently meaningless paraphernalia. So, they have become meaningless formalism and mechanical routine. it is, however, necessary to remember that the idol is not God, but represents God. -- devishakti_india( divyabhakti )( http://spiritualhinduism.blogspot.com ) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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