As a baby, a child sleeps beside the mother. It knows the comfort of the mother’s body. As it grows up, you want to let the child sleep separately, which is very essential for the growth of the child. But if you put him in a different bed suddenly, he feels uncomfortable. So what do we do? Usually we give him a toy – a doll or teddy bear to hold onto. He holds onto this doll and feels comfortable. As he grows up, you don’t have to tell him “Get rid of the doll.” As growth happens the doll falls away by itself. The teddy bear disappears, but when he needs the doll if you snatch it away, then you will harm the child. You will damage his psyche in a very deep sense.
Similarly, right now you need an image. An idol is an image that you have created which you think is the image of God. You need to hold somebody’s hand and walk, you do it. It is perfectly okay. As long as you understand that someday you have to become free from this also, there is no problem. But if you think this is God, then you are in trouble. You create an image of God because you want to relate to it. As long as you need it you use it, but the aim is to grow out of it.
India is one place where they went into elaborate systems of idol-making. This has been misunderstood by other cultures as worshiping some doll as a god. No. Here, people are very much aware that it is we who create the shapes and forms.
If you look at it from the standpoint of modern science, we know today that everything is the same energy, but everything is not the same in the world. This same energy can be like an animal or it can function like the Divine. When I say the Divine, I am not talking about you as a being. I am just talking about the body itself. The physical body itself can be transformed into a Divine entity if we just reorganize our systems in a particular way.
There is a whole science of idol-making. What this means is that they create a certain form with certain material and energize it in a certain way like a human being. Different idols are made different ways but they relocate or rearrange the charkas in certain places to make it into a completely different possibility. So idol-making is that science through which you manifest the energy in a particular way so that your quality of life can be enhanced.
The ancient temples in India were not created for worship. Only over a period of time it has become the way it has become. Temple building is a very deep science. If the basic aspects of the temple – the size and shape of the idol, the mudra that the idol holds, the parikrama, the garbha griha and the mantras that you use to consecrate the idol are properly matched, a positive energy system is created.
In Indian tradition, nobody told you that you must worship or ask for this or that if you go to a temple. They told you if you go the temple, you must sit for a while and come. But today you just touch your bottom to the floor and run away. This is not the way. You are required to sit there because there is a field of energy that has been created. In the morning, before you go out into the world and transact your business, the first thing in the morning is you go sit in the temple for awhile and go. This is a way of recharging yourself with very positive vibrations of life so that you go into the world with a different perspective.
Isha Foundation New Zealand conducts Isha Inner Engineering and Hatha yoga Programmes. It also offers free Isha Kriya and Isha Upa yoga practices for the General public regularly. For more information Pls contact: 0224637811 or Visit: www.ishayoga.nz