Today everyone speaks of positive energy and positive thinking. Where to get these positive energies and drive out negative thoughts and energy, was the problem faced by ancient Indian scientists(rishi's).
Initially they were writing some drawings on a certain kind of paper-like material called Yantra and they would energize these Yantra by Mantra.Yantra means machine, Mantra was used to fuel the yantra, to fill us with positive energy and positive thoughts.
Later Rishi's thought of making big yantra's, which resulted in bigger yantras of size and dimension. But these yantra's were only used by individual people and a family. Not everybody could afford to keep one at home and the disadvantage was they needed to be energized frequently after the eclipse. So the rishi's thought of building a bigger Yantra which was more efficient. Then came the concept of a temple.
Temple's have their own architecture which is called in Veda's as Āgama (Hinduism) shastra, to build temple's. which are nothing but energizing centers for the public which had more life than normal Yantra. This is the reason behind Temple's India.
What you call Idols in temples are not Actually Idol's. They are the center of the temple which concentrates the whole energy of the temple and above that main shrine a kalasa will be placed to harness the cosmic energy into the temple.
If god is everywhere, why can't they see it inside a temple?
Muslims worship in a direction, can we say is god only in that direction?
Now let's come to the spiritual part of Idol worship, why does anyone need spiritual worship, or why should anyone worship god inside a temple only.
In Hinduism(Sanatana dharma), we worship plants, rivers, hills, and anything which supports human life, in order to respect the environment and pay respect to it. Not just in temples we worship god everywhere because he is everywhere.
Idol is just a symbol of what you want to become, what you like in nature, what you want to accomplish in your life. As you can see, we have gods from humans in nature to Hanuman in nature. We don't differentiate between any living beings, we worship any living thing which has served the human kind with morals and lessons everyone should learn.
I'll be giving an example, this might help you understand it.
1. Here Maa Sarasswathi is sitting on a stone, it says as a student you need to sit tightly and focus on your studies with dedication.
2. Maa wearing a white saree, it depicts her pure soul, how a studious person must not get carried away by temptations.
3. The place Maa is sitting is calm and serene with water, which shows the place you need to choose.
4. Maa has four hands and in one hand there are beads, in another written material, with two other hands Maa is holding Veena.
Like this, the pics gave us values and how we should behave while studying. How the Maa(who is the source of knowledge) would do her studies and we should follow her was the message behind it.
More Explanation (From Speakingtree.in)
1. Science of the Ancient Temples - The temples were not just art. Their motive was to connect humans to the divines. It was a pure science from the size of the temple and idols, bells and everything. And this science, research and the reason and understanding of making those temples has been lost.
2. Energy enters - Far from being a place of prayer or worship, temples were created as powerful spaces where an individual could imbibe the enshrined energies. Most temples were created to address a particular aspect of life, and were thus consecrated to activate one or two particular chakras, the main energy centers within the human system.
3. Construction of a Temple - The main deity was often complemented by one or more minor deities carefully positioned along the path of approach to the main deity.
4. Scientific reasons for visiting temples - There are thousands of temples all over India in different sizes, shapes and locations but not all of them are considered to be built the Vedic way. To build a temple it was necessary to keep the size, shape and locations in mind as the temples were the energy storers. It is said that in ancient times, a temple should be located at a place where earth's magnetic wave path passes through densely. It is hard to say how they found these locations for the temples. That's why temple tops are pointy because they attract and absorb energy. Temples were just a tool to attract and store energy and then use them to energize people.
5. Location of the deity - Temples are located strategically at a place where the positive energy is abundantly available from the magnetic and electric wave distributions of north/south pole thrust. The main idol is placed in the core center of the temple. In fact, the temple structure is built after the idol has been placed. The place of the deity is where earth’s magnetic waves are found to be maximum!
6. Metal plate beneath the statue - In most of the temples we find that the god’s statue is placed on a copper plate. What could be the possible reason? It is widely believed that these copper plates absorb earth’s magnetic waves and radiate it to the surroundings. Thus a person regularly visiting a temple and walking clockwise around the Main Idol receives the beamed magnetic waves. This is a very slow process and a regular visitor will eventually start feeling the positive vibes.
7. Make of the chamber helps you relieve stress - If you would notice, in a temple, the chamber of the god is closed on three sides. This increases the effect of all energies. The lamp that is lit radiates heat energy. The ringing of the bells and the chanting of prayers takes a worshiper into trance, thus not letting his mind waver. When done in groups, this helps people forget personal problems for a while and relieve their stress. (Kind of sound therapy).The other reason for lighting camphor is for the idol to absorb the heat and vibrate within the chamber for a certain period.
8. Divine Aura - The fragrance from the flowers and the burning of camphor give out the chemical energy that creates a good aura. The effect of all these energies is supplemented by the positive energy from the idol, the copper plates and the utensils used while worshiping the God. When people go to a temple for evening Aartis and when the doors open up, the positive energy gushes out onto everyone present there.
9.The holy water - The curd, honey, milk, sugar and coconut water by which we clean the copper idol is believed to make the charna-amrit a blessing.
10. Magic of temple bells - A Temple bell is another scientific phenomena; it is not just your ordinary metal. It is made of various metals including cadmium, lead, copper, zinc, nickel, chromium and. manganese. The proportion at which each one of them mixed is real science behind a bell. Each of these bells is made to produce such a distinct sound that it can create unity of your left and right brain.
11. What happens when you ring the temple bell - The moment you ring that bell, the bell produces a sharp but lasting sound which lasts for a minimum of seven seconds in echo mode, good enough to touch your seven healing centers or chakras in your body. The moment bell sound happens your brain is emptied of all thoughts. Invariably you will enter Tran's state where you are very receptive (receptive - willing to consider or accept new suggestions and ideas). This Trans state is the one with awareness.
12. Insects in old temples - Bells had other reasons also, as most of the old temples never had doors and were located near hills and forest there would have been distinct possibilities for animals, Insects, birds to take shelter. But the bell sound doesn’t allow any of the living creatures to sustain inside for a long time. So don’t be surprised if you find Old temples still brimming with energy inside with less dust, no sign of insects or animals.
13. The logic behind idol worship - Deities work as your focal point. Idea is to remind you of your womb and your nine months. Idea here is to remind you of your true potential! In silence your thoughts have tremendous potential to become reality. This is why people say “My prayers have come true”. Indeed every prayer has potential to come true provided you prayed in deep awareness. Deity itself has no meaning unless you create. Deity is used more as a focal point or to attack your Mind.
14. Don't just visit, sit - Traditionally, the belief is that when one goes to a temple one should sit down for a while before coming out, otherwise, the visit would be fruitless. This is so because temples were built like a public charging place, by which people could charge themselves with an inner energy. People visited the temple before they entered into their daily work, so that they could go about with a certain sense of balance and depth in their lives.
15. No footwear in the temple - Temples are the place that contains pure vibrations of magnetic and electric fields with positive energy. In olden days, temples were built in such a way that the floor at the center of the temple were good conductors of these positive vibrations allowing them to pass through our feet to the body. Hence it is necessary to walk barefoot while you enter the core center of the temple.
16. Parikrama - The idol inside the chamber absorbs all the energy from the bell sound, camphor heat and vibrates the positive energy within the chamber for a certain duration of time. When you do the circumambulation at this point of time, you tend to absorb all these positive vibrations once your five senses are activated. (Circumambulation is the act of moving around a sacred object or idol and It is also present in other religions, including Christianity, Judaism, and Islam.) It also works as a focusing mechanism. A central point is deity, you direct your thoughts, prayers and focus to the center which helps you to absorb positive energy more easily. Is this also a reason that as we do parikrama, ye central point ko energize karta hai. And that is why all planets are revolving around sun and thats how sun is burning? Maybe, maybe not.
17. Blowing the Conch - In Hinduism, the sound from the conch is associated with the sacred syllable 'Om' which is believed to be the first sound of creation. The Shankh or conch marks the beginning of any good work. The sound of the conch is believed to be the purest form of sound which ushers in freshness and new hope. This gets more powerful with the positive energy radiated in the temples and hence has amazing impacts on the devotees.Om - A cosmic sound. A sound in empty cosmic space. Visualize yourself in space, not in a spaceship, just out there in black empty infinite space, floating and then try to hear the sound of 'OM'
18. Temples do not belong to any religion - Temples don't belong to Hindus. Temple doesn’t belong to any beliefs. Temple is just a guiding place for people on a path. Churches, Mosques also serve you the same way. All roads lead to just one place! Once you have the deepest experience of Meditation then you create a temple inside you.
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Max Müller says: - "The religion of the Veda knows no idols; the worship of idols in India is a secondary formation, a degradation of the more primitive worship of ideal gods."
Hindus are idol worshipers of the large number of Gods and Goddesses whereas in Vedas the God has been described as:-
Sakshi (Witness)
Chetan (conscious)
Nirguna (Without form and properties).
Nitya (eternal)
Shuddha (pure)
Buddha (omniscient)
Mukta (unattached).
The nature of the Atman (soul) is:-
Witness
Conscious
Without form and properties
Eternal
Pure
Omniscient
Unattached
Thus it refers to formless and attributeless God, which is the Atman (soul), the innermost self within the false experience. Thus it indicates clearly all the Gods with form and attributes are mere imagination based on the false self. Thus Atman or soul, the innermost self is God.
The Vedas do not talk about idol worship. In fact, till about 2000 years ago followers of Vedism never worshiped idols. Idol worship was started by the followers of Buddhism and Jains. There is logic to idol worship. Vedas speaks of one God that is the supreme self in i.e. Atman or soul, but Hinduism indulges in worshiping 60 million Gods.
The Vedas as a body of scripture contains many contradictions, and they are fragmentary in nature. For Hindus, scriptures like the Bhagavad-Gita, Ramayana, Mahabharata and Puranas are more attractive and appealing than the Vedas. And also the gods and goddesses they worship differ considerably from the Vedic ones. The collection of hymns called Vedas written in praise of certain deities by poets over several centuries does not seem to have much significance for the Hindus.
Yajur Veda says:-
They enter darkness, those who worship natural things (for example air, water, sun, moon, animals, fire, stone, etc).
They sink deeper in darkness those who worship sambhuti. (Sambhuti means created things, for example table, chair, idol etc.) (Yajurveda 40:9)
Vedic gods hardly have any significance in the present day Hindu belief system. The gods and goddesses important to the Hindus of today are Ram, Krishna, Kali, Ganesh, Hanuman, Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva and the respective consorts of the last three, namely, Saraswathi, Lakshmi and Shakti. None of these deities figured prominently in the Vedic pantheon, and some of them are clearly non-Vedic.
Originally Shiva and the cult of the Mother Goddess belonged to the religion of the Indus (Sindhu) Valley people. Vedic worshipers did not use temples and idols as Hindus of today do. For them, the sacrificial rituals were more important than the temple or idol worship.
The theory of Avatar of gods which is very important to modern Hinduism is non-Vedic. The term Avatar is not found in the earlier Vedic texts and is absent from the older Sanskrit glossaries”. The caste system which is so integral to Hinduism, was also not practiced in the Vedic times.
There is hardly any evidence of a rigid caste system in the Vedas. It is argued that the purushasukta hymn of the Rig Veda which is often referred to in order to give a religious sanction to caste system, was a later interpolation.
The Vedas, however, speak of various classes of people, which appear to have been names of professions, and they were not hereditary. The very concepts of castes by birth, upper/lower castes, superior/inferior castes, outcastes, untouchables, Dalits, etc. are clearly prohibited by Rig-Veda”. Vedic people did not worship Hindu Gods and Goddesses.
In YajurVeda – chapter- 32: - God Supreme or Supreme Spirit has no ‘Pratima’ (idol) or material shape. He cannot be seen directly by anyone. He pervades all beings and all directions. Thus, Idolatry does not find any support from the Vedas.
"Beef was an important part of Vedic diet. In ancient India, cow-slaughter was considered auspicious on the occasions of some ceremonies. Bride and groom used to sit on the hide of a red ox in front of the ‘Vedi’ (alter).” Many scriptures are witnesses to such sacrifices and killings of animals for consumption. References of such commands are replete in Hindu scriptures like Manusmriti, Vedas, Upanishads, Brahmins, Grih sutras, Dharma sutras and others.
Manusmriti (Chapter 5 / Verse 30) says, “It is not sinful to eat meat of eatable animals, for Brahma has created both the eaters and the eatables.”
Manusmriti (5 / 35) states: - When a man who is properly engaged in a ritual does not eat meat, after his death he will become a sacrificial animal during twenty-one rebirths.
Maharishi Yagyavalkya says in Shatpath Brahmin (3/1/2/21):- “I eat beef because it is very soft and delicious.”
Apastamb Grihsutram (1/3/10) says, “The cow should be slaughtered on the arrival of a guest, on the occasion of ‘Shraddha’ of ancestors and on the occasion of a marriage.”
Rigveda (10/85/13) declares:- “On the occasion of a girl’s marriage oxen and cows are slaughtered.”
Rigveda (6/17/1) states that: - “Indra used to eat the meat of cow, calf, horse and buffalo.”
Vashistha Dharma sutra (11/34) writes:- “If a Brahmin refuses to eat the meat offered to him on the occasion of ‘Shraddha’ or worship, he goes to hell.”
Swami Vivekananda said:- “You will be surprised to know that according to ancient Hindu rites and rituals, a man cannot be a good Hindu who does not eat beef”. (The Complete Works of Swami Vivekanand, Vol.3, p. 536).
Dr. Pandurang Vaman Kane says, “Bajsancyi Samhita sanctifies beef-eating because of its purity”. (Dharmashastra Vichar Marathi, page 180)
Sri Sage Sankara commentary on Brihdaranyakopanishad 6/4/18 says : ‘Odan’ (rice) mixed with meat is called ‘Mansodan’. On being asked whose meat it should be, he answers ‘Uksha’. ‘Uksha’ is used for an ox, which is capable of producing semen.
“The Formless Supreme Spirit that pervades the universe can have no material representation, likeness or image.”~YajurVeda 32:3.
Hymn CLXIX of the Rig Veda says: "May the wind blow upon our cows with healing; may they eat the herbage Like-colored various-hued or single- colored whose names through sacrifice are known to Agni, Whom the Angirases produced by Fervour - vouchsafe to these, Parjanya, great protection. Those who have offered to the Gods their bodies whose varied forms are all well known to Soma '' (The Rig Veda (RV), translated by Ralph H. Griffith, New York, 1992, p. 647). In the Rig Veda (RV: VIII.43.11) Agni is described as "fed on ox and cow" suggesting that cattle were sacrificed and roasted in fire.
Quoting from Rigveda, historian H. H Wilson writes, “The sacrifice and consumption of horse and cow appears to have been common in the early periods of the Aryan culture.”
A great majority of Hindus are not in contact with their religious history therefore, they believe their inherited beliefs as the ultimate truth.
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