On Apr 16, 2005, at 7:23 PM, anonymousff wrote:
> There is no need to adopt any Hindu idol-worshipping-rituals; > the opposite is truth. Guru Dev and MMY stated that the pure > knowledge is lost and what left are only empty rituals. > It could be the case that our friend is doing both > the pure practice and rituals at the same time, however the 'path' > don't state worshipping Guru Dev nor any image of him or > Ganesha idol etc as necessary. Swami Brahmananda Sarsvati, as not only a Shankaracharya but esp. as a dandi swami, represents one of the more orthodox manifestation of traditional Hinduism. Consequently an important part of external worship involves the 16-fold worship of murtis, external ritual (mahayoga), etc. It's a central part of the tradition. Technically however these are not "idols", they are not inanimate forms. In fact murtis (or statue representations of deity) all undergo the same process that someone who receives a TM-style ishta mantra: they are established with prana-shakti. Thus they serve as living doorways to the divine. This is an important distinction. While this particular style of devotion and worship is not necessarily for me, I think it's pretty cool that Ben's kids have a home which contains doorways to the divine within it. -V. To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
