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The rites of oblation, O lovers of truth, which the
sages divined from the sacred verses, were variously expounded in the
threefold Veda. Perform them with constant care. This is your path to the world of holy action.
Atharva Veda, Mundaka Upanishad, 1.2.1. VE, P. 414

Monday
LESSON 309
Angelic Helpers
Good evening! It is wonderful to be in Mauritius and
see how strong Saivism is here. You have the advantage, not enjoyed in
countries like Sri Lanka and Malaysia, that Hindus form the majority of
the population of this beautiful island nation. This makes it possible
for you to set a fine example to all the world, to courageously and
dynamically teach and preach the Saiva faith through your temple
society and other fine institutions. I hope you will do this, and by
doing so bring Saivism positively into the technological age.
Tonight
I want so speak about the great Gods of our ancient religion and the
holy temples where we commune and communicate with these spiritual
beings. A Hindu temple such as this one is filled with millions of devas. When someone is born into the Hindu religion, or formally accepted into the religion later in life, guardian devas in the unseen worlds are assigned to automatically protect and guide him through his Earthly life. These guardian devas
in the heaven world cannot be seen by you with your physical eyes, but
they can be seen and are seen by those who know how to use the psychic
vision of their third eye. Nevertheless, you can feel their presence in
your home. They surround you, they help you and they communicate with
the great Gods of our religion to guide you through life.
There
are three worlds of existence. The Third World is where the highest
beings, such as Lord Ganesha, Lord Murugan and our Great God Siva,
exist in shining bodies of golden light. This Third World is called the
Sivaloka. The Second World of existence, or astral plane, is called the
Devaloka. The great Gods have millions of helpers in the Devaloka who
help each and every one of us. One or more of them is assigned to
personally help you in this First World, which is the world of material
or physical existence, called the Bhuloka. When we leave our physical
body at night, we go into the Devaloka, the Second World, and commune
with the devas there and with the Gods of our religion in the Sivaloka, the Third World.
Saivism's
most sacred substance, the holy ash, is the symbol of our religion, and
we wear it across our forehead as a symbol of purity. But even more so,
the devas in the Devaloka, in the Second World, can actually
see this sacred substance on our forehead. They can actually hear the
chanting of your sacred devotional hymns, your Devarams. They
can actually see the flame that is passed before the image that
represents the Deity. This is why we wear this pure white ash, to alert
the devas that we are members of this religion. This vibhuti is
a sign, a way of saying, "We seek your help, and we seek your
blessings." And by seeing the ash, they can distinguish your face. When
they look into this world, it is like looking through a veil. They
cannot see us too clearly. So we have signs and symbols to attract
their attention, to earn their grace and their blessings. This is why
it is important, especially when you come to the temple, to wear the
sacred ash, so that you can be seen by the great beings in the inner
worlds and attract their attention. They will respond. They will heal
the aching mind.
Tuesday
LESSON 310
The Hindu Forehead Dot
Why do we wear the pottu, the red dot between our eyes? The dot worn on the forehead is a sign that one is a Hindu. It is called bindi in the Hindi language, bindu in Sanskrit and pottu
in Tamil. In olden days, all Hindu men and women wore these marks, and
they both also wore earrings. Today it is the women who are most
faithful in wearing the bindi. The dot has a mystical meaning.
It represents the third eye of spiritual sight, which sees things the
physical eyes cannot see. Hindus seek to awaken their inner sight
through yoga. The forehead dot is a reminder to use this
spiritual vision to perceive and better understand life's inner
workings -- to see things not just physically, but with the "mind's
eye" as well. With our third eye, we can see into the future. With our
third eye, we can see into the next world, the Devaloka. With the third
eye, we can see into the Third World, the Sivaloka. With our third eye,
we can see into the past. It is an eye that we were born with and which
is eternally awake, but we are usually unaware of its many functions.
In most people it is clouded over with intellectual ignorance and
disuse. When we are in a state of meditation and our entire mind is
concentrated in the area of the third eye between our eyebrows, we see
a red light begin to form. When we put a red dot between our eyebrows,
the pottu, or bindu, as we are taught to do in the
temple and at home, this enhances the use of the third eye, just as
eyeglasses enhance the use of our two eyes.
There are many types of forehead marks, or tilaka
, in addition to the simple dot. Each mark represents a particular sect
or denomination of our vast religion. We have four major sects:
Saivism, Vaishnavism, Shaktism and Smartism. Vaishnava Hindus, for
example, wear a V-shaped tilaka made of clay. Elaborate tilakas are worn by Hindus mainly at religious events, though many wear the simple bindi,
indicating they are Hindu, even in the general public. By these marks
we know what a person believes, and therefore how to begin and conduct
our conversations.
For Hindu women, the forehead dot is also a
beauty mark, not unlike the black beauty mark European and American
women once wore on the cheek. The red bindi is generally a sign of marriage. A black bindi is often worn before marriage to ward off the evil eye. The bindi is sometimes used as an exotic fashion statement, its color carefully chosen to complement the color of a lady's sari. Ornate bindis are sometimes worn by actresses in popular American TV shows.
It
is common in many religions to identify one's beliefs by wearing
distinctive religious symbols. Often these are blessed in their
temples, churches or synagogues. Jewish men wear the round skull cap, yarmulka.
Christians wear a cross or medal on a necklace or coat lapel. In some
countries, Muslim women still cover their face with a veil.
So, do not hesitate to wear the bindi
on your forehead in the United States, Canada, Europe or any country of
the world. It will distinguish you from all other people as a very
special person, a Hindu, a knower of eternal truths. You will never be
mistaken as belonging to another religion or to no religion at all. For
boys and girls, men and women, the dot can be small or large depending
on the circumstance. Recently a Canadian TV documentary distinguished
the bindi by calling it a "cool dot." Times are changing, and
to proudly wear the symbols that distinguish and define us is totally
cool!
Wednesday
LESSON 311
The Nature Of God Siva
The most important teaching of God Siva is that He
has three perfections. He is not only timeless, formless and spaceless.
That Absolute Reality, Parashiva, is but one of God Siva's perfections.
He also has an all-pervasive form which flows through all things --
Satchidananda. He pervades all form. There is no place that Siva is
not. And He has yet another perfection, which is a golden body of light
in the Third World, a perfect body in which He is our Lord and Creator,
the most wonderful and loving and perfect Being we can imagine. In the
temple, when we invoke God Siva, He comes in this golden body of light
and blesses the people. He can see you. He can hear your prayers. He
has created all the souls on this planet and all other planets in our
universe, our holy scriptures tell us.
God Siva is in all
things and everywhere simultaneously, at every point in time. And yet,
Siva as Maheshvara, the Divine Dancer, Nataraja, has a body not unlike
yours or mine, a body in which He can talk, a body in which He can
think, a body in which He can see you and you can see Him, a body with
legs, a body with arms. In this body He dances the eternal dance. I had
a vision, once, of Siva Nataraja dancing. I could hear the bells on His
ankles. I could see His feet and legs. He is a beautiful dancer, and He
dances in the Third World.
God Siva is so close to us. He is
closer than our breathing, nearer to us than our hands or feet. Yes, He
is the very essence of our soul, and yet He has a body just like ours
that lives in the Third World. In this body of light He can come into
the inner sanctum of the temple, and He can look at us, and we can feel
His shakti, His power and presence. He is our great God, the ruler of this universe.
Sometimes
we hear the misconception that if you worship God Siva He will take
everything away from you. That is not true. That is anti-Saivite
propaganda. It is not true at all. God Siva gives you everything,
because He is the universal God described in the Vedas as the
Life of your life. This unfavorable propaganda, which exists primarily
in the north of India, but elsewhere, too, postulates that Siva is only
Rudra, the Destroyer. It makes people afraid of Siva. There is never a
reason to fear Siva. He is a God of love, of compassion for all He has
created.
Nothing has ever been destroyed by God Siva but that
He creates, constantly changes the form of and absorbs back to Himself
His creations. For is not the ultimate absorption, after eons of time,
the ultimate destruction of what was once created? This is the goal, is
it not, for all to merge in oneness with our God Siva? We are not
destroyed by doing this. We are fulfilled! He does not take anything
away from us, but that which would harm us. God Siva takes from us
greed and gives abundance. God Siva takes from us lust and gives
contentment. God Siva takes from us anger and gives love. God Siva
takes from us jealousy and gives self-confidence and security. God Siva
is an ever-fulfilling God.
Thursday
LESSON 312
Temple Metaphysics
Our Supreme God Siva has created the Mahadevas, the
Gods, to help us, to protect us, to inspire us -- such as Lord Murugan,
Lord Ganesha and many others. Ganesha, above all others, is the God,
the great Mahadeva, to be invoked before every act and especially
worshiped and prayed to when changes occur in our lives as we move from
the old established patterns into new ones. Lord Ganesha is always
there to steady our minds and open the proper doors as we evolve and
progress. He never, ever fails. He is always there for us when we need
Him. Lord Murugan was created by God Siva's shakti and given a vel
of spiritual discernment, a lance of divine intelligence. Pray to Lord
Murugan to unravel the great mysteries of the universe. Pray to Lord
Murugan to make you a spiritual person. Pray to Lord Murugan to release
you into the arms of Lord Siva by teaching you more about your Saivite
religion.
The understanding of the reality of God and the Gods
may help you to appreciate the importance of prayer and worship. Take,
for instance, our hymns and chants -- our Devarams and bhajanas, our japa
and the many other ways we express the praises and love of God Siva
that we feel in our hearts. These hymns are actually heard by the
subtle beings. Devas in the Second World come, hover around and
near us and rejoice in our singing. If we are deeply devoted and
inspired, then even the Mahadevas of the Third World will hover above
the devas in their magnificent bodies of light, showering blessings to those who are singing or chanting prayerfully.
You
may not be able to see these subtle beings, but you can feel their
presence, feel a holy atmosphere around you. I'm sure that many of you
here have felt this, perhaps while chanting Aum Namah Sivaya. As long
as somebody is saying "Aum Namah Sivaya," the Saivite religion exists
on the planet in full force. Wake up in the morning saying "Aum Namah
Sivaya, Aum Namah Sivaya." Go to sleep at night saying "Aum Namah
Sivaya, Aum Namah Sivaya," and through the night you will leave your
physical body and travel in the celestial spheres, where we are all
together, learning, meditating and advancing ourselves spiritually.
On
this Earth plane the Gods have a special home, and that is the holy
temple. It is in the sanctified temple, where regular and proper puja
is being performed in a pure way, that the Gods most easily manifest.
You can go to a Hindu temple with your mind filled up with worries, you
can be in a state of jealousy and anger, and leave the temple wondering
what you were disturbed about, completely free from the mental burdens
and feeling secure. So great are the divine psychiatrists, the Gods of
our religion, who live in the Third World, who come from the Third
World to this world where our priests perform the pujas and invoke their presence over the stone image.
Hindus
do not worship stone images. Don't let anyone ever convince you of
that. It is absolutely false. Those who say such things simply do not
understand the mystical workings of the temple, or they seek to
ridicule our religion because they feel insecure about their own. Hindu
priests invoke the Gods to come and manifest for a few minutes within
the sanctum of the temple. The Deities do come in their subtle bodies
of light. They hover in and above the stone image and bless the people.
If you are psychic and your third eye is open, you can see the God
there and have His personal darshana. Many of our ancient
Saivite saints, as well as contemporary devotees, have seen such
visions of the Gods. They know from personal experience that God and
the Gods do exist.
When we go to the temple, we leave with our mind filled with the shakti of the Deity. We are filled and thrilled with the shakti
of the temple in every nerve current of our body. When we return to our
home, we light an oil lamp, and that brings the power of the temple
into the home. This simple act brings the devas in the Second
World right into your home, where they can bless the rest of the family
who perhaps did not go to the temple. With a little bit of study of the
mysticism of Saivism, we can easily understand how the unseen worlds
operate in and through us.
Friday
LESSON 313
Talking to God During Puja
Many have wondered what the priest is saying when he is chanting in the Sanskrit language, which is the language of the devas, the celestial beings. When he is in the shrine chanting and performing puja with
water, flowers and other offerings, you may wonder about the meaning of
those very complex rituals. The priest's craft is very important to the
proper working of the temple in our lives. He must be pure and follow
strict disciplines so that the Gods will be drawn to the sanctum.
Through his chanting, he is speaking to God and the Gods, saying, "O
God, I am going to perform this puja at such-and-such a temple located in such-and-such a place in your universe of forms, and this puja will
be for the purpose of such-and-such. I hope that you will consider this
worship auspicious and grace it, and that you will grant our needs and
our wishes and bring good things into the lives of everyone in this
community. I pray that we will please you with our worship, making no
errors and forgetting nothing that should be done. But if we do, Lord,
please forgive us and make the blessings of this puja just as
powerful as if we had done it perfectly, without error. We beseech you
to come to this temple and hover over the stone image with your body of
light and bless the people. Thus, I am offering you rice. I am offering
you fruits and flowers. I am offering you all the fine things that we
have, so that you will come and stay for awhile."
The priest's
initial chants are basically letting God know the place and purpose of
this day's worship. He intones, "We hope we are pure enough in our
performance of the puja that we sanctify the atmosphere here,
so that you will come and be our honored guest in this temple." Then he
bathes the Deity image, dresses the Deity in fine clothes, and worships
the Deity so that the God from the Third World will come into this
finite body in the First World, this body made of stone. Our bodies are
made with bones, but we are not our bones. The God's body in the temple
is made of stone, but He is not that stone body. His Third-World form
is a body of light. He is a great soul, just as we are also souls.
During the height of puja, the God comes with all of His devas,
His celestial helpers. They take the problems or concerns out of your
mind, harmonize the currents of your body and dissolve all the problems
for you. When that happens, you walk out of the temple feeling you have
been blessed, having forgotten the concerns that you went in with.
If you arrange for an archana -- an optional personal puja generally held in-between the main pujas of the day -- the priest pronounces your name. He intones the name of your birth star, or nakshatra,
and presents you to the God in a proper way. He says, "O Lord, this
devotee humbly requests blessings for a particular problem or a special
event. Please hear his prayers as he places them at your holy feet in
the knowing that you will assist with the best possible outcome."
"Would this work just as well if the priest chanted in English?" you
might wonder. Yes, it would! In your mind you can talk to the God in
English or in any other language, and He will understand. But the
Sanskrit language has its own power, a spiritual vibration. It is a
most ancient language, and far more subtle in its ability to
communicate spiritual ideas and meanings. That is why it gives a good
feeling to hear the ancient mantras, even if we don't understand them.
Saturday
LESSON 314
Approaching The Temple
Devotees ask, "Why do we circumambulate the temple?"
When we come to the temple out of the world, off the street, we are
often shrouded by negative vibrations, which can actually be seen in
our aura. Our nerve system may be upset, especially now, in the
technological age, when we often suffer from stress and strain, the
insecurity of so many changes and the rapid pace of life. In order to
prepare ourselves to enter the sanctum sanctorum of the temple, the
great mandapa inside, we walk clockwise around the temple very
slowly. In this way we prepare our mind. We consciously drop off
worldliness, letting the sufferings go, letting all disturbances leave
our mind the best we can, and trying to reach deep inside of ourselves
where peace exists eternally. We become as celestial as we can during
the time we are walking around the temple, so that we can communicate
with the celestial beings within the temple.
A Siva temple
marks an agreement between God Siva and the people on the Earth as a
meeting place where the three worlds can consciously commune. It is the
home of Lord Siva and many of the other Gods. Specifically sanctified,
it possesses a ray of spiritual energy connecting the First World with
the Sivaloka. My satguru, Siva Yogaswami of Sri Lanka,
proclaimed, "O Lord, O Primal One who gives blessings to devotees, who
has become the embodiment of Love, O Supreme Lord, Transcendent One who
dwells in the temple, make me to live here like a God. In this world we
may acquire a multitude of siddhis, but never stray from bhakti's path, nor disobey the words of bhaktars." A
holy Siva temple must be approached with great reverence and humility,
as God lives in the temple. Go into the temple as you would approach a
great king, a governor, a president of a great realm, anticipating,
with a little trepidation, your audience with Him.
The worship
in the temple creates the culture in the land. The worship in the
temple creates the wealth of the land. The worship in the temple
creates the obedience to the divine law of God Siva, the Saiva Dharma.
The ancient Tirumantiram conversely warns, "When in Siva's
temple worship ceases, harm befalls the ruler, scanty are the rains,
theft and robbery abound in the land" (518). The greatest temples in
the world are the homes of God Siva, and within them there are private
rooms and sanctums for Lord Ganesha, Lord Murugan and others of the 330
million Gods of our Saivite Hindu religion. Pray to God Siva. Flock to
the Siva temples, and God Siva will reward you, each and everyone of
you, abundantly, as you perform His worship.
We just visited the great temple of Chidambaram, where God Siva dances. The priests at the temple had their inner sanctum, the garbhagriha, scientifically
tested. Scientists from the West came, made certain measurements and
found that the inner sanctum was not only radioactive, but it also had
the highest level of gravity on the planet. Yes, things are very heavy
in the inner sanctum, much heavier than any other place in the temple
or the surrounding area. And it was radioactive. This great power has
been built up by thousands of years of worship there.
Why are
Americans converting to the Saivite religion? Because they have
actually seen these mystical things happen, even in the new temples
that are being constructed in the West or in their own meditations.
They have actually seen the God come and hover over His First-World
image. They have actually felt the rays of shakti coming out of
the sanctum, cutting through their body, cutting through their aura,
and their mind being cleansed and their whole life, even the atoms of
their body, being inwardly changed. Therefore, the Americans, who want
everything, also want the greatest of all things -- the blessings of
God Siva.
Sunday
LESSON 315
Emissaries Of Lord Siva
Worship God Siva and you will be filled with love.
Become a member of the united Saivites of the world, who love one
another, who take care of each other in England, in South Africa, in
Nepal, in North America, in South America, in Mauritius, in Malaysia,
in Java, in Fiji, in Trinidad and Tobago, in Guyana, in Suriname, in
Sri Lanka and in India. It is this Sivasambhandam, this inner
association of Saivites the world over, that is the strength for
Saivites wherever they find themselves. In this technological age this
must become an outer association as well.
I urge all Saivites,
devotees of God Siva, to worship Him as the God of Love and, in doing
so, to become beings of love. The great saints of our religion were
Siva bhaktas. They changed the world through their love of God.
They did not need vast institutions to spread their message. They did
not need riches or carts filled with books to spread their message.
They did not need radio, television or the Internet. Their message
spread because their minds were filled with direct knowledge, direct
experience of God Siva. Their message spread far and wide, though they
perhaps never left their native village. They just evolved within it.
You, too, are emissaries of Lord Siva, and your love for Him is your
greatest message. Simply love God Siva and let that love radiate out
into the world.
We cannot forget that Lord Siva is the
uncreated God. He is the closest to you. He is nearer than your
breathing. He is nearer than your heartbeat. He is the very Self of
you, each and every one of you. Saivites love Siva in that very way, as
the Self of themselves. Being in all things simultaneously, at every
point in time, God Siva is in your fingers, He is in your eyes, He is
in your heart, He is in your mind. As our great satguru, Siva
Yogaswami, said, "There is one thing that Lord Siva cannot do. He can
do everything, but there is one thing He cannot do. He cannot separate
Himself from me." That is the only thing that God Siva cannot do. He
cannot take Himself out of you.
There are three things we must do: perform or attend puja
every day in the home, attend a temple once a week and make a
pilgrimage once a year. These three are the foundation of our Saiva
Siddhanta. Plus, for those who are able, meditation and certain sadhanas
are part of this worship. External worship builds a vibration within
us, and that vibration is taken within, into deep meditation --
internalizing the worship in worshiping God and the Gods within you and
contacting them within the higher chakras until you realize that you also have always been the all-pervasive energy that pervades the universe.
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