Were the temple in the past merely meant for worship? If temples were meant only for worship, why not we do so at home? Why do we need a temple at all?
Temples were not meant for worship alone but for the welfare of the society as a whole. A temple can nurture the quality of love and gratitude.
A study of the ancient Hindu scriptures, The Vedas shows that these revered scriptures never used the word temple nor did they suggest building of temples. The Vedas, however, did not lose sight of social justice.
In the epic Ramayan, there is mention of king Dasaratha going to a temple for worship. If needed, the king worshipped the Sun inside the palace. Also, Kings and citizens in those days prayed within their hearts.
Saint Viswamitra asked for Rama’s help only to save the "Yaga" and not for saving the temple.
In Vedic Age, Yagas and Yagnas formed the foundation of worship. Rig Veda talks of angels, demons and the triumvirates. It talks of only one God with many names. But, there was scope no for building temple. It talks of Indra, as Rain God.
Yajur Veda mostly speaks of worship at the Yagnas. It talks of the rituals and practices yet no mention of temple occurred here too.
Next, the Sama Veda deals with recitation of prayer in a musical song. There again was no mention of any temple.
Atharva Veda is said to have been lost. It had some mantric applications which could destroy others. But this text also made no mention of temples. Probably, this text was a tool or an instrument likely to be misused by some to the detriment of society. Hence, it was destroyed.
Veda Vyasa wrote 18 historical at the end of the Vedas. Koorma Puranam, for example, deals with building and worshipping Shiva by Vishnu. Each of these puranas never differentiated between Saivism and Vaishnavism. In one purana, Siva is describing the worship of Vishnu.
Only in the purana periods, the concept of temples get recognition lest the people should not forget the gods named in the puranas and hence, there were no need for temple before.
During First and Middle Sangha period, (Before the Christ) and the third Sangha period (dated after the Birth of Christ), evidence suggests the existence of temple.
About 2,000 years ago, a poet Mamoolanar has written about a group of unruly youth who hunted down a wild ox and ate it. They symbolized lack of civilization. The youth were making boisterous noises. Blood was dripping through their mouth. They had no education or discipline or intellect. They could be corrected only by Saivite worship.
The poet says that temples were built then as an indispensable tool to bring education and discipline to the unruly populace.
First, Man worshipped with mud. The symbol made of mud was worshipped and dissolved. Then, a small mud symbol was made and the idol was kept for few days for worship. As the society became civilized, the practice of building a place of worship with wood and trees gained root.
Later, when kings and rulers came into being, stone temples were came into existence. Tamil Saint Thirunavukkarasar has sung in praise of 78 temple towns. But in one of the songs, he cautioned that one should think god was not only in there 78 places and in their home town or village. Be it a small stone temple, mud temple wood temple, or temple made of plants and leaves or big temple with great worship, God is not only in temple towns, he is everywhere, even in pot of consecrated water.
In Chola period, every temple was built under the Agama tradition. They decided on the goals and planned out the temple in such a way to meet the goals. Madurai Meenakshi temple, for example, has an annual festival of 48 days. In one moth, eight flags are hoisted. In nearby Thiruparangunram, this is not the practice.
Only the temple which has 11 towers, four entry points and four Royal Towers can hoist eight flags. If one royal Tower and four entry points are there, five flags could be hoisted there, according to the ancient tradition. Each temple is built, based on the mode of worship.
Temples were being built and maintained by Kings themselves in those days. There were no trustees. The general public was involved in the temple maintenance. If the rich donated to the temples, the poor people got help from the temples.
In temple offerings, one part went to the priest, one went to the poor, two part were set aside for visitors, and one part went to the temple.
During the first to fifth century, temple worship deteriorated as temples were attacked by anti-social elements.
In 549 AD, under the Pallava kingdom, temples again got a fresh lease of life. This lasted till 1271 AD.
From 1311 AD, two Pandya kings fought each other and one of them sought the help of Muslim leader Malik Kapur. Malik Kapur, after seeing Sri Rangam, Chidambaram and Madurai was tempted to plunder the temple wealth. He defeated both the warring brothers and drove then away. Malik Kapur took away all the jewelry from the temples. For many years these temples remained without worship. Sri Rangam temple became an army barrack.
If an idol is lost today, we may commission another one and raise funds for making it. But, in those days, the devotees were keen on getting their own original idol. The idol was not mere idol for them as it was their God.
The devotees went to Delhi and retrieved the stolen idols. A woman from Malik Kapur’s harem got attracted to the idol. She was not willing to part wit it. She traveled to Sri Rangam with the idol. Hence, there is a temple dedicated to the Muslim woman inside a Hindu Temple. It is known as Thulukka Nachhiar temple, in recognition of her devotion.
Temples continued to face hardships through the Moghul rule. Then the British rule did not help temples either. Then King Krishna Devaraya helped in recapturing the temples in Tamil Nadu and restored them to the people. Hence, each temple has its first tower dedicated to the Devaraya Dynasty.
In Nyanmar and Azhwar period, the philosophy of worship was popularized and temples flourished. Worship was being done in Tamil at that time.
With the advent of Krishna Devaraya, who did not understand Tamil, Sanskrit worship was introduced. Tamil priests resisted. Then both Tamil and Sanskrit worship became a practice.
Subsequently, in the period of Nayakars, the ruling family donated lot of wealth to the maintenance of temples. Then in major temples, priests got divided over sharing the spoils of wealth. To bring unity among priests, the office of "Dharmakartha" or a trustee was introduced. Then to prevent misuse of the position, a board of trustees was created.
In each temple, a scheme was in vogue to help visitors from other places. The visitors were given food at the temple. There were no restaurants in those days. Various massive halls were built to promote fine arts like literature and dance.
Visiting temple was one of the five basic duties of an individual. Choosing a bride in those days was done on the temples. After initial meeting in temples, further contacts were made in homes.
Two brothers fighting in court of law visited the temple and made compromise after worship. During floods or earthquake, temples provided shelter for the homeless.
Helping the aged and the poor, feeding the visitors were among the important social purpose of a temple. In temples, social service was the main purpose rather than ostentatious celebrations of festivals. The general public gave their funds for the benefit of the society, by donating to the temples.
Today, there are many temples without money for even lighting a lamp. People in that place would rather go to a Tirupati or Tiruttani or some other temple to pray in the hope of getting a certain reward or benefit.
The possible benefits of prayers to a deity corrupted the mind of the people. After saying a prayer, the likely benefitsfrom that prayer were described. This later day introduction of benefits of prayer was aimed at attracting crowd and keep the following for a religion. Going to Rameswaram or Kashi is in the same category.
But in the olden days, people neither forgot the Tirupati temple nor did they ignore their hometown god.
In the past, volunteers managed the temple finances. Now, all temples have too many employees. Administrative staffs are more than priests and traditional staff. Over 60 percent of public donation now goes to meet the staff salary. About 20 percent goes for infrastructure facilities. Only 10 percent goes to the temple in real sense. Against this, earlier, 90 percent went to the temple.
Children should be made to work as volunteers in temples now so that in future days, temples can have their service instead of fully paid maintenance staff.
In most of the temples, halls meant for fine arts have become warehouses. Promotion of arts and literature has one of temple premises.
If Agama shastra was given importance, income to the temple would go down. The tradition set certain times for public prayer. Now, to get money worship is allowed at all the times and the Agama tradition got a back seat.
Priests also took liberty with traditions and gave up their customs. Sincerity of priests dwindled. They did not feel the importance of learning the agama traditions. Priests today are unable to answer some basic questions about the worship.
In those days, kings built the temples. Today, people build the temples. People were not allowed to build temple in those days because the differences of opinion among the people should not hinder a project. Unity among people was sought to be protected.
Today, there is demand for various types of temples and agama tradition is compromised now and devotees’ desire takes precedence.
Enlightened saints never differentiated between Saivite and Vaishnavite gods. Even today, in certain temples in southern India, a Saivite can’t perform the rituals in a vaishnavite temple and so on. But, in the U.S., in a temple like the one in Houston, such disparities do not exist. We have both Saivite and Vaishnavite temples and Saivite priest can perform the worship rituals for the Vaishnavite.
The unified sense of religion now flourishes in the U.S. Until yesterday, nothing but ghee entered the sanctum sanatorium for lighting the temple. Today, we have electric lights. Temple kitchen alone provided food in the olden says. Now, the people prepared food and brought to the temple.
These are changes in tradition with changing times. In future, American temples may provide guidance to temples in India.
Whatever be the changes, God is not going to punish us. He is the father for the thief as well as the victim. God has not been painted as a punisher in the Vedas. God is a symbol of patience.
Today we have many inter religious weddings. Christians and Hindus for example get married but they do not change their religion in their hearts. We celebrate Christmas with Christmas tree. We celebrate birthdays by cutting cakes.
Future generations may not see the difference between both the traditions. There may be a merger of both the cultures. Future generations of inter-religious couple, may impose both their traditions on their offspring.
Just, as many gods are installed in our temples today, to meet the needs of the devotees, in future as we do celebrate Christmas and Deepavali, for satisfying the children, we may have joint worship of the church and the temple.
Instead of going separately to a church, a church may even be built within the temple. Yet the importance of temple will not diminish.
The traditions and rituals may change but temples will survive, may alongside a church. Rituals in temples may slowly be given up and the worship may dwindle. Networking and modern communications methods may be used in worship.
Our children should be sent for volunteer work in temples, not necessarily to pray or worship. College students coming from India should be helped through temples. This will help them maintain their touch with the tradition.
Temples were not meant for worship alone but for the welfare of the society as a whole. A temple can nurture the quality of love and gratitude.
A study of the ancient Hindu scriptures, The Vedas shows that these revered scriptures never used the word temple nor did they suggest building of temples. The Vedas, however, did not lose sight of social justice.
In the epic Ramayan, there is mention of king Dasaratha going to a temple for worship. If needed, the king worshipped the Sun inside the palace. Also, Kings and citizens in those days prayed within their hearts.
Saint Viswamitra asked for Rama’s help only to save the "Yaga" and not for saving the temple.
In Vedic Age, Yagas and Yagnas formed the foundation of worship. Rig Veda talks of angels, demons and the triumvirates. It talks of only one God with many names. But, there was scope no for building temple. It talks of Indra, as Rain God.
Yajur Veda mostly speaks of worship at the Yagnas. It talks of the rituals and practices yet no mention of temple occurred here too.
Next, the Sama Veda deals with recitation of prayer in a musical song. There again was no mention of any temple.
Atharva Veda is said to have been lost. It had some mantric applications which could destroy others. But this text also made no mention of temples. Probably, this text was a tool or an instrument likely to be misused by some to the detriment of society. Hence, it was destroyed.
Veda Vyasa wrote 18 historical at the end of the Vedas. Koorma Puranam, for example, deals with building and worshipping Shiva by Vishnu. Each of these puranas never differentiated between Saivism and Vaishnavism. In one purana, Siva is describing the worship of Vishnu.
Only in the purana periods, the concept of temples get recognition lest the people should not forget the gods named in the puranas and hence, there were no need for temple before.
During First and Middle Sangha period, (Before the Christ) and the third Sangha period (dated after the Birth of Christ), evidence suggests the existence of temple.
About 2,000 years ago, a poet Mamoolanar has written about a group of unruly youth who hunted down a wild ox and ate it. They symbolized lack of civilization. The youth were making boisterous noises. Blood was dripping through their mouth. They had no education or discipline or intellect. They could be corrected only by Saivite worship.
The poet says that temples were built then as an indispensable tool to bring education and discipline to the unruly populace.
First, Man worshipped with mud. The symbol made of mud was worshipped and dissolved. Then, a small mud symbol was made and the idol was kept for few days for worship. As the society became civilized, the practice of building a place of worship with wood and trees gained root.
Later, when kings and rulers came into being, stone temples were came into existence. Tamil Saint Thirunavukkarasar has sung in praise of 78 temple towns. But in one of the songs, he cautioned that one should think god was not only in there 78 places and in their home town or village. Be it a small stone temple, mud temple wood temple, or temple made of plants and leaves or big temple with great worship, God is not only in temple towns, he is everywhere, even in pot of consecrated water.
In Chola period, every temple was built under the Agama tradition. They decided on the goals and planned out the temple in such a way to meet the goals. Madurai Meenakshi temple, for example, has an annual festival of 48 days. In one moth, eight flags are hoisted. In nearby Thiruparangunram, this is not the practice.
Only the temple which has 11 towers, four entry points and four Royal Towers can hoist eight flags. If one royal Tower and four entry points are there, five flags could be hoisted there, according to the ancient tradition. Each temple is built, based on the mode of worship.
Temples were being built and maintained by Kings themselves in those days. There were no trustees. The general public was involved in the temple maintenance. If the rich donated to the temples, the poor people got help from the temples.
In temple offerings, one part went to the priest, one went to the poor, two part were set aside for visitors, and one part went to the temple.
During the first to fifth century, temple worship deteriorated as temples were attacked by anti-social elements.
In 549 AD, under the Pallava kingdom, temples again got a fresh lease of life. This lasted till 1271 AD.
From 1311 AD, two Pandya kings fought each other and one of them sought the help of Muslim leader Malik Kapur. Malik Kapur, after seeing Sri Rangam, Chidambaram and Madurai was tempted to plunder the temple wealth. He defeated both the warring brothers and drove then away. Malik Kapur took away all the jewelry from the temples. For many years these temples remained without worship. Sri Rangam temple became an army barrack.
If an idol is lost today, we may commission another one and raise funds for making it. But, in those days, the devotees were keen on getting their own original idol. The idol was not mere idol for them as it was their God.
The devotees went to Delhi and retrieved the stolen idols. A woman from Malik Kapur’s harem got attracted to the idol. She was not willing to part wit it. She traveled to Sri Rangam with the idol. Hence, there is a temple dedicated to the Muslim woman inside a Hindu Temple. It is known as Thulukka Nachhiar temple, in recognition of her devotion.
Temples continued to face hardships through the Moghul rule. Then the British rule did not help temples either. Then King Krishna Devaraya helped in recapturing the temples in Tamil Nadu and restored them to the people. Hence, each temple has its first tower dedicated to the Devaraya Dynasty.
In Nyanmar and Azhwar period, the philosophy of worship was popularized and temples flourished. Worship was being done in Tamil at that time.
With the advent of Krishna Devaraya, who did not understand Tamil, Sanskrit worship was introduced. Tamil priests resisted. Then both Tamil and Sanskrit worship became a practice.
Subsequently, in the period of Nayakars, the ruling family donated lot of wealth to the maintenance of temples. Then in major temples, priests got divided over sharing the spoils of wealth. To bring unity among priests, the office of "Dharmakartha" or a trustee was introduced. Then to prevent misuse of the position, a board of trustees was created.
In each temple, a scheme was in vogue to help visitors from other places. The visitors were given food at the temple. There were no restaurants in those days. Various massive halls were built to promote fine arts like literature and dance.
Visiting temple was one of the five basic duties of an individual. Choosing a bride in those days was done on the temples. After initial meeting in temples, further contacts were made in homes.
Two brothers fighting in court of law visited the temple and made compromise after worship. During floods or earthquake, temples provided shelter for the homeless.
Helping the aged and the poor, feeding the visitors were among the important social purpose of a temple. In temples, social service was the main purpose rather than ostentatious celebrations of festivals. The general public gave their funds for the benefit of the society, by donating to the temples.
Today, there are many temples without money for even lighting a lamp. People in that place would rather go to a Tirupati or Tiruttani or some other temple to pray in the hope of getting a certain reward or benefit.
The possible benefits of prayers to a deity corrupted the mind of the people. After saying a prayer, the likely benefitsfrom that prayer were described. This later day introduction of benefits of prayer was aimed at attracting crowd and keep the following for a religion. Going to Rameswaram or Kashi is in the same category.
But in the olden days, people neither forgot the Tirupati temple nor did they ignore their hometown god.
In the past, volunteers managed the temple finances. Now, all temples have too many employees. Administrative staffs are more than priests and traditional staff. Over 60 percent of public donation now goes to meet the staff salary. About 20 percent goes for infrastructure facilities. Only 10 percent goes to the temple in real sense. Against this, earlier, 90 percent went to the temple.
Children should be made to work as volunteers in temples now so that in future days, temples can have their service instead of fully paid maintenance staff.
In most of the temples, halls meant for fine arts have become warehouses. Promotion of arts and literature has one of temple premises.
If Agama shastra was given importance, income to the temple would go down. The tradition set certain times for public prayer. Now, to get money worship is allowed at all the times and the Agama tradition got a back seat.
Priests also took liberty with traditions and gave up their customs. Sincerity of priests dwindled. They did not feel the importance of learning the agama traditions. Priests today are unable to answer some basic questions about the worship.
In those days, kings built the temples. Today, people build the temples. People were not allowed to build temple in those days because the differences of opinion among the people should not hinder a project. Unity among people was sought to be protected.
Today, there is demand for various types of temples and agama tradition is compromised now and devotees’ desire takes precedence.
Enlightened saints never differentiated between Saivite and Vaishnavite gods. Even today, in certain temples in southern India, a Saivite can’t perform the rituals in a vaishnavite temple and so on. But, in the U.S., in a temple like the one in Houston, such disparities do not exist. We have both Saivite and Vaishnavite temples and Saivite priest can perform the worship rituals for the Vaishnavite.
The unified sense of religion now flourishes in the U.S. Until yesterday, nothing but ghee entered the sanctum sanatorium for lighting the temple. Today, we have electric lights. Temple kitchen alone provided food in the olden says. Now, the people prepared food and brought to the temple.
These are changes in tradition with changing times. In future, American temples may provide guidance to temples in India.
Whatever be the changes, God is not going to punish us. He is the father for the thief as well as the victim. God has not been painted as a punisher in the Vedas. God is a symbol of patience.
Today we have many inter religious weddings. Christians and Hindus for example get married but they do not change their religion in their hearts. We celebrate Christmas with Christmas tree. We celebrate birthdays by cutting cakes.
Future generations may not see the difference between both the traditions. There may be a merger of both the cultures. Future generations of inter-religious couple, may impose both their traditions on their offspring.
Just, as many gods are installed in our temples today, to meet the needs of the devotees, in future as we do celebrate Christmas and Deepavali, for satisfying the children, we may have joint worship of the church and the temple.
Instead of going separately to a church, a church may even be built within the temple. Yet the importance of temple will not diminish.
The traditions and rituals may change but temples will survive, may alongside a church. Rituals in temples may slowly be given up and the worship may dwindle. Networking and modern communications methods may be used in worship.
Our children should be sent for volunteer work in temples, not necessarily to pray or worship. College students coming from India should be helped through temples. This will help them maintain their touch with the tradition.
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