namaskaram Farrukh :namaste
I appologise for the rudeness of some of my fellow hindus ...apart from Makaranda who gave a polite and beautifull explanation ....
quote Makaranda ...
The God is invoked through the statue, but the statue itself is not worshiped. It is not difficult to comprehend. God is represented in many different ways and in many different forms in Hinduism, according the devotee's attraction and preference. For many Hindus, including myself, God is ultimately formless and without anthropomorphic/physical attributes such as a body, but for the sake of expressing my devotion outwardly, I also use murtis (statues) to represent Him.
as you probaby know the Hindu faith is very broad some beleive God to be formless others beleive God to have his own personal form ...and that he may take form as he wishes ... a Vaisnava (devotee of Visnu)beleives that God has a nature which is all pervasive , that he is present all around us , ... we ask him to take form for our benifit as it is very difficult for us to understand him in his all pervasive form as it is beyond our limeted comprehension ... this is how it comes about that hindus worship different forms as each seeks a form which they can understand and relate to .
i was just wondering how people can make gods for themselves with their own hands? like i can take some clay and make a god that will solve my problems, will it be foolish or will it make sense?
I studied in a book that father of Abraham may peace be upon him had similar job, he used to made tiny and big gods, and poor people used to buy mini ones while rich people used to buy bigger ones. and then one day Prophet Abraham may peace be upon him broke all their gods.
I will explain from the perspective of my tradition ...
when a murti is made it is like making a hollow vessel which represents one aspect of that supreme gods being , when this Murti is made it must be made to a very specific set of rules which tell you how this God should look , what position he must be standing in how he should hold his hands , what particular things he must wear or hold . all these things are very important when the murti is finished it will be brought to the temple and go through a proces of instalation where upon prayers are made to purify the place and to invite the god to enter into this Murti form especialy so that we may legitimately worship him in this form .
Vaisnavas do belive that god resides within this image and embues this image with his divine energy , because we belive that god is nondifferent from his name and his form ,
however we do not make this murti or ask god to come to reside here so that we can ask him to solve our problems , we ask him to reside here so that we may serve him and pay homage to him .
a Vaisnava will tell you that the more love and devotion is shown to a murti the stronger the presence of god is within that murti , as god will want to remain there to receive our devotions , and inturn he will bestow his blessings .
this is an extremely simplified explanation , but I hope that it helps your understanging :namaste
