Good evening! It is wonderful to be in Mauritius and see how strong Śaivism 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 Śaiva faith through your temple society and other fine institutions. I hope you will do this, and by doing so bring Śaivism 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 Gaṇeśa, Lord Murugan and our Great God Śiva, exist in shining bodies of golden light. This Third World is called the Śivaloka. 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 Bhūloka. 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 Śivaloka, the Third World. ¶Śaivism’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 vibhūti 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. §
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 Śivaloka. 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: Śaivism, Vaishṇavism, Śāktism and Smārtism. Vaishṇava 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 sārī. 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! §
The most important teaching of God Śiva is that He has three perfections. He is not only timeless, formless and spaceless. That Absolute Reality, Paraśiva, is but one of God Śiva’s perfections. He also has an all-pervasive form which flows through all things—Satchidānanda. He pervades all form. There is no place that Śiva 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 Śiva, 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 Śiva is in all things and everywhere simultaneously, at every point in time. And yet, Śiva as Maheśvara, the Divine Dancer, Naṭarāja, 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 Śiva Naṭarāja 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 Śiva 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 śakti, His power and presence. He is our great God, the ruler of this universe. ¶Sometimes we hear the misconception that if you worship God Śiva He will take everything away from you. That is not true. That is anti-Śaivite propaganda. It is not true at all. God Śiva 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 Śiva is only Rudra, the Destroyer. It makes people afraid of Śiva. There is never a reason to fear Śiva. He is a God of love, of compassion for all He has created. ¶Nothing has ever been destroyed by God Śiva 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 Śiva? 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 Śiva takes from us greed and gives abundance. God Śiva takes from us lust and gives contentment. God Śiva takes from us anger and gives love. God Śiva takes from us jealousy and gives self-confidence and security. God Śiva is an ever-fulfilling God. §
Our Supreme God Śiva has created the Mahādevas, the Gods, to help us, to protect us, to inspire us—such as Lord Murugan, Lord Gaṇeśa and many others. Gaṇeśa, above all others, is the God, the great Mahādeva, 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 Gaṇeśa 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 Śiva’s śakti 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 Śiva by teaching you more about your Śaivite 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 Śiva 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 Mahādevas 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 Namaḥ Śivāya. As long as somebody is saying “Aum Namaḥ Śivāya,” the Śaivite religion exists on the planet in full force. Wake up in the morning saying “Aum Namaḥ Śivāya, Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.” Go to sleep at night saying “Aum Namaḥ Śivāya, Aum Namaḥ Śivāya,” 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 pūjā 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 pūjās 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 darśana. Many of our ancient Śaivite 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 śakti of the Deity. We are filled and thrilled with the śakti 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 Śaivism, we can easily understand how the unseen worlds operate in and through us. §
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 pūjā 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 pūjā at such-and-such a temple located in such-and-such a place in your universe of forms, and this pūjā 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 pūjā 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 pūjā 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 pūjā, 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 pūjā generally held in-between the main pūjās of the day—the priest pronounces your name. He intones the name of your birth star, or nakshātra, 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.§
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 maṇḍapa 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 Śiva temple marks an agreement between God Śiva and the people on the Earth as a meeting place where the three worlds can consciously commune. It is the home of Lord Śiva and many of the other Gods. Specifically sanctified, it possesses a ray of spiritual energy connecting the First World with the Śivaloka. 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 Śiva 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 Śiva, the Śaiva Dharma. The ancient Tirumantiram conversely warns, “When in Śiva’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 Śiva, and within them there are private rooms and sanctums for Lord Gaṇeśa, Lord Murugan and others of the 330 million Gods of our Śaivite Hindu religion. Pray to God Śiva. Flock to the Śiva temples, and God Śiva will reward you, each and everyone of you, abundantly, as you perform His worship. ¶We just visited the great temple of Chidambaram, where God Śiva dances. The priests at the temple had their inner sanctum, the garbhagṛiha, 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 Śaivite 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 śakti 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 Śiva. §
Worship God Śiva and you will be filled with love. Become a member of the united Śaivites 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 Śivasambhandam, this inner association of Śaivites the world over, that is the strength for Śaivites wherever they find themselves. In this technological age this must become an outer association as well. ¶I urge all Śaivites, devotees of God Śiva, to worship Him as the God of Love and, in doing so, to become beings of love. The great saints of our religion were Śiva 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 Śiva. 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 Śiva, and your love for Him is your greatest message. Simply love God Śiva and let that love radiate out into the world. ¶We cannot forget that Lord Śiva 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. Śaivites love Śiva in that very way, as the Self of themselves. Being in all things simultaneously, at every point in time, God Śiva is in your fingers, He is in your eyes, He is in your heart, He is in your mind. As our great satguru, Śiva Yogaswami, said, “There is one thing that Lord Śiva 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 Śiva cannot do. He cannot take Himself out of you. ¶There are three things we must do: perform or attend pūjā 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 Śaiva Siddhānta. Plus, for those who are able, meditation and certain sādhanas 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.§