Value of Temples: Preserving Our Rich Vedic Heritage

By Paramahamsa Nithyananda

Our ancient Vedic masters have created so many methods, techniques to hold the Existential energy. Existential energy manifests itself in the form of the five elemental energies: earth, water, fire, air and ether. Earth is the grossest form of Existential energy, expressed physically as matter. Ether is the subtlest form of energy and is intangible.

These masters created different techniques to access and absorb these different forms of energy. Temples are the techniques that they created to experience the energy in the earth or matter form. Meditation is the technique that is needed to reach the energy of Ether. In between they developed other techniques such as fire rituals, mantras and so on to access other forms of energy.

The ancient Vedic system of worshipping deities is not 'idol worship'; it is not worshipping some inanimate object; it is worship through the idol. We do not worship the idol itself; we worship the ultimate cosmic Energy through the idol. Our prayer is not towards the stone idol itself, but to Existence which is personified by the idol.

Temples provide an easy and convenient way for the common man to relate with the divine; to constantly remind him of his deep connection with the divine.

Temples also provide a common platform for people to share and bond with each other as a family. They enable to see the all-pervading divine not only through the idol but in each other.

In the energy space of temples, two things happen. First, you will have the shakti (power) to make your dreams into reality. Next, you will have the buddhi (intelligence) to realize what you think as reality itself is a dream!

The energized idol is not an idol; it becomes a living energy, a deity. The cosmic Energy radiates itself, makes itself available to us through these deities.

Temples are like satellite relay centers where high intense spiritual energy is created; where the high intense spiritual vibrations are created and send all over the world to help heal people physically, mentally, emotionally and above all spiritually.

Guru Purnima Blogspot

Guru Purnima

What is Guru Poornima?

Guru Poornima is the day to pay our deep gratitude to all the great gurus or Masters who have happened on planet Earth. The guru is the one who dispels the darkness of ignorance and infuses the light of awareness into our lives.

Who is a Guru?

Guru is a person who has achieved the Ultimate Truth, the state of enlightenment, as an experience and who can create the technology and the techniques to reproduce the same experience in any human being.
He is the ultimate scientist of the Inner world because he is the one who can initiate others into the same experience that happened in him. He gives the ‘weapons of knowledge’ through his words, body language and the techniques he has developed. These, when used with awareness, can simply pull you out of any kind of depression and negative thinking and lead you to a positive, blissful living.

What is the need for a guru in one’s life?

It is very difficult especially for the modern mind to understand the need for a guru or Master.

The guru is the one who gives you a glimpse of the Real, the truth of who you are.
He is not here to teach; he is here to awaken.
The guru is the only scripture which is alive.

A person who reproduces the visualization from his head to your head is a teacher, an acharya. The person who reproduces the experience from his being to your being is a Master, guru. That is the difference between the teacher and guru.

The greatest gift on planet Earth is the rare event of an enlightened Master happening in one’s life. He is the ultimate luxury.

The guru is like dynamite because he has exploded in 360 degrees and he has the capacity to create that same explosion of enlightenment in each and every one. When you are around a living Master, your potential to experience pure, eternal bliss or nithya-ananda gets heightened.

Whenever a disciple just sits in the presence of the Master, the same experience of enlightenment which happened in the Master is reproduced in the disciple. This great happening is Upanishad -just sitting.

Surrender towards God is difficult because you don’t know where God is or who God is. The guru is One with the Whole; he has reached the Ultimate. Through him, you can also take the quantum jump into the arms of God.

Life is a divine flow. The more river-like one is, the more one is in tune with life. But we have become stagnant. The guru’s whole work is to bring back the flow of life so that you start becoming joyous and utterly happy and blissful for no reason at all.
Just ‘to be’ is enough; one need not ‘have’ anything to be blissful.

The only thing standing between you and your true nature of bliss is your ego. The process of becoming a disciple is the process of renouncing your ego. The guru-disciple relationship is a device to help the disciple drop the ego. The ego is very difficult to drop because dropping it means losing the solid identity that you have been carrying thinking you need it for survival. Dropping the ego looks like death when actually it is the ego that stands between you and life.

Dropping the ego is possible only in a relationship of deep trust, love and reverence with the guru. Then slowly you gather the courage and risk dropping the only thing you cling onto throughout your life - your ego, because now you know you will only fall into the unfailing safety net of the infinite love and compassion of Existence embodied by the guru.

The Guru-Disciple Relationship

The guru-disciple relationship is the most extraordinary relationship in the world.
As you walk with him, you walk in the light of Existence, away from the darkness of ignorance. You leave behind all the problems of your life and move towards the peak experiences of life.

The guru has much to say but it cannot be said because words are too poor to convey what he has to commune. In the deep, vibrant silence there is a communion. Nothing is said, nothing is heard, but a flame is transferred.

It is an incomparable journey where the guru leads you from the visible to the invisible, from the material to the divine, from the ephemeral to the eternal.

Gurum Bhajé - Guru Poornima 2008 with Paramahamsa Nithyananda

This Guru Poornima we have the rare opportunity to be in the presence of the living enlightened Master Paramahamsa Nithyananda.
It is only on this day that Paramahamsa directly accepts any kind of offering (bhiksha) that comes from your heart, be it fruits or flowers or whatever. Offering bhiksha to the embodiment of Existence, the guru, is actually a wonderful technique devised by the rishis, inner scientists, for offloading your karmas.
The Guru Gita says, you can neither add to nor subtract from the guru by what you give or don’t give him. Just by the very act of accepting your bhiksha (karma), his grace starts flowing into your life. This is the ultimate expression of compassion.

Come, celebrate Gurum Bhajé - Guru Poornima 2008 with Paramahamsa Nithyananda!

Find more of these articles and offer Biksha (offering to the Guru) at www.dhyanapeetam.org (copy and paste link into your browser window).

Nithyananda Vedic Temple of Phoenix will celebrate Guru Purnima on Thursday, July 17, 2008 from 6pm to 10pm. To find out more, email or subscribe to our newsletter at vedictemplephx@yahoo.com