(Post 04)
(http://literature.awgp.org/akhandjyoti/2004/Sept_Oct/ShikhaSutra/)
Prophet Hazarat Muhammad had opposed idol worship because of the sinful customs that were propagated and practiced through it during his times.
The place where he was born was dominated by the blind rule of might is right, those days. Dacoits and hoodlums used to rob the villages, and take away all the crops, cattle and young women for their pleasure; some of them used to possess ten to fifty women. Some of the children born by them were allowed to grow to serve as bonded laborers or work in the dacoit gangs. As it was found a waste to raise the rest, those kids were killed in the name of sacrifices before the giant idols, made in the lands occupied by the dacoits.
The angelic soul of Hazarat Muhammad was born in human form to eliminate such heinous acts and insane customs.
He destroyed the roots of such evils by opposing the mindless and cruel rituals of worship.
It was the necessity of that time and that place.
This does not mean that all kinds of idol-worship are bad or irrational.
You must remember that all the idols of Divine manifestations are simply the source of reminding us of God.
We may, for example, go to the temples of Lord Krishna, and also bend our head and offer prayers.
But we should know that this pranam and prayers are not for the stone that is enshrined in the temple. Rather, these are for Lord Krishna, whose divine incarnation in human form had taken place to bestow the light of divinity, to establish the law of righteousness, to give new direction of enlightened progress to the world.
The idols simply help to awaken our devotional sentiments.
These may activate the linkage of our inner mind with Him during meditation or emotionally engrossed prayers, if we have really purified our mind and have adopted the true meaning of devotional faith in our lives.
(http://literature.awgp.org/akhandjyoti/2004/Sept_Oct/ShikhaSutra/)
Prophet Hazarat Muhammad had opposed idol worship because of the sinful customs that were propagated and practiced through it during his times.
The place where he was born was dominated by the blind rule of might is right, those days. Dacoits and hoodlums used to rob the villages, and take away all the crops, cattle and young women for their pleasure; some of them used to possess ten to fifty women. Some of the children born by them were allowed to grow to serve as bonded laborers or work in the dacoit gangs. As it was found a waste to raise the rest, those kids were killed in the name of sacrifices before the giant idols, made in the lands occupied by the dacoits.
The angelic soul of Hazarat Muhammad was born in human form to eliminate such heinous acts and insane customs.
He destroyed the roots of such evils by opposing the mindless and cruel rituals of worship.
It was the necessity of that time and that place.
This does not mean that all kinds of idol-worship are bad or irrational.
You must remember that all the idols of Divine manifestations are simply the source of reminding us of God.
We may, for example, go to the temples of Lord Krishna, and also bend our head and offer prayers.
But we should know that this pranam and prayers are not for the stone that is enshrined in the temple. Rather, these are for Lord Krishna, whose divine incarnation in human form had taken place to bestow the light of divinity, to establish the law of righteousness, to give new direction of enlightened progress to the world.
The idols simply help to awaken our devotional sentiments.
These may activate the linkage of our inner mind with Him during meditation or emotionally engrossed prayers, if we have really purified our mind and have adopted the true meaning of devotional faith in our lives.
