Page 8 - Towards The Goal Of Beautiful Life

Saint Tukaram says, "Human body is a temple and the soul is God who dwells in it''
Saint Dnyaneshwar says,

"Why do you wander here and there searching for God, not knowing who is God.
Remember well, God has no name, no form and no specific place. Worship God within

you and offer him ceaseless service''
Similarly Saint Dnyaneshwar points out, "God is unrevealed, formless, without shape,

from whom the entire universe emerges, you must worship Him.''
Saint Namdeo, to whom some popular myths are attributed, has very clearly and

without any reservation said,
"Some people see stone idol as God, but stone idol can never be God. Some

believe stone idol satisfies their wishes, but they forget, stone idol breaks if hammered.
Some people worship stone idol as God, they are bound to be doomed for ever. Out of

ignorance and blind faith, some people gossip that stone idol speaks, and eats food
offered by devotees. Those who speak thus and those who listen to it both are fools.''

However, for the convenience of the common ignorant people, they encouraged
worship of stone idol with the sole intention and expectation that, in course of time

people would turn towards worshipping the real God. Just as the attention of a child is
drawn to the moon behind the branch of a tree by asking the child to look first at the tree

branch, similarly by teaching people the process of idol worship the intention of saints
and sages was to guide people to worship the real God. The intention and expectation of

the saints and sages was that the worshipper in the process of performing idol worship
would turn towards himself and also contemplate on the fundamental question as to,

"Who performs this idol worship? Who looks at the idol? and Who am I?'' The saints and
the sages expected that, in the process of contemplating on the main issue of `Who am

I?' the worshipper, in course of time would attain self-realisation and experience the
elixir of divine bliss. In this context, an event in the life of Shree Ramakrishna

Paramahaunsa is noteworthy. Shree Ramakrishna Paramahaunsa, while in the process of
worshipping, used to attain a state of divine emotion and in this state, instead of offering

flowers to the idol, he used to shower flowers on his own head. Thus, in teaching people
the practice of idol worship, the main purpose of saints and sages was basically

auspicious and noble. However, unfortunately, all these auspicious intentions of saints
and sages got perverted and nullified. The result is that people totally lost sight of the

very objective of realisation of God and experiencing the ultimate oneness with the
divinity within, by surrendering completely the individual identity. Instead, the masses

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