SHRINE
MOTHER
WORSHIP
THE GREAT FEMININE POWER
There is a fundamental idea, found in all countries:
the great feminine power. Mother worship has existed
throughout the world. In India, the energy of the
universe is called Shakti, and is considered the personification
of Cosmic Energy in its dynamic form.
Worshiped as mother,
Primordial power is the ultimate basis of all creation.
Shakti is the power and energy with which the Universe
is created, preserved, destroyed and recreated and
it is living. This is because there is really no distinction
between the Godhead and His power, except what we
make. Energy and Transcendent Ground are as inseparable
as the sun and its radiance.
Thus, the worship of Shakti or the feminine aspect
of Divinity is an integral (and popular) element of
the religious fabric of the entire Indian subcontinent.
However, worship of the Great Goddess or Great Mother
was common in Europe and other countries as well.
Goddess worship was found among all the Pagan religions,
among the Greeks, Romans, Celts, etc. The Pagan religions
were eventually suppressed.
MANY NAMES AND FORMS OF MOTHER
Goddesses have been called by many names by different
cultures and ages: Anat, Aphrodite, Aradia, Arianrhod,
Artemis, Astarte, Brighid, Ceres, Demeter, Diana,
Eostre, Freya, Gaia, Hera, Ishtar, Isis, Juno, Kali,
Lilith, Ma'at, Mary, Minerva, Ostare, Persephone,
Venus, Vesta, etc.
Yet a feminine presence re-entered into Christianity
as the Virgin Mary (Mother of God).
Still, during the Renaissance, hundreds of thousands
of women were suspected of being witches and were
exterminated by burning and hanging.
Modern Goddess Worship A renaissance of Paganism,
with its worship of Goddesses and Gods occurred in
the middle of this century with the re-emergence of
Wicca (popularly called White Witchcraft, the benign
religion of the ancient Celts).
With the rise of feminism, new traditions within
Wicca were created. The Goddess grew in importance,
and the role of the God shrank into obscurity. One
such tradition is Dianic Wicca. The Goddess in both
Goddess Worship and Neo-Paganism is often visualized
in three aspects: Maiden, Mother and Crone. Her aspects
are mirrored in the phases of the moon: waxing, full
and waning. The Maiden represents youth, emerging
sexuality, the huntress running with her hounds. The
Mother symbolizes feminine power, fertility, and nurturing.
The Crone is wisdom, the compassion which comes from
experience, and the one who guides us through the
death experience.
From
Swami Vivekananda's Inspired Talks,
Wednesday, July 2, 1895
"The Saktas worship the Universal Energy as
Mother; it is the sweetest name they know.
The mother is the highest ideal of womanhood in India.
When God is worshiped as mother, the Hindus call such
worship the "right hand" way, and it leads
to spirituality but never to material prosperity.
When God is worshiped in His terrible aspect, that
is, in the "left hand way" it usually leads
to great material prosperity but rarely to spirituality;
and eventually it leads to degeneration and the obliteration
of the race that practices it.
Mother is the first manifestation of power and is
considered a higher idea than father.
The name of mother brings the idea of sakti, Divine
energy and omnipotence, the baby believes its mother
to be all-powerful, to be able to do anything.
THE KUNDALINI
The Divine Mother is the Kundalini sleeping in us;
without worshipping Her we can never know ourselves.
All merciful, all powerful, omnipresent - these are
attributes of the Divine Mother.
She's the sum total of the energy in the Universe.
Every manifestation of power in the universe is Mother.
She's Life, Intelligence and Love. She is in the universe,
yet separate from it. She is a person, and can be
seen and known - as Sri Ramakrishna saw and knew Her.
Established in the idea of Mother, we can do anything.
She quickly answers prayer. She can show Herself to
us in any form at any moment.
The Divine Mother can have form (Rupa) and name (Nama),
or name without form; and as we worship Her in these
various aspects, we can rise to Pure Being, having
neither form nor name. The sum-total of all cells
in an organism is one person; each soul is like one
cell, and the sum of them is God. And beyond that
is the Absolute.
SPACE, TIME AND CAUSATION
The sea calm is the Absolute; the same sea in Waves
is the Divine Mother. She is time, space and causation.
Mother is the same as Brahman and has two natures;
the conditioned and the unconditioned. As the former
She is God, nature and soul - the triangle of existence.
This is the Qualified Monistic idea. A bit of Mother,
a drop, was Krishna; another Buddha; another was Christ.
The worship of even one spark of Mother in our earthly
mother leads to greatness. Worship Her if you want
love and wisdom.
DIFFERENT WAYS OF WORSHIP
The Dharma of the Westerners is worship of Shakti
- the Creative Power regarded as the Female Principle.
With them it's somewhat like the Vamachari's worship
of women. As the Tantrika says, "On the left
side the women . . . on the right, the cup full of
wine; in short, warm meat with ingredients. . . .
The Tantrika religion is very mysterious, inscrutable
even to the Yogis." It is this worship of Shakti
that is openly and universally practised.
The idea of motherhood, i.e. the relation of a son
to his mother, is also noticed in great measure.
Protestantism as a force isn't very significant in
Europe, where the religion is, in fact, Roman Catholic.
In the religion, Jehovah, Jesus, and the Trinity are
secondary; there, the worship is for the Mother-She,
the Mother, with the Child Jesus in her arms.
The emperor cries "Mother", the field-marshal
cries "Mother", the soldier with the flag
in his hand cries "Mother", the seaman at
the helm cries "Mother", the fisherman in
his rags cries "Mother", the beggar in the
street cries "Mother"!
A million voices in a million ways, from a million
places - from the palace, from the cottage, from the
church, cry "Mother," "Mother,"
"Mother!" Everywhere is the cry "Ave
Maria;" day and night, "Ave Maria,"
"Ave Maria!
Next is the worship of the woman. This worship of
Shakti isn't lust, but is that Shakti-Puja, that worship
of the Kumari (virgin) and the Sadhava (the married
woman whose husband is living), which is done in Varanasi,
Kalighat, and other holy places (in India).
It's the worship of the Shakti, not in mere thought
or imagination, but in actual, visible form. Our Shakti-worship
is only in the holy places, and only at certain times
is it performed; but theirs (in the West) is in every place and always,
for days, weeks, months, and years.
Foremost is the woman's state, foremost is her dress,
her seat, her food, her wants, and her comforts; the
first honors in all respects are accorded to her.
Not to speak of the noble-born, not to speak of the
young and the fair, it's the worship of any and every
woman, be she an acquaintance or a stranger.
ISLAM'S ROLE IN SHAKTI-WORSHIP
The Moors, the mixed Arab race, Islam in religion,
first introduced this Shakti-worship into Europe when
they conquered Spain and ruled her for eight centuries.
It was the Moors who first sowed in Europe the seeds
of Western civilisation and Shakti-worship. In course
of time, the Moors forgot Shakti-Worship and fell
from their position of strength, culture and glory,
to live scattered and unrecognised in an unnoticed
corner of Africa, and their power and civilisation
passed over to Europe.
The Mother, leaving the Moors,
smiled Her loving blessings on the Christians and
illumined their homes.
You've not yet understood the wonderful significance
of Mother's life - none of you. But gradually you'll
know. Without Shakti (Power) there's no regeneration
for the world.
Why is our country (said in India in the 1890's) the
weakest and the most backward of all countries?--Because
Shakti is held in dishonour there. Mother (Sarada
devi) has been born to revive that wonderful Shakti
in India; and making her the nucleus, once more will
Gargis and Maitreyis be born into the world. Dear
brother, you little understand now, but by degrees
you'll come to know it all. Hence it's her Math (monastery)
that I want first. . . .
Without the grace of Shakti nothing is to be accomplished.
What do I find in America and Europe? -- the worship
of Shakti, the worship of Power. Yet they worship
Her ignorantly through sense-gratification. Imagine,
then, what good they'll achieve who will worship Her
with all purity, in a Sattvika (peaceful) spirit,
looking upon Her as their mother!
VIVEKANANDA'S WORK IN INDIA
I'm coming to understand things clearer every day,
my insight is opening out more and more. Hence we
must first build a Math for Mother. First Mother and
Mother's daughters, then Father and Father's sons
- can you understand this? . . . To me, Mother's grace
is a hundred thousand times more valuable than Father's.
Mother's grace, Mother's blessings are paramount to
me. . . . Please pardon me. I'm a little bigoted there,
as regards Mother.
In our thought of God, there's human limitation,
personality:
with Shakti comes the idea of One Universal Power.
"I stretch the bow of Rudra when He desires to
kill," says Shakti. The Upanisads didn't develop
this thought; for Vedanta doesn't care for the God-idea.
But in the Gita comes the significant saying to Arjuna,
"I am the real, and I am the unreal. I bring
good, and I bring evil."
Again the idea slept. Later came the new philosophy.
This universe is a composite fact of good and evil;
and one Power must be manifesting through both. "A
lame one-legged universe makes only a lame one-legged
God." And this, in the end, lands us in want
of sympathy and makes us brutal. The ethics built
upon such a concept is an ethics of brutality. The
saint hates the sinner, and the sinner struggles against
the saint. Yet even this leads onward.
For finally the wicked self-sufficient mind will
die, crushed under repeated blows; and then we'll
awake and know the Mother.
Eternal, unquestioning self-surrender to Mother alone
can give us peace. Love Her for Herself, without fear
or favor. Love Her because you're Her child. See Her
in all, good and bad alike. Then alone will come "Sameness"
and Bliss Eternal that is Mother Herself when we realise
Her thus. Until then, misery will pursue us. Only
resting in Mother are we safe.
