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Some nuns belonging to a Hindu sect, who were against idol worship, once asked the Holy Mother Sarada Ma this question. The incident is documented in the book: Gospel of The Holy Mother and has been excerpted below from there:
A few women devotees were in the adjacent room. Two of them wore ochre robes. They prostrated themselves before the Mother. They brought some sweets for offering.
We came to know they were the disciples of Siva-Narayan Paramahamsa of Kalighat. Their teacher was just then engaged in performing a grand sacrifice.
One of the nuns asked, “Is there any truth in image worship? Our teacher does not approve of it. He instructs people in the worship of the fire and the sun.”
Sarada Ma: “You should not doubt the words of your own teacher. Why do you ask me about it, when you have heard the opinion of your Guru in the matter?”
The nun: “We want to know your opinion.”
The Mother refused to give any opinion. But the nun was stubborn and began to press for a reply.
The Mother said at last, “If your teacher were an illumined soul — you have forced me to say — then he would not have made such a statement. From time immemorial innumerable people have worshipped images and thereby attained spiritual knowledge. Do you want to deny this fact? Sri Ramakrishna never cherished any such parochial and one-sided view.
Brahman (God) exists everywhere. The prophets and incarnations are born to show the way to a benighted humanity. They give different instructions suited to different temperaments. There are many ways to realize the Truth. Therefore all these instructions have their relative value.
Take, for instance, a tree. There are birds perched on its branches. They have different colours, white, black, yellow, red, etc. Their sounds are also different. But we say that these are the sounds of the birds. We never designate a particular sound as that of birds and refuse to acknowledge other sounds as such.”
Moral: From the above incident we can draw 2 important lessons: 1) The idol worship of Hindus is a genuine path to God-realization; and 2) Merely by taking on the title of Paramahamsa one does not become a real Paramahamsa i.e., an enlightened sage. Clearly the guru of the nuns was not an enlightened sage, as Sarada Ma herself pointed out. Otherwise, he would not have denounced idol worship.
What kind of yogic powers do God-realized sages possess? How are they able to help devotees even after giving up the body? Find out by subscribing to our Yogic Powers of Pandit Shriram Sharma Newsletter on the Spiritual Bee Academy App.
