Feb 18, 2004, 12.00am IST
B K Mohini.
Mahashivratri or Shiva Jayanti is a festival imbued with deep spiritual meaning. Today, it is celebrated by devout Hindus as one of the many festivals and very few are aware of the deep significance of observing Mahashivratri.
Shiva symbolises the universally worshipped form of God, the Eternal Light. Shiva literally means one who is Kalyankari, the Benefactor of all souls.
Mahashivratri, therefore, is the memorial of the divine incarnation and divine acts of the incorporeal God.
Shiva is the Supreme Father, He who performs the triple role of creation, sustenance and destruction. This divine Trinity is symbolised as Brahma, Vishnu and Shan-kar in Hindu theology.
When devotees offer prayers to the Trinity form, they say “Brahma devtaya namaha, Vishnu devtaya namaha, Shankar devtaya namaha” and “Shiv Paramatmaya namaha”. Shiva denotes the Supreme God who is the creator of these three subtle deities through whom he performs divine acts. Only God the Father has the power to create, sustain and also destroy creation in order to renew it. Shiva is the Paramatma, the Supreme Soul, the Incorporeal, the Formless. But all deities and incarnations have corporeal form. Shiva and Shankar are worshipped distinctly as God and deity respectively.
The Shiva lingam denotes the incorporeal form of God Shiva. The three lines and a dot in the centre signify the subtle form of God as a point of light and his three divine acts. The 12 renowned temples in India, the Jyotirlingam Maths, are dedicated to the divine attributes of Shiva. The prayer Om Namo Shivay signifies that Om is the soul who is worshipping Shiva. Those who believe themselves to be manifestation of God say Shivoham (I am Shiva). We seldom hear of anyone referring to themselves as God, taking the name of deities. The deities are addressed as Lord; they are earthly rulers who appear in the cycle of karma, according to the fruit of their actions. God remains always beyond joy and sorrow. Deities are the highest creations of God; hence they are also worshipped alongside God. But they take birth in the corporeal world while God never appears in the cycle of birth and death, for, He is beyond it.
Deities are worshipped as pure beings but only God is patitapavan, the Purifier of all impure beings. All Shiva temples are named after His divine attributes and acts. Legends tell us that even the most revered deities, Krishna and Rama, invoked the blessings of Shiva, and this is represented by the temples at Rameshwaram and Gopeshwar. God is known as the Liberator who grants salvation to all souls because He is the only one who remains libera-ted, eternally.
Shivratri signifies the night of ignorance and unrighteousness when Shiva incarnates in order to open our third eye of wisdom. Today, due to ignorance, we say that God is omnipresent; yet, we continue to suffer and seek Him for salvation. In blind faith, we believe every spark of light to be the Sun.
When we cannot comprehend God, we look up to His divine creation as God. But it is the Supreme Soul who is the eternal source of Light and Might. All that seems divine, are, in fact, His creation.
Due to spiritual ignorance, we have lost our divinity. We can regain our divine nature only when we link ourselves to the Supreme Soul Shiva, who is the Ocean of all divine virtues and powers. As the Gita points out, when the Ocean is bestowing everything, why stop at a river or pond?
(Today is Mahashivratri)
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