This was a question emailed to me by one of the few viewers watching these videos.
Typically after the festivities of ganesha turtle and durga puja are over
there is this concept of visarjan where the idols are taken and dissolved in flowing water.
The question was this - once the festivities are done why do people immerse and dissolve
these idols in flowing water? There is a beautiful symbolism behind this that Iwant to talk about. We
see people celebrating durga puja and vinayaka chaturthi with great zeal. These festivals are
the epitome of realizing the joy of devotion lots of people come together there is a joyous
display of worship everybody is merged in bhakti. So let us take the durga puja for instance - when
worshiping ma durga the divine mother, it is essential to understand this - to a mother
you can ask for help with issues in worldly life as well as spiritual liberation a nurturing mother
will give everything to her child she will reprimand the child of course
but give everything to the child to make sure that the child reaches its true potential. I will make
a more detailed video on the symbolism of ma durga and the aspects of the divine sacred feminine
later. There is a very deep philosophy behind the worship of ganesha too remember that ganesha lord
vinayaka was created by the divine mother in her aspect of parvati. Now the story of ganesha
has a very rich symbolism and I will go into more details on the symbolism behind ganesha
in another video. There are very many aspects of this narrative that are usually not covered
but in the devotional aspect he is regarded as the god energy who can remove the obstacles in one's
life. Ganesha is regarded as the manifestation of intellect and spiritual prowess with which one can
and should navigate the world and eventually hopefully head towards liberation coming back
to these festivals in the festival days most of the devotees are very joyous
they celebrate life. Of course, people will place requests to these god energies
to clear obstacles in their worldly lives. Some might want health problems to go away,
some might want good things for their family and so on. The devotional thought process in these
days is around how to navigate life in this world but on the whole it is a joyous dance of delight
so when the festival ends why then do we dissolve these idols in flowing water.
The symbolism is this this whole world experience is the dance of delight of the brahman. This
infinite consciousness is ebbing and flowing infinitely manifesting one creative experience
after another weaving this web of maya in the process. The days of revelry during the festival
is a symbolism of this dance of delight dissolving the idols into the flowing
water is the understanding of the gnana the knowledge that underlies bhakti.
The idol which is a representation of an aspect of the god energy merges with the supreme absolute
infinite. We also in this process realize that we too are part of this infinite consciousness
and the supreme absolute. The natural clay harvested from the rivers goes back to the
river like the dissolution of the idols in flowing water liberation is the individual self the atman
becoming one with the brahman the supreme absolute. So this is the reason why we dissolve
the idols in flowing water. As always the known is a drop and the unknown an ocean
peace