Highly refined and sensitive souls might have been waiting eagerly to know Worship in detail. These persons wish to have the kernel, the very essence of the fruit of worship without having to deal with any shell or bark. It is true that mere formal performance of worship unaccompanied by the pure and fervent spirit counts for nothing and that the spirit is the essence. But so far it was dealt with externals. They are indispensable to clothe, embody and convey the spirit form person-to-person, form place to place, form stage to stage and even form age to age. It is the nectar we want, but the liquid nectar comes only in a cup. What we want is Sweetness. Worship is saturated by fervent admiration, reverence or love. A few words on the nature and essence of the worship are necessary to stress their importance.
Indian readers would appreciate worship better if we take them to the corresponding Sanskrit words. Those words are puja and upasana. These are well-understood terms in constant use. We say a person is doing puja when he offers flowers, water, food, scents and praise to a person or an image of divine being. Yet all the while, that worshipper is not acting like a robot, but is simultaneously using speech and thought. He utters words, mostly mantras and slokas and his mind turn to their meanings for most of the time. Occasionally he may be merging himself in the object of worship mentally – attaining Poorna laya, or feeling prefect bliss and forgetting all ideas of his self.
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