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On Saturday I visited the Rajdhani Mandir in Chantilly. I didn't really know what to expect, but was pleasantly surprised when we pulled up to the small white building. When we walked through the front door we saw a few vendors, selling clothes, videos, books, and many more faith related items. To the left was the office, where I went in and asked the man who was in there if I was dressed ok. He said that we were fine, and free to take a look around and talk to any of the people or the priests if we had questions. To the right, there was a room labeled "shoes room". Before you could go in the main part of the church, the part where the worshiping is done, you had to leave your shoes in the room. There were cubbies made for this that reached the ceiling, and stretched around the whole room. There was also a "foot wash", but I did not use this. There was also a "coat room", where you hang your coat before you go into the prayer hall (what I was told was the term for the main worship room). I spoke with the vendor asking him, can I do anything that's disrespectful, and he said no just do not wear your shoes in the prayer hall. I asked him why and she said that this has just always been a Hindu practice. He gave me an example of a time when Moses took his shoes off, so I could relate this to my own religion. We entered the prayer
room, which at first glance sort of took my breath away. The walls were lined
with elaborate statues and pictures of about 12 deities or so. We walked over to
the first one, and a man came up to us and told me that this was a statue of
Ganesha, I later asked a vendor about Ganesha, and he gave me the neat story. He said that the legend goes like this, Shiva left home for many years, also leaving his wife, Parvati, and young his son, Ganesha. When he returned a years later, Ganesha was outside playing, and saw the strange man approaching the house and came over to him to protect himself and his mother, since he was the man of the house. His father, Shiva, had been gone so long and did not recognize him and chopped off Ganesha's head. His mother ran outside yelling what have you done, you have just chopped our son's head off, and then Shiva realized that the boy was infant his son. He then found an elephant and put the elephant's head on the boy's body. This is why Ganesha is always shown with an elephant's head. I found this story very interesting, and I also will know now that when I see a deity with an elephant's head, it is Ganesha. I also asked the vendor about the disappearing milk phenomenon, and he had a very different view on the situation. He told me that there had been discoveries that this was a scandal, and people would hide behind the statues and catch the milk in bowls, and do things like that. This meant that the milk was not disappearing, but they were making people think that it was. The vendor said that this is not a part of the Hindu religion, and that these people were a disgrace. I found this very very interesting. This is an example of how dishonesty can turn people again any sort of phenomenon. So now in any case, even if their was a true miracle, people will have a hard time believing it because they remember a time when a legend was untrue and they had been tricked into believing it. This happens in other religions besides Hinduism. The Rajdhani Mandir was celebrating the 2nd day of it's 3 day event called Bhagawan Mahavir when I was visiting. I noticed that at the front of the stage there were many offerings by a picture of one of the deities. So I asked one of the priests about it. He said that before the statue of the deity, which in this case was SaraswatiJi, the deity of education, can be installed into the temple, they must have a ceremony and people must make offerings. The statue against the wall was covered by a curtain, and he said after the event was over they would uncover the deity. I saw that the people had offered many things: coconuts, bananas, flowers, beans, rice, nuts, apples, incense, and kum kum to name a few. The other priest told me that kum kum was dabbed on the forehead to represent life line. I was glad he told me this because I had been wondering since I got there why people had this red powdery dot on their forehead. The priests were not very friendly, one seemed to be very busy and he was cleaning up the mess from the ceremony. He seemed like it was a burden for me to ask questions, and the other priest was sitting on the stage talking on his cell phone most of the time. I would say this was the most disappointing part of my visit, since all the members of the temple kept telling me to ask the priests any questions I had. I watched a woman and a man come up to the priest on his cell phone, and the priest gave them a spoon of something that they ate. Then they handed him an offering, and he gave them a handful of nuts. Later I found out that what the priest gave them was called prasad, which could be either liquid or solid food. In this case, the priest gave them holy water on the spoon and they put it in their mouth. The nuts he gave them after they gave him an offering symbolized his final blessing for the ritual. He used the example of the Eucharist in the Catholic religion and said that this was very similar. I also asked about the service, and if there were mandatory times to come to the temple. The vendor told me that you basically come when you can, and the only time that people are expected to come is for major holidays. He told me that the two main Hindu holidays are Divali which happens around September or October and Holi. These are both on the lunar calendar cycle, unlike ours, so the dates change every year. He said that the pujar, who is the priest which wore the yellow cloth, conducts mass a certain time every week, but most people know what to do on their own, and worship by themselves. He said that the songs were sung in Hindi (language) and the mass conducted in Sanskrit. He said it is not a spoken language but used for mass, and we compared it to how Latin is used in the Catholic mass, but a dead language. I also noticed that at the top of the stage there were 10 large statues, that had human bodies and faces. I asked him if it meant anything that they were human, and he said no they were also deities, just some are depicted as humans. He did say that the reason they are larger and at the top of the stage was because there is a hierarchy of deities, and these were higher than the deities that lined the walls, like the statue I mentioned of Ganesha. I also noticed that in front of every deity there was a donation box, for people to put in money. I related that to how we pass around baskets for people to put money in at my church.
Overall, I had a very nice time at Rajdhani Mandir. I learned much that I did not already know. This is the first time that I had ever visited a Hindu place of worship and I was pleasantly surprised. I was intimidated when I walked in but immediately people were willing to speak with me and let me know they were there to answer any questions. I was only disappointed in the amount of people there, very few (under 10) so I could not get as much insight as I wanted, and I was disappointed at how unwilling the priests (Brahmin) were to help me, but I can understand that they had other important duties to fulfill. I was impressed by the elaborate decorations of the statues, and the prayer hall itself. The architecture was beautiful. I am happy with this experience, and will visit another Hindu temple to learn and see more. I can't wait to witness a puja! |
who is the son of one of the major gods, Shiva. The statue was had an
elephant head, four hands, and was sitting with it's legs crossed. He told me
that Ganesha was the embodiment of success, and gave the example that you would
pray to him if you were starting a business. He also mentioned a phenomenon that
he said happened a couple of years ago, all over the world. He said that when
worshippers offered the statues of Ganesha milk, the milk would disappear. He
said its was amazing, then he had to go so that was all I got to speak with him.
| Created by Laura Ellen Shulman |
Last updated: March 06, 2005
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