Temples of Kerala
Submitted by jayamohan on Tue, 2009-08-18 08:13
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Many of us would have visited famous temples of Kerala, like Guruvayoor, Chottanikkara, Trichur Sive temple etc., But, I feel, the beauty of Kerala temples lie in village temples with a small sanctum sanctorum, a tiny vigraham with minimum decorations and a lot of brass lamps burning around!These temples do not have big gopurams as in Tamilnadu.
Just tiled roof with dwaja-sthamba or deepa-sthamba in the front, lamps around the praharams lighted on special occasions. There are no special archanas or aradhanas conducted for devotees. No queues or special darshans needed. Atma-darshan is possible only in such surroundings!
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Lata
Wed, 2009-08-19 00:35
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Jayaji, what is the name of the village that you'd visited?
You're right, we've heard about popular temples like Guruvayoor, but we would come to know of the "hidden" ones only when someone tells us.
jayamohan
Wed, 2009-08-19 07:17
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One village is Perumbavoor near Kalady. Almost all village temples are like this!
sjnt
Tue, 2009-09-15 05:18
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The priest will close the door of the sanctum sanctorum once in the morning and once in the evening. He will do puja inside. After opening the doors, he sprinkles theertham from inside, on the waiting devotees outside. The significance of that sprinkling is as follows. He energises the idol inside by light energy {lamps], sound energy {mantras]. The idol is so powerful that the devotees stand outside the sanctorum won't be able to take the reflection of that energy emerging from inside. So, he sprinkles theertham and cools us.
There is one, Dr. Gopalakrishnan who gives such explanations through his speaches on our culture, all over India.
He has been appointed by India Govt to spread the culture of India, outstations as well as in India.