[Advaita-l] paJNchAyatana pUja

[bhaskar.yr at in.abb.com]

praNAms
Hare Krishna

-- The article says "We believe it was established by Shankaracharya
himself." Are there any differences over the issue. Is this supposed to
have
been the tradition in AmnAya maThas? Are there no written records of
shaN^karAchArya instituting this practice?

>  As far as my knowledge goes, there is no specific mention of
paNchAyatana pUja nor anything about sri chakra upAsana or sri vidyA  in
shankara's prasthAna trayi bhAshya.  However, there are plenty of prakaraNa
grantha-s available in the name of bhagavadpAda wherein he glorified somany
deva-devata-s i.e including shiva, vishnu, nrusimha, lakshmi, gaNapati,
skanda, durgA etc. etc. And our advaita Acharya-s in their respective
peetha-s since the time immemorial have been performing these pUja-s &
upAsana-s.  Hence paNchAyatana pUja has become the part of ritualistic
obligation to advaita  peetAdhipati-s.

-- The mAyA paJNchakaM in the article seems to state that brahma, viShNu,
shiva are non-different from Ishvara (saguNa brahma). Is this the advaita
vEdAntic position in the vyavahArika world that all the three Gods are
different names of the same entity? How about dEvI, gaNEsha, sUrya etc.?
Are
they also supposed to be the same entity (Ishvara) being assigned a
different name? Or are they supposed to be different entities with equal
powers (in which case some of them must be different from Ishvara, and
could
not have equal powers)? Or is the idea that when one of the deities is
worshipped, the nirguNa brahma in that deity is being worshipped?

>  to get the answer to these questions we have to refer to purANa-s...but
there too, it is not clear which god is superior to which....One place
shiva bhagavan prays vishnu and in some other places shiva bhagavan being
worshipped by vishnu himself..All gods are equally powerful, do creation,
maintains it & does the laya kArya in their respective purANa-s...It is
difficult to grade them according to their merit :-))  However, in purANa
itself we can find slOka-s like shivaya vishNu rUpAya, shiva rUpAya
vishNave etc.

-- Can the ishTa dEvata be anybody? For example, is Jesus Christ
acceptable?

>  I think it is acceptable only if you keep in mind that  the bhagavan as
a paramArtha tattva does not have any specific name and form...vEda says
yEkam sat viprA bahudA vadanti....

Hari Hari Hari Bol!!!
bhaskar