Do you too reject the concept of image-worship?

Question

Thanks to all your philosophical answers. Have a great day!

Answer 1

The only reason why image-worship could be counterproductive is the folly it can create of believing the image as real. However, that can happen with any symbol for the worship or rituals accompanying any worship.... all these symbols provided by various religions are merely to anchor our mind on something so as for us to get the required concentration for worship... if we get too involved with the symbol itself, then what it symbolizes gets lost (in the case of worship, that means we lose God, because God just can not be equated with anything at all).

In summary I would say that image-worship can become counter-productive, perhaps more so because image as a symbol is very powerful and can take our mind easily away from the real God.

Answer 2

I wish I could get philosophical in my answer, but all I can say is... yeah, I reject image worship. Images are just things, they are just what they are... pictures or statues or books or other things involving 'image,' ephemeral things that most often are literally here today and gone tomorrow. Nothing to worship about them at all. Everything is subject to so much change over time that it seems a dicey concept of worship at best, and a dangerous one at worst.

Answer 3

commonplace question. Why Hinduism is improperly misrepresented as Idol worship? answer. the 1st reason is that distinctive practices via distinctive cultures in India that have not have been given a non secular call have been conglomerated right into a kit talked approximately as 'Hinduism' via foreigners and the pity is such an action has been regarded via the Indians themselves! distinctive practices comprise pagan worship, nature worship, image worship, idol worship, no idols etc. If 'Hinduism' is a faith how could desire to or no longer that's possible for a great number of a type of distinctive practices interior of its fold? for this reason, that's sparkling that what's practiced in Indian context is a loose subculture that were traditionally surpassed down via the ancestors belonging to distinctive community areas and not any synthetic guy-created faith. So, without formal difficulty, what the foreigners have carried out is to kit deal and type the subculture as a faith and related it with idol-worship which grew to become into very truthfully considered via them, with little resistance from the practitioners themselves! the 2nd reason is that the easy scriptures concerning to God are in Sanskrit language, which the effortless human beings are no longer gifted with what honestly they are announcing, yet on a similar had no compulsion to stick to in practice what the scriptures have suggested. the actuality the scriptures very for sure say that God can not be constrained via a type isn't prevalent to effortless human beings. The absence of a non secular dictate, that's a needed element of an synthetic faith, has made human beings to coach their very own approach that comprise idol worship. that's for this reason no longer a fault of scriptures. Nor the human beings could nicely be faulted, as God does no longer get 'indignant' if worshiped in a type! Counter question- Did God forbid all people to make image of him or attempting to discern him out? for sure no!

Answer 4

There are two aspects to image worship.

1. Worshiping the image of a hero. eg. the statue, photo or portrait of a political leader. Here also, till such time the image is seen as a representation of the real object, there is no problem. There is this famous story of Vivekananda from India. A king who was opposed to image worship abused Vivekananda for doing idol worship saying it is nonsense to worship stones and clay. Vivekananda asked one of the servants to bring a picture of the king. When it was brought V asked him to spit on the picture. The servant was taken aback. But the king understood. When you worship you are not worshiping the paint, paper, mud or stone, but you are creating a mental image of the worshiped, since you cannot create that image otherwise. Well if you can create that image in your mind, without the help of image, fine. Go ahead.

2. Cultures like the Hindu, Mayan, Budhist etc. knew (knew, not thought) that in certain geometrical figures, some kind of concious energy can be contained. That geometrical figure could be proportional idol, figures like intersecting triangles, circles etc. or even physical geometrical structures like pyramids or temples. The ancient Hindus has this concept of image of Lord Shiva which is exactly like an atomic reactor of today. The Hindus considered that unlimited concious (self propelling) energy could be contained in that shape.

Every human being does some kind of image-worship. The picture of father, mother etc. The picture of religious and political leaders. The pictures of moon, sun, stars etc. Geometrical figures like crossing triangles, petals, squares etc. Cross, Cresent etc. Shiva, Vishnu etc.

The debate is only that my image-worship is not image-worhip and it is fine, but yours is not.

Answer 5

The Will is positive, the Judgment is negative and we have built a comprehesion that abandons that foolishness. To worship totality, the totality, is not to single out one or an other. To respect God is not to let selfs Judgment Judge the totality (God) but to Judge each according to the purpose of the Will to live (the Will).

Answer 6

LJK cannot give a philosophical answer, because this isn't a philosophical question. Anyway, I also hope you have a great day.

Answer 7

I sooo do!

Many people from other religions accuse Christians of image-worship and idolatry. But I say to them... We do not worship images and statues of saints and Jesus, and Mary! We merely show our respect and pay homage to them through these statues, just as we ask for forgiveness from God through priests. They are what we call like "instruments" that we do things through...

Answer 8

An image is just as good as a delusion.

Answer 9

Yes...no life in images...it's all based on what you give to the image

Answer 10

yep

to me its non sensical , they are all man made , so i dont see the point of it

i look at the sky and the sea , and thats my inspiration for higher thoughts

all the best
Ian