HPI
HPI’S EDITORIAL OFFICES, February 21, 2009: HPI has been receiving news about the arrangements done in preparation for Mahasivaratri in India and, actually, all over the globe. While most reports focus on the logistics and material aspects of the preparation, HPI brings to you, below, a mystical description of Siva’s great night, drawn from the book “What is Hinduism?”. Mahasivaratri is celebrated on the new moon evening, which in India happens on Monday and in the West happens on Sunday.
On “Siva’s Great Night,” Mahasivaratri, the fourteenth day of the dark half of Kumbha, or Aquarius (Phalguna–February/March), devotees fast all day in preparation to worship Lord Siva from evening until early dawn — bathing the sacred Siva Linga with water, milk, honey and saffron water, then offering bilva leaves while chanting Sri Rudram, the pre-eminent Vedic hymn to Siva, or reciting His 1,008 names are the high points of the all-night vigil.
Only when the last puja is finished in early morning do devotees break their fast by eating the sacred prasadam offered earlier to the Lord. The following day is one of feasting and gaiety, especially at grand fairs held in many parts of India. On Siva’s night we contemplate Siva as the Unmanifest Reality. We dive deep in yogic meditation on His endless/beginningless Radiance.
Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami (founder of Hinduism Today) explains, “This is a magical night, a night such as this where devotees of Siva gather together all over the world. A sage of Sri Lanka, Yogaswami, ‘One thing Siva cannot do, with all of his power the, Creator, Preserver, Destroyer of the Universe. One thing he cannot do. He cannot take Himself out of you. He cannot extract Himself out of you because He is the Life of the Life of you.’
“Siva is the source of the light that lights your thoughts. Siva’s the life of the body. I move my arm, I move my hand, and that energy is the Shakthi of Siva is emanating out of the central source of all Energy. The light that lights the mind, that illumines your thoughts, comes from the central source of all energy. So we’re all here tonight to be close to Siva. Or to be close to your Self. Realizing the Self of you is realizing Siva and realizing Siva is realizing the Self of you. There is no difference.”