Vaishnavism with Shaivism
Namaste folks,
In history we find kings who built Vaishnava temples inspite of being staunch Shaivites - King Ko Chengan Chozhan, for examples, built 70 Shaivite temples along with 1 Vaishnava divyadesam - the temple at 'Thirunarayur'.
(It is said Vishishtadvaita and Advaita are 99% the same, only the last 1% different!). In our temple, the Vaishnava purohits also do archana and abhisheka to Shaiva murthies such as Ganesha and vice versa.
You can say I'm following their footsteps - although having not 1 or 2, but 3 personal favorite Vaishnava deities (Rama, Narasimha and Ranganatha), my love for deities also stretches into those of the Shaivite pantheon - I love Shiva and Muruga! And into the Shakta tradition too - I love goddess Mariamma.
Also, someone from Shaivite tradition told me that whenever I pray, I should, regardless of being a Vaishnava, first offer my obeisance to Lord Shiva, as he is elder to Vishnu.
So in my daily devotional practice, I first recite hymns and then offer food for deities in the following order -
Ganesha, Nataraja, his consort Sivakami, Thiruvannamalaiyappa, Medha Dakshinamoorthy, Sri Anjaneya, Sri Rama, Sita, Srimad Ramanuja, Sri Lakshmi Narasimha, his consort Rajyalakshmi thaayaar, Tirupathi Balaji, his consort Alarmelu manga, Ranganatha, his consort Mahalakshmi, Krishna, his consort Rukmini, Muruga, Deivayanai, Valli, Karumariamma, Meenakshi, Raghavendra, SuryaNarayana, and finally my late grandmother, my late father, my late in-laws!
And I offer the same food as naivedyam to each of the above deities. I mentally say 'Naivedyam samarpayami, shodasopachaaram samarpayami' and offer the food.
Do any of you, being staunch Vaishnavite or Shaivite, include gods from the other sect in your daily spiritual practice thus? Is it correct for me to say, 'shodasopachaaram samarpayami' although I am not doing the shodasa or 16-fold upacharas or respects? Is there any alternative term you use? Kindly explain.
Also what is the procedure for your worship? I'm curious to know if there are any other steps included in the process that I can incorporate.
Thank you.
jai hanuman gyan gun sagar jai kapis tihu lok ujagar
Bookmarks