Earlier in the month, we were reminded by President Irfaan Ali that Guyana is a multi-religious society with the largest religions of mankind – Hinduism, Islam and Christianity – all represented in large swathes of our peoples. This diversity of spiritual aspirations is co-joined with a similar diversity in culture and races and this should be one of our strengths. We should be able to appreciate through our lived experiences that fundamentally, all mankind exhibits the full panoply of traits that are part and parcel of “human nature”. As such, our societies should create meta institutions at our national level that will accommodate and facilitate these diversities and not try to force our peoples into any one “true” path.
Today, Hindus will commemorate the festival of Maha Shivratri, which literally means “The great night of Shiva”. Shiva is regarded as one of the three major aspects of Brahman that pervades all creation and the uncreated. These are “Brahma” that creates, Vishnu that sustains and Shiva into which all creation returns in immense cycles of time amounting to billions of years. As a very ancient way of life, Hindu practices are replete with symbolism explained by a very sophisticated system of semiotics. As such, there are always levels of meaning found in the seemingly mundane customs that have been passed on through the ages.
Most mundanely, “Shivratri” or “night of Shiva” is celebrated in the 14th day of every month of the lunar calendar. But once a year, in late winter in the northern hemisphere, Maha Shivratri is celebrated to commemorate the oncoming summer. On this night, the northern hemisphere of the planet is positioned in such a way that there is a natural upsurge of energy in a human being. This is a day when nature is pushing one towards one’s spiritual peak. It is to make use of this, that in this tradition, we established a certain festival which is nightlong. To allow this natural upsurge of energies to find its way, one of the fundamentals of this nightlong festival is to ensure that you remain awake with your spine vertical throughout the night.
From one perspective, this momentous change is essential for our survival on this planet; it is explained on this night that Lord Shiva performs his cosmic dance or ‘tandav’. We now know that the universe is sustained through movement from the subatomic level to the furthest galaxies formed at the beginning of the last Big Bang, or creation, that the new James Webb space telescope is revealing to us. But the vast emptiness that holds them does not come into everybody’s notice – we call this “dark matter”. This vastness, this unbounded emptiness, is what is referred to as Shiva. Today, modern science also proves that everything comes from nothing and goes back to nothing. It is in this context that Shiva, the vast emptiness or nothingness, is referred to as the great lord, or Mahadeva. This year, the festival will commence this evening.
Of the 12 Shivratris observed in any given year, Maha Shivratri is considered especially auspicious. From our level of existence, it is also the night of convergence of Shiva and Shakti, which in essence mean the masculine and feminine energies, the inert male principle and the feminine power that balance the world. In Hindu culture, this is a solemn festival that as in almost all the others reminds us that ‘overcoming darkness and ignorance in life’ needs us to play our roles as is necessary at different times and eras.
From a ritual standpoint, every Hindu is asked to perform worship to the formless “Linga” that symbolises Shiva. This is done by pouring various specified liquids such as water and milk, etc, each representing various aspects of our being, over the linga to merge with it as is our goal of our atma or soul to merge or receive moksha or liberation with the Divine Soul. These offerings will be made at four intervals or “prahaars” through the night.
