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Oct 12, 2019 Letters
Guyanese Hindus continue the tradition of observing Navratri and other festivals in New York, Florida and other places where they have settled (like Jersey, Houston, Dallas, Atlanta, Minnesota, etc. in America. I am told the same is true of those who are settled in Canada, UK, and Trinidad. Other Caribbean Hindus joined Guyanese in observing the Ganesh festival and Pitri Paksh last month an auspicious festival of Navratri, the annual period of fasting that pays obeisance to the universal mother. Guyanese have helped to institutionalize these festivals in parts of America. They receive support and recognition from politicians.
With regards to Navratri, the celebration included making offerings in the morning and evening over the nine days. Nav means nine and ratri means night. It is a festival that is celebrated during the night with prayers and spiritual dancing and a discourse that also includes singing. The festival began on evening of September 29 and concluded on October 7. The observance was extended into the Dussehra celebration on October 8; Dussehra means tenth day. Dussehra symbolizes the conquest of good over evil. All temples in the NY area held discourses on the occasion – some nightly discourses.
Navratri is one of the holiest periods in the Hindu calendar that was accompanied with people fasting, visiting mandirs, and performing pujas as well as inviting pandits to conduct special services at their home. People fasted during this period focusing on purification of the minds and bodies. During this period, people tend to pray with great fervour and devotion. Observants were seen nightly dressed in traditional colourful garb heading for the mandirs; there are dozens of mandirs in the greater Richmond Hill area.
In New York, all of the temples held Navratri kathas and poojas. Pandit Rajin Balgobind of Berbice held his service under a tent at the Cheddi Jagan ground attracting a thousand worshippers nightly.
The pandits explained that Navratri is an extremely wonderful festival highly inspiring and instructive on how people should live. It is associated with the propitiation of the feminine aspects of the Almighty – clearly illustrating that Hindus do not discriminate among the sexes. Hindus pay obeisance to both male and female murthis representing their God or Goddess. But during Navratri, Hindus focus on worshipping the Goddesses Durga and her two feminine Lakshmi and Saraswati. The same is true for pujas during Diwali when Goddess Laxmi is worshipped. Although Hindus pray to many Gods and Goddesses, there is only one God taking on many re-incarnations and names. Hindus believe they all represent the same one almighty God or Goddess who take different appearances for different purposes and came on earth at different times with different names to model an appropriate lifestyle for humans. In Hinduism, Gods as well as Goddesses are worshipped and for every God there is a corresponding Goddess as his consort as for example Shiva and Parbatie or Ram and Sita.
There are several meanings attached to the celebration of Navratri which is directly linked to other Hindu festivals like Ram Leela, that will be celebrated right after Navratri which will be followed by Diwali and then karthik or Teerat that concludes the year for religious festivals.
One meaning given for Navratri is nine nights that connotes worshipping of the Goddess Durga, Lakshmi and Saraswati. Each Goddess is worshipped for three nights to offer protection (Durga), provide wealth (Lakshmi) and guide the devotee to knowledge (Saraswati) respectively. Durga means fort or a place that is protected. She is the General in charge of security of the nation. People pray to Durga for protection, strength and shakti (power) in defense against their many enemies. When people worship Durga, they are worshipping the other manifestations of God and are seeking divine protection and removal of disease. A devotee prostrates to Mother Lakshmi, the Goddess of prosperity, so that he or she can become wealthy, kind and generous towards others. And a devotee worships Mother Saraswati for wisdom.
According to pandits, during Navratri, a devotee becomes conscious of his/her faults, limitations and internal enemies such as lust, hatred, greed and anger and want to reform his life. People make sacrifices in their fast so they can become conscious of their faults and correct them. By worshipping Durga and her sisters, these internal enemies are destroyed and are replaced by love, cheerfulness, compassion, and devotion.
The famed Lord Rama is also associated with Navratri — his appearance, disappearance and reappearance in the holy city of Ayodha. In the spring Navratri, Hindus celebrate the birth of Lord Rama, and in the fall, Hindus celebrate the destruction of the evil Ravana by Lord Rama, signifying the triumph of good over evil which is also called Dussehra, a holiday in India. The Ramleela celebrations are associated with this period and some temples are holding such celebrations.
Yours truly,
Vishnu Bisram
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