'Maha Shivaratri'- The Night Of 'Enlightening Ignorant Minds' And Protecting From 'Human Sufferings'

Shivaratri is celebrated at midnight to celebrate Shiva. Why at night? That is because Shiva comes to this world when it is enveloped in the darkness of igno rance when everyone has forgotten their true identity as souls and instead believe that they are bodies. 

This body-consciousness gives rise to vices such as lust, anger and greed, which are the root causes of all human suffering. Shivaratri thus stands for not just one night but the entire Kaliyug period of ignorance and unrighteousness that is brought to an end by Shiva.

The incorporeal Shiva enlightens ignorant minds by giving spiritual knowledge and instilling virtues in humans. He performs this task through a human medium remembered as Brahma. This is alluded to in the Shivapurana, which says that Shiva, the Jyotirlinga, the column of divine light, had mercy on all beings of the world and appeared in the forehead of Brahma and recreated the Satyug world through him. 

Shiva reminds humans that they are spiritual and not physical beings, and that purity, peace, truth and love are their original qualities. In this way, Shiva creates a new consciousness that is the seed from which emerges a virtuous and righteous world order. Following this process of creation, the old, unrigh teous order gets destroyed, subtly as well as physically. 

As evil reaches extreme proportions, misguided human intellects devise deadly weapons of mass destruction and man's rapacious plunder of nature triggers devastating `natural' calamities that clean out the world to enable man and nature to make a fresh start.

Shiva, whose name literally means benefactor, then nurtures the new world order through those who imbibe His teachings and spread His light in the world. The `tripundi' ­ the three lines on the Shivalingam ­ which is one of the forms in which Shiva is represented ­ signifies this threefold task of creation, sustenance and destruction performed. Since His divine intervention delivers all humans from suffering and ushers in a new era of peace and happiness, Shiva is remembered in various forms by people of different cultures and faiths.

Shiva's incorporeal form is universally represented by light. The 12 famous Shi va temples in India are known as Jyotirlinga Math signifying His divine light form. The eternal light that hangs above the ark in every synagogue, altar lamps in churches, and light symbols as sociated with Egyptian, Babylonian, Druid, Norse gods and the Donyi-Polo faith of Arunachal Pradesh corroborates to the widespread belief in the divine light as the image of one, incorporeal, supreme being. In Japan, members of a messianic Shinto group called Ananai kyo meditate on a round, black stone similar to a Shivalingam that they call `Chinkon Se ki', which means one who bestows peace.

In addition, various names of God, such as `Shiun' in Babylon, `Seva' or `Sevajya' in Syria, Egypt and Fiji, and `Jehova' bear a similarity to the Sanskrit word Shiva, which is derived from two phonetic parts, `shi' and `va', meaning redeemer and liberator.

Shivaratri thus commemorates a momentous occasion, marking the beginning of a new cycle of time, when the world passes from the Iron Age or Kaliyug into the Golden Age or Satyug, when the negative give way to the positive.

In a world where levels of corruption, crime and violence are ringing alarm bells, it is becoming clear to more and more people that we are lost in the darkness of ignorance. We can help dispel the gloom by carrying out in our personal life what Shivaratri commemorates ­ that is, destroying negative ways of thinking and nurturing a positive attitude ­ to illuminate our lives with Truth.