The Levels of Religion
You should understand the psychology of religion. The Truth is man created God in his own mould. If you are caught in ignorance, you worship the goddess of knowledge, Saraswati. Whatever you don't have, you worship that, because you want that. If you are mature, your worship or your ishta devata (favorite deity) also will be mature.
Understand, with a person who has renounced the world, who wants enlightenment, you will never expect that he will be sitting in front of Lakṣmī, the goddess of wealth, and worshipping Lakṣmī.
So naturally you will not see a monk sitting in front of a Lakṣmī, Maybe he may worship MokshaLakṣmī (goddess of enlightenment),
Here this whole tradition starts with worshipping enlightened Masters, means the highest conscious beings.
You will expect somebody to give you the readymade beliefs. You will not analyze. Any charismatic leader is enough to take you for a ride. Second, if you are fear-oriented, if you are fear-based,
What is he going to do even if Lakṣmī showers on him? He has no utility for wealth. Wealth has no use for him.
not DhanaLakṣmī (goddess of wealth), surely not SantanaLakṣmī (goddess of progeny). So your ishta devata will very clearly tell in which state of consciousness you are living.
Understand, there are different levels in religion. If you are caught in ignorance, the lowest level, you will worship or you will be interested more in fanatic beliefs.
if you are afraid and you want the god who will remove fear from you, you will worship gods with big swords and with too many weapons, having eighteen hands and twenty hands and all kinds of weapons.
But here you are worshipping arihantas and siddhas who are sitting in meditation. You are not worshipping gods who have too many hands. If you are fear-based, if you are caught in fear, you will create a god who has too many hands and too many weapons so that you will be protected by at least some weapon.
And if you are greed-based, naturally you will worship the gods and goddesses who give wealth, who promise you wealth - Lakṣmī or any gods and goddesses who shower gold coins. If you see Lakṣmī's statues and photographs, you will see that she is showering gold coins. It is just the projection of your fantasy, nothing more than that.
If you are greed-based it is very easy to exploit you. If somebody comes and gives you just a verbal promise, it is enough. If he creates such words that your fantasies will be fulfilled through him, you are gone. This is a real incident which happened:
An astrologer used to come to our ashram. Earlier he used to come in a two-wheeler. One day suddenly I saw him in a new car. I asked him, 'How do you suddenly have a new car? Did you win any lottery?' He said, 'No, no Swamiji, these are all happening because of Lakṣmī yantra.' I asked, 'Lakṣmī yantra? I have never heard of this. Who gave you this?' He said, 'No, no, nobody gave me, Swamiji, I started giving to others!'
If you are greed-based you will worship the gods and goddesses who promise wealth.
If you are logic-based, you will be at the next level; you will worship philosophers. You will worship the people who give you words. The person who gives you words is worshipped, respected.
You can't call all these four levels as a religion. They are not religions. They cannot give you solutions. They can only give you support. Understand, these four levels will give you only support, not solution. Totally there are seven levels. The first four levels can't be called as religions. It is just a sort of support.
In the next three levels, you will see the true spirituality. Love-based system means you will worship a person who radiates love. You will be attracted towards the person who radiates love. The next is meditation-based. Here you will be attracted to a person who is sitting in meditation, who is radiating peace, who is radiating energy, who is radiating life, who is radiating consciousness. The last, the ultimate, is celebration-based. It is led by one who is not only radiating, but who can also make you radiate the same energy, who can share, who can create that ambience, who can create that energy in you also.
Arihanta means not only the person who has achieved himself, but who can also reproduce it, who can create it in you also. This is the religion, the tradition based on enlightenment.
Understand the seven levels: ignorance-based, fear-based, greed-based, logic-based - these four are preliminary levels. You can't call them as religions. They are support, not even solutions. It is like adding little oil to you and making you run in the same way. It is like when too much friction happens, you need to add little oil to reduce the friction. In the same way these four levels are like a little oil to run your machine. They won't give you solutions. The other three levels, higher levels, are love-based, meditation-based and celebration-based. The celebration-based systems are based on joy, bliss and ananda. Here they worship, bow down to the great energies and Masters who are love-based, meditation- based and based on celebration, enlightenment, ananda and ecstasy. One more thing, if your core message is love, meditation and enlightenment based, maybe outside your temples you can have few statues also, nothing wrong. They are like a visiting card – 'Please if you are greed-based, fear-based, ignorance-based also you can come, you are welcome; we don't say you can't come. But please come beyond that. There is something beyond.' If you keep the love, compassion, meditation and celebration as the main mulavigraha or the main base, you can have few of the other things also on the outside, nothing wrong. But there are some traditions which started keeping the fear-based, greed-based, ignorance-based things in the main altar. That is where their corruption started. That is where dilution starts. That is what I call a dangerous distraction.
As long as our focus is towards the main Truths, corruption or dilution is impossible. Somehow, Mahāvīra, a great Master, managed to create a tradition without dilution, without corruption. Still the main Truth even after 2500 years is the same. Still the core is the same, still the religion is love-based, meditation-based and enlightenment-based and celebration-based. Maybe in course of time there is a little bit of fear base or greed base but that is not the core. That is not the Truth. The dilution also is not able to affect the Truth or the core.