IDOL WORSHIP OF SYMBOLISM:

    Ritualistic worship does not mean idol worship.  When the deity is invoked through the chanting of the appropriate mantra, the agama ritual clearly lays down three steps: the asana, the murti and the murti-man.  Asana is the seat offered to the deity.  The second step is the murti; this is the object which the  deity is requested to be present in.  It is not God but God is requested to appear and abide temporarily in this object. The third invocation is to the deity or the particular god-murtiman; this is not the image, but is God whom we pray to appear before us and to condescend to accept the puja offered. 

Thus the three mantras for the invocation make it unmistakably clear that it is not the image that is worshipped, but some other force to which the image serves as a temporary residence.  Presuming we are worshipping Ganesa here, the invocations will be: Ganesa-sanaya-namah, Ganesa-murthaye namah, Ganessaya namah.  These steps in the invocation will make clear the position in idol worship.  Saivism has idols in its worship but it does not do idol worship.

    The worshipper never says that he is worshipping the image or the idol.  Even while offering flowers to the image before him, or to the handful of sand, etc.  He is simply saying that he is worshipping Ganesa or Siva.  But the worshipper is not conscious of the image or the idol; He says and feels that he is worshipping the Supreme being, as Ganesa or Siva, not as an idol.

    Siva worship reaches beyond and goes further to the Supreme idea that is sought to be invoked in the idol.  The mind of man which functions only through the senses and the other internal organs cannot at all reach Suddha-Siva, the nirguna (without attributes, who is immutable and transcendental).  Hence to satisfy these organs and to give them some concrete object on which to focus the senses and the organs to begin with, the form of Siva the Saguna (with attributes) was invented by our forefathers. 

This is installed in different forms in the temple so that the limited mind of man may comprehend the Unlimited Being in the symbol.  The image or the Siva-linga is only a symbol.  It is not God or Siva.  It is a symbol intended to point to the Being beyond.  All thought goes to that Being through the symbol.

    When many concentrate their thoughts on the image in the temple the concentrated thought-effect of large congregations of devotees endows it with a great potency for grace and succour.  It gets hallowed as the abode of Divinity and, as generations roll by, this potency for aid and succour is indeed felt by succeeding generations of worshippers.