As an artist, the more I channelise my interest in temple architecture and iconography; the more It is turning into a serious study.
And even as a layperson it is very vast to understand the Hindu Temple as a sacred structure. It’s an epicentre of both the philosophy as well as the practical aspects of temple architecture.
It has always been an immensely satisfying experience for me.
In Shilp and Vastu Shastra; the temple structure can be compared with the human body. Architects have creatively expressed with perfect geometries and mathematical principles. The macrocosm is reflected in the microcosm. The great cosmos is reflected in the human body. And the parts of a temple are identical with the parts of the human body.
Temple architecture as the main form of Hindu architecture has various styles. Though the basic nature of the Hindu temple remains the same, with the essential feature an inner sanctum, the Garbhagriha or womb-chamber, where the primary Murti is housed in a simple bare cell. (Don’t call it an idol because it is not. There is a difference between an Idol, a Murti, and a Vigraha.) This chamber often has an open area designed for movement in clockwise rotation for rituals and prayers. On the exterior, the Garbhagriha is crowned by a tower-like Shikhara, also called the Vimana in the south. The shrine building often includes an circumambulatory passage for Parikrama, a Mandapa congregation hall, and sometimes an Antarala (Space) antechamber and porch between Garbhagriha and Mandapa.
Hindu temple architecture reflects a synthesis of arts, the ideals of Dharma. What’s interesting to observe is all the cosmic elements that create and celebrate life in Hindu pantheon, are present in a Hindu temple—from fire to water, from images of nature to deities, from the feminine to the masculine, from Kama to Artha, from the fleeting sounds and incense smells to Purusha—The form and meanings of architectural elements in a Hindu temple are designed to function as the place where it is the link between man and the divine, to help his progress to spiritual knowledge and truth, his liberation/Moksha.
After experiencing both historical and religious persecutions for centuries in colonial rule (be it western or middle-eastern) Indic civilization somehow managed to keep itself attached to the temples which were epicentres of the whole ecosystem and its way of life. As the Dharma doesn’t impose its practices on anyone; it accepts even an atheist into the Dharmic fold and the cultural ethos.
