Why does Jagannatha Puri temple forbid non-Hindus from entering?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Thank you.
Question. Why does the Jagannath temple in Puri not allow western people to enter? Isn’t everyone equal in the eyes of God? Answer. Yes, everyone is equal in the eyes of God, but God is not equal in the eyes of everyone.
That means that different people have different conceptions of God and according to their conceptions, they may even be violently against certain depictions of God. Historically India has been ruled for nearly a millennia by religious rulers whose religion was strongly against any kind of deity worship. So hundreds and hundreds of temples in India have been destroyed by Islamic invaders.
And among the temples that faced the brunt of such fanatical destruction, the Jagannath temple is among the most prominent. The Jagannath temple has had to be reconstructed several times in the last thousand years. And the deities themselves were desecrated at times, the deities were stolen.
And in that way, because of having faced the brunt of fanaticism, there has been a response or reaction of conservatism with respect to who all can visit the temple. In the Abrahamic religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam, because there is no positive description of God’s form, so these religions often believe that depicting God in any form, any image is a concoction and they consider such a depiction as a competition to God. And in fact they not only destroy such depiction, but they consider such destruction as a progression, as a glorification of the God who is depicted in their tradition.
So many times the destruction of the images in the temples is accompanied by cries to the glorification of say Allah. So therefore, the protection of Jagannath deities is one of the most important considerations naturally for those who are devoted to him. And for that reason, now people come and see the temple and people see the devout worship that happens, that will agitate their envy, their antipathy, their disregard.
So it’s best that if there is antipathy, then it’s out of sight is out of mind. Now of course we may say that invaders, they don’t want permission. They are just going to do aggression.
That is true. But for invaders to get the information also, somebody has to see it. Now by reputation, it may be known that this temple has a lot of wealth or has a lot of religious significance and that may also provoke aggression.
But relatively speaking, if people who belong to religions that have a strong antipathy towards deity worship, if they are not allowed inside the temples, then it is likely that the antipathy will not be increased and in that way the protection can be done. There are of course rules that serve their purpose and there are rules that outlive their expiry date. So even if in the medieval times when such rules might have come into existence for a valid purpose and even if they serve some purpose, how effectively may be open to debate.
But even if they served a purpose at that time, now those rules have outlived their expiry date and they need to be duly relegated to the pages of historical customs. There is no scriptural basis specifically for such rules and there is no logical reason for the continuation of those rules now. And that is not even in harmony with the inclusive spirit of the worship of Jagannath.
Jagannath, if you look at the history, that deity was earlier known as Neel Madhav and that was worshipped by people who were traditionally considered to be tribals, Shabaras. So not exactly the most high class people in terms of orthodox Hindu tradition. And Jagannath also comes out once a year in Athyatra to give darshan to everyone, which also indicates his inclusive spirit.
So in keeping with that inclusive spirit, it would be best if the temple opens up its worship for everyone. And Shri Prabhupada would often say that he is Jagannath, why are you making him Bharatnath or Hindunath more specifically. So that is unfortunate.
Sometimes the rules become fossilized and the purpose is forgotten. This is in Bhakti tradition called as Niyamagraha, that sticking to the letter of the law without considering the spirit or its purpose. So this is unfortunately an example of Niyamagraha.
And we can hope and pray that in the near future, the merciful nature of Jagannath, in wanting to give mercy to everyone, be manifest. Also in the rules of the temple management, which allows people who are devoted to Jagannath, or people who want to have the darshan of Jagannath, to come in and have darshan.