THE STRENGTH OF OUR RELIGION

In this connection, it is good to remember two devotional hymns, one in praise of Vishnu and the other in praise of Siva sung by devotees of the different persuasions. They are the Tiruppaavai of Aandaal and the Tiruvembaavai of Maanickavaachakar. 

Both of them deal with awakening the sleeping devotees of God from their slumber before dawn. The language and the substance of the two hymns show a remarkable similarity bringing forcibly to our minds that, in the ultimate analysis, from the point of the devotee and his devotion there need be no difference in respect of Siva or Vishnu.

A devotee of one manifestation is a devotee of every other manifestation. That is the way to establish devotional harmony. All theistic schools of our religion have stemmed from the Vedic religion, which proclaimed: That which exists is One; the sages speak of it variously, The substance is ultimately zone; its shape and name may be as various as you please.

In the matter of the form that one chooses for one's worship, one goes by the practice in vogue, the Sampradaya in one's family. There I to give up one form of worship and ad s no need Similarly one need not give up the religion another. ion in which one is born and adopt another. The apachaara or sin in conversion is not so much in going to a new religion as in giving up the old religion in which one was born.

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