Religion
Hindu temple traditions part of immigrants' new lives here

By Mary M. Byrne
Religion News Service

COURTESY STEPHEN SAWYER / RNS Dr. B. Krishna Mohan stands near a new Shiva temple being constructed on the grounds of the Hindu Temple of Atlanta, which he co-founded. The first Shiva temple in the Southeast will give Hindu devotees more choice, Mohan said.

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RIVERDALE, Ga. — Builders of the first traditional Hindu temple in the southeastern United States devoted primarily to the deity Shiva are working quickly, hoping to finish the basic structure in time for consecration of the temple next Saturday.

In the Hindu tradition, the weeks before the summer solstice are an auspicious time for temple consecration.

When completed, the $1 million Shiva temple of the Hindu Temple of Atlanta will be one of a growing number in the United States built according to ancient Indian architectural specifications — and one of the few with an accompanying traditional temple to the deity Balagi, also known as Vishnu, right beside it.

"It's giving more choice to people," said Dr. B. Krishna Mohan, who co-founded the Hindu Temple of Atlanta in 1984 and chairs the Shiva temple's construction committee. He expects many devotees will worship in both temples, depending on their needs and interests.

Family and community traditions often shape a Hindu's preference for worshipping one god or another.

"When you grow up with that god pervading your mind and your soul, you are attached to that person," says Vasudha Narayanan, religion professor at the University of Florida. "The Hindu tradition highlights the importance of individual devotion as well as the collective."

Some Hindu temples are appearing in Washington, too, as the state's Indian population swells. According to U.S. census figures, the number of people moving to the state from India has nearly tripled since 1990 to about 24,000. In 2002, a $1.5 million Hindu Temple and Cultural Center was completed in Bothell — the first of its kind in the region.

Traditions, deities differ

	RNS Workers hustle to finish Atlanta's new Shiva temple, being built to ancient architectural specifications. As part of tradition, Shiva will be known there by a local name.

In some Hindu traditions, the ultimate divine being has no name, form or gender that humans can express or apprehend, though the divine can appear in various manifestations, or deities, whom devotees worship.

Shiva, Vishnu, goddesses and their families are principal Hindu deities, each with distinct attributes and personalities. Some attributes, such as the deity's name or appearance, vary from place to place and from community to community.

At the Hindu Temple of Atlanta, for example, Shiva will be known as Ramalingeswarama.

G.V. Raghu, president of the temple, says organizers consulted Vijayendra Saraswathi Shamcaracharya, a spiritual teacher in south India, for help in giving Shiva a name for their new temple.

"That way, we feel it came from a spiritual master, (and we) take it on complete faith," he said. They phoned Shamcaracharya; he offered the name Ramalingeswarama on the spot.

Raghu finds the name apt. The Southeast's first Shiva temple will share the name of a famous Shiva temple in south India, while the name of Detroit's temple to Shiva corresponds to a famous Shiva temple in north India.

And many devotees in the Hindu Temple of Atlanta, he said, are from south India.

This sense of identification also spurred temple leaders toward traditional architecture.

"Home is supposed to be like a home," said Raghu. "And when you are brought up from childhood imagining a temple to have this particular structure, naturally you feel a sense of devotion, and safe feelings, in a temple which is built beautifully according (to tradition), instead of just four walls of a modern structure."

For both the Balagi and Shiva temples, organizers consulted renowned temple architect Padmasri Muthiah, who designed temples in India and the United States, including structures in Nashville, Tenn., and Livermore, Calif.

The goal, Mohan said, is to build a temple "totally according to the style of temples back home ... without any compromises."

Narayanan said temples in the United States appear in a wide range of architectural forms, from a converted gym in Jacksonville, Fla., to a modified airport hangar in Allentown, Pa., to a large community hall with a simple tower in Orlando, Fla.

"But very soon the devotees start to have a need for what they call a 'real' temple," she said. "This is a search for the authentic. That authenticity is seen in terms of architecture, ritual, space and time — all of which combine to produce the feeling of joy and belonging."

Southern style

At the Hindu Temple of Atlanta, organizers have looked to a distinctively south Indian architectural style, characterized by a large tower in the front called a raja goporam and multiple towers over each shrine. The earliest experiments in this style, Narayanan said, began in Tamil Nadu, a southeast state of India, in the sixth century and flourished during the 11th century.

Mohan, who has practiced cardiology in Riverdale for 26 years, notes that organizers have faced hurdles in getting the job done right.

Non-Hindu construction companies can handle the basic structure of a traditional Hindu temple. But "Indianization," or the creation of ornately carved facades and icons according to ancient styles, is the domain of specially trained artisans from India called silpas. The silpas often belong to families whose work, over many generations, is exclusively devoted to traditional temple building. Silpas worked on the Indianization of the Balagi Temple for two years.

"We are in the process of applying for their visas," Mohan says. "In the current atmosphere, it's difficult. Even when we had them come here in 1993 — even then it was kind of difficult."

Copyright © 2004 The Seattle Times Company

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