Symbolism in Hinduism

Conceptual thinking is hard to the many. To contemplate upon the formless and therefore the Transcendental Essence is given but to a few. The majority needs some grosser expression of the Pure and the Infinite, for their mind to conceive It and their intellect to contemplate upon It. These symbols of the Eternal Ground, the Supreme Truth, are called idols. Thus, an idol represents an ideal. When we do not know the ideal which a given idol represents, it is something like seeing a portrait in a studio! If it were my beloved’s portrait I would have seen in it more than what the black-and –white picture represents. I would experience the warm pulsating menace of my love, the mother of my beloved Childen! In the same way the religious symbols and idols have a deeper depth for us to discover, over and above their mere external shape, the general forms of the symbol and, in each, even the exact arrangements of its various aspects.