Question: What is the purpose behind deity installations? What is the difference between an installed deity of the Lord and any other image/deity form of Krishna? What is the importance of installation if Krishna is already present in both deity forms?
Answer by Romapada Swami:
Q 1. What is the difference between an installed deity of the Lord and any other image/deity form of Krishna?
Ans 1: They are Non-different.
Q 2. What is the importance of installation if Krishna is already present in both deity forms?
Ans 2: Installation marks the formal acceptance of the Lord into one’s heart and home/ temple.
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Srila Prabhupada gave various reasons for installing deities. The three most prominent reasons he gave are as follows:
1. Preaching: To give the opportunity for the congregation, and the public in general, to reawaken their lost relationship with the Supreme Lord.
2. Personal Purification: To provide us the opportunity to engage the mind and senses in the service of Krsna 24 hours a day, thus our mind and senses
become purified and our love of God reawakens.
3. Direct Service to the Lord: Deity worship is a powerful means to help us develop a personal relationship with the Lord. We are unable to perceive the Lord with our material senses; therefore out of kindness He agrees to descend in a form that we are able to interact with. Through the development of a service relationship, our perception of the Lord’s presence grows.
Preaching, nama-hatta, and bhakti-vrksa centers: These centers generally do not have deities. Rather, as Srila Prabhupada instructed, there is worship to pictures of the Panca-tattva and guru-parampara. The purpose of preaching centers is to act as a base for devotees to go out and perform harinama-sankirtan, book distribution, etc. If there is deity worship in the center, the time and resources needed for the primary purpose of going out to positively affect and connect with the public could be diverted to the service of the deities. When the numbers of steady devotees is small, as is generally the case in such centers, the prime function of propagating Krsna consciousness might be hampered if worship of three-dimensional deities is introduced.
While the worship of three-dimensional deities requires regularity, commitment and worship only by brahmanas, the worship of the Lord in picture form does not require the same regularity or commitment, and the worship may be done by either first initiates and/or brahmanas.
Besides this, there are many devotees who have opened up their personal homes to others for regular preaching programs. Oftentimes these devotees have deities that are regularly worshiped. The above guidelines do not apply to such situations.
