Sunday 20 March 2022

What are the benefits of worshiping Lord Vishnu?

 There are so many gods and we worship them for certain benefits. We worship Lord Ganesha to remove all obstacles from our path, we worship Goddess Laxmi for money, Goddess Saraswati for learning, Goddess Durga for powers and beautiful wife and so on. However when analysed deeply we find the benedictions received from these gods are all temporary. All these benedictions are pertaining to bodily affairs.

In contrast worship of Lord Vishnu gives us something beyond materialism. Consider the case of Dhruva Maharaja. He worshipped Lord Vishnu to acquire a kingdom greater than that of Brahma. However when Lord Vishnu appeared before him to grant him the boon, Dhruva said “I don’t need anything else now after seeing You. I was looking out for pieces of glass but now got a diamond. So what’s the need of the glass pieces”. See here, how Dhruva’s mind changed after having the darshan of Lord Vishnu. He became desireless of all worldly affairs. But it is not that worshipping of Lord Vishnu will not grant us any worldly joy. Dhruva did attain a special planet called Dhruva loka which is inexhaustible.

Besides Dhruva, there were many other devotees also who attained unparalleled benedictions. For example king Bali, after attaining the dust of Lord Vamana’s feet, he attained fearlessness. In fact Lord Vamana became Bali’s security something which king Indra too didn’t attain.

Similarly king Sugriva too got the protection of Lord Rama and attained the kingdom of Kishkindha. Pandavas, Sudama attained great fortunes and wealth due to their devotion towards Lord Krishna (though attaining the worldly kingdom was never their goal).

So we can see, devotees attain unparalleled benefits by devoting to Lord Vishnu even if they don’t those.

Therefore Srimad Bhagavatam says:

A person who has broader intelligence, whether he be full of all material desire, without any material desire, or desiring liberation, must by all means worship the supreme whole, the Personality of Godhead.” [SB 2.3.10]

Lord Krishna says in Bhagavad Gita:

“O best among the Bhāratas, four kinds of pious men begin to render devotional service unto Me – the distressed, the desirer of wealth, the inquisitive, and he who is searching for knowledge of the Absolute.” [BG 7.16]

So from the above 2 verses, we come to know irrespective of our wishes and desires be it material desires, spiritual knowledge, protection from dangers , attaining liberation from the cycle of birth and death or pure love of God, we should worship the Supreme Lord Vishnu or Krishna. Ratnadeep Ray

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