By Alexander G. Colombos, CRC, MA, MPS, MA
Certified Rehabilitation Counselor, MA Psychologist, Historian (MA, BA), Former History/Social Studies, Science, Special Ed, Bible/Religion & Greek Studies Teacher, and Doctoral Candidate of Biblical Archaeology at the Newburgh Theological Seminary and Bible College
I took this picture tonight as I was going to a local store to shop. I noticed at the Diversity Plaza between 37th Ave and Roosevelt Ave here in Jackson Heights, NY (Queens) a huge white kiosk set on the spot of Diversity Plaza that is close to 74th St across the Citibank branch. Inside the kiosk, there was a huge statue of Kali, the goddess of the multiple hands, to whom ancient Indians used to offer human sacrifices.
I apologize for the bad picture, but all of the sudden my cellphone started acting crazy and it couldn't take any single picture! Then I prayed in my head saying Trisagion
and the Lord's Blessing Prayer (Κύριε Ιησου Χριστέ ελέησον με"), which is very powerful and I was able to take this blur picture. The audio didn't work at all, as invocations to Hindu gods and goddesses, including Kali were uttered! l!
and the Lord's Blessing Prayer (Κύριε Ιησου Χριστέ ελέησον με"), which is very powerful and I was able to take this blur picture. The audio didn't work at all, as invocations to Hindu gods and goddesses, including Kali were uttered! l!
Inside the open kiosk and despite the rain, there were people sitting in chairs and many others were patiently standing up for hours, as I found out. On the stage, there was an idol of Kali the goddess of the multiple hands! There were many candles and musicians were playing eerie music that sounded like captives marching with a firing squad or rather sacrificial victims were taken in front of Kali's statue! At some point, a singer cried some rhythmic screams which were very creepy! When I crossed myself, a few of the candles went out as a breeze blew them out!
Outside the white tent, there was a red symbol of the swastika, which many scholars say comes from the god of nature Svast Inga, but we know that the Indians took such symbols from the Greeks a long time ago in Dionysus' campaign to the East, as there were three historical figures with that name, but this particular Dionysus lived in the Minoan times. (That is the time when the Harrapan culture appeared in India. All archaeologists today call this culture Indian, but they refuse to call the Minoan culture Greek, not even proto-Greek or early Greek despite the recent DNA studies and the affinities of Linear A and Linear B, and Linear B was proved to be Greek. The first Dionysus lived probably in the Neolithic times and he is probably the one who introduced agriculture, including viticulture. The third Dionysus most likely lived in the Mycenaean times).
Kali reminds us of the Hekatoncheires (Εκατόγχειρες) or the "Hundred-handed" of Greek mythology. The difference is the Greeks did not worship those man-eating creatures. On the contrary, they turned against them and the Olympians defeated them as they did with the Titans or Giants (Titanomachy or Gigantomachy). The Hindus not only worship such negative entities and creatures, which our Church would also fairly calls demonic, but they also use them for black magic, as a weapon against their enemies, and also for divination. For instance, there are many Indian astrologers and psychics in this area of Jackson Heights, who do black magic with invocations and prayers to Kali and other negative entities. Also, if one starts screaming in ancient languages, though he is a High School dropout and hardly masters his native language, levitates and does things beyond scientific explanation, the Hindus worship him/her and put that person in an empty building or in isolation while they offer fruits and flowers to the demon.
Another issue with Eastern religions, such as Buddhism and Hinduism is the ambiguous sense of morality they have, a very sketchy perspective on ethics if any... That is because, as the late Dr. Nikos Moustakis, theologian and sociologist of religion put it, "Eastern religions have an anemic theology" meaning their theology is really weak. It's more like philosophy and anthropology that is what they have as a culture and when we say "Eastern philosophy" it could not be compared with Greek philosophy because philosophy came from ancient Greece and it was separate from religion, superstition, and magic and it's rather a quest for truth by raising questions to be answered through reason and dialogue for the matters of social and political and moral philosophy or ethics and science and math for the matters of nature. Eastern philosophy is not a real philosophy when we see philosophy from the Greek point of view. Thus, the gymnosophists or Indian yogis once they met the philosophers of Alexander the Great, could not really understand the points of the Greeks and the Greeks were shocked by the yogis. Alexander the Great even joked around with them telling them that he will kill the gymnosophists if they fail in their philosophical debate and contest with the Greek philosophers. In the end, Alexander told them he was just kidding and he showed respect for the different worldviews of the gymnosophists. However, most people who follow Eastern traditions do not possess the wisdom and knowledge of the ancient gymnosophists.
There are people in India (Hinduism and some of them in Buddhism), Tibet (Tibetan Buddhism), and China where people believe in Zen (Chinese Buddhism) and some in Taoism (Tao) who try to be strictly vegan, sometimes not even vegetarian, so they don't eat any animal or animal product, but they don't even want to kill a venomous snake or a dangerous tarantula or even a fly or an ant, because they think that the more innocent the animal they kill the worse the karma they will have in the next past lives. If one has various disabilities and special needs, they may say "too bad! This person did something wrong in a past life, so this person has bad karma"! So they don't want to kill a fly or a mosquito, but they may let somebody die out of starvation or after being beaten up by thieves in the street, because they may think that this person did something terrible in their past life, so this person deserves to die such a horrible death! So here in this case karma interferes with altruism and charity! Also, these Eastern traditions talk about free life. They compare human beings to animals! They say the animals have no morals. They make love everywhere and in any position possible! But this is not love! This is a carnal instinct for procreation. Tantric sex is based on Tantra teachings about combining ritualistic sex positions and complicated postures of tantra yoga with romantic and superstitious ideas about sex and rhythmic dance movements that in terms of science, medicine, and health have no value or rather may even harm the spine and the sex organs and they rather allure to sexual promiscuity and ephemeral carnal relationships, thus mixing up romantic and intimate relationships with mere exotic sexual pleasure!
Such Eastern traditions cannot separate biological needs from pleasure or from the gift of procreation, maternity, and paternity! If one asks "how can you make such a comparison between an animal and a human being?", the answer they give is "why not? If we can be reincarnated into animals or plants or even germs or inanimate objects of inorganic matter, then what keeps us from making comparisons with anything, not just animals?" But what means "free love"? What means freedom, anyway? Your freedom stops when my freedom is in danger of your behavior and advances! So what makes love free? To have no boundaries? Do they know no limit when it comes to sexuality, marriage, and family? Is free love all about ignoring the sacred oaths of the wedding and committing adultery or the family and blood bonds or even kinship and committing incest? Is this freedom or rather a regression to the animal instincts and slavery of carnal passions?
From a New Age point of view, such notions and concepts are met with less mature thinking and emotion and they are rather more naive and utilitarian going hand in hand with liberalism and progressivism. However, how can you be a vegan and avoid killing a mosquito that may be infectious just because you respect life and then you support abortion instead of being pro life for an embryo, as according to studies, it has all the functions of a human being after the first three months? Orthodox Christian Church Fathers, the Greek Fathers, wrote that after the 21st day of gestation, the fetus has a soul!!! These hypocrites don't want to kill a mosquito, but they don't care about killing a baby! They say that the woman is in charge of her own body and can do whatever she wants with it! Orthodox Christianity says "No!" Your body is not your property the same way anything in this world is not really your property! The body is the house of the soul and the temple of God! God gave us our bodies. Your child, either a fetus or even an adult, is not your property! You didn't make it by yourself, lady! There was a man who helped! And that man has equal rights and kinship to this child as much as you do! He is a father and fatherhood is also important! Fatherhood matters! Your baby is not your property! It's nobody's property! We are born without property and we die without taking anything to the next life which is the afterlife and not just another reincarnation.
According to Christianity, in the afterlife, your soul and your actions in the earthly life are evaluated and you go to a place that is closer to either Heaven or Hell, but still, it's not the real Heaven or Hell, because that will happen only in the Last Judgment during the Second Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Our lord gives us many chances to repent! Metanoia! (Repeatance!) St Maximus the confessor never stopped screaming the word "metanoeite" that is "repent!" even when they severed his right hand! Metanoia, which is a change of mind, heart, and lifestyle, leads to salvation! That's why we have the mnemosyna or memorial services! Just by praying and especially when many people praying, then the dead has more chances to go to a better place! The prayer is always stronger when many people pray together! God may listen to many people's requests rather than to just one! There are many experiences of dreaming about dead people who were happier after a memorial service! So there is a motive for people to acquire self-monitoring and self-control skills and a sense of good and right when they make important decisions that may harm themselves or others. However, one who believes in karma (redemption from past lives) and samsara (reincarnation) traditions, may think "let's mess up and have fun in this life and I do better in another life!" These are the perils of Eastern traditions in terms of morality and social impact.
The same people practice yoga, which is not only all about exercises and positions, but also words, short phrases of incantations, and exclamations that are dedicated to the Sun god, such as the posture for "greeting the Sun" or the "Pelican's posture" or so many others! There is Karma yoga, which has to do with meditating on past lives using yoga for divination and it comes with rituals of changing one's karma. So who is so idiotic and imbecile to say that yoga is only exercise? That's how gyms promote their "exercise" using Asana Υoga or Bakti Υoga or Hatha Yoga, but these are all related to worship and they have a religious context whether they want it or not! Even if they try their best to avoid anything that looks or sounds religious when practicing or teaching yoga, it's still a religious ritual with many different versions! In my area on Woodside Ave, there is a yoga center that has a huge symbol of Hinduism on its wall inside the lobby, as one can see from the glassdoor and outside there is a sign with the hours and it literally gives the hours for "placing flowers at the altar" and it operates as a registered religious organization!
Yoga originally comes from the Greek word "zygos" or balance/scale and it means the balance and equilibrium between body and mind, matter and energy that is a truly holistic approach from the Greek word "holon" (όλον), which means the "whole thing". The Indians could not pronounce "zygos" and they ended up calling it "yigos" which gradually became "yoga". The problem, however, is not the pronunciation but the distortion of the therapeutic, scientific, and philosophical meaning of yoga which was incorporated with Eastern religions and philosophies, such as Hinduism and Buddhism and it was totally distorted and misused. It became today's yoga which uses exercises with very complicated postures, some of them leading to herniated or dislocated disks and other spinal, neurological, and orthopedic problems as well as mental and spiritual problems, which are even worse!
As his Eminence, the former Archbishop of America, Demetrios, once put it in plain English in one of his speeches at the Community Hall of the Holy Trinity Cathedral in Manhattan: "Enough with the yoga and the "moga" and such naive trends and fashions of our days! We have such a great tradition from Ancient Greece to our Byzantine Greek Church Fathers to today's Hellenic Christian Orthodoxy! What do we need all this New Age nonsense for?"
