Source: Hinduism Today RUSSIA, November 16, 2001: A letter arriving from the Hawaii ashram home of Hinduism Today containing sacred ash, vibhuti, from the temple ceremonies, to a devotee here attracted considerable interest from the local postal authorities. They summoned the recipient to the post office, where 15 officials waited, concerned that they had just discovered an anthrax-laden letter. The…
GO TO SOURCE BHUBANESWAR, INDIA, November 14, 2001: The icon of Lord Madan Mohan, made of astadhatu, an alloy of eight metals including gold and silver, and weighing 18 kilograms, was found in a well inside the 12th century Jagannath Temple complex in Puri, about 56 km from here. Icons of Lord Madan Mohan and Lord Narayan, both avatars of…
GO TO SOURCE LONDON, U.K., November 10, 2001: A joint Australian-Indonesian venture The Ramayana written and directed by Nigel Jamieson and brought to the U.K. by the London International Festival of Theatre received rave reviews from theater critics. The story from the Hindu epic and dealing with the abduction of Sita by Ravana took on a different perspective as it…
GO TO SOURCE NEW DELHI, INDIA, November 13, 2001: The festival of lights and fireworks, Divali, is just round the corner but wholesalers of firecrackers in the capital have done only a fraction of the business they normally do. Compared to a business of around US$13,000 that they averaged in the last ten to seven days before Divali last year,…
GO TO SOURCE KAUAI, HAWAII, November 16, 2001: The staff of Hinduism Today requests clippings or video tape of television coverage of the passing of Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami kindly be sent on to us at: Hinduism Today, 107 Kaholalele Road, Kapaa, HI 96746. We are especially trying to get a video tape of the CNN coverage on November 14 or…
GO TO SOURCE KAUAI, HAWAII, USA, November 13, 2001: Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami, one of Hinduism’s foremost spiritual teachers, a prolific author and publisher of Hinduism Today magazine and Hindu Press International news service, passed away today at age 74 at his ashram home on the island of Kauai, Hawaii, USA. A spokesperson for the ashram said the Hindu master discovered…
GO TO SOURCE PURI, INDIA, November 12, 2001: The icon of Madan Mohan, found missing from Sri Jagannath Temple, was recovered from inside a well in the temple complex on Monday, official sources said. Another icon of Narayani, also missing since Sunday, is yet to be traced. The two feet high astadhatu (eight metals) idol of Madan Mohan, regarded as…
GO TO SOURCE NEW YORK, USA, November 10, 2001: Shoba Narayan, a working mother residing in New York, reflects on her return to religion. “Recently, I had an epiphany of the sort one normally experiences in middle age: I realized that, within my social circle, religion had become quite fashionable. Many of my friends are middle-aged Hindu Indians with successful…
GO TO SOURCE SCOTLAND, U. K., November 12, 2001: Researchers at a Scottish university have been awarded government funding to investigate the effects of spiritual healing on asthmatics. The Scottish Executive is backing a team of scientists from Aberdeen University in their bid to test the effects of spiritual healers on 50 people and will investigate claims by practitioners that…
GO TO SOURCE HIVALI, INDIA, November 11, 2001: In Uttar Pradesh, Dalits are taking Buddhist vows and firing parting shots at the upper castes. Leading the movement is Udit Raj, an income-tax official who headed the November 4 conversion ceremony of thousands of “outcaste” Hindus to Buddhism in Delhi. “Since we were thwarted in Delhi [by the police preventing more…