Acharya Prashant explains that India has traditionally worshipped everything because the entire world is seen as a manifestation of the divine. He uses the analogy of a letter from a beloved to describe how Hindus view the world; since the beloved cannot be reached directly, the Hindu kisses the stone or the river as a representation of that love. He clarifies that this does not mean Hinduism believes in many gods, but rather that the truth, which is a great void, manifests itself in various divine forms. Addressing the biblical prohibition of idol worship, he argues that while worshipping one particular statue as God is false, Hinduism suggests that all forms are forms of the formless. He posits that a mind that looks at any formābe it a river, a child, or a personāand is reminded of the truth or the great void, is operating from a different quality of understanding. In this view, the entire universe serves as a reminder of the formless truth.
