What is a puja?
A puja is an act of worship in which a deity is welcomed and served as an honoured guest. It can be a short daily offering at a home shrine or a long temple rite. The usual steps are to invite the deity, offer water, flowers, incense, a lamp and food, and close with aarti, the waving of a lamp, and with prayer. The food offered then becomes prasada, a gift shared by all. Fuller rites count sixteen services (shodashopachara). The Gita says that even “leaf, flower, fruit, water”, offered with devotion, is accepted (9.26). Families and traditions differ in steps, words and prayers.
Written for Pujadeep and checked against the sources listed.
What the schools say
Smarta
Many Smarta homes keep the panchayatana puja, the worship of five deities together: Shiva, Vishnu, the Goddess, Surya and Ganesha, with the family's chosen deity in the centre. A puja usually begins with Ganesha, so that the rite goes forward without obstacles, and follows the family's custom, which differs from place to place.
Sources for this reading
- Monier Monier-Williams, Religious Thought and Life in India, Part I (London: John Murray, 1883; title page leaf n4), “Pancayatana Ceremony”: the five symbols of Vishnu, Siva, Ganesa, the Goddess and the Sun, “arranged in five different methods, according to the preference given to any one of the five deities at the time of worship”, with that deity in the middle; Ganesa invoked before the service; worship by “sixteen acts of homage”; local variations. Monier-Williams died 1899: public domain. The author's own judgements are not repeated. (pp. 411–416 (leaves n426–n431); pp. 412–413 and 416 checked on the page images)
- Encyclopaedia Britannica, “Smarta sect” (worship of the five major gods, Shiva, Vishnu, Shakti, Surya and Ganesha, in the pancayatana puja; Shankara their greatest teacher and, for some, the founder). Read in the Wayback Machine copy (snapshot July 27, 2026). Cited, not copied.
- T. A. Gopinatha Rao, Elements of Hindu Iconography, vol. 1, part 1 (Madras, 1914), p. 46: Ganesha is the god whom the pious Hindu “invokes when he begins all sacrifices and religious ceremonies”; p. 35: Vighnesvara, “the deity presiding over obstacles”, who puts them in the way or removes them; Introduction, p. 9: household images of the family deity and daily worship of a small object such as a salagrama or bana-linga. Gopinatha Rao died 1919: public domain. Checked on the page images. (main text pp. 35 and 46 (leaves n190, n201); Introduction, p. 9 (leaf n48). The book numbers its Introduction and main text separately.)
- V. Nagam Aiya, The Travancore State Manual, vol. 2 (Trivandrum: Travancore Government Press, 1906), chapter VIII, “Religion”: temple puja of washing the image, flowers, lights, fanning and food offering, “in all sixteen forms of propitiation known as the Shodasa Upacharams”; prasadams then distributed to the worshippers. Cited, not copied. (chapter VIII, daily worship at the Sri Padmanabha temple, Trivandrum, pp. 75–76 (leaves n100–n101), checked on the page images)
Vaishnava
For Vaishnavas, puja is loving service of the Lord present in the image. Food is cooked for him and offered first, and what returns is prasada. The Gita joins this to all of life: “Whatever you do … whatever you eat, whatever sacrifice you make, whatever you give, whatever penance you perform, do that as offered to me” (9.27, Telang).
Sources for this reading
- The Bhagavadgîtâ with the Sanatsugâtîya and the Anugîtâ, translated by Kâshinâth Trimbak Telang (The Sacred Books of the East, vol. VIII, ed. F. Max Müller) (Bhagavad Gita 9.26–27 (SBE 8, p. 85, leaf n98), quoted verbatim and checked on the page image)
- Sri Bhagavad-Gita with Sri Ramanujacharya's Visishtadvaita commentary, translated by A. Govindacharya (Madras, 1898) (commentary on 9.26–27, pp. 308–310: offering in love, service and worship; whatever is eaten or done is dedicated to the Lord)
- T. A. Gopinatha Rao, Elements of Hindu Iconography, vol. 1, part 1 (Madras, 1914), Introduction, p. 9: “nothing can be eaten by a pious Hindu which has not been offered in worship to his deity”; the salagrama looked upon as a representative of Vishnu (pp. 9–10). Public domain. (Introduction, pp. 9–10 (leaves n48–n49); p. 9 checked on the page image)
Advaita (Shankara)
Advaita teachers value puja as a support for the mind. Brahman is everywhere, yet the mind can rest more easily on one form in one place: Shankara compares the contemplation of the Lord within the heart to the way Hari is contemplated in the sacred salagrama stone. He adds that such limits belong to the way of contemplation, not to Brahman. In his teaching, worship of the Lord with form does not by itself bring release; in time it leads on to the knowledge of Brahman beyond all form, and that knowledge brings release.
Sources for this reading
- Brahma Sutra 1.2.7, Shankara's commentary, in George Thibaut (tr.), The Vedânta-Sûtras with the Commentary by Sankarâkârya, Part I (Sacred Books of the East, vol. 34, Oxford, 1890). Thibaut died 1914: public domain. Summarised in our words. (1.2.7, p. 114 (leaf n243); also 1.2.14, p. 126: a place given to Brahman serves contemplation, as when Vishnu is contemplated in the salagrama)
- George Thibaut, Introduction to The Vedânta-Sûtras with the Commentary by Sankarâkârya, Part I (Sacred Books of the East, vol. 34, 1890), on Shankara's teaching: devout meditation on Brahman with qualities “does not directly lead to final emancipation”; the worshipper goes on “until at last he reaches the highest knowledge, and, through it, final release”. Public domain. Summarised in our words. (p. xxvii (leaf n28), checked on the page image)
Arya Samaj (Dayananda Sarasvati)
The Arya Samaj does not worship images. Its members keep the Vedic fire rite (havan or yajna), offering ghee and other offerings into the fire with Vedic mantras, together with prayer and meditation on God, whom they hold to be without form.
Sources for this reading
- Lala Lajpat Rai, The Arya Samaj: An Account of Its Origin, Doctrines, and Activities (London: Longmans, Green, 1915): the Samaj's belief in God as “formless” (its rules, pp. 54–55); its daily observances, among them Deva yajna, the Homa, “burning of Ghi (clarified butter) and other articles in the fire” with Vedic texts, and worship of God by contemplation and prayer (p. 132); Dayananda's opposition to image-worship (p. 7). Lajpat Rai died 1928: public domain. (pp. 7, 54–55 and 132 (leaves n40, n87–n88, n167); pp. 7, 54 and 132 checked on the page images)
Sources
- Monier Monier-Williams, Religious Thought and Life in India, Part I (London: John Murray, 1883), p. 415: the sixteen acts of homage, among them invocation (avahana), a seat, water for the feet, water for sipping, flowers, incense, a lamp (dipa), food (naivedya) and a final act of adoration with prayer. Monier-Williams died 1899: public domain. Summarised in our words. (p. 415 (leaf n430))
- The Bhagavadgîtâ with the Sanatsugâtîya and the Anugîtâ, translated by Kâshinâth Trimbak Telang (The Sacred Books of the East, vol. VIII, ed. F. Max Müller) (Bhagavad Gita 9.26 (SBE 8, p. 85, leaf n98): “Whoever with devotion offers me leaf, flower, fruit, water, that, presented with devotion, I accept from him whose self is pure.”)
- T. A. Gopinatha Rao, Elements of Hindu Iconography, vol. 1, part 1 (Madras, 1914), p. 9: images worshipped “not only in temples as public places of worship but also in private households”, with daily offerings at home. Public domain. Checked on the page image (leaf n48). (p. 9)
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