The Hindu temple is an institution of immemorial antiquity that has played a remarkable role not only in the religious life of the people, but also in their social, cultural and economic history. In the millennia that span India’s past, it has had, like so many other things in our life, a proven history, now prosperous, now persecuted, now abandoned, and now revived. The temple, of course, is not unique to India. It was once a global institution until the rise of universal religions such as Christianity and Islam, when many of its functions were taken over by the church and the mosque. But in India a unique continuity has prevailed, many ancient temples still survive and serve their main purpose as places of worship. Western scholars are reluctant to assign an early date to the Hindu temple, which they would gladly derive from Greek or Buddhist models. To be sure, a Greco-Indian school of sculpture and architecture flourished in Gandhara at the same time.

But that does not necessarily mean that it predates the Hindu temple. The argument is that the Vedic religion is polytheistic and oriented towards fire sacrifices, where temples should emphasize monotheism and idol worship. Hinduism has always tolerated many approaches to God. There is no reason why the path of sacrifices and the path of idol worship have not flourished side by side. It can even be shown that while the Vedas could be studied and sacrifices performed by select castes, the temples were universal institutions in which all classes and both sexes worshiped freely. The rise of the temples is part of the liberal tradition of Hinduism, which emphasizes the easy accessibility of God for all. That they predate the Christian era is beyond question. A Besnagar inscription from the 2nd century BC. It refers to a Vasudeva sanctuary. Panini, centuries earlier, refers to the worshipers of God as Vaasudeva. Our two great epics of uncertain dates have references to temples. It is not out of the range of possibility that Vedic invocations to the gods and offering them seats, tributes, and oblations could have inspired analogous invocations of divine presence in diagrams such as mandalas, yantras, and idols. Be that as it may, it should not be forgotten that the Vedas are not exempt from descriptions of gods and these must have helped the sculptural representations.

The alleged contradictions between the polytheism of the Vedas and the monotheism of the Agamas on which temple worship is based is largely a creation of Western prejudices. Indian opinion has never held that the Vedas are polytheistic. The Rigveda proclaims that what exists is one, although the sages call it by several names. The Upanishads emphasize the concept of a One Power manifesting as the universe, and they are an integral part of the Vedas according to Hindu tradition. The exegetical principles show how God is given various names in various contexts in the Vedas. Furthermore, the Aagamas were not anti-Vedic. They prescribed Vedic mantra procedures in the temple and domestic worship. They represent the liberal tradition in orthodoxy that has always sought the spiritual welfare of the masses without degrading higher philosophy or antagonizing the elite. But, after all said and done, the origin and early history of temples in India is a highly speculative topic. We know for a fact that they have served important cultural and spiritual interests almost since the beginning of history in India. The fact that they continue to do so to some extent is a tribute to the sense of continuity that has marked the history of India during its march for thousands of years. Sponsored by royalty, the aristocracy, and the wealthier classes and popular with the masses, the temples grew in number, size, and influence, and the roles they played in society multiplied. The cults of Vishnu, Siva and Sakti developed side by side and almost in parallel lines. There were differences in philosophical principles between them, and between them and Vedanta, but they did not affect the acceptability of the temples. In the rituals and festivals they performed, there were striking similarities between the different cults. Temple worship became a common spiritual exercise in India long ago, and has been ever since. Fashions in the celebration of temple festivals may have changed in minor matters, but in essence they have remained true to their original purpose and continue to be an expression of spiritual fervor. The iconoclastic zeal of Islam and Christianity had only a marginal effect on the Hindu attitude towards temples, despite the rise of sects such as Brahmo Samaj and Arya Samaj that abandoned idol worship, despite the spread of skepticism, agnosticism and atheism.