A "Goddess" Whose Office And Title Were Revoked

A "Goddess" Whose Office And Title Were Revoked

The very word, "God" conveys the ideas of one who is all-powerful, omniscient and omnipresent, who is immutable in words and actions. Those who worship idols have a much more limited concept of their gods. The news tells the story of Sajani Shakya a 10 year old living goddess in Kathmandu, Nepal. She is worshiped by Hindus and Buddhists in her land.

In this pagan tradition, the child is not born a goddess. Rather, she is chosen from a group of contestants and declared to be divine. The priests say the goddess Durga comes down and occupies her body and she then becomes the goddess Kumari Devi. The girls are chosen early in life, often as young as four. They are allowed to reign until the first drop of blood comes from their bodies. Even a cut or scratch that allows blood to escape finishes their reign. If they avoid all such childhood scrapes, the moment their menstrual cycle begins they cease to be divine. When retired, the former goddesses are sent home with a single gold coin for their services. Most recently the government has begun providing a $40 per month allowance for former goddesses. Most of them never marry because legend has it that men who marry former goddesses die young.

The living goddess, Sanjani Shakya, was allowed to travel to Britain and America to promote a documentary film about living goddess in Nepal. When she returned home, the priests voted to rescind her deity because she had broken tradition by traveling outside Nepal. Their move has created an uproar among her devotees and stirred bad publicity around the world. Now they are considering restoring her godhood.

Here we see a good example of the gods of paganism. They choose one child from among several. They pronounce her a goddess. An illness or an accidental scratch can rob her of her godhood. Her natural growth from childhood to adolescence destroys her deity. If she displeases her priests they can vote her out of her celestial office. If public pressure is sufficient she can be reinstated.

Be grateful for the light of the gospel that has rescued us from pagan "darkness and translated us into the kingdom of the Son of his love" (Col. 1:13). "Thus saith Jehovah...I am the first, and I am the last; and besides me there is no God....They that fashion a graven image are all of them vanity and the things that they delight in shall not profit and their own witnesses see not, nor know: that the may be put to shame. Who hath fashioned a god, or molten an image that is profitable for nothing: Behold all his fellows shall be put to shame..." (Is. 44:6-11).

We love, fear and obey the living God (Eccle. 12:13). We pity the little girls who are subjected to this pagan custom. When they are selected, most of them are too young to know their right hand from their left. In their spiritual darkness, her devotees bow down and worship a helpless, unlearned, mortal child whom the great Jehovah hath made. For the rest of their lives they are left to wonder what was this all about? We serve the mighty Jehovah who made the heavens and the earth and things therein. He is the God of our salvation.

Sincerely,

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