In plain words
To raise this flag, and before that to win victory, they went through hardships of many kinds, were shut up in prisons, and suffered untold pains. Some even gave up their lives. Bearing so many kinds of hardship, enduring them, putting up with them, they won this flag. On 15 August or on 26 January the people of Bhārata raise this flag and pay it honour in every way. Not only the people of Bhārata: in their own countries others raise their own national flags and honour them. Not only national flags: they raise the flags of various parties and honour them. If you inquire whether this flag is something solid, whether it has a shape, what power is in it, the faith placed in it is itself the honour paid to it. In the same way, when people worship a stone, is there consciousness in the stone? It is inert, isn't it! Those who say, "Why worship something lifeless?" will understand it well if they recognise this truth. When a yard of cloth, cloth made of nothing but threads, is raised as a flag, what value is there in it? The value in it is only that of a victory flag, the flag of a victory won. That victory has no form. This flag is precisely what shows the victory. Without the flag you cannot show victory a form. In the world there is a hundred-rupee note five inches long. This hundred-rupee note has no consciousness of any kind. How carefully you keep it hidden away! In the world today you will not find anyone who has no longing for money. From the renunciant to the pleasure-seeker, from the simple villager to the Paramahaṃsa, people do all their work only out of this longing for money. A job is only for money, study only for money, positions only for money; everything is only for money. Who in the world has no longing for this money? Money is bitter to no one. They worship money. Has this money any consciousness? If you inquire whether this money has any good qualities, whether this money has any love, no quality of any kind has a form at all. But the person who shows such qualities has a form. There is a flower. It gives a fine fragrance. What is the form of fragrance? Fragrance has no form, but the flower that gives the fragrance has a form. What is the form of love? Love has no form, but the mother who gives love has a form. Without the mother, where would the love come from? So for one who argues, "Where is God, where?", these forms are the very sign that serves to show God. If you ask where God is, God is in every atom. Every atom is the form of God's power. Every atom is something we must worship. Everything is to be honoured. This honour and respect are essential for every person. But believing that the physical, worldly, natural body is what matters and is the measure of all, and that this is living Prakṛti, man wastes his time, his action and his body for the sake of its power and strength. Without the body there are no actions. Without doing actions no result comes. The body is the root cause of everything. This is an image. The mother is an image. The father is an image. The guru too is an image. But these images have value joined to them. Only through them can divinity be attained. Worship without a form is not found anywhere in the world. Worship without a form is nothing but foolishness. Only people with such foolishness go about preaching that a form must not be worshipped. In every religion each faith has its own form. A small example. Nature. Nature has a power of attraction. This earth itself holds the five elements blended in it. Only through this earth do we receive food. From this earth alone we receive all the metals. The earth alone protects man in his daily life. So what is wrong in worshipping the earth? Must we not give thanks to what grants us everything? That thanks is itself worship. Every person has the five elements. Without these five elements man would not be man. He would not be a living being. So must we not give them thanks? There is nature. This earth has a power of attraction. This is called magnetic power. The earth has a mighty power of attraction. It attracts everything that comes near this nature. To every object it attracts, it gives this power of attraction. Many scientists are only now trying to recognise this. There is a temple. Thousands of people enter the temple for the darśan of God. The earth's power of attraction is in that idol. Though thousands gather here, the idol draws the power of feeling that is in them. That is why the power of attraction of that idol grows great. For those who worship, too, that power grows still greater. How? Keep two nails beside ten magnets and watch. After two or three days that magnetic power reaches the nails too. In the same way, when we enter a temple, our power of feeling enters the idol. With the power of feeling of these thousands and hundreds of thousands, the idol becomes still more powerful. That powerful idol makes everyone powerful. Nothing powerless is found in the world.