Every full moon, thousands of devotees undertake girivalam around Tiruvannamalai. Across India, countless others travel to famous temples, perform elaborate rituals, and undertake arduous pilgrimages believing these acts will erase their bad karma and ultimately grant moksha. Sacred places have inspired seekers for centuries, but they also raise an uncomfortable question: Can a ritual, however sacred, compensate for a life lacking compassion, honesty, and self-awareness?
A recent trend during girivalam is particularly disturbing. Many devotees deliberately pass through the narrow stretch known as the Moksha Margam, believing that doing so guarantees liberation from the cycle of birth and death. The irony is heartbreaking. On crowded full moon nights, people have been injured and, in some tragic instances, have even lost their lives in the rush to pass through this route. If the pursuit of moksha begins by risking one’s own life or that of fellow devotees, have we not misunderstood the very essence of spirituality? No sacred path can grant liberation if it is walked without awareness, compassion, and concern for the lives around us.
The Bhagavad Gita offers a clear answer. Krishna does not promise liberation through rituals alone. He teaches that one’s thoughts, actions, and intentions shape one’s spiritual destiny. The Upanishads echo the same truth, declaring that liberation comes through self-knowledge and inner transformation, not external ceremonies. Even Ramana Maharshi, whose life became inseparable from Arunachala, did not ask seekers merely to walk around the holy hill. His teaching was simple and profound: “Who am I?” The journey inward was always more important than the journey around the mountain.
Yet modern spirituality has become increasingly transactional. Many stand in endless queues for a few seconds of darshan, pay for privileged access, sponsor rituals they scarcely understand, and return home believing their spiritual account has been settled. If pilgrimages alone could erase dishonesty, greed, or cruelty, the world would have become a far better place. Devotion, for many, has become an insurance policy rather than a guide to righteous living.
The irony is striking. A devotee may walk fourteen kilometres around the holy Arunachala with unwavering determination, yet hesitate to cross the road to help an elderly stranger. Someone may donate generously to decorate a place of worship while ignoring a poor old couple living next door. If our scriptures proclaim that God resides in every living being, which act of worship truly reaches Him?
This is not an argument against temples, pilgrimages, or religion. They can inspire humility, discipline, and silence. They become meaningful when they awaken introspection and transform the individual. But a ritual without inner change is little more than a habit repeated in the hope of a spiritual reward. Karma is not erased by ceremonies. It is transformed by better actions, honest living, selfless service, and genuine repentance.
Perhaps we have spent too much time searching for God in idols while overlooking Him in people. The holiest temple may well be the human heart. The highest form of worship may be integrity. The purest offering may be compassion. And the longest pilgrimage is not necessarily the number of kilometres you walk barefoot in search of God, but the few inches from the mind to the heart.
When our devotion makes us kinder, humbler, more truthful, and more willing to serve others, every step becomes sacred, whether taken inside a temple or on an ordinary street. Until then, perhaps the pilgrimage has not truly begun.
