Working English summary of the Tamil teaching on Agama Vidhi — for review.
The ages when our kings ruled were the ages that protected these rare arts, nurtured them, and put them to the service of the people. Foreseeing that later generations might, in their ignorance, let these wonderful arts be destroyed, those kings built temples — enduring across the ages — that hold all of this knowledge within them, so that the people who come to them may benefit.
The sacred purpose of a temple is to heal all the inner ailments of those who enter and leave it. Medicine has two divisions: inner medicine and outer medicine. Outer ailments are cured by the physician; inner ailments are cured by temples. When the inner is set right, the outer is set right; the two are woven together. For a temple to heal a person’s inner ailments it must rise according to a rule — and that rule is the Agama Vidhi. Just as, in the eight-span body, the eye must be where the eye should be, so the sanctum of a temple must be where it should be. When it is so placed, that is the rule; otherwise it is an error.
These temples are themselves the greatest “theem”. To this day a temple purifies the inner being of thousands of people at once. Above all, it is the temple with a kodimaram (flagstaff) that is a true temple; without a flagstaff, nothing is equal to a temple. The flagstaff is the equivalent of the navel-cord — the tree that draws down and gives the vibration between this universe and the earth. To gain the inner power of a temple, visiting for a few minutes is not enough; one must go for at least seven days to feel its full effect. A temple fifty years old with a flagstaff gives one benefit; temples two hundred to a thousand years old give a certain benefit.
If we compare the Agama Vidhi of a temple to the eight-span body: the navel-cord is the flagstaff; the two doors of the Raja Gopuram are the feet; the Ardha Mandapam is the long part up to the knee; the mandapams in the middle correspond to the middle of the body; the innermost sanctum is the source; the separate head part, beneath the raised vimana, is where the Lord gives darshan as a form of light.