The vast majority of Temples were built in accordance with particular textual traditions & were intended to be sites where rituals are held in perpetuity in accordance with those texts & associated extra-textual traditions. The traditions place a premium on particular patrilines.
Giving tradition as a distinct option & that too in quotation marks betrays the all-too-often bias that traditions not based in a scripture/text are nonsense or just “made up”. Tribal or rural folk shrines may not be based on any text but purely orally transmitted non-textual traditions. They are just as valuable as guides for those following that system. Scriptures fall under tradition too—textual tradition.
Temples, as they had developed in Hindu thought, were not primarily meant for places of public congregation or even private devotions. As in, they don’t exist to satisfy those needs. They are incidentally taken care of. What is the primary purpose of a temple?
The temple is essentially a site where a variety of ritual inputs are assembled by skilled priests/ritualists. Of course, the temple itself is a massively significant input. Hence, the स्थपति & शिल्पी must have made the temple & divine images as perfectly as possible. When the ritual inputs (particular mantras, particular ritual vessels, particular materials, animals, etc) are all stationed at the right places, the desired effect is realized by the people of the village or town as a whole. This, some at least would be aware of.
What most would not be aware of at all is that the arcakas (priests) themselves, as well as their ancestry/lineage, are also ritual inputs.+++(5)+++ Even the arcakas’ state of mind & contemplation are all ritual inputs.
The crux is this: We attach immense importance to the inherent ritual value of objects, persons, particular divisions & types among them based on ancestry, gender, etc & colours, directions, positions of objects & persons, numbers, etc. Ritual is a precise art for a Hindu soul.
Nobody should needlessly try to rationalize it with science or, worse, deconstruct it with imbecilic sociological theories. It has its own internal coherence, that can only be grasped by an insider with faith.