Goddess Kali Ma - Liberator of Souls - Destroyer of Negativity
She is Prakriti, the Procreatrix, Nature, the Destroyer, the
Creator. Nay, She is something greater and deeper still for those
who have eyes to see. She is the Universal Mother, "my mother" as
Ramakrishna would say, the All-powerful, who reveals Herself to Her
children under different aspects and Divine Incarnations, the
Visible God, who leads the elect to the Invisible Reality; and if it
so pleases Her, She takes away the last trace of ego from created
beings and merges it in the consciousness of the Absolute, the
undifferentiated God. Through Her grace" the finite ego loses itself
in the illimitable Ego-Atman-Brahman".
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The name Kali derives from the Sanskrit root word Kal meaning time.
Nothing escapes from time. Her Tibetan Buddhism counterpart is named
Kala, a male figure. Of the Hindu goddesses, Goddess Kali Ma is the
most misunderstood. The Encyclopedia Britannica is very mistaken in
this quote, "Major Hindu goddess whose iconography, cult, and
mythology commonly associate her with death, sexuality, violence,
and, paradoxically in some of her later historical appearances,
motherly love."
It is partially accurate to say the Goddess Kali Ma is a goddess of
death. However, She brings the death of the ego as the delusional
self-centered view of reality. Nowhere in the sriptures is She seen
killing anything but demons nor is She associated exclusively with
the process of human dying like Yama the Hindu god of death. Both
Goddess Kali Ma and Shiva are said to inhabit cremation grounds and
devotees often go to these places to meditate. The purpose is not to
glorify death but to overcome the I-am-the-body idea. The cremation
grounds reinforce the idea that the body is a temporary. Kali and
Shiva are said to dwell in these places because it is our attachment
to the body that gives rise to the ego. Kali and Shiva give
liberation by dissolving the illusion of the ego. Thus we are the
ever-existing I AM and not the impermanent body. This is emphasized
by the scene in the cremation grounds.
Out of all the Devi forms, Kali is the most compassionate because
She provides moksha or liberation to Her children. She is the
counterpart of Shiva. They are the destroyers of unreality. When the
ego sees Mother Kali it trembles with fear because the ego sees in
Her its own eventual demise. An individual who is attached to
his/her ego will not be able to receive the vision of Mother Kali
and She will appear in a fear invoking or "wrathful" form. A mature
soul who engages in spiritual practice to remove the illusion of the
ego sees Mother Kali as very sweet, affectionate, and overflowing
with incomprehensible love for Her children.
Ma Kali wears a garland made of 52 skulls and a skirt made of
dismembered arms because the ego comes out of identification with
the body. In fact, we are beings of spirit and not flesh. So
liberation can only prevail when our attachment to the body comes to
an end. Therefore, the skirt and garland are trophies worn by Her to
represent the liberation of Her children from attachment to the
finite body. In two of Her hands, She holds a sword and a freshly
severed head that is dripping blood. This represents a great battle
in which she defeated the demon Raktabija. Her black (or sometimes
dark blue) skin represents the womb of the unmanifest from which all
of creation is born and into which all of creation will eventually
return. Goddess Kali Ma is depicted as standing on a white skinned
Shiva who is lying beneath Her. His white skin is in contrast to Her
black or sometimes dark blue skin. He is showing a blissful detached
look on His face. Shiva is pure formless awareness sat-chit-ananda
(being-consciousness-bliss) while She represents "form" eternally
sustained by the underpinning of pure awareness.
Through ignorance of the story behind Goddess Kali Ma it is easy to
misinterpret Her symbolism. In the same way one could say that
Christianity is a religion of destruction, death, and cannibalism in
which the followers drink the eat the flesh of Jesus and drink his
blood. Of course, we know this is not the correct way to understand
the communion sacrament.
Associating sexuality to Mother Kali is not founded in the
traditional understanding of Her. In the Hindu stories, there is
nothing that associates Her with sexuality. It is just the opposite.
Kali is one of the few Goddesses who is celibate and practicing
renunciation!
The idea that She is the goddess of death, sex and violence is
simply not true. When we study the life of the great saint
Ramakrishna or the great poet saint Ramprasad (both famous Kali
worshippers), or listen to traditional Hindu devotional songs to
Goddess Kali Ma, there is no suggestion of this death-sex-violence
idea. This can also be substantiated by going to any of the Hindu
websites such as www.hindunet.com and reading about Her. Anyone
sincerely interested in Mother Kali should read the book Kali: The
Black Goddess of Dakshineswar, by Elizabeth Harding. In addition,
there is a beautiful traditional Kali temple in Laguna Beach,
California which may be visited on-line at
www.kalimandir.org. Goddess
Kali Ma is the goddess of liberation or enlightenment.
In Hindu mythology, Durga is a fierce form of
Devi, the Mother Goddess, the all-powerful almighty goddess.
According to a legend the gods could not defeat the buffalo demon
Mahish, who was threatening the existence of the universe. They
begged Shiva for his assistance, and Shiva advised all the gods to
release their shaktis.
The shaktis of the gods emerged in female form. These goddesses
fused together in blinding light from which arose a magnificent
goddess with many arms. She was as beautiful as she was deadly.
Durga was born fully-grown and is depicted as extremely beautiful
and full of rage.
The gods called this goddess Durga, the invincible one, and they
armed her with all their weapons. Thus armed, Durga rode to the top
of a mountain on a lion. In a bloody battle, she defeated Mahish and
his army of demons and thus saved the Universe from this demon’s
menace.
More Will be Coming Soon...............
