Kali
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"The black one" redirects here. For the 2005 drone metal album, see
Black One. For the male choral group, see
The Black Ones.
(
Sanskrit:
काळी,
IPA: [kɑːliː]), also known as
Kālikā (
Sanskrit:
काळिका), is the
Hindu goddess associated with empowerment,
shakti. The name Kali comes from
kāla, which means black, time, death, lord of death,
Shiva. Since Shiva is called
Kāla—the
eternal time—Kālī, his consort, also means "Time" or "Death" (as in
time has come). Hence, Kāli is the Goddess of Time and Change. Although
sometimes presented as dark and violent, her earliest incarnation as a
figure of annihilator of evil forces still has some influence. Various
Shakta Hindu cosmologies, as well as Shākta
Tantric beliefs, worship her as the ultimate reality or
Brahman. She is also revered as
Bhavatārini (literally "redeemer of the universe"). Comparatively recent devotional movements largely conceive Kāli as a benevolent
mother goddess.
[1]
Kālī is represented as the consort of Lord
Shiva,
on whose body she is often seen standing. Shiva lies in the path of
Kali, whose foot on Shiva subdues her anger. She is the fierce aspect of
the goddess
Durga (Parvati) [2]
Tantra
Goddesses play an important role in the study and practice of
Tantra Yoga, and are affirmed to be as central to discerning the nature of reality as are the male deities. Although
Parvati is often said to be the recipient and student of
Shiva's wisdom in the form of
Tantras, it is Kāli who seems to dominate much of the Tantric iconography, texts, and rituals.
[10] In many sources Kāli is praised as the highest reality or greatest of all deities. The
Nirvana-tantra says the gods
Brahma,
Vishnu, and
Shiva all arise from her like bubbles in the sea, ceaselessly arising and passing away, leaving their original source unchanged. The
Niruttara-tantra and the
Picchila-tantra declare all of Kāli's mantras to be the greatest and the
Yogini-tantra,
Kamakhya-tantra and the
Niruttara-tantra all proclaim Kāli
vidyas (manifestations of
Mahadevi, or "divinity itself"). They declare her to be an essence of her own form (
svarupa) of the
Mahadevi.
[11]
In the
Mahanirvana-tantra, Kāli is one of the epithets for the primordial
sakti, and in one passage
Shiva praises her:
- At the dissolution of things, it is Kāla [Time] Who will devour
all, and by reason of this He is called Mahākāla [an epithet of Lord
Shiva], and since Thou devourest Mahākāla Himself, it is Thou who art
the Supreme Primordial Kālika. Because Thou devourest Kāla, Thou art
Kāli, the original form of all things, and because Thou art the Origin
of and devourest all things Thou art called the Adya [the Primordial
One]. Re-assuming after Dissolution Thine own form, dark and formless,
Thou alone remainest as One ineffable and inconceivable. Though having a
form, yet art Thou formless; though Thyself without beginning,
multiform by the power of Maya, Thou art the Beginning of all, Creatrix,
Protectress, and Destructress that Thou art.[10]
The figure of Kāli conveys death, destruction, and the consuming
aspects of reality. As such, she is also a "forbidden thing", or even
death itself. In the
Pancatattva ritual, the
sadhaka boldly seeks to confront Kali, and thereby assimilates and transforms her into a vehicle of salvation.
[12] This is clear in the work of the
Karpuradi-stotra,
[13] a short praise Kāli describing the
Pancatattva ritual unto her, performed on
cremation grounds. (
Samahana-sadhana)
- He, O Mahākāli who in the cremation-ground, naked, and with
dishevelled hair, intently meditates upon Thee and recites Thy mantra,
and with each recitation makes offering to Thee of a thousand Akanda
flowers with seed, becomes without any effort a Lord of the earth. Oh
Kāli, whoever on Tuesday at midnight, having uttered Thy mantra, makes
offering even but once with devotion to Thee of a hair of his Shakti
[his energy/female companion] in the cremation-ground, becomes a great
poet, a Lord of the earth, and ever goes mounted upon an elephant.[12]
The
Karpuradi-stotra clearly indicates that Kāli is more than a terrible, vicious, slayer of demons who serves
Durga or
Shiva. Here, she is identified as the supreme mistress of the universe, associated with the five elements. In union with Lord
Shiva,
she creates and destroys worlds. Her appearance also takes a different
turn, befitting her role as ruler of the world and object of meditation.
[14]
In contrast to her terrible aspects, she takes on hints of a more
benign dimension. She is described as young and beautiful, has a gentle
smile, and makes gestures with her two right hands to dispel any fear
and offer boons. The more positive features exposed offer the
distillation of divine wrath into a goddess of salvation, who rids the
sadhaka of fear. Here, Kali appears as a symbol of triumph over death.
[15]
Bengali tradition
Kali is also a central figure in late medieval
Bengali devotional literature, with such devotees as
Ramprasad Sen (1718–75). With the exception of being associated with
Parvati as
Shiva's
consort, Kāli is rarely pictured in Hindu legends and iconography as a
motherly figure until Bengali devotions beginning in the early
eighteenth century. Even in Bengāli tradition her appearance and habits
change little, if at all.
[16]
The Tantric approach to Kāli is to display courage by confronting her
on cremation grounds in the dead of night, despite her terrible
appearance. In contrast, the Bengali devotee appropriates Kāli's
teachings adopting the attitude of a child, coming to love her
unreservedly. In both cases, the goal of the devotee is to become
reconciled with death and to learn acceptance of the way that things
are. These themes are well addressed in Rāmprasād's work.
[17]
Rāmprasād comments in many of his other songs that Kāli is
indifferent to his wellbeing, causes him to suffer, brings his worldly
desires to nothing and his worldly goods to ruin. He also states that
she does not behave like a mother should and that she ignores his pleas:
- Can mercy be found in the heart of her who was born of the stone? [a reference to Kali as the daughter of Himalaya]
- Were she not merciless, would she kick the breast of her lord?
- Men call you merciful, but there is no trace of mercy in you, Mother.
- You have cut off the heads of the children of others, and these you wear as a garland around your neck.
- It matters not how much I call you "Mother, Mother." You hear me, but you will not listen.[18]
To be a child of Kāli, Rāmprasād asserts, is to be denied of earthly
delights and pleasures. Kāli is said to refrain from giving that which
is expected. To the devotee, it is perhaps her very refusal to do so
that enables her devotees to reflect on dimensions of themselves and of
reality that go beyond the material world.
[18][19]
A significant portion of Bengali devotional music features Kāli as its central theme and is known as
Shyama Sangeet
("Music of the Night"). Mostly sung by male vocalists, today even women
have taken to this form of music. One of the finest singers of Shyāma
Sāngeet is
Pannalal Bhattacharya.
In Bengal, Kāli is venerated in the festival
Kali Puja - the new moon day of
Ashwin month which coincides with
Diwali festival.
In a unique form of Kāli worship,
Shantipur worships Kāli in the form of a hand painted image of the deity known as
Poteshwari (meaning the deity drawn on a piece of cloth).
Legends
Slayer of Raktabija
The Goddess Ambika Leading the Eight
Matrikas in Battle Against the Demon
Raktabija, Folio from a
Devi Mahatmya - (top row, from the left) the Matrikas -
Narasimhi, Vaishnavi, Kumari, Maheshvari, Brahmi. (bottom row, from left)
Varahi, Aindri, Chamunda or Kali (drinking the demon's blood),
Ambika. on the right, demons arising from Raktabiīa's blood
In Kāli's most famous legend,
Durga and her assistants, the
Matrikas, wound the demon
Raktabija,
in various ways and with a variety of weapons in an attempt to destroy
him. They soon find that they have worsened the situation for with every
drop of blood that is dripped from Raktabija he reproduces a clone of
himself. The battlefield becomes increasingly filled with his
duplicates.
[20]
Durga, in need of help, summons Kāli to combat the demons. It is said,
in some versions, that Goddess Durga actually assumes the form of
Goddess Kāli at this time. The
Devi Mahatmyam describes:
Out of the surface of her (Durga's) forehead, fierce with frown,
issued suddenly Kali of terrible countenance, armed with a sword and
noose. Bearing the strange khatvanga
(skull-topped staff ), decorated with a garland of skulls, clad in a
tiger's skin, very appalling owing to her emaciated flesh, with gaping
mouth, fearful with her tongue lolling out, having deep reddish eyes,
filling the regions of the sky with her roars, falling upon impetuously
and slaughtering the great asuras in that army, she devoured those hordes of the foes of the devas.[21]
Kali destroys Raktabija by sucking the blood from his body and
putting the many Raktabija duplicates in her gaping mouth. Pleased with
her victory, Kali then dances on the field of battle, stepping on the
corpses of the slain.
[22] In the
Devi Mahatmya version of this story, Kali is also described as a
Matrika and as a
Shakti or power of
Devi. She is given the epithet
Cāṃuṇḍā (
Chamunda), i.e. the slayer of the demons Chanda and Munda.
[23] Chamunda is very often identified with Kali and is very much like her in appearance and habit.
[24]
Dakshina Kali
Bhadrakali (A gentle form of Kali), circa 1675.
Painting; made in India, Himachal Pradesh, Basohli,
now placed in
LACMA.
In her most famous pose as
Daksinakali, popular legends say
that Kali, becoming drunk on the blood of her victims on the
battlefield, dances with destructive frenzy. In her fury she fails to
see the body of Shiva, who lies among the corpses on the battlefield and
steps on his chest.
[25]
Realizing Shiva to lie beneath her feet, her anger is pacified and she
calms her fury. Though not added in any of the puranas, the popular
legends tell that Kali was ashamed at the prospect of keeping her
husband beneath her feet and thus stuck her tongue out in shame. The
'Devi-purana", which goes into great depths about Goddess Kali, reveals
the true reason for the symbolism of the tongue. The characteristic
icons that depict Kali are the following; unbridled matted hair, open
blood shot eyes, open mouth and a drooping tongue; in her hands, she
holds: a Khadga (bent sword or
scimitar)
and a human head, she has a girdle of human hands across her waist and
an enchanted Shiva lies beneath her feet. Each of these icons represent a
deep philosophical epithet.
[26]
The drooping out-stuck tongue represents her blood-thirst. Lord Shiva
beneath her feet represents matter, as Kali is undoubtedly the primeval
energy. The depiction of Kali on Shiva shows that without energy, matter
lies "dead".
[27]
This concept has been simplified to a folk-tale depicting a wife
placing her foot on her husband and sticking her tongue out in shame. In
tantric contexts, the tongue is seen to denote the element (
guna) of
rajas (energy and action) controlled by
sattva.
If Kali steps on Shiva with her right foot and holds the sword in her left hand, she is considered to be
Dakshina Kali.
[28][29]
The Dakshina Kali Temple has important religious associations with the
Jagannath Temple and it is believed that Daksinakali is the guardian of
the kitchen of the Lord Jagannath Temple. Puranic tradition says that in
Puri, Lord Jagannath is regarded as Daksinakalika. Goddess Dakshinakali
plays an important role in the 'Niti' of Saptapuri Amavasya.
[30]
One South Indian tradition tells of a dance contest between Shiva and Kali. After defeating the two demons
Sumbha and
Nisumbha, Kali takes up residence in the forest of Thiruvalankadu or
Thiruvalangadu.
She terrorizes the surrounding area with her fierce disruptive nature.
One of Shiva's devotees becomes distracted while performing austerities,
and asks Shiva to rid the forest of the destructive goddess. When Shiva
arrives, Kali threatens him, claiming the territory as her own. Shiva
challenges Kali to a dance contest; both of them dance and Kali matches
Shiva in every step that he takes until Shiva takes the "Urdhalinga"
step in which the genitals are exposed.
[31]
Kali refuses to perform this step as she is a woman and reduces her
disruptive acts in the forest. Interestingly enough, this legend in
reality doesn't match with the contemporary image of Kali, who dances
naked on her husband's chest.
[32]
Smashan Kali
If the Kali steps out with the left foot and holds the sword in her
right hand, she is the terrible form of Mother, the Smashan Kali of the
cremation ground.
[28][29] She is worshiped by tantrics, the followers of
Tantra, who believe that one's spiritual discipline practiced in a
smashan (cremation ground) brings success quickly.
Sarda Devi, the consort of
Ramakrishna Paramhansa, worshipped Smashan Kali at
Dakshineshwar.
[33]
Maternal Kali
Another legend depicts the infant Shiva calming Kali. In this similar
story, Kali has defeated her enemies on the battlefield and begun to
dance out of control, drunk on the blood of the slain. To calm her down
and to protect the stability of the world, Shiva is sent to the
battlefield, as an infant, crying aloud. Seeing the child's distress,
Kali ceases dancing to care for the helpless infant. She picks him up,
kisses his head, and proceeds to breast feed the infant Shiva.
[34] This legend is notable because it shows Kali in her benevolent, maternal aspect, with which she is not usually identified.
Mahakali
Ekamukhi or "One-Faced"
Murti of Mahakali displaying ten hands holding the signifiers of various Devas
Mahakali (
Sanskrit: Mahākālī,
Devanagari: महाकाली), literally translated as
Great Kali, is sometimes considered as a greater form of Kali, identified with the Ultimate reality of
Brahman. It can also be used as an honorific of the Goddess Kali,
[35] signifying her greatness by the prefix "Mahā-". Mahakali, in
Sanskrit, is etymologically the feminized variant of
Mahakala or
Great Time (which is interpreted also as
Death), an epithet of the God Shiva in Hinduism. Mahakali is the presiding Goddess of the first episode of the
Devi Mahatmya. Here she is depicted as Devi in her universal form as
Shakti. Here Devi serves as the agent who allows the cosmic order to be restored.
Kali is depicted in the Mahakali form as having ten heads, ten arms,
and ten legs. Each of her ten hands is carrying a various implement
which vary in different accounts, but each of these represent the power
of one of the
Devas
or Hindu Gods and are often the identifying weapon or ritual item of a
given Deva. The implication is that Mahakali subsumes and is responsible
for the powers that these deities possess and this is in line with the
interpretation that Mahakali is identical with Brahman. While not
displaying ten heads, an "ekamukhi" or one headed image may be displayed
with ten arms, signifying the same concept: the powers of the various
Gods come only through Her
grace.
Iconography
Kali is portrayed mostly in two forms: the popular four-armed form
and the ten-armed Mahakali form. In both of her forms, she is described
as being black in color but is most often depicted as blue in popular
Indian art. Her eyes are described as red with intoxication, and in
absolute rage, her hair is shown disheveled, small fangs sometimes
protrude out of her mouth, and her tongue is lolling. She is often shown
naked or just wearing a skirt made of human arms and a garland of human
heads. She is also accompanied by
serpents and a jackal while standing on a seemingly dead Shiva, usually right foot forward to symbolize the more popular
Dakshinamarga or right-handed path, as opposed to the more infamous and transgressive
Vamamarga or left-handed path.
[36]
In the ten-armed form of Mahakali she is depicted as shining like a
blue stone. She has ten faces and ten feet and three eyes. She has
ornaments decked on all her limbs. There is no association with Shiva.
[37]
The
Kalika Purana describes Kali as possessing a soothing dark
complexion, as perfectly beautiful, riding a lion, four-armed, holding a
sword and blue lotuses, her hair unrestrained, body firm and youthful.
[38]
In spite of her seemingly terrible form, Kali Ma is often considered
the kindest and most loving of all the Hindu goddesses, as she is
regarded by her devotees as the Mother of the whole Universe. And
because of her terrible form, she is also often seen as a great
protector. When the
Bengali saint
Ramakrishna
once asked a devotee why one would prefer to worship Mother over him,
this devotee rhetorically replied, "Maharaj, when they are in trouble
your devotees come running to you. But, where do you run when you are in
trouble?"
[39]
According to Ramakrishna, darkness is the Ultimate Mother, or Kali:
My Mother is the principle of consciousness. She is Akhanda Satchidananda; indivisible Reality, Awareness, and Bliss. The night sky between the stars is perfectly black. The waters of the ocean depths are the same; The infinite is always mysteriously dark. This inebriating darkness is my beloved Kali.
-Sri Ramakrishna
This is clear in the works of such contemporary artists as
Charles Wish, and
Tyeb Mehta, who sometimes take great liberties with the traditional, accepted symbolism, but still demonstrate a true reverence for the
Shakta sect.
Popular form
A
Tamil depiction of Kali
Classic depictions of Kali share several features, as follows:
Kali's most common four armed iconographic image shows each hand carrying variously a
sword, a
trishul (trident), a severed head and a bowl or skull-cup (
kapala) catching the blood of the severed head.
Two of these hands (usually the left) are holding a sword and a
severed head. The Sword signifies Divine Knowledge and the Human Head
signifies human Ego which must be slain by Divine Knowledge in order to
attain
Moksha. The other two hands (usually the right) are in the
abhaya (fearlessness) and
varada (blessing)
mudras,
which means her initiated devotees (or anyone worshipping her with a
true heart) will be saved as she will guide them here and in the
hereafter.
[40]
She has a garland consisting of human heads, variously enumerated at
108 (an auspicious number in Hinduism and the number of countable beads on a
Japa Mala or rosary for repetition of
Mantras) or 51, which represents Varnamala or the Garland of letters of the Sanskrit alphabet,
Devanagari. Hindus believe
Sanskrit is a language of
dynamism,
and each of these letters represents a form of energy, or a form of
Kali. Therefore she is generally seen as the mother of language, and all
mantras.
[41]
She is often depicted naked which symbolizes her being beyond the covering of
Maya
since she is pure (nirguna) being-consciousness-bliss and far above
prakriti. She is shown as very dark as she is brahman in its supreme
unmanifest state. She has no permanent qualities—she will continue to
exist even when the universe ends. It is therefore believed that the
concepts of color, light, good, bad do not apply to her—she is the pure,
un-manifested energy, the
Adi-shakti.
[42]
Shiva in Kali iconography
In both these images she is shown standing on the prone, inert or dead body of
Shiva. There is a legend for the reason behind her standing on what appears to be Shiva's corpse, which translates as follows:
Once Kali had destroyed all the demons in battle, she began a terrific dance out of the sheer joy of victory. All the worlds or lokas
began to tremble and sway under the impact of her dance. So, at the
request of all the Gods, Shiva himself asked her to desist from this
behavior. However, she was too intoxicated to listen. Hence, Shiva lay
like a corpse among the slain demons in order to absorb the shock of the
dance into himself. When Kali eventually stepped upon Shiva, she
realized she was trampling and hurting her husband and bit her tongue in
shame.[43]
The story described here is a popular folk tale and not described or hinted in any of the
puranas. The puranic interpretation is as follows:
Once, Parvati asks Shiva to chose the one form among her 10 forms
which he likes most. To her surprise, Shiva reveals that he is most
comfortable with her Kali form, in which she is bereft of her jewellery,
her human-form, her clothes, her emotions and where she is only raw,
chaotic energy, where she is as terrible as time itself and even greater
than time.[44] As Parvati takes the form of Kali, Shiva lies at her feet and requests her to place her foot on his chest, upon his heart.[45]
Once in this form, Shiva requests her to have this place, below her
feet in her iconic image which would be worshiped throughout.[46]
This idea has been explored in the
Devi-Bhagavata Purana [26] and is most popular in the
Shyama Sangeet, devotional songs to Kali from the 12th to 15th centuries.
The
Tantric interpretation of Kali standing on top of her husband is as follows:
The Shiv tattava (Divine Consciousness as Shiva) is inactive, while the Shakti tattava (Divine Energy as Kali) is active. Shiva and Kali represent Brahman,
the Absolute pure consciousness which is beyond all names, forms and
activities. Kali, on the other hand, represents the potential (and
manifested) energy responsible for all names, forms and activities. She
is his Shakti, or creative power, and is seen as the substance behind
the entire content of all consciousness. She can never exist apart from
Shiva or act independently of him,just as Shiva
remains a mere corpse without Kali i.e., Shakti, all the matter/energy
of the universe, is not distinct from Shiva, or Brahman, but is rather
the dynamic power of Brahman.[47] Hence, Kali is Para Brahman in the feminine and dynamic aspect while Shiva
is the male aspect and static. She stands as the absolute basis for all
life, energy and beneath her feet lies, Shiva, a metaphor for mass,
which cannot retain its form without energy.
While this is an advanced concept in
monistic Shaktism, it also agrees with the
Nondual Trika philosophy of
Kashmir, popularly known as
Kashmir Shaivism and associated most famously with
Abhinavagupta.
There is a colloquial saying that "Shiva without Shakti is Shava" which
means that without the power of action (Shakti) that is Mahakali
(represented as the short "i" in Devanagari) Shiva (or consciousness
itself) is inactive; Shava means
corpse
in Sanskrit and the play on words is that all Sanskrit consonants are
assumed to be followed by a short letter "a" unless otherwise noted. The
short letter "i" represents the female power or Shakti that activates
Creation. This is often the explanation for why She is standing on
Shiva, who is either Her husband and complement in
Shaktism or the Supreme Godhead in
Shaivism.
To properly understand this complex Tantric symbolism it is important
to remember that the meaning behind Shiva and Kali does not stray from
the non-dualistic parlance of
Shankara or the
Upanisads. According to both the
Mahanirvana and
Kularnava
Tantras, there are two distinct ways of perceiving the same absolute
reality. The first is a transcendental plane which is often described as
static, yet infinite. It is here that there is no matter, there is no
universe and only consciousness exists. This form of reality is known as
Shiva, the absolute
Sat-Chit-Ananda—existence, knowledge and bliss. The second is an active plane, an immanent plane, the plane of matter, of
Maya, i.e., where the illusion of
space-time
and the appearance of an actual universe does exist. This form of
reality is known as Kali or Shakti, and (in its entirety) is still
specified as the same Absolute
Sat-Chit-Ananda.
It is here in this second plane that the universe (as we commonly know
it) is experienced and is described by the Tantric seer as the play of
Shakti, or God as Mother Kali.
[48]
Kali and
Bhairava (the terrible form of Shiva) in Union, 18th century, Nepal
From a Tantric perspective, when one meditates on reality at rest, as
absolute pure consciousness (without the activities of creation,
preservation or dissolution) one refers to this as Shiva or Brahman.
When one meditates on reality as dynamic and creative, as the Absolute
content of pure consciousness (with all the activities of creation,
preservation or dissolution) one refers to it as Kali or Shakti.
However, in either case the yogini or yogi is interested in one and the
same reality—the only difference being in name and fluctuating aspects
of appearance. It is this which is generally accepted as the meaning of
Kali standing on the chest of Shiva.
[47]
Although there is often controversy surrounding the images of divine
copulation, the general consensus is benign and free from any carnal
impurities in its substance. In Tantra the human body is a symbol for
the microcosm of the universe; therefore sexual process is responsible
for the creation of the world. Although theoretically Shiva and Kali (or
Shakti) are inseparable, like fire and its power to burn, in the case
of creation they are often seen as having separate roles. With Shiva as
male and Kali as female it is only by their union that creation may
transpire. This reminds us of the
prakrti and
purusa doctrine of
Samkhya wherein
prakāśa-
vimarśa
has no practical value, just as without prakrti, purusa is quite
inactive. This (once again) stresses the interdependencies of Shiva and
Shakti and the vitality of their union.
[49]
Gopi Krishna proposed that Kali standing on the dead
Shiva or Shava (Sanskrit for dead body) symbolised the helplessness of a person undergoing the changing process (
psychologically and
physiologically) in the body conducted by the
Kundalini Shakti.
[50]
Development
In the later traditions, Kali has become inextricably linked with
Shiva. The unleashed form of Kali often becomes wild and uncontrollable,
and only Shiva is able to tame her just as only Kali can tame Shiva.
This is both because she is often a transformed version of one of his
consorts and because he is able to match her wildness.
The ancient text of Kali Kautuvam describes her competition with Shiva in dance, from which the sacred 108
Karanas appeared. Shiva won the competition by acting the
urdva tandava,
one of the Karanas, by raising his feet to his head. Other texts
describe Shiva appearing as a crying infant and appealing to her
maternal instincts. While Shiva is said to be able to tame her, the
iconography often presents her dancing on his fallen body, and there are
accounts of the two of them dancing together, and driving each other to
such wildness that the world comes close to unravelling.
Shiva's involvement with
Tantra and Kali's dark nature have led to her becoming an important Tantric figure. To the
Tantric
worshippers, it was essential to face her Curse, the terror of death,
as willingly as they accepted Blessings from her beautiful, nurturing,
maternal aspect. For them, wisdom meant learning that no coin has only
one side: as death cannot exist without life, so life cannot exist
without death. Kali's role sometimes grew beyond that of a chaos—which
could be confronted—to that of one who could bring wisdom, and she is
given great metaphysical significance by some Tantric texts. The
Nirvāna-tantra clearly presents her uncontrolled nature as the Ultimate
Reality, claiming that the
trimurti
of Brahma, Vishnu and Rudra arise and disappear from her like bubbles
from the sea. Although this is an extreme case, the Yogini-tantra,
Kamakhya-tantra and the Niruttara-tantra declare her the svarupa
(own-being) of the Mahadevi (the great Goddess, who is in this case seen
as the combination of all devis).
The final stage of development is the worshipping of Kali as the
Great Mother,
devoid of her usual violence. This practice is a break from the more
traditional depictions. The pioneers of this tradition are the 18th
century Shakta poets such as
Ramprasad Sen, who show an awareness of Kali's ambivalent nature.
Ramakrishna,
the 19th century Bengali saint, was also a great devotee of Kali; the
western popularity of whom may have contributed to the more modern,
equivocal interpretations of this Goddess. Rachel McDermott's work,
however, suggests that for the common, modern worshipper, Kali is not
seen as fearful, and only those educated in old traditions see her as
having a wrathful component. Some credit to the development of Devi must
also be given to
Samkhya. Commonly referred to as the Devi of delusion,
Mahamaya, acting in the confines of (but not being bound by) the nature of the three
gunas, takes three forms: Maha-Kali, Maha-
Lakshmi and Maha-
Saraswati, being her
tamas-ika,
rajas-ika and
sattva-ika forms. In this sense, Kali is simply part of a larger whole.
Like
Sir John Woodroffe and
Georg Feuerstein, many Tantric scholars (as well as sincere practitioners) agree that, no matter how propitious or appalling you describe them,
Shiva and
Devi are simply recognizable
symbols
for everyday, abstract (yet tangible) concepts such as perception,
knowledge, space-time, causation and the process of liberating oneself
from the confines of such things. Shiva, symbolizing pure, absolute
consciousness, and Devi, symbolizing the entire content of that
consciousness, are ultimately one and the same—totality incarnate, a
micro-macro-cosmic amalgamation of all subjects, all objects and all
phenomenal relations between the "two." Like man and woman who both
share many common, human traits yet at the same time they are still
different and, therefore, may also be seen as complementary.
[51]
Worshippers prescribe various benign and horrific qualities to Devi
simply out of practicality. They do this so they may have a variety of
symbols to choose from, symbols which they can identify and relate with
from the perspective of their own, ever-changing time, place and
personal level of unfolding. Just like modern chemists or physicists use
a variety of molecular and atomic models to describe what is
unperceivable through rudimentary, sensory input, the scientists of
ontology and
epistemology must do the same. One of the underlying distinctions of
Tantra,
in comparison to other religions, is that it allows the devotee the
liberty to choose from a vast array of complementary symbols and
rhetoric which suit one's evolving needs and tastes. From an aesthetic
standpoint, nothing is
interdict and nothing is
orthodox.
In this sense, the projection of some of Devi's more gentle qualities
onto Kali is not sacrilege and the development of Kali really lies in
the practitioner, not the
murthi.
A
TIME magazine article of October 27, 1947, used Kali as a symbol and
metaphor for the human suffering in
British India during its
partition that year.
[52]
Swami Vivekananda wrote his favorite poem
Kali the Mother in 1898.
In New Age and Neopaganism
An academic study of Western Kali enthusiasts noted that, "as shown
in the histories of all cross-cultural religious transplants, Kali
devotionalism in the West must take on its own indigenous forms if it is
to adapt to its new environment."
[53] The adoption of Kali by the West has raised accusations of
cultural misappropriation:
A variety of writers and thinkers have found Kali an exciting figure for reflection and exploration, notably feminists and participants in New Age
spirituality who are attracted to goddess worship. [For them], Kali is a
symbol of wholeness and healing, associated especially with repressed
female power and sexuality. [However, such interpretations often
exhibit] confusion and misrepresentation, stemming from a lack of
knowledge of Hindu history among these authors, [who only rarely] draw
upon materials written by scholars of the Hindu religious tradition. The
majority instead rely chiefly on other popular feminist sources, almost
none of which base their interpretations on a close reading of Kali's
Indian background. The most important issue arising from this
discussion—even more important than the question of 'correct'
interpretation—concerns the adoption of other people's religious
symbols. It is hard to import the worship of a goddess from another
culture: religious associations and connotations have to be learned,
imagined or intuited when the deep symbolic meanings embedded in the
native culture are not available.[54]
