passages from david nelson's book on KALI .....

[Guest guest]

These posts were posted by our respected sankarukku in our 'Bhraman'

group and it is my pleasure to share with you all. Although our

sankarrukku is no longer with us in this group but during the short

time that he was with us, he posted some wonderful messages and the

rich legacy that he left with us are our treasures! thanks, sankar.

 

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since Kali is, among many things, the goddess of

death. Written at the end of the nineteenth century,

Swami Vivekananda's poem, "Kali the Mother," evokes the

Night of Kali as a time of pitchy darkness that blots

out the stars, while on every side, "a thousand,

thousand shades of Death begrimed and black" scatters

plagues and sorrows in a mad, joyful dance. In the poet's

awesome vision, Terror is the goddess's name, Death is in

her breath, and destruction follows every footfall,

for she is the relentless power of all-consuming

Time.Little of this characterization would pass in the West

as conventional religious sentiment, for Kali is

Nature in her raw, exuberant power. The Hindus call this

power Mother. To the Western mind, Mother Nature more

often evokes visions of abundant harvests, forests

teeming with wildlife, majestic mountains and inspiring

sunsets; only when she goes on a rampage in the form of a

natural disaster do we remember and fear her other side.

Goddess-worshiping Hindus, called Shaktas, are more likely to

recognize her auspicious and destructive aspects in equal

measure. <br>Like the Shaktas, Western Pagans also regard

life and death as complementary and inseparable arcs

in the circle of existence. They acknowledge a

triple goddess, characterized as maiden, mother and

crone, who reflects the cyclical nature of the world:

that everything has a beginning, a middle, an end, and

a new beginning. Similarly, for the Shakta Hindu,

Kali is a powerful and complex goddess with multiple

forms. In many household shrines she is worshiped as the

gentle Shyama, who dispels fear and grants boons. In

times of natural disaster she is invoked as the

protective Rakshakali. As Shmashanakali she embodies

destructive power and is said to haunt the cremation ground

in the company of howling jackals and terrifying

female spirits. At the magnificent Dakshineswar Temple

in Calcutta, she is revered as the beautiful

Bhavatarini, Redeemer of the Universe. And as Mahakali, the

Great Kali, she is the formless Shakti, the immanent

primordial power who is not different from the

transcendental Absolute.

 

from the book 'many faces of kali' by david brown

 

jai gurudeva !

 

jai mahakali!