Kali Ma

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nature

climber
Santa Fe, NM
Topic Author's Original Post - Oct 10, 2008 - 12:18am PT
She is the terrible one who has a dreadful face. She should be meditated upon as having disheveled hair and a garland of freshly cut human heads. She has four arms. In her upper left hand she holds a sword that has just been bloodied by the severed head that she holds in her lower left hand. Her upper right hand makes the gesture of assurance and her lower right hand, the sign of granting favors. She has a bluish complexion and is lustrous like a dark cloud. She is completely naked, and her body gleams with blood that is smeared all over it from the garland of bleeding severed heads around her neck. Her ear ornaments are corpses of children. Her fangs are dreadful, and her face is fierce. Her breasts are large and round, and she sears a girdle made of severed human hands. Blood trickles from the corners of her mouth and makes her face gleam. She makes a terrible sound and lives in the cremation ground, where she is surrounded by howling jackals. She stands on the chest of Shiva in the form of a corpse. She is eager to have sexual intercourse in reverse fashion with Mahakala. She wears a satisfied expression. She smiles.
Ouch!

climber
Oct 10, 2008 - 12:24am PT
Sounds like Fattrad in drag.
nature

climber
Santa Fe, NM
Topic Author's Reply - Oct 10, 2008 - 12:25am PT

snakefoot

climber
cali
Oct 10, 2008 - 12:39am PT
i know a girl like that........
2tallclimber

Trad climber
The OC
Oct 10, 2008 - 03:02am PT
Where did you get the pic of my ex?
Anastasia

climber
Not there
Oct 10, 2008 - 04:28am PT
You both know my mom?
quartziteflight

climber
Oct 10, 2008 - 08:21am PT
Radical,

ha ha!!! I think the modern term for that would be "reverse cowgirl"..



/thread slumps into gutter....
Tomcat

Trad climber
Chatham N.H.
Oct 10, 2008 - 08:22am PT
Hillary.....
Riotch

Trad climber
Kayenta, Arizona
Oct 10, 2008 - 10:17am PT
Once McCain is elected and promptly dies, Sara Palin will take over and transform herself into Kali Ma - on national television.


Then we will know the end times are upon us . . .





By the way Nature, what have you been reading???
MisterE

Trad climber
My Inner Nut
Oct 10, 2008 - 11:11am PT
It's really the earth mother, this times she's really pissed at us.
nature

climber
Santa Fe, NM
Topic Author's Reply - Oct 10, 2008 - 11:18am PT
By the way Nature, what have you been reading???

My Anusara Teachers Training Manual
The Bhagavad Gita - Juan Mascaro
The Bhagavad Gita - Stephen Mitchel
Poised for Grace: Annotation on the Bhagavad Gita from a Tantric View - Douglas R. Brooks
Tantra: The Path of Ecstacy: Georg Feurerstein
Hanuman's Tale - Philip Lutgendorf
The Ramayana - Valmiki
Tantric Visions of the Divine Feminine. The Ten Mahavidyas - David Kinsley (the OP quote came from this book).
Fletcher

Trad climber
Kidland, 24x7, but sometimes Pasadena, CA
Oct 10, 2008 - 12:15pm PT
Kali is not good nor bad, forget the duality. She's just part of the cycle. It would be helpful for Palin to aspire to better understand Kali. She might learn something.

I enjoyed a great rafting trip down her namesake river (Kali Ghandaki) in Nepal years ago. The river is the embodiment of her qualities.

Fletch
Jaybro

Social climber
wuz real!
Oct 10, 2008 - 02:26pm PT
A reading project,


I have fallen behind, on.
Beatrix Kiddo

Mountain climber
Littleton
Oct 10, 2008 - 03:01pm PT
Kali Ma Shakti de
Um Num Shiva
Um Num Shiva

I remember that from Indiana Jones. :-)

nature

climber
Santa Fe, NM
Topic Author's Reply - Oct 10, 2008 - 03:27pm PT
perhaps they were chanting:

Om Namah Shivaya? ;-)
nature

climber
Santa Fe, NM
Topic Author's Reply - Oct 10, 2008 - 03:38pm PT

left to right...

My Hanuman murti, Shiva in deep meditation right before he got up, went to the cremation grounds and danced the Ananda Tandava (thus bringing the world into existence), a little lakshmi, Kali Ma (this murti was on the sushi bar in Yosemite).
mark miller

Social climber
Reno
Oct 11, 2008 - 12:19am PT
Yeah I'd do her from behind in a "Reverse" sex position....I like the long hair..

Hey Doug do you want to have a Thanksgiving Sushi Fest in Vegas with a "Burning Barn" reunion tour (Think War Pigs Bro...)? This could happen..... Epinephrine in the morning and Yellow Tail for a snack and "Burning Barn" till hell freezes over, I'm getting a chubby just thinking about it. Wheres the reverse Yogi biatch when you need her?
Lynne Leichtfuss

Social climber
valley center, ca
Oct 11, 2008 - 12:38am PT
Sheeee, i'd never want to be a Kali Ma or even be around her. Is this the person you blame your freak outs and temper rocks on ? She sounds like she's in control of the Iraq war....and alot of other bad sheee on this planet. Blood, death, dismemberment, corpses of children, dreadful fangs....and people think jesus is bad....

Wade Icey

Trad climber
www.alohashirtrescue.com
Oct 11, 2008 - 12:49am PT
people think Jesus is bad?

temper rocks?

(she's blue)
Lynne Leichtfuss

Social climber
valley center, ca
Oct 11, 2008 - 12:59am PT
Wade Icey, temper rocks .... when you are so rocking with your bad temper you hurt with words and physicality.

and many people do not think jesus had/has much to offer the world.
WBraun

climber
Oct 11, 2008 - 01:04am PT
Yes Kali in her fearsome form is not very pleasant and the materialists are generally attracted to her.

But her other form ......

John Moosie

climber
Beautiful California
Oct 11, 2008 - 02:56am PT
"Sheeee, i'd never want to be a Kali Ma or even be around her. Is this the person you blame your freak outs and temper rocks on ? She sounds like she's in control of the Iraq war....and alot of other bad sheee on this planet. Blood, death, dismemberment, corpses of children, dreadful fangs....and people think jesus is bad...."

Lynne, those are simply some peoples interpretations of kali. Another way to think of Kali is that she is an aspect of the allness of God. She represents destruction. You might then ask, Why would God have destruction as one of its aspects?. One reason is that God has given His/Her children ( all of us ) free will and dominion over earth. We are here to grow in knowing God and becoming one with God, yet because we are children and we have free will, we can make mistakes. The bible would call these mistakes "sin".

So when you make a mistake, you create energy that is misguided. You can also create form that is misguided. To undo this form you must destroy it. To raise up energy that is misguided, you must transform it. In some traditions, Kali is the consort of Shiva. Shiva can represent destruction but he can also represent transformation.

These are the purposes of the goddess Kali and her consort, the God Shiva, to destroy that which is sin and to transform it into the Christ. In the teaching that I follow, the female energy of God is the contracting energy, it always tries to take things back to God. So Kali is simply trying to put a form back into alignment with God's will. Male energy is the expansive energy. So Shiva expands misguided energy by transformation. This can appear as destructive because the old form it help no longer exists. At this point you do need to be aware that we all have male and female energy within us but this could take a long time to explain so I will stop here.

Shive and Kali undo the mistakes that we make. Sometimes through grace, through forgiveness when we seek it, and sometimes through Karmic return, which if enough is coming back to you can appear very destructive.


Now think of all the different ways people imagine the teachings of Jesus to be horrid, such as eating the body of Christ. To some this sounds like cannibalism. Yet we know that this is just symbolism and to understand it you must look beyond the words and dig for the meaning. So my hope is that you do not discount the teachings of Kali and Shiva simply because they appear harsh.

There is much much more to say about this, but I hope that this gives you a small picture.

John
Karl Baba

Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
Oct 11, 2008 - 03:26am PT
It is said that the divine can appear and respond in the form that the devotee can relate to. The power that can create a universe so vast that light takes billions of years to traverse at 182,000 miles per second can be hard to relate to.

Fortunately, a spark of that power dwells within us, as us, since we in the image of that One.

and in "Hindu" philosophy, there may appear to be many gods, but in reality are acknowledged to be aspects of that One absolute Being. (in a similar way that "Christian" Philosophy seems to have three gods but really only has one, and saints in Catholicism, plus mary have status that would be like Hindu Gods)

Many of the iconographic elements in Hindu dieties are symbolic of the cosmic powers that they represent. (like Saint Peter might be pictured with a key)

Some believe these Gods exist for real in the forms depicted in statues and paintings. Others believe those aspects of God assume those forms in order to relate to our limited human capacity that needs to love and understand things more similar to ourselves. Some have an "inbetween" philosophy (what are gods made of anyway. If there is an old man in the sky, what's his leg made of?)

It's no surprise that some aspects of God being worshiped have fearsome aspects. On a more primitive level. folks have wanted to worship the gods that have power regarding what people fear most, death and transformation. Wasn't it fire, brimstone and the fear of eternal damnation that led some folks to repent?

Peace

Karl
nature

climber
Santa Fe, NM
Topic Author's Reply - Oct 11, 2008 - 09:53am PT
Lynne... as pointed out she is the consort of Shiva. Shiva is one of trinity in hindu mythology.

Brahma - the creator
Vishnu - the maintainer
Shiva - the destroyer

Shiva is depicted in the form for Nataraj dancing on the drawf Apasmara who signifies ignorance. Thus Shiva destroys ignorance. The dance he dances is the Ananda Tandava - the dance which creates the universe. (Lynne: you may have noticed I wear a Nataraj around my neck [though I'd consider Hanuman - shiva's 11th incarnation - my ishta devata])

Other forms of Kali:
Durga:

Bradrakali (gentle kali)

Dakshayani or Sati (Rama's Consort in the Ramayana)

Parvati (mother of Ganesha)

So you see she's not just one god. She's all god(esses).

My guess is that you knowledge of hindu (and eastern) philosophy is limited and thus you judge the one goddess on one picture and one story. Some might even look at kali and think she's the devil or evil - which she is knott.

Werner.... which form is that? Radha? (Is that Krishna?)


Speaking of Hanuman... find Kali in this painting:















When Shiva wanted to incarnate as a monkey (Hanuman) to go help Rama in the epic war told in the Ramayana, Shakti (Kali, etc...) didn't want to be left behind. So she became his tail.
MisterE

Trad climber
My Inner Nut
Oct 11, 2008 - 11:10am PT
Taoism is a lot simpler!
mark miller

Social climber
Reno
Oct 11, 2008 - 01:53pm PT
PBRism is a lot simpler too....
Jaybro

Social climber
wuz real!
Oct 11, 2008 - 02:48pm PT
I'm with Mr E, though this stuff is fascinating enough for a lifetime, or so...

Jay-Neo(quasi?)Taoistmoralatheist-bro
Lynne Leichtfuss

Social climber
valley center, ca
Oct 11, 2008 - 10:42pm PT
Thanks ! To all you guys for the information ! You know it means alot to Lynnie that people actually care to respond to questions and then give relevant information.

I was looking for life meaning years ago and read about quite a few eastern philosophies and many other religions along with agnostic and atheistic views.....

Peace, which belongs in all our hearts ...Lynnie
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