Dasa maha vidhya

Dhumavati: The Goddess of Silent Dhumavati is the eldest among the Goddesses, the Grandmother Spirit. She stands behind the other Goddesses as their ancestral guide. As the Grandmother Spirit she is the great teacher who bestows the ultimate lessons of birth and death. She is the knowledge that comes through hard experience, in which our immature and youthful desires and fantasies are put to rest.
Dhuma means “smoke.” Dhumavati is “one who is composed of smoke.” Her nature is not illumination but obscuration. However, to obscure one thing is to reveal another. By obscuring or covering all that is known, Dhumavati reveals the depth of the unknown and the unmanifest. Dhumavati obscures what is evident in order to reveal the hidden and the profound.
Dhumavati is portrayed as a widow. She is the feminine principle devoid of the masculine principle. She is Shakti without Shiva as a pure potential energy without any will to motivate it. Thus she contains within herself all potentials and shows the latent energies that dwell within us. To develop these latent energies we must first recognize them. This requires honoring Dhumavati.
Dhumavati shows the feminine principle of negation in all of its aspects. On an outer level she represents poverty, destitution, and suffering, the great misfortunes that we all fear in life. Hence she is said to be crooked, troublesome, and quarrelsome – a witch or a hag. Yet on an inner level this same negativity causes us to seek a greater fulfillment than can be achieved in the limited realms of the manifest creation. After all, only frustration in our outer life causes us to seek the inner reality. Dhumavati is whatever obstructs us in life, but what obstructs us in one area can release a new potential to grow in a different direction. Thus she is the good fortune that comes to us in the form of misfortune.
Dhumavati represents the darkness on the face of the deep, the original chaos and obscurity which underlies creation. She is the darkness of primordial ignorance, Mulavidya, from which this world of illusion has arisen, and which it is seeking to transcend.
Dhumavati represents the power of ignorance or that aspect of the creative force which causes the obscuration of the underlying light of consciousness. While Maya is the magic or illusion power of the Lord that makes the one reality appear as many, ignorance is a form of darkness which prevents us from seeing the underlying reality.
Dhumavati is the void, wherein all forms have been dissolved and nothing can any longer be differentiated. Yet this void is not mere darkness. It is a self-illumining reality free of the ordinary duality of subject and object.
Dhumavati represents the negative powers of life: disappointment, frustration, humiliation, defeat, loss, sorrow and loneliness. Such experiences overpower the ordinary mind, but to the yogi they are special doors of opportunity to contact the reality which transcends desire.
Dhumavati is the elder form of Kali, Kali as an old woman. She represents time or the life-force dissociated from the process of manifestation. She is the timeless which never really enters into the process of time.
Dhumavati is portrayed as a tall and thin old woman with disheveled and matted hair. She is fearful, unattractive and dark in complexion, with a wrinkled face, and her limbs are red. She has a harsh look in her eyes and she is missing a number of her teeth, which are otherwise large in size. Sometimes she is portrayed with fangs and her nose is long and snout-like. She is dressed in old or dirty clothes and her breasts hang down. She rides a chariot whose insignia is a crow. In her left hand she carries a winnowing basket and with her right makes the gesture of knowledge (Cinmudra). In other accounts she carries a skull-cup and sword in her two hands. She wears a garland of severed heads and is ever hungry and thirsty, always provoking quarrels and misunderstandings.

Tara: The Goddess of Sound Tara is not only an important Hindu Goddess, she is also the most important of the Buddhist Goddesses. The Bodhisattva Tara is the consort of the great Buddha Avalokiteshvara, the Lord who looks down with compassion on all living beings.
The term Tara means the deliverer or savior, from the Sanskrit root tri, meaning “to take across,” as to take across a river, the ocean, a mountain, or any difficult situation. The Goddess Tara is called upon in emergencies or at crossroads where we require guidance as to which way to turn. Tara is the saving knowledge. She is the Saviouress. The idea of the Goddess as saving wisdom is as old as the Vedas, and is a common idea in many spiritual traditions.
Tara is the feminine form of Om or Om personified as a Goddess. Tara is the unmanifest sound that exists in the ether of consciousness, through which we can go beyond the entire manifestation. Tara is Om that has the appearance of the ether and which pervades the ether as its underlying vibratory support, but also transcends it. Om is the unmanifest field behind creation, which is the destroyer as well as the creator of the universe.
Tara is the purifying force of the vital breaths. Sound that manifests in the ether is the same as the Prana (life-force) that manifests in the ether. Breath is the primal sound of life, and the sound of the breath is the original, spontaneous and unuttered mantra (So’ ham). Both mind and Prana, as word and vibration, have their root in sound. Hence the use of sound or mantra both purifies and energizes the mind.
Tara is the radiance of knowledge that arises from the differentiation of meanings through sound. Different sounds serve as vehicles whereby different ideas or meanings flash forth. Om is the underlying light that illumines these different sounds and allows meaning to flow through them. All meanings exist to reintegrate us into the ocean of meaning that is pure consciousness itself.
Tara, like Kali, is deep blue in color. She has matted hair, wears a garland of human heads, and has eight serpents for her ornaments. She is dancing on a corpse, has four arms and carries in her four hands a sword or head chopper, a scissors, a severed head and a lotus.

Tripurasundari: The Beauty and Bliss of the Three Tripurasundari is not the ordinary beauty of form (which is more properly an aspect of Kamala). The highest beauty does not lie in any object, though it is not apart from objects. The highest beauty is of perception – to “hold Infinity in the palm of your hand, and Eternity in an hour,” as the poet Blake so eloquently wrote.
Beauty derives from the light of consciousness that is irradiated through objects. It is never really contained in any object. Hence beauty can never pass away but merely has manifold forms for its revelation. The light of beauty we see in things is thus the light of our own awareness. Discovering this we contact the well springs of infinite delight within us. This is part of the revelation of Tripurasundari.
The beauty of perception occurs only when the mind is cleansed from the known, when consciousness is cleared of its conditioning and rests in pure awareness without any residue of memory. Then whatever we see is irradiated with the light of eternity and is effulgent with the glory of our own Self as the Universal Being. Otherwise the residue of our thoughts and emotions, like a dark film, obstructs the subtle and transparent beauty and presence in things, though we may be able to perceive clearly their physical characteristics.
Tripurasundari represents the ultimate beauty of pure perception which arises when we see all the universe in ourselves, when we see all nature as a reflection of the reality of consciousness. Tripurasundari is thus the beauty of nature but as seen through the spiritual eye of unity – the vision that all the universe is Brahman – that there is nothing but God above, below, within, without, to the north, south, east or west, past, present or future.
Tripurasundari thus is the Goddess of Vedantic knowledge, which is the knowledge of the Supreme Self or Divine. She teaches us that all is the self and that the world is Brahman or the Absolute. From her perspective Samsara is Nirvana; the world of illusion is merged into the Absolute. Hence she is the form of the Goddess most beloved among Vedantic Swamis and teachers. She represents the knowledge of the Supreme Self.
Tripurasundariis called Lalita or “She who plays.” The entire universe exists for the delight of awareness, which is the play of the Divine Mother. Creation arises in joy, and returns to joy. We are but transient figures in her eternal play, who have yet to understand the source of the energy that moves us. Our sorrow and suffering is a delusion, a misconception born of ignorance and the ego. Because we attempt to control or possess joy from the standpoint of the separate self, we divide ourselves from true joy which is universal. The Goddess, as the image of joy, shows us the way out of our error, which is not to deny ourselves happiness but to discover the true happiness that we seek, which is in being one with all. Lalita awakens the receptive soul to the bliss that underlies all things.
Lalita is the deity of the Shri Chakra, the great yantra or energy pattern which underlines the entire universe, which arises from the mantra Om. She is the most blissful and beautiful of all the Goddesses, as she represents the ultimate bliss at the source of all delights. She is the deity who dwells at the summit of Mount Meru, the cosmic mountain or the mountain of the spine, and gives the orders whereby the entire universe moves. She is the Divine love which is the central motivating force behind the universe, and which is the original impulse within our own hearts.
Tripurasundari is also called Rajarajeshwari or “the supreme ruler of the universe.” From her arise all the commands which govern the universe, including he command which allows us to unfold spiritually or to give spiritual teachings in the world. We must seek her command in order to do anything significant in life. Yet her command is not based on authority but love. To gain her approval we merely need be open to her love. What she allows us to do is to love her and to love everything. To discover her commands, however, we must be willing to surrender our own egoistic desires and attempt to control things.
Tripurasundari is often represented as a young girl of sixteen years age. As such she is called “sixteen” (shodasi) or “the young girl” (bala). At this stage of a woman’s life the delight aspect of her existence is most pronounced. Her nature is to play, to seek new experiences, and to charm others to her. Her innocence attracts to her all that is true and good.
Tripurasundari is the power of consciousness, Cit-shakti. She is the awareness of the Supreme Self, Paramatman, as one with the supreme Reality or Absolute, Parabrahman. As true knowledge she is called Samvit, which is the power to comprehend all things as consciousness itself.
Tripurasundari is thus the power of spiritual knowledge (jnana-shakti), which is more a matter of feeling and perception than of thought and analysis. Hence she is the form of the Goddess most to be worshipped by those following the yoga of Knowledge. She is the form of the Goddess who represents pure consciousness and the bliss that flows from it. She combines the being of Kali, with the knowledge of Tara and adds the bliss dimension of spiritual realization

Bhuvneshvari: The Queen of the Bhuvaneshvari is the Queen or ruler (feminine, Ishvari) of the universe or realm of beings (Bhuvana). She is the Divine Mother as the Queen of all the worlds. All the universe is her body and all beings are ornaments on her infinite being. She carries all worlds as a flowering of her own Self-nature. She is thus related to Sundari and to Rajarajeshvari, the supreme Lady of the Universe.
The Goddess represents space. Space is the Mother or Matrix in which all creatures come into being. She is the field in which all things grow. She is the receptive spirit who gives space to allow all things their place and function. She is the cosmic womb that gives birth to all worlds. As space, Bhuvaneshvari is complementary to Kali who is time; they are the two main faces of the Goddess as both the infinite and the eternal. Bhuvaneshvari creates the stage on which Kali performs her dance of life and death. At the stage Bhuvaneshvari is also the witness, the observer and the enjoyer of the dance.
As Kali creates events in time, so Bhuvaneshvari creates objects in space. All events are merely episodes in the Devine Mother Kali who is time. All places are merely phases of the dance of the Divine Mother Bhuvaneshvari who is space. The Goddess is the place, the field, the matrix in which we act to manifest the Gods. Knowing her as the ground on which we stand and the reality which pervades us, we gain the capacity (Shakti) to accomplish the highest actions, which are the practice of Yoga. Returning to her passive presence, we ourselves become the field in which the Gods, the cosmic powers, can be born and assume their roles in the cosmic creative unfoldment.
Bhuvaneshvari is the cosmos (Bhuvana) personified as Goddess. Worshipping her promotes a cosmic vision and absolves us from the narrowness of opinion and belief. She helps us go beyond all identifications with creed, class, race, sex, nation and religion, to a universal understanding. She gives us world vision, a global understanding, and a sense of the infinite.
As the power that measures out the universe, Bhuvaneshvari is called Maya, which also means illusion. When things are measured we are in their limited forms and forget the underlying unitary space in which they appear. This is how illusion arises. All manifest forms are merely waves in the infinite space of the Divine Mother. We must learn to see the space of the Mother, which is the embrace of consciousness, in all apparent objects of world, and no longer take their diverse forms as reality.
As Kali is the power of Action (kriya-shakti) and Sundari is the power of Knowledge (jnana-shakti), Bhuvaneshvari is the power of Love (iccha-shakti). Love creates space and provides freedom. It does not limit or try to posses, which is the action of selfish desire. Yet the space of love is not an empty or unfriendly space, it is a space that nurtures and gives room to grow and flower. If love does not give space, it is not a Divine Love.
Bhuvaneshvari has a form like Sundari, whom she resembles in many ways, which reveals her beneficent nature. She has the colour of the rising sun, with the crescent moon on her head, with four hands and three eyes. She holds in two hands the noose and the goad. With her other two hands she gives the gestures that grant boons and dispel fears.
The mantra for Bhuvaneshwari is the single syllable Hirim. Hirim is one of the most important of all mantras. It is called the Devi Pranava, or the equivalent of Om for the Goddess. Hirem refers to the heart (Hridaya). It also relates to Hri, which is modesty.
Bhuvaneshvari as the Mother can be worshipped through the mantra Ma, which is the natural sound for mother. This mantra, like Hirim, can be used for the Divine Mother in all her forms. The Divine Mother is called Shri Ma (respected, beautiful or resplendent Mother), which can also be used as a mantra for her.