Kali – The Dark Mother

Kali is one of the most powerful and terrible forms of the Divine Mother. Her appearance is striking and difficult to forget. She is dark, with wild and dishevelled hair, her tongue extended, and around her neck she wears a garland of severed heads. In her hands she carries weapons, and the whole of her form expresses a power that is fierce, uncontrolled and destructive. Yet those who worship her do not see in her only destruction. They call her Mother.

This is one of the deepest and most difficult aspects of Kali to understand. The Mother is not represented here merely as a gentle and protecting presence. She is also the power that destroys the forces which threaten the world. Her terrible aspect is not separate from her nature as Mother, but is one of its expressions. When the powers of evil become too great, the Mother appears in a form capable of meeting them.

The story of Kali is therefore connected with the greater story of the Divine Mother, Devi. The gods, confronted by forces which they were unable to overcome, joined their powers together. Their energies came together and took the form of the Great Goddess. She received from them their weapons and their strength, and became the power through which the demons could be confronted.

Within this great manifestation of divine power appears Kali, the dark and terrible form of the Goddess. Her coming is connected with the struggle against the demons and with a power that is no longer gentle or restrained. She represents a force that destroys what stands against the divine order.

Her darkness is therefore not simply the darkness of evil. The material presents Kali as a manifestation of a much greater divine power, the power of Shakti. She belongs to the mystery of the Divine Mother, whose nature cannot be limited to one form. She can give life and protect, but she can also destroy. Her power can appear beautiful and compassionate, or terrible and overwhelming.

This is why the image of Kali cannot be understood merely by looking at her outward appearance. The skulls, the weapons, the blood and the fierce expression belong to a deeper meaning. They show a form of the Mother who does not turn away from the terrible aspects of existence. She confronts them directly.

The story of Kali is therefore not only the story of a goddess who destroys demons. It is the story of divine power taking a form that is necessary when other forms are no longer sufficient. It is the story of the Mother as protector, but also as destroyer of that which must be destroyed.

To understand the appearance of Kali and the reason for her terrible form, one must return to the beginning of the story, to the moment when the gods found themselves powerless before the forces that threatened them. It is there that the Great Goddess appears, born from the combined power of the gods, and the story of the Divine Mother begins.

Source & Note

This article is based on Elizabeth U. Harding’s Kali: The Black Goddess of Dakshineswar (Nicolas-Hays, 1993). The material has been edited and adapted for this publication.

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