Daily Signet

Continued contemplations on the Mahavidyas…

The Paralyzing Power of Bhagalamukhi: In the tradition of lengthy philosophical debates, whenever the debate takes an ugly turn, it is common to call on Bhagalamukhi to block the flow of speech and dumbfound the acrimonious debater!! Bhagalamukhi—the “one who puts a bridle in the mouth” can arrest the flow of speech. While she is the one who makes the opponent “duck-faced,” she can also turn the duck into a swan.  

Clad in yellow, Bhagalamukhi is shown clutching the opponent’s tongue in her left hand and striking him with a mace held in her right hand. She is a striking force, a paralyzing force, she stupefies. She is the stifling force of the mother. She induces sudden immobility in action. She can suppress action after it has begun.  She can slow things down when they are moving too fast.

Bhagalamukhi induces stillness and immobility when energy is being dissipated. Many practitioners of Hathayoga call on her to help them still their mental activities. It is said, that “by her force, she can alter the course of one’s destiny.” The ability to be restrained, to sidestep, to center yourself…these things come by the grace of Bhagalamukhi; she might be one to whom the prayer, “Thy will be done, Oh Lord” is addressed.                                     

Teri H Martin 

From the August High Service…

O regulating Bhagalamukhi
The center of my mind
the unseen leader in the heart
Be a home for your light and in this center
…lives obey the inner nature’s law.
Secure a place—a hearth—
There is kept grandeur’s store, the hero’s mould
Where thought becomes insight.     Teri H Martin
The soul is the watchful builder of its fate. Sri Aurobindo

On This Day…

Orthodox Christian Dormition of Our Most Holy Lady Theotokos and Ever Virgin Mary

Catholic Christian Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Shinto Kaza Matsuri: celebration of the Kami of the Wind

Edna Ferber born in Kalamazoo, Mich., 1887, died 1968: novelist, short story writer, playwright, Pulitzer Prize recipient

Works: So Big, Show Boat, Cimarron

Quotes: “Christmas isn’t a season, it’s a feeling.” “Living the past is a dull and lonely business; looking back strains the neck muscles, causing you to bump into people not going your way.” “Perhaps too much of everything is as bad as too little.”

Daily Signet

Continued meditations on the Mahavidyas…

The Silent Inertness of Dhumavati is Darkness, the darkness hidden in darkness. But she is not absolute absence of light, but rather Dhumavati is smoky hue, darkness impregnated with the seed of light. The smoke carries within it the particles of the heat of flame. Dhumavati is the state just before creation and also the ultimate state after the creation is withdrawn and readied for the next.  Dhumavati was at the very beginning, before the age of gods and is called “the Eldest”. Not only is she said to have been at the beginning, it is also said that she is the ultimate darkness of dissolution at the end of things as well. Thu,s she is also known as the “smoky swallower of the universes.” She is all potential, all seed, and all unrevealed potentialities are held in her obscure bosom. If Bhairavi represents the energetic heat of Tapas, Dhumavati is the coiled energy of inactivity. She holds in potentiality all creative principles.  She is sleep that holds in assimilation all that has been gained in the waking state preparing for what has yet to be achieved Gestation periods are all by the grace of Dhumavati. 

Teri H Martin

From the August High Service

Darkness hidden by darkness,
There is no lesson in the fern except uncurling slowly,
one green frond at a time;
O somnolent Dhumavati, there in the slumber
learning to do well in dark places;
of the Cosmic Will,
letting growth come from the underside of things.              Kathleen Cain
the secret key of Nature’s change…                                 Sri Aurobindo

On This Day…

Russell Baker born in Londown County, Va., 1925: writer of satirical commentary, Pulitzer Prize recipient

Works: Growing Up, So This Is Depravity, Russell Baker’s Book of Humor

Quotes: “Oh, summer, what power you have to make us suffer and like it.” “Inanimate objects can be classified scientifically into three major categories:  those that don’t work, those that break down, and those that get lost.”

Daily Signet

Continued contemplations on the Mahavidyas…

The Striking Force of Chinnamasta: This Mahavidya is portrayed as standing on a couple who lay in close embrace. She is stark naked, but robed in dazzling light. In form, she is headless, a trunk of a body with two arms held aloft.  In one hand, she holds her own severed head and in the other, a pair of scissors.  From her neck three streams of blood gush forth. The middle stream flows into her own mouth straight from the severed head she holds in her hand. Two attendants who stand by on either side drinking from the other two streams of blood. This is Chinnamasta. 

From this description, Chinnamasta might seem an incomprehensible object of worship. She is an indomitable destructive power like Kali, but there is a difference between her action and Kali’s. Kali’s force is fierce and terrible, but Chinnamasta is even more so. Kali represents the power of transformation, the force of evolution in creation. Her action is strong and swift, but she still works with the aid of Time. Chinnamasta on the other hand, pays no attention to time, for she is the “Lord’s weapon”—the crash of thunder, the Vajra—she destroys instantaneously. Kali is vital force; Chinnamasta is electric energy. Kali’s seat is in the heart of things—power of strong emotion and quick action; Chinnamasta is in the head specifically, in the third eye. She is the power of will and vision, the power of lightning and electrical currents.

Chinnamasta is the mother of Parasurama who at the behest of his father (obviously displeased with the boy’s mother), cut her head off. But Parasurama, by virtue of a boon from his father who is pleased with his son’s unquestioning obedience, uses the boon, to his father’s displeasure, to bring his headless mother back to life. Chinnamasta comes back as the sole warrior, the force that is victorious over all that opposes it. She has the power to annihilate the mind, and then restore it as well. To worship her is to imagine a constant downpour of lightning from the skies and submit the body, mind and self to it in absolute dedication and surrender.   

Teri H Martin

From the August High Service

O terrifying Chinnamasta, 
She holds in her hand her own severed head,
three streams of blood fountain forth from her mouth,
Hers, the lessons of swift death, total surrender, ultimate sacrifice
Slashing power of Vajra, lightning flash and drum-ripping thunder
Shredding our blankets and blindfolds of ignorance.
Gutting us of our best answers, truest opinions, smug rightness.
Her boon: the bloody show of waters.                       Teri H Martin

Daily Signet

Continued Contemplations on the Mahavidyas…

The Effulgent charm of Bhairavi: Bhairavi is the heat, energy, tapas of life; she is the self-energizing heat of the divine. The world was created in the form of an egg which was broken by the heat of incubation allowing the soul in Nature to emerge like a bird from the egg. Associated with fire, agni, Bhairavi is described as the flame of the concentration of consciousness that burns in each and every being.  She is the source of the fire of Kundalini which burns through all ignorance.  She is shown as a coiled serpent, a fiery bridge that closes the chasm between the narrowness of matter and the immensity of the Spirit. As is the case with many of the Mahavidyas, she is at once both beautiful and terrible.                                       Teri Martin

From the High Service…

Of flame-hued Tripura Bhairavi,
May the generative center in me
Re-wed the closed finite’s lonely consonant 
with the open vowels of Infinity.
Be a home for your light and in this center
A hyphen must connect Matter and Mind
Secure a place—a hearth of wisdom—
The narrow isthmus of the ascending soul.                       Sri Aurobindo
Through which the passions of yin and Yang become dance.  Amen.            Teri Martin

Daily Signet

Continued Contemplations on the Mahavidyas…

The Vast Vision of Bhuvaneshwari: If Kali is Time, Bhuvaneshwari is Space as created by divine perception.  It is the kind of space that grows as we perceive and realize more and more. Space is the self-extension of the Divine. The Great Mother is called Bhuvaneshwari, the Sovereign of the worlds.  As Space, she not only creates the worlds, but also enters them, sustains them, supports them and nourishes them.  She is the all-pervasive force that permeates the whole fabric of creation, warp and woof.  She is the gaze of the godhood. She sets the stage for Kali’s dance.  

Teri Martin

From the August High Service…

From the measured drops of a glacial thaw 
to the churning rush of a canyon river.
Of the universal Mother Bhuvaneshwari,                               
From the veil of a morning drizzle to the downpour of black thunder.
All things are wrapped in the dynamic One
From the quiet waters of green pastures
to the steamy moisture of a jungle forest.
A subtle link of union joins all life.                             
Her essence, continuity; Her substance, growth. 
She transforms, yet, She remains.      Teri Martin
Thus all creation is a single chain.    Sri Aurobindo