MAHĀKĀLI DHYANAM
Meditation on Mahākāli
From the Devī Mahātmyam [Mārkendeya Purana]
Om Namaś Chaṇḍikāyai.
Om khaḍgaṁ chakra-gadeṣu-chāpa-parighāñ
chūlaṃ bhuśuṇḍīṁ śiraḥ
śaṅkhaṁ saṃda-dhatīṁ karai-stri-nayanāṁ
sarvāṅga-bhūṣāvṛitām
Nīlāśma-dyutimāsya pāda-daśakāṁ
seve Mahākālikāṁ
yāmastaut-svapite harau kamalajo
hantuṁ madhuṁ kaiṭabham.
Om Namaś Chaṇḍikāyai.
Om, I bow to the Goddess Chaṇḍikā.
Om, holding a scimitar, disk, mace, arrows and bow, lance, club, a skull and a conch shell in Her ten hands. The three-eyed goddess, Her body covered with ornaments, Her countenance with the brilliance of blue diamonds, with ten limbs. We offer our service to Mahākāli, She who Brahma praised for protection from the demons Madhu and Kaitava, when Vishnu was in sleep.
Om, I bow to the Goddess Chaṇḍikā.
Book 3/Chapter 8/1:51
On the Gunas and their
forms
1. Brahmâ said :--O Nârada! I have described to you what you asked me
just now about the creation of this universe, etc. Now hear with attention the colour of the
three qualities, as well their configuration and how they are seen to exist.
2-3. The Sattva Guna is the source of pleasure and
happiness; and when happiness comes, everything seems delightening. When integrity, truthfulness, cleanliness,
faith, forgiveness, fortitude, mercy, bashfulness, peace and contentment arise
in one's heart, know certainly that there has arisen firmly the Sattva Guna in
that man.
4. The colour of the Sattva quality is white; it
makes one always like religion, and have faith towards good purposes and
discard one's tendencies towards bad objects.
5. The Risis, the seers of truth classify
Sraddhâ (faith) under the three headings:
Sâttvik, Râjasik and Tâmasik.
6. The quality Rajas is of red colour, wonderful
and is not pleasant; it is the source of all troubles; there is no doubt in
this.
7-8. The intelligent should understand that Rajas
has certainly arisen in him, when his mind is filled with hatred, enmity,
quarrelsome feeling, pride, stupification, uneasiness, sleeplessness, want of
faith, egoism, vanity and arrogance.
9-11. The quality Tamas is of black colour. From Tamas arises laziness, ignorance, sleep,
poverty, fear, quarrels, miserliness, insincerity, anger, aberration of
intellect, violent atheism, and finding fault with others. The wise should think that Tamas has overpowered
him when the above qualities are found to possess him. When this Tamas quality is attended with the Tâmasî
faith, then it becomes the source of pain to others.
12. The well wishers should manifest in
themselves the Sattva qualities, control the Râjasic qualities, and destroy the
Tâmasic qualities.
13. These three qualities are always found to
remain intermingled with another, and each of them has always an inherent
tendency to overcome the others; and therefore they are always, as it were, at
war with another. They never have a
separate existence from one another.
14. Never is found anywhere only one Sattva
quality to the exclusion of others, the Rajas and Tamas; similar is the case
with the Rajas or Tamas. They remain intermingled
and depend on one another.
15. O Nârada!
Now hear, in detail, which two qualities remain in twins, knowing which,
one is freed from this ocean of the transmigration of existence.
16. I have realised these; therefore you ought
not to have any uncertainties on these points.
The reality of these is especially felt, when it is really understood
and when its effects begin to manifest themselves.
17. O high-minded! No one is able to realise these at once; it
requires be heard, and then meditated upon.
It also depends on one's natural capability and merits, due to the past
actions.
18-21. Suppose one hears of the sacred places of
pilgrimages and is filled with the Râjasic devotion. He goes out to those places and sees what he
had heard before. There he performs his
ablutions, makes offerings and the Râjasic gifts, stays there for some time;
but all this he does under the influence of the Râjasic quality. And when he returns home, he finds himself
not free from lust, anger, love and hatred; he remains the same that he was
before. Therefore, in this case, O
Nârada! man hears but he does not
realise the purifying effects of those holy places. O best of Munis! And when he does not find any benefit from
the holy place of pilgrimage, it is equivalent to his not at all hearing of the
place.
22. O best of Munis! The effect of visiting the sacred places of
pilgrimages is then said to accrue to any individual, when he becomes freed
from his sins, just as the fruit of cultivating fields is then said to occur,
when the cultivator gets the ripened harvest out of his labour and enjoys the
produce of his fields.
23. O Nârada!
Lust, anger, covetousness, delusion, thirst, hatred, love, vanity,
malice, jealousy, non-forgiveness, unrest all these indicate that there is sin;
and until these are purged out of one's body and mind, man lives in sin. If the visiting of the sacred places of
pilgrimages does not enable one to overcome the above passions, then the
labours in going to those places are in vain, i.e., those labours merely are
the results just as the toil only undergone by the cultivator is his only
result, and is not met with any reward when there is no harvest at all.
24-28. Lo! The
cultivator takes hard labour to clear his fields and cultivate the hard soil;
he then sows the valuable seeds, because this is considered as doing good. Next, in expectation of the harvest, he
undergoes a good deal of pains, day and night, to protect his fields and goes
down to sleep, in the cold season, in the forest surrounded by tigers and other dangerous animals; but alas! locusts coming eat away and destroy all the crops,
to the utter disappointment of the cultivator.
All his labours are spent in vain.
So, O Nârada! The labour taken by
one in going to the holy places yields pains, and pains only, instead of
success and happiness.
29-32. When the Sattva quality grows in abundance,
as a consequence of reading the Vedânta and the other S'âstras, dispassion
comes towards the Râjasic and the Tâmasic qualities and things, and the Sattva
quality overpowers the Rajas and Tamas. Similarly
when the Râjasic quality grows in abundance, as a natural consequence of greed
and avarice, then it overpowers Sattva and Tamas; so, by delusion, when the
Tâmasic
quality grows in abundance, it overpowers
the Sattva and the Râjasic qualities. O Nârada! I will now speak to you, in detail, about the
overpowering of these qualities by one another.
33-35. When the Sattva quality grows in
preponderance, the mind rests in religious ideas and things; it no more thinks
of those external things, the products of the Rajas and Tamas qualities. Rather it wants to enjoy the Sâttvic things;
wealth, religious affairs, sacrifices that can be acquired or performed without
any trouble. Then that individual yearns
after salvation and renounces his pursuits after the Râjasic and Tâmasic
objects.
36. Thus, O Nârada! first try to conquer the Rajas and then the
Tamas; then the Sattva becomes pure.
37. When the Râjasic quality grows in
preponderance, the individual imbibes the Râjasic faith, abandons his own
Sanâtan Dharma (settled eternal religion) and practises against his religious
instructions.
38. Under the Râjasic propensities, one is eager
to amass wealth and enjoy the Râjasic things.
The Rajas drives away the Sattva and curbs the Tamas.
39-41. Nârada!
So when the Tâmasic quality grows in preponderance, the faith in the
Vedas and in the religious S'âstras entirely disappears. Imbibing the Tâmasic faith, the individual
squanders away his wealth and is always engaged in quarrels, and party
feelings, envy, violence and never enjoys peace. The individual with the Tâmasic quality in
excess overpowers the Râjasic and Sâttvic qualities and becomes angry, wicked,
and a great cheat and does everything as he likes, without any regard to his
superiors.
42. Nârada!
Thus you see that, of these three qualities, no one can remain entirely alone,
free from the other qualities. These
remain always in twos or threes.
43-44. The Sattva can never exist without the Rajas;
the Rajas can never exist without the Tamas; and these two qualities can never
exist without Tamas. Again Tamas cannot exist
without Rajas and Sattva. These
qualities act and react always in twos or threes.
45-47. They never exist separately; they live in
pairs or threes and are the originators of each other; these qualities are of
the nature of procreating things; in other words, Sattva originates the Rajas
or Tamas; again the Rajas originates sometimes Sattva and Tamas. Again the Tamas sometimes originates Sattva
and Rajas. Thus they generate each other
as the earthen pots and earth are their mutual causes.
48-49. Deva Datta, Visnu Mitra, and Yajña Datta
these three united perform any action, so these three qualities united reside
in the buddhi (intellect) of the Jîvas and generate their sense perceptions. Just as the husband and wife get into a
couple, the qualities get into couples.
50. The Sattva with Rajas forms the couple Rajas
Sattva; so Sattva Rajas forms another couple, where the Sattva predominates. So Sattva end Rajas forms each with Tamas the
other couples.
51. Nârada said!
O Dvaipâyana! Hearing thus about
these three qualities from my father, I asked him again these questions.
Thus ends the eighth chapter of the Mahâ
Purânam S'rîmad Devî Bhâgavatam containing the description of the Gunas, of
18,000 verses by Maharsi Veda Vyâsa.
Source: Translation of The Srimad Devi Bhagvatam by
Swami Vijnanananda
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