“Hymn to Kali” is a famous Hindu verse that praises Kali, the goddess of destruction, transformation, and the ultimate reality beyond. Woodroffe’s rendering of the hymn includes extensive notes on the Tantric implications of the work. The hymn portrays the depth and mystic power of the Tantric sadhana, the devotion, and outpouring of love for divine power and beauty.
Availability
Excerpt
Verses 10, 15-18, and the second portion of verse 20 deal with Latāsādhana.
The śakti [feminine aspect] of this sādhana [religious practice] is ordinarily the own wife of the sādhaka [practitioner], married according to the Vaidik injunctions; the svaśakti or ādyāśaktī, as she is technically called in Tantra. One’s own wife is Ādyā-Śaktī [original or primordial feminine energy] and Sādhana should be done with her aid (Ādyā-śaktīh svadārāh syāt tāmevaśṛtya sādhayet). With her is practised that śaktīsādhana, the aim of which is the acquirement of self-control, which, checking the outward-going current [the orgasm], places the sādhaka upon the path of nivṛtti [cessation of suffering]. Indeed, the Kaulikarcanadfpika says, “Without adya s’akti worship is but evil magic”. … It is only the siddha, which term is here used in the special sense of one who has obtained complete control over his passions, to whom is permitted another s’akti (paras’akti).