page_title: Chhinnamasta
section_title: Legends and textual references
hierarchical_section_title: Chhinnamasta / Legends and textual references
caption_attribution_description: English: Chinnamasta India: Rajasthan Eighteenth century CE "The blood of a goddess symbolically feeds the world and also herself. That represents the "eternal cycle" of psychic life supporting the ego for the sake of the Self."
context_page_description: Chhinnamasta, often spelled Chinnamasta, and also called Chinnamastika and Prachanda Chandika and Jogani Maa, is a Hindu goddess. She is one of the Mahavidyas, ten goddesses from the esoteric tradition of Tantra, and a ferocious aspect of Parvati, the Hindu Mother goddess. The self-decapitated nude goddess, usually standing or seated on a divine copulating couple, holds her own severed head in one hand and a scimitar in another. Three jets of blood spurt out of her bleeding neck and are drunk by her severed head and two attendants.
  Chhinnamasta is a goddess of contradictions. She symbolises both aspects of Devi: a life-giver and a life-taker. She is considered both a symbol of sexual self-control and an embodiment of sexual energy, depending upon interpretation. She represents death, temporality, and destruction as well as life, immortality, and recreation. The goddess conveys spiritual self-realization and the awakening of the kundalini – spiritual energy. The legends of Chhinnamasta emphasise her self-sacrifice – sometimes coupled with a maternal element – sexual dominance, and self-destructive fury.
context_section_description: Chhinnamasta is often named as the fifth or sixth Mahavidya (Mahavidyas are a group of ten fearsome goddesses from the Hindu esoteric tradition of Tantra), with hymns identifying her as a fierce aspect of Devi, the Hindu Mother goddess. Kinsley says that three Mahavidyas – Kali, Tara, and Chhinnamasta – are prominent among Mahavidya depictions and lists, but that Chhinnamasta barely has an independent existence outside the group. The Guhyatiguhya-Tantra (c. 9th century) equates the god Vishnu's ten avatars with the ten Mahavidyas; the man-lion avatar Narasimha is described to have arisen from Chhinnamasta. A similar list in Mundamala Tantra (pre-16th century) equates Chhinnamasta with the avatar Parshurama.
  Chhinnamasta appears in two distinct set of legends: the origin myths of Mahavidyas as a group and those explaining the genesis of Chhinnamasta as an individual goddess.
caption: An 18th-century painting from Rajasthan depicts Chhinnamasta as black, as described in the Pranatoshini Tantra legend. She is seated on a copulating couple (Krishna & Radha).
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