Kamakhya Temple: The temple of menstruation

Kamakhya Temple: The temple of menstruation

Kamakhya Devi,  the mother goddess of menstruation, the symbol of womanhood, and one of the 4 main Shaktipeeth of Hindu pilgrimage.

At the other places where menstruating girls are considered profane and treated profoundly with disgust, at Kamakhya the same people worship the menstruating mother goddess with the same extent of devotion.

What an ironic tragedy? Things related to religion are sacred meanwhile, people related to them are unholy!

The temple has always been a unique and captivating site of Hindu Pilgrimage that has its roots dwelled in the pages of Shivaism history.

Worship 

The temple lies in the Nilachal hills of Guwahati, Assam. There is a complex of 10 Mahavidyas of Shakti at Kamakhya temple namely Kali, Tara, Sodashi, Bhuvaneshwari, Kamalatmika, Matanga, Kamakhya, Tripurasundara. Among these, the last 3 are situated at a single place, the main sanctum of Kamakhya temple.

The deity is worshiped with flowers and animal sacrifices. According to Kalika Purana, The goddess is the yielder of all desires, and the young bride of Shiva is the merciful giver of Salvation ( Moksha).

Also popular as Kamrupa-Kamakhya temple. She is the divine Shakti, wife of Shiva.

It is worshiped to repel evil spirits and black magic over anyone and to celebrate the ability of women to conceive.

The tale of the bleeding goddess

The famous legend says that Shakti the newly married wife of Shiva wanted to attend a Yajna at her father’s home. Being uninvited, Shiva stopped her, but she ignored him and did heavy arguments.

When she reached Yajna, her father who was envious of Shiva insulted her a lot. He reached to its maximum limit of sin when he abused Shiva. Shakti was outraged devastatingly from her husband's insult and jumped into the holy fire of Yajna. 

When Shiva acknowledged the suicidal demise of her new bride, he became extremely raged and thundered with the dance of destruction, Tandava, holding the corpse of her wife in arms.

Being extensively upset, raged, and shocked, he wandered everywhere in the universe holding the burnt corpse of her wife.

All the deities were extremely scarred by the dreadful Shiva, only then Vishnu used his Chakra and split the corpse into 108 parts. The 51 places where parts of Shakti fell were called Shaktipeeth, founded by Shiva himself.

 The lower genital part of Shakti fell at Kamakhya, this temple is popular for the Yoni part.

Significance

It is believed that Kamakhya is the same place where Shiva and Shakti spent their secret quality time after marriage.

The deity is believed to suffer from regular menstruation for 3 days in June month. Hence, the doors are closed for that particular time and on the 4th day, a great festival of Ambavasi puja is celebrated. 

It celebrates the auspicious regular menstruation of Shakti and the ability of women to conceive.

There is no Idol in the sanctum Sanctorum( Garbhgrah), instead, there is a shape of the genital part of women with a womb and vagina filled with water and red color.

It is the main place of worship.

Facts to discover!

A royal family Koch Bihar is abolished to visit the temple due to an ancient legendary curse by a goddess. Thus they are strictly prohibited there.

Also, it was built with help of Kamadeva, hence popular as Kamdev Kamakhya temple. 

It is very tragic to see that on one side people worship the menstruating goddess, with a lot of devotion, and on the other side, menstruating girls are prohibited to enter.

These topics have always been an issue of stigma and embarrassment.

Many myths and misconceptions regarding menstruating girls say they are impure, untouchable, and bring bad luck during menstruation has led the situations harsh.

While at the other corner of the state, the deity is worshiped with pomp and glory! Even people visit here to achieve salvation from the bleeding goddess!

It has been a well-known epicenter for tantriks to attain power and knowledge of repelling evil spirits too!