Maa ChinnaMasta Jayanti

Significance of Maa ChinnaMasta Jayanti

Maa ChinnaMasta Jayanti is an auspicious festival celebrated annually on Shukla Paksha Chaturdashi of the Baisakh month, according to the lunar calendar, by the ardent devotees and worshippers of Maa ChinnaMasta — the Divine Mother of self-sacrifice and altruism, the life-giver and the life-taker.

Origin stories and legends of Maa ChinnaMasta

The story of the emergence of Maa ChinnaMasta appears in two distinct sets of legends:

• The origin myths of the Das Mahavidyas
• Stories explaining the genesis of Maa ChinnaMasta as an individual form of the Divine Mother

The emergence of Maa ChinnaMasta as one among the Das Mahavidyas

In chapter 8 of the tenth-century Shakta Mahabhagavata Purana, Lord Shiva extolled the glory of the Das Mahavidyas to sage Narada, and recounted the legend of their emergence — the ten great cosmic wisdom expressions of the Divine Mother of the universe.

According to the legend, once Maa Sati, a form of the Divine Mother manifesting as the daughter of Daksha and first life-partner of Lord Shiva, became enraged when her father did not invite her and Lord Shiva to his fire-sacrifice ceremony. Despite Lord Shiva's protests, Maa Sati in her anger insisted on attending to humble her father's pride. When Lord Shiva kept refusing permission, Maa Sati resolved to remind him that she was the very emanation of the Divine Mother herself.

With lips trembling with anger and eyes blazing like the fire of destruction, Maa Sati roared with laughter. Terrified, Lord Shiva fled in all directions. To restrain him, the Divine Mother appeared in one transcendent form in each of the ten directions. In whichever direction he fled, she confronted him in one of her ten Mahavidya forms. To his right (in the east), holding her self-decapitated head in her hand, stood Maa ChinnaMasta — the fearsome and enigmatic form of the Divine Mother. Her association with the east symbolizes the auspicious renewal of the process of life and death.

The emergence of Maa ChinnaMasta as an individual form of the Divine Mother

In the Prana Toshini Tantra, drawn from the Narada Pancharatra, one day Maa Parvati — the reincarnation of Maa Sati — went to bathe in the Mandakini river with her attendants Jaya and Vijaya, also known as Dakini and Varnini. Her two attendants begged her for food out of extreme hunger, praying, “We are overpowered with hunger, O Mother of the universe! Give us food so we may be satisfied, O merciful one, bestower of boons and fulfiller of desires.”

On hearing this sincere prayer, the merciful Divine Mother smiled and severed her own head with her fingernails. Her head fell onto the palm of her left hand, and three bloodstreams emerged from her throat — the left and right falling into the mouths of her attendants, and the central into her own mouth. After this act of self-sacrifice to feed her devotees, Maa Parvati was venerated as Maa ChinnaMasta.

In the Svatantra Tantra portion of the Prana Toshini Tantra, Lord Shiva narrates a similar story. In the Krta Yuga, Maa Mahamaya was engaged in mahavrata with Lord Shiva on Mt. Kailasa; from her body two shaktis emerged as her attendants Dakini and Varnini. One day, at the bank of the Pushpabhadra river, her hungry attendants requested food. The smiling and auspicious Divine Mother looked in all directions, severed her head, fed Dakini with the left stream, Varnini with the right, and drank the central stream herself. After playing in this way she replaced her head and reverted to her original form, returning home at dusk. This happened on Viraratri — and so Maa ChinnaMasta is said to have emerged on Viraratri.

These origin stories emphasize the greatness of Maa ChinnaMasta's mercy and the power of self-sacrifice and altruism. Her depiction — decapitating herself, feeding her attendants and herself — symbolizes that in her divine play, destruction and creation occur simultaneously, and that she is all-pervasive yet remains beyond all that she has created.

Temples commemorating Maa ChinnaMasta Jayanti

Maa ChinnaMasta Jayanti is celebrated with great festivity. Devotees decorate temples and shrines with love and devotion, chant mantras, and recite praises of Maa ChinnaMasta. Many temples arrange community kitchens where the poor are served good food for free. Temples and shrines associated with the day include:

1. The temple of Maa Chintpurni in Himachal Pradesh, northern India
2. The temple in Rajrappa in Jharkhand, India
3. A shrine dedicated to Maa ChinnaMasta in the Maa Durga Temple complex, Ramnagar, near Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh
4. A shrine in the Changu Narayan Temple, Changunarayan Municipality, Bhaktapur District, Nepal
5. A temple in Patan, Lalitpur Metropolitan City, Nepal