Sthaneshwar Timalsina

In one of the simplest images of Kālī, for example, she is portrayed as standing atop Śiva or a corpse, carrying a chopped head and a sword, and displaying the gestures of giving and protection. She is visualized as standing in the cremation grounds. There is a direct correspondence between the symbols used in Kālī imagery and the concepts to which they refer. Tantric texts decipher images as if texts, and use an image for visualization practices to bring to memory the central Tantric doctrines. All the aspects of visualization, the dark hue of Kālī, her nude body and widely spread hair, strident position sitting atop Śiva, for example, mean something if exploited as metonymic relations. When an image is visualized, the process compresses multiple layers of thought into a single image. These images are consciously preserved in memory, brought alive through mental projection, and are manipulated in the mental space in accordance with the system of visualization.

Any symbol can be used to signify multiple relations and complex, related concepts. The concept of “mirror networks” helps to decipher this process. A deity seated in a particular vehicle or a seat identifies her association with another deity or concept. Kalı sitting atop a corpse in the cremation ground depicts both her relation to death and time, and in essence, her transcendence to time. The chopped head or the sword that she carries indicates a specific role that she plays or a particular act that she accomplishes. Even the most basic image with two hands describes two different roles, and thus two concepts. Thus, the concept of mirror network has relevance to a fruitful exploration of Tantric images.