The Divine Sacrifice of Chinnamasta: Symbolism of Dakini and Varnini Drinking the Sacred Blood
The Legend of the Self-Decapitated Goddess
Among the ten Mahavidyas, Goddess Chinnamasta stands as one of the most awe-inspiring and profound manifestations of the Divine Mother. The name “Chinnamasta” literally means “She whose head is severed.” The Devi appears fearsome, holding her own severed head in one hand, while three streams of blood flow from her neck—one entering her own mouth and the other two being drunk by her attendants, Dakini and Varnini.
According to the legend, Goddess Parvati once went to bathe in the sacred river Mandakini, accompanied by her attendants, Dakini and Varnini. After bathing, the attendants expressed intense hunger. Knowing that they could only be nourished by blood and flesh, the compassionate Goddess, in an act of supreme sacrifice, cut off her own head with her fingernail. Three streams of blood emerged—two feeding her attendants and the third nourishing herself.
The Symbolism of Chinnamasta
This striking image holds deep esoteric significance. Chinnamasta represents the eternal balance between life and death, creation and destruction, selflessness and self-awareness. Her act of self-decapitation is not one of violence, but of transcendence—it reveals the truth that life feeds upon life, and that sacrifice sustains the universe.
The three streams of blood symbolize the three major nadis or energy channels in yogic philosophy—Ida, Pingala, and Sushumna. By cutting off her head, the Goddess severs the ego (the head being symbolic of individuality and attachment), allowing divine consciousness to flow freely.
Dakini and Varnini: The Consuming Energies
Dakini and Varnini, her attendants, are not merely companions but personifications of the consuming energies of existence. Dakini represents rajas (activity and passion), while Varnini symbolizes tamas (inertia and dissolution). The Goddess herself embodies sattva (purity and illumination). Their drinking of her blood signifies the cyclical balance of the three gunas—how all aspects of nature are nourished by the same divine source.
The Spiritual Message
Chinnamasta’s act teaches the ideal of complete self-surrender and the unity of opposites. She is both the giver and the receiver, the nourisher and the nourished. Her terrifying form conceals a sublime truth—that spiritual awakening often demands the cutting away of the self and ego. As described in Devi Bhagavata Purana (7.33.12), “She who appears terrible to the ignorant is, to the wise, the embodiment of supreme compassion.”
Thus, the image of Dakini and Varnini drinking from the Goddess is not one of horror, but of divine sustenance—an eternal reminder that all beings are sustained by the same cosmic power, and that the path to liberation lies through the sacrifice of the self into the infinite.