Palden Lhamo is the black goddess protector is an especially powerful female protector of the faith. She is known in sanskrit as Shri Devi a wrathful emanation of Saraswati.
Palden Lhamo is also the personal protector the Dalai Lama. Once, while queen of Sri Lanka, Shridevi strenuously objected to her husband's practice of human sacrifice and threatened to kill their son if her husband's barbarism did not cease. When human sacrifice continued, she carried out her promise. As the goddess mounted a mule (covered with the flayed skin of her son) to flee the kingdom, the king aimed an arrow in her direction, hitting the mule's haunch. Shridevi removed the arrow and magically transformed the wound into an eye, thus augmenting her powers to see and watch over the realms of the Buddhist faith. Riding on a white wild ass, adorned with skulls, she holds a skull cup filled with brains while crossing a sea of blood. Hanging from the flank of the wild ass are a pair of dice to cast the karmic fate of sentient beings, and a bag filled with the world's diseases. She brandishes a demon-taming staff. It is her mission to protect the Buddhist teachings, institutions and practitioners.
|