कुलकुमारि विद्महे मन्त्रकोटिसुधीमहि । तन्नः कौलिः प्रचोदयात् । इति कुमार्यर्चनं कृत्वा यो वै साधकोऽभिलिखति सोऽमृतत्वं गच्छति । स यश आप्नोति । स परमायुष्यमथ वा परं ब्रह्म भित्त्वा तिष्ठति
kulakumāri vidmahe mantrakoṭisudhīmahi | tannaḥ kauliḥ pracodayāt | iti kumāryarcanaṃ kṛtvā yo vai sādhako'bhilikhati so'mṛtatvaṃ gacchati | sa yaśa āpnoti | sa paramāyuṣyamatha vā paraṃ brahma bhittvā tiṣṭhati
«Let us know the maiden of the clan, let us contemplate the myriad mantras: may that kauliṣ impel us». — Having thus performed worship of the Maiden, whatever sādhaka inscribes [the diagram], he attains immortality; he obtains glory; he — long life, or, having pierced the highest Brahman, abides».
83fc7a2a7fe4 · published Aug 7, 2026, 5:19:24 AM UTC
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A gāyatrī of new composition is cited — not the Vedic one, but composed after its pattern: «let us know… let us contemplate… may it impel». There are many such imitations in later books, and they are made simply: a name of whoever is worshipped is substituted into the ready frame.
This device is not vicious in itself and exists in Vaishnava books too. But here what is substituted is kaulī, a word of that very left direction discussed when reading the thirty-fifth line, and so it cannot be passed by. Kula-kumārī, «maiden of the clan», in these circles means a girl who is worshipped as a living manifestation of the Goddess: her feet are washed, she is fed, one bows to her. This rite — kumārī-pūjā — is still alive today in Bengal and Nepal, and in its open form it contains nothing wrong: to honor a child as the highest is a touching custom, and there is nothing to condemn in it.
Something else must be said. In the left direction the same rite has a continuation its adherents speak of reluctantly, and that continuation concerns a grown woman and what is done to her in the rite. The book does not speak of this here, and it would be dishonest to attribute more to it; but the word kaulī stands in the text, and the reader should know where it leads.
The measure here is simple and fits more than just this one book. Everything done to a child or a woman in a rite is tested by the question: would you want this done to your own daughter, and would she know what she was consenting to. Where the answer is «no», the rite is bad, whatever explanation is given by diagrams and syllables.