Narodakini

Nāroḍākinī (Sanskrit, Standard Tibetan: Naro Khachö Wylie: nā ro mkha' spyod^[1]) is a deity in Vajrayana Buddhism^[2] similar to Vajrayogini^[3][4] (red, striding, bearing a vajra).

In the Sādhanamālā, she is said to be a transformation or emanation of Vajrayogini.^[5] Nārodākinī is readily recognizable by her lunging posture and kapala. Her head is uptilted, poised to imbibe the blood that overflows her kapala, and her right hand brandishes a curved kartika. Nārodākinī's physical attributes are interpreted with reference to long-standing Buddhist principles as well as distinctively tantric concepts. For example, her freely flowing hair is, in the Indic setting, a mark of a yogic practitioner, especially one who cultivates tummo,^[6] whereas Buddhist exegetes interpret the unbound tresses as a sign that her mind, free from grasping, is a flowing stream of nonconceptuality.^{[7][8][9][10]} Her crown of five skulls represents her transformation of the five aspects of selfhood into the five transcendental insights of a Buddha. Her garland of fifty severed heads symbolizes her purification of the fifty primary units of language and thought. Her bone ornaments represent five of the six perfections of a bodhisattva. Her body itself represents the sixth perfection, wisdom, which all female deities implicitly personify.

Nārodākinī carries a mystical khaṭvāṅga^[11][12]), supported by her left arm or balanced across her left shoulder. The staff indicates that she is not celibate and has integrated^[13] eroticism into her spiritual path, mastering the art of transmuting pleasure into transcendent bliss.^[14]

She manifested herself in an initiatory vision to the great Indian mahasiddha and teacher Naropa, (956-1040) who received teachings from her. She is patroness of the Sakya school and an acolyte of Vajravārāhī. She is a sarvabuddhaḍākinī, having access to all the Buddhas and thus is more powerful. This form of Vajrayogini is the preeminent form of yogini in the Cakrasaṃvara and Vajravārāhī tantras.^[15]