Kurukulla (Tibetan: Rigjema) is a red, dancing goddess of Tibetan Buddhism, often regarded as a form of Tara. Vajrayana Buddhism describes enlightened activity in four modes, pacifying, enriching, magnetising and subjugating, and magnetising is her special field. She is the deity of attraction: practitioners call on her to draw favourable conditions and other people towards them and, above all, to draw beings towards the Dharma.
How she is shown
- Red, the colour of magnetising activity, with one face and three eyes, her expression partly peaceful and partly fierce.
- Four arms. One pair draws a bow and arrow; the other holds a hook and a noose. All four are made of red utpala flowers: she wins beings over by attraction rather than force.
- Dancing, her right leg drawn up and her left foot pressing down on a prostrate figure, on a sun disc and lotus. In some accounts the figure is the demon Rahu.
- A crown of skulls, bone ornaments and a garland of severed heads, with a tiger-skin skirt: the dress of a semi-wrathful deity.
- Flames of wisdom surround her, and Amitabha Buddha often sits above her or in her crown.
Where she comes from
Kurukulla was probably an Indian goddess of enchantment before she entered Buddhist tantra. Her mantra appears in the Hevajra Tantra, and one scripture of the Tibetan canon, the Practice Manual of Noble Tara Kurukulla, is devoted to her; its title shows how closely she is tied to Tara. She is also linked with Amitabha and, in the Hevajra tradition, with Hevajra. In the Sakya school she is one of the "Three Great Red Deities", with Red Ganapati and Takkiraja.
What magnetising means
Her practice manual contains rites of enthralment, of increasing wisdom and of removing poison, and it gives each a deeper meaning: by attracting beings with loving kindness, the practitioner can lead them all to awakening. Her practice is done after initiation, under a teacher's guidance.
Her mantra
Om Kurukulle Hrih Svaha, in Tibetan pronunciation Om Kurukulle Hri Soha.
In a painting
Look for movement: a dancing figure whose weight rests convincingly on one foot, a bow drawn taut and an arrow aimed true. Her bow, arrow, hook and noose should still read as flowers, petal by petal. The red of her body should glow evenly against the flames around her, with soft shading rather than a flat fill, and the tiny heads of her garland and skulls of her crown should be drawn with care. Some of our paintings set her in a landscape of trees and rivers beneath a sun and moon. To recognise her at a glance: a red, four-armed goddess dancing on one leg and drawing a bow made of flowers.
