Though Kali is associated with divinity, She has also been called 'Queen of the Demons' (and deservedly so). Her role could be compared to that of Persephone/Proserpine of the Greeks, who descends into the Underworld to rule there during half the seasonal and cosmologic cycle. Kali seems much more in control over Her destiny than the Greek goddess, however.
Let us begin, then, with this story to which I make mention (perhaps one of the first known concerning Kali):
The gods and the titans engaged in a great battle. There was one particular titan who was too powerful for the lesser gods to defeat. Durga, the Warrior/Mother goddess, was then called upon for aid. She arrived in splendour, riding a lion into battle, Her ten arms each bearing a magical weapon, Her ten faces each displaying a serene calm. She became the center of a cyclonic force of destruction.
Durga wounded the asura king (who was Her main opponent and the hub of his army). From his wounds the blood flowed to the ground, yet where each drop touched the soil a 'clone' of him appearred. The more quickly and fiercely She attacked, the faster his reproduction took place.
In the heat of Her frenzy, Durga called forth Her most powerful (and gruesome) aspect. From Her brow emanated Kali, the Destroyer. Kali was as black as the night, draped in a tiger's skin, was wearing a necklace of skulls, a skirt of severed hands, and had a gaunt, ghoulish contenance. She was the very essence of wrath. With the fierce passion of a mad mother protecting Her children, She began to eat the asura army.
Kali's intense hunger and lust for blood were the necessary elements for victory. She gobbled up the new forms of the asura king, slurped up the blood escaping from his wounds, finally devouring him whole. The army, defeated and demoralized, quickly dispersed and peace was again restored to the realm of the gods.
In many ways the asuras were the manifestation of malevolent masculine energies. They are most often depicted in male form and almost always as feral, animal-like beings. They are the brutish, coercive aspects of the Cosmos.
In this story Kali is a savioress despite the gruesomeness of Her appearance. She enters as the Queen of Battle in order to quench the demon-fire that ravages the heavens (and by fallout, our world). Her main strengths are Her passion and Her ability to take others into Herself: to consume. This is an important point. Kali is the powerful, hungry feminine. The consumption of the masculine is therefore necessary and transformative.
When a battle is forced (by asura-energies), it is our ability to take in, to absorb the very being of our adversary which makes real peace possible (preferrably by our understanding of their position and thus our ability to negotiate, rather than our ability to predict their behavior and react aggressively in response).
If and when consciousness devolves into combative conflict (as it has many times in the past and shall likely continue), then 'consuming our adversary', in the spirit of 'knowing our enemy', is the best method of successful resolution. Direct confrontation only breeds others in succession who will readily assume the role of adversarial leader in the event of a temporary triumph.
When ravaging masculine energies threaten the sacred, Kali comes to the fore here so as to quell the activity of that war, matching the wild masculine passion with Her feminine counterpart, and renewing a harmonized equilibrium.
Kali is the mask of Death, drinking the Elixir of Life (blood) and reconciling polar energies. She is the goddess of our time (in many Hindu cosmologies we currently live in the 'Kali yuga', or 'Age of Kali' -- a time of disintegration and moral depravity).
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