விசாலாட்சி அம்மன் கோயில் (காசி)Vishalakshi Temple, Kashi

Sthala Mahātmyam

Vishalakshi at Varanasi, invoked as 'Varanasyam Vishalakshi', is the seventeenth Maha Shakti Peetha, in the eternal city of Kashi beside the Ganga. Tradition holds that an earring (karna-kundala) of Sati, and by some accounts her face, fell here near the celebrated Manikarnika, and so she is also called Manikarni Devi. Her name, 'she of the large, wide eyes', is an epithet of Parvati, and she is enshrined at Mir Ghat (Lohari Tola / Dharmakupa) as the presiding Shakti of Kashi, complementing Vishwanath and the guardian Kala Bhairava. To worship Vishalakshi in the city of liberation is held to be especially meritorious. She is particularly venerated by devotees from the South, who regard her as akin to Kanchi Kamakshi and Madurai Meenakshi. Chief festivals are Kajali Tij, the third day of the dark fortnight of Bhadrapada, celebrated grandly at the shrine, along with Navaratri and Durga Puja, and Fridays sacred to the goddess. Pilgrims combine her darshan with Kashi Vishwanath and a Ganga bath to complete the sanctity of Kashi.