Siva first appeared as Kumâra Nîla Lohita or âgavataPurâRudra. And all beings thereafter got the potentiality of dissolution, phenomenal change, death and decay. But in the first stage of life process, phenomenal change, decay or dissolution was not in requisition, as Monads went on in their downward journey, not by dissolution, but by evolution. They remained what they were, and they acquired in addition a more material form. As the material form became prominent the Deva form and the astral form became suppressed.
Consciousness in Deva form manifests itself as mind, in the astral form as animal desire and sense perception. In the mineral form it can hardly shew itself.
Siva works out the decay and dissolution of mineral matter, so that the astral element may once more assert itself and there may be sense perception in the mineral metamorphosed into the vegetable. The process is carried further in the animal kingdom, and the animals get a constitution in which Kâma or animal desire can manifest itself. The animals evolve themselves by death. Death frees them from the trammels of one set of experience, and carries them onwards till the human body is reached.
The work of dissolution proceeds in various ways. Our sleep is partial dissolution. It is brought on by the astral attendants of Siva.
Dissolution is caused by Tamas. Tamas begets inaction, and inaction causes death and decay. There is no phenomenal change without dissolution, death or decay.
There are so many material tendencies in us that they require rejection. Siva gives us the power of rejection, as Vishnu, the power of preservation -- preservation of all that is good in us. Death makes the man, where moral teachings fail, The Consort of Siva is the Energy through Whom He guides the life process of Monads or Jivas. In the first stage of life process She is called Sâti or the Lasting. For the body of the Jiva was lasting during the period of evolution. But Her mission was to act on the Monad itself, to cause the material tendency in it by means of Tamas.
In the second stage, She is the Energy of dissolution, death and phenomenal change. In the third stage, she is over and above that the Energy of rejection (of all that is evil in us.) She is the kind mother, who has been nourishing all Jivas in their course of evolution.