Epitome of Jainism

SR No.: 006737
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: K B Jindal
Publisher: Munshiram Manoharlal Publisher's Pvt Ltd New Delhi
Publication Year: 1988
Total Pages: 248
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 13 MB

Page 143

Gommatsara, Jiva-kand
131 (5) The thickness of the first earth from its crust at the Middle World
down to the end of the second part; Panka Bhaga, i.e. just before
the beginning of the first layer of the first hell. Now the central or first continent, Jambûdvîpa, has a diameter of one lac Yojanas. This is divided into seven countries (Ksetra) each separated from the other by a mountain (Kulâchala). Thus we have seven countries and six mountains. The first is a country, the second a moun tain and so on. Each succeed ingdivision has double the width of its predecessor, till we reach Videha, the central region round Sumeru, from where the width begins to be half of its predecessor. Thus arithmetically the divisions are 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 32, 16, 8, 4, 2, 1, a total of 190 units. The countries in the extreme north and south being each of one unit have a width of one lac Yojans divided by 190, i.e. 526 . Yojanas.
The second, third and fourth countries, next to the extreme north and south, have respectively 4, 16, and 64, units of width.
In these three pairs of countries there are the three Bhog Bhûmis or Enjoyment-Lands, being the lowest (Jaghanya), middle (Madhyama), and the highest (Uttama) Bhoga-Bhûmis, respectively.
In Videha, however, the eastern and western countries, beyond the eastern and western limits of the Bhadra Sala forest, are Karma Bhûmis. The rest alone, i.e. the region immediately round Sumeru is the highest Bhoga Bhúmi. The region in the north is called Uttara Kuru, that in the south Deva Kuru Bhoga Bhûmi.
In 32 countries of Videha, and in the rest of the continent there is Karma Bhúmi or Work-Region, where people have to depend on agriculture etc. for their living. In Enjoyment Region, they have no work to do, they get all that they want from Kalpa Vșikșas, wishing-trees, never have disease or accidents, and live the full span of their lives. The least happiness of a man in Bhoga Bhûmi is infinite times the happiness of a Chakravarti.
It is very significant that the islanders of Java have a word in their language denoting an Enjoyment-Land. Is it that the Jaina missionaries and colonists penetrated into these islands, centuries and centuries ago, and left the tradition of their Bhoga-Bhůmi three ?
In the Lavana Ocean round Jambûdvipa, and in Kâlodadhi round Dhâtukî Khanda, there are 96 islands; 48 in cach, 24 on each shore of the Ocean. They are inhabited by ill formed persons (kumanusya) with disproportionate (hundaka) bodies. All of them have an age of one Palya. These people also do not have any agriculture etc, and live, some on mud and some on fruits. They have no wishing-trees. As they have no arts of agriculture etc., they are called people of Bhoga Bhûmi, but as their life is low and savage-like and their forms improper and distorted, the land is called Ku-Bhoga Bhûmi or wrong, distorted or improper EnjoymentLand.