Religious Quest of India

SR No.: 011031
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: J N Farquhar, Griswold
Publisher: J N Farquhar Griswold
Total Pages: 365
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 25 MB

Page 137

FUNDAMENTAL TRUTHS
poor (Vastra punya) and especially to monks, as the following legend teaches. Once upon a time a rich merchant's wife saw some monks shivering with cold, and made them blankets of cloth of gold out of some magnificent material she had by her. As a recompense she became in her next birth Marudevi, the mother of the first Tirthankara Ṛişabhadeva, and attained mokşa in the same incarnation.
III
Another legend illustrates the reward gained by any one, iv. even a heretic, for building or lending a house to a monk Layana and (Layana punya), or providing seats, beds or bedding v. Śayana (Sayana punya). A potter named Śakaḍāla, a follower of punya. Gośāla, once saw Mahavira enter his village and approach his dwelling. At first he thought of not inviting Gośāla's great opponent into his house, but seeing Mahavira's divine qualities, he at length asked him in and gave him lodgings and a bed. (He could not offer food, as a sadhu may not eat at the house where he stays.) In return Mahāvīra taught Śakaḍāla the law and converted him to the true faith, and he became a devoted Śrāvaka in this life and after death a god. Being reincarnated as a man, he became a sadhu and so reached mokşa.
By thinking well of every one and wishing them well we vi. Mana gain Mana punya, and by excrting ourselves to render them punya. service or to save life we accumulate Kaya or Śarīra punya, vii. Śarīra as the following history shows. In a certain forest there punya. was a small clearing, and once, when a terrible fire raged in the wood, all the animals rushed to this spot, and it became dangerously overcrowded. Even the mighty elephant had taken refuge there, and as he happened to raise his foot to change his position a hare ran under it. The elephant saw at once that if he put his foot down he would crush the hare, and in that crowded space there was not another place to which the hare could possibly move. So the elephant continued to hold his foot in the air for hours and hours, until at last, worn out, he fell to the ground and died. Immediately he was reincarnated as the son of a mighty