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JULY, 1977
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In time the pilgrim drew again To the spiritual mountain, Where with a cane tree to shelter him, Last words he spoke as pilgrim: “Speak, Soul, Speak ye that the body ye control. O body-distress Of transitoriness! Ye Soul, wondrous strange, Ye permanence in midst of change, Ye eternal and spiritual substance, That in many bodies ye delay omniscience. Is not the ultimate aim of life the liberation From the mirage of body identification ? Soul! Take ye the vow Into the Eternal Identity to journey now, Nor heed the body that ye control Nor speak, till Truth to ye speaks, ye Soul !"
The pilgrim now sought ecstatic meditation, O, stars turned around him in veneration As right judgment he strove to employ That obscuring karmas would destroy. ... Fifty-four days silent, On the fifty-fifth day He took Enlightenment: All-knowing of past, present and future happenings, All-seeing of persons and things, All-powerful within the Infinite, All-wise in the truth of the Spirit.
At that auspicious moment fell divine flowers. In a perfume of lotus showers, And the universe beheld fulfilment of prophecy In the advent of the Lord Aristanemi.
For the Lord's first congregation In revival of the Jaina path to emancipation, Celestials built a four-faced preaching hall For celestial, human, animal and infernal, The four states of worldly existence By their free wills welcome to the Lord's resplendence. For the preaching Lord always would be Surrounded by the pomp of the Asoka tree,
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