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Ancient Jaina Hymns
327
events of a Tīrtharkara's life, viz., conception, birth, initiation into monkhood, attainment of omniscience, and final salvation. The Muni-suvratastavana mentioned these five ‘Kalyāņaka' with regard to the 20th Tīrthankara ( st. 15).
(2) The ‘antarāņi”, i.e., intervals between the Nirvāṇas of two Tirthařkaras succeeding one another. According to the law of the 'Kālacakra', these intervals are on a steady decline, as this Caturvimśatikā belongs to an Avasarpiņī. Thus, 50 lakṣa-koți of sāgaropamas of years intervened between Rşabha and Ajita, the two first ones, but only 250 years elapsed between Pārsva and Mahāvīra, the two last ones.
(3) The spans of their lives, which likewise steadily decrease, as the Avasarpiņi progresses. Thus 84 lakṣa pūrvas of years is given as the age of Rşabha, 30,000 years as that of Munisuvrata (mentioned in st. 6 of the pertinent stavana), 100 as that of Pārsva, and 72 as that of Mahāvīra.
This set of data, combined with the previous one, allows a kind of chronology to be established. Rşabha, the first Tirtharkara's birth took place 84 lakņa pūrvas, 3 years and 8/2 months before the beginning of the 4th 'Ārā', and his death 3 years and 82 months before the same. As we are supposed to live in the third millennium of the 5th 'Ārā', and the duration of the 4th 'Ārā' is 1 koțākoți of sāgaropamas minus 42,000 years, this leads down into mythological ages ! Munisuvrata, another of the Tīrthankaras mentioned in our texts, is supposed to have been an approximate contemporary of Rāma and Sītă, and to have died 1 lakṣa and 84,000 years before Vīra, or roughly 11,84,500 B.C. As he died at the age of 30,000 years, he would have been born 12,14,500 B.C. It is also interesting to realize that Neminātha, the 22nd, is believed to have been contemporary with Krsna, and to have died 84,000 before Vīra, i.e. roughly 84,500 B.C. As he was then 1,000 years old, he would have been born 85,500 B.C. With Pārsvanātha, the 23rd, the dawn of history is reached. As he is stated to have died 250 years before
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