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I am the Soul
at the feet of the Lord, prayed to Him, heard the sermons and arranged for the Lord to observe chaturmas (the four months of rains) at Rajgruhi for fourteen years. Not just that, he always lamented his inability in getting ordained. When he saw the many fortunate jivas accepting ordainment after hearing the Lord's sermons, his own queens and princes being ordained, while he himself experienced the inability to get into the order, the sadness within him reached the peak and he was in a turmoil.
He began earning commission from piety. He made his financial strength available to everybody and facilitated those who desired to get ordained. The finest noble thoughts that resided within him took him on the path of becoming a Tirthankar. That is, he earned the Tirthankar Nam Gotra karma, and now he is bound to become Tirthankar just like Bhagwan Mahavira. In this same Bharat Kshetra (region), in the coming Avasarpini age, he will be the first among the future twenty-four Tirthankars. Thus because of the company of a Tirthankar, he will be a Tirthankar.
The power of the good company did have another result - Shrenik achieved True Faith, he experienced his Soul. His earlier actions had already bound him to a life in hell and hence going to hell was inevitable. The scriptures tell us that he did go to hell but endured the intolerable torture in peace. The true faith that resided in his soul kept him from sensing the miseries. How could they? Misery is after all misery. The same miseries that affect the Mithyatvi - f1221697- (one with a wrong faith) also affect the Samyaktvi - Apaaret - (one with true faith). But -
ज्ञानी के अज्ञानी जन, सुख-दुःख रहित न कोय ज्ञानी भोगवे ज्ञानशुं, मूरख भोगवे रोय । Enlightened or ignorant, none escapes the sorrows and joy,
The prudent suffer with wisdom, while the foolish suffer and cry! By this rule the vision of the one with true faith would have undergone a change. He does not look upon sorrow as sorrow.
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