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INTRODUCTION TO JAINISM
had written three books (the number would be almost double that a year later). But the language and typographical qualities are “Indian.” I have a digital camera, a laptop and other technical gadgets. She has knowledge, intelligence and fire. We readily agreed that I would go with her, after a month, on a pilgrimage-cum-scientific expedition. But when the gods give assignments, it does not mean that the road will be smooth. On the contrary, one builds character through resistance and conquest.
A few weeks later the telephone rang: “Come at once.” She had gone to a monastery more than a 1000 kilometers to the South. When we met again it was a meeting of friends. She has a deep emotional-spiritual relationship with the leader of the group, guru Achāryaji, and she is respected by everyone. For the last 35 years she has been following him from pilgrim's site to pilgrim's site. Jains are very strict in their principles, but are aware of the relativity of their rules as well. I too was accepted into the community with love and openness, though probably no Westerner had ever been allowed to put his bare feet on the sacred soil. I owe this to the fact that I am a vegetarian, consume no alcohol or drugs, and approach every living being – even the smallest – with care and sympathy. Also I am not married – and that has a very different meaning in such circles in India than it tends to have in the West.
Naked
Nothing but cordiality and openness in the Jain community. Immediately after arriving in the early dawn, I was taken to the inner square of the monastery. The guru, Achāryaji, was meditating there between two temple towers. All the monks, nuns and guests sit devotionally at his feet and takes part in the prayers. The women to the right of him, most of them dressed in the white of the nuns. The men to the left, all of them naked, as was the guru. Unknowingly I had come to a
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