Introduction to Jainism

Author(s): Rudi Jansma, Sneh Rani Jain
Publisher: Prakrit Bharti Academy

Page 35

HISTORY AND TIRTHAMKARAS
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before such a soul enters into the womb of his mother-to-be. Nature and the environment change and become of extremely pleasant character. No poverty and no unhappiness prevail, and their birth brings fulfillment all around the region. They themselves are born in families where all worldly things have reached their highest fulfillment, i.e. in royal families. For the time being all suffering of the surrounding people disappears. Before he incarnated on earth he had lived 33 eons in a heavenly realm as a celestial being of very high nature. The birth of Tīrthamkaras is surrounded by miraculous events. The positions in time to which the Jains assign their Tīrthamkaras are expressed in astronomical numbers of sometimes quadrillions of years, which no doubt have a hidden meaning. But in any case, Rishabha lived more than 6/2 million years ago. This seems at first glance absurd from a western point of view, but if we take into account that the teachings given here describe the entire development of human culture and cultural history of our own human race from its early youth, that figure appears is so very strange. The dominant scientific opinion in the West is that humans have been a species distinct from their physically nearest relatives for a few million years.
The subsequent Tīrthamkaras lived later of course, but succeeded each other ever more rapidly. The space between the 23rd and 24"" was only 250 years. The 22nd lived more than 5000 years ago, and the 20th almost 870,000 years (according to the Hindu timescale of yugas).
Rishabha married two beautiful girls; one gave him 98 or 100 sons and one daughter, the other one son and one daughter. His oldest son was Bharata, who later, when Rishabha withdrew from the world to lead a spiritual life, succeeded him as king. The actual name of the country which in the West we call India is Bhārata - as we can see on every postage stamp and banknote - the land of the great lineage that was initiated by Bharata, son of Rishabha.
Rishabha lived at a time of transition. Old traditions were already fading away and new values had not yet been