Jain Legend Vol 2

Author(s): Hastimal Maharaj, Shuganchand Jain, P S Surana
Publisher: Hastimal Maharaj Shugan C Jain P S Surana

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the humanity very badly from time to time. The culture, the spirituality and religious knowledge that was earned by the untiring efforts of the elevated men for centuries together, and the very concept of humanity was considerably lost as a result of the evil effects of the famine. Even in these calamitous circumstances, the lights of virtues like temperance and spiritual knowledge were kept burning due to the insurmountable willpower of great c ryas like Vajra Sw m. By the grace, mercy and efforts of such great religious leaders, our religion, spiritual knowledge and culture survived and the humanity is kept alive till date, despite the severe blows received from time to time by dreadful famines, political turmoil's and religious upheavals,
The innate desire of crya Vajra Swm was to see that the ocean of knowledge of scriptures should continue to flow perennially and uninterruptedly. But as there was none able and worthy to receive the knowledge of Prvas, he in the autumn of his life felt worried, that the knowledge of Da ap rvas would be lost with him. The spiritual yearning of great souls would not be left unheard. Proving the truth of this axiom, a young monk named rya Rak ita, obeying the command of rya Tosaliputra came to c rya Vajra Sw m. He obtained the knowledge of nine P rvas and could learn only half of the Ten Prva. This is explained in detail in the chapter on rya Rak ita.
Propagating and spreading the preaching of Lord Mah v ra's Jain order, Vajra Sw m reached the southern part of India. He ordered a disciple to bring dry ginger to get relief from his cough. After taking some, as a remedy, he kept the remaining portion of the dry ginger on the upper part of the ear and completely forgot about it. Afternoon, during the time of transcription, as he removed the cloth covering his mouth, the dry ginger also fell on to the ground. He pondered over the incident, “I am on the verge of my life and I became careless. And so, I forgot about this dry ginger which I kept on my ear. How will temperance sustain when carelessness has stepped in? It is better for me to take Sam dhi.” Immediately he foresaw with his power of cognition that a 12 year long famine would upsurge in the near future, which would be more dreadful than the previous one. Hoping that disastrous famine would not engulf all the monks without any survivors, and so in order to save the family of monks, he ordered his disciple Vajrasena to leave for Kumku a (Koka a) with few monks and to wander there until the situation comes
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