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March), he realized the way of gaining lasting happiness. This is known as the ultimate enlightenment and the attainment of omniscience or Kewaljnän. Then for guiding the people towards the right path, he set up the fourfold religious order comprising monks, nuns, householder males and householder females. Rushabhsen, the son of Bharat (Some people consider him as a son of Rushabhdev) became the head of the monks and Brähmi and Sundari headed the order of nuns. As establisher of that religious order which is known as Tirtha, he is considered the first Tirthankar of the current Avasarpini. Being thus the first Lord, He is also known as Adinath (Adi means the first or beginning and Nath means the Lord). He lived long enough thereafter to teach the truth about the everlasting happiness.
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BHARAT AND BÄHUBALI
Lord Rushabhdev had two wives named Sumangala and Sunanda. By Sumangalä he had 99 sons of whom Bharat was the eldest and the most well known and one daughter named Brähmi. By the second wife Sunandä he had one son named Bahubali and one daughter named Sundari. All of them were given proper training in different arts and crafts appropriate to them. Bharat turned out to be a great warrier and a politician. Bahubali was tall, well built and strong. He is known for his mighty arm. In Sanskrit language, arm is known as Bahu and mighty is known as Bali. Because he had very strong arm, he is known as Bahubali. Brähmi attained very high literary efficiency. She developed the writing script which came to be known as Brähmi script. Sundari got high proficiency in mathmatics. After Lord Rushabhdev attained omniscience, both the girls renounced the worldly life and became his pupils.
As a king, Rushabhdev had his sway over a very large area. At the time of his renouncement, he handed over Vinitä, also known as Ayodhyä, to Bharat and Taxshila to Bahubali. To the remaining 98 sons he gave different parts of his vast kingdom.
Bharat quickly established a firm hold over Vinita. He was an ambitious ruler and intended to become the emperor of the whole India. For this purpose he organized a strong army and started evolving different types of fighting equipments. His armoury turned out a miraculous wheel called Chakraratna (Chakra means wheel and Ratna means precious jewel) that would not miss its target. Then he embarked upon his journey of conquest. That time there was hardly any one who could stand against his well equipped army. He could therefore easily conquer the regions round about Vinitä. Then he turned attention towards his brothers and asked them to acknowledge his suzereignty. 98 brothers of his saw the futility of fighting with the elder brother. They therefore surrendered their territories to him and became disciples of Lord Rushabhdev.
Now only Bahubali remained. He was of different mettle. He was conscious of his right to rule over the kingdom handed over by his father. Moreover, he was too proud to surrender and had the will and capacity to fight the invader. When he therefore received the message of Bharat to accept a subordinate status, he refused to accept that type of serfdom and got ready to fight. Both the brothers were strong and the war between the two was sure to result in large scale bloodshed. The counsellers on both the sides therefore tried to dissuade their masters from resorting to war but neither of them would give up his ground. The war thus seemed inevitable and both the brothers brought their armies face to face with each other. Every one shuddered at the prospect of the heavy casualty that was going to result by the imminent war.
At last, the counsellers explained to their masters that the point at issue pertained to determination of the superiority between the two. Instead of undertaking the large scale war for that purpose, they may better resort to a duel, that would avert unnecessary bloodshed. Since
