Jainism

Author(s): M R Gelra
Publisher: Createspace

Page 22

There was another sage praying at a great distance from this young man at the same time. The sage was calm and had been praying with such spirit and dedication for years that the Angels decided to pay him a visit. The Angels appeared in front of the sage and asked him his reason for praying. The sage was slightly startled to see the Angels. Breaking out of his meditation, he replied, "I seek not much, only a little wisdom to see myself and the world better. I know that only the divine powers can grant me this." The Angels were pleased, yet, decided to test the Sage. "Do not mock us O Sage, we know more than you do and can see much more than you can. Do you not want more, to destroy those whom you hate and bring them down for all the injustice they have done to you?"
The Sage smiled, "I need nothing but wisdom. I have no enemy on this earth.' The Angels were still not mollified, "We do not have any wisdom to grant you, all we have is the ultimate weapon that will allow you to redeem yourself and do away with those whom you dislike." The Angels wanted to be certain of the Sage's intentions. "With all due respect Angels, then I will continue to meditate and pray, asking for wisdom, as I need nothing more," vowed the Sage. The Angels, assured of the pure intentions of the Sage's prayers, did not hesitate before granting the Sage the fruit of his prayers.
This story reflects that only those Prayers are fruitful in life whose true purpose is to subconsciously bring out the spirituality in us, which have a great effect on our minds and help to practice wisdom as a way of life. This, we find in the Jain prayer.
Jain Prayer
For spiritual evolution, Jains pray to Dev, Guru, and Dharma.
Dev means Arhats, the Tirthankars who have conquered the passions.
Guru means the spiritual preachers who inspire to live a virtuous life.
Dharma means the path of righteousness, i.e. right knowledge, right faith and right conduct.
The contents of the prayers differ in different sects of Jainism; all cannot be included here. One will serve the purpose, as the aim of all the Jain prayers is the same. To illustrate the general trend of the prayer, an example of the followers of Jain Swetamber Terapanthi sect is, as follows:
22