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Jainism: The Cosmic Vision small wooden sticks pushed into Mahavira's ears and with great effort he pulled them out.
Everyone now began to slander the cowherd, who had proved to be such a cruel termentor. Bhagwan said, "This is no fault of the cowherd. I am suffering the consequence of what I have done. In my eighteenth Bhava (birth) I was a king named Triprushtha Vasudeva and it was I who had ordered molten lead to be poured into the ears of the servant who always made my beds. This is the fruit of that sin. Everyone must bear the fruit of his Karma, even he may be a mundane soul or a monk."
It was a cowherd who caused the first torment to Bhagwan in Karmargrama and again it was a cowherd who caused the last torment. During the period of his austerity, he suffered a number of torments, but in suffering them he always maintained his equanimity. He never had feelings of anger or aversion towards anyone, even if the man was hostile or had turned tormentor for no reason. His heart was brimming over with love for all : gods, devils, humans and beasts, even when they caused terrible torments to him. Exercising complete restraint on himself, on his mind, speech and body, Bhagwan suffered all this with complete equanimity and constantly pursued the path of self-realization. In torrential rain, in bitter cold, or in a raging storm, the unflickering lamp of his austerity constantly shone bright. Bhagwan had preached ahimsa (nonviolence), but mankind was found to be slipping back into himsa (violence). The power mongers can never abandon their love for war. The victor in such wars plundered people's gold and silver and sold young men and women in the bazaar. The city of Kaushambi had recently won such a victory. Bhagwan daily
Non-Violence : A Way of Life went on his round, begging for alms in that city. He went from house to house, but returned not accepting any food from any house. In this way six months passed by. For as long a period as six months he did not accept even a grain of food. The people of Kaushambi thought that Mahavira was like a fish dying of thirst in an ocean full of water.
Everyone in the kingdom; the king, the minister, the merchant, the monk began to weigh his own Karma. Everyone began to think "What is an evil deed? What is a good deed ? What is justice ? What is injustice ?"
One day the news came that Bhagwan had accepted boiled unsplit black beans from Chandanbala who was a slave in the household of merchant Dhanavaha. On hearing this, people started streaming to the place of the merchant Dhanavaha. But after some time they were surprised to find that the woman, whom they had mistaken for a slave woman, was actually the daughter of the king of Champanagar. Her mother was the sister of the king of Kaushambi. She was now a prisoner taken in the war between Champa and Kaushambi. Seeing this, people exclaimed, "How terrible is war, in which man kills his own kinsfolk."
Mahavira showed to the world the strength of the soul and of the body. Out of his austerity period of twelve and a half years, for 349 days he took only one meal a day. On all the rest of the days, he fasted without taking even water. During this period of severe austerity, he performed one penitential exercise of six months. One penitential exercise of six months less five days. Nine penitential exercises of four months. Two penitential exercises of three months, two penitential exercises of two and
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