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Puspaiḥ Suraganan Vṛkṣaḥ Phalaiścāpi Tathā Pitrn Chāyaya Catithintāta Pūjayanti Mahirūhāḥ
'Look at the tree! It worships the gods with its flowers, it honours the ancestors with its fruits, and it provides shade for its guests.' (A couplet from the Mahabharat.)
Trees swaying in the wind, every twig laden with smiling buds, flowers giving off their perfume, breezes running through velvet grass; these exquisite sights of nature bring joy to men's hearts. The gods also delight in such places. The splashes of green spattered across this canvas of creation give us untold bliss. But nature has feelings as well. Take the fragile little mimosa flower for instance. At the merest brush of our finger it shrinks away and curls up within itself, making us realise just how sensitive nature is. It seems to be asking humankind to look at it with love and understanding.
Trees and plants have been friends to man through the ages. From ancient times man has worshipped and looked after all sorts of
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The Jains through Time
plant life - fruit trees, flowers, medicinal herbs, grains and pulses as they have been very useful to him. Two and a half thousand years ago Tirthankar Mahavir distinctly proclaimed: "Plants have life as well; they have a consciousness and a sensitivity. Like all other creatures, life and death also affect them. Nature experiences sorrow and joy, pleasure and pain, despair and delight, so do not torment or torture it. Do not cause it pain." Through his knowledge and experience he revealed his oneness with nature. He declared that earth, air, fire, and water are all sentient; they are man's benefactors, so we should not hurt them in
any way.
What is amazing is that these pronouncements were made at a time when there was no such thing as environmental pollution. There was still a feeling of equilibrium in nature. There was no question of an ecological imbalance, as water and plant life was abundant. Even so, a declaration during that era for the protection of earth, air, water, fire and plant life was extremely important in itself.
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