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Lord Mahåvira each half of a time cycle,5 have done so from beginningless time, and will continue to do so forever.
Hence a Jina or Tirthankara is not the founder of a religion; he is rather the propagator of a truth and a path which have been taught in the same manner by all teachers of his everpresent, imperishable tradition. Each Jina reanimates this tradition for the benefit of succeeding generations. The teachings are neither received through divine revelation nor manifested through some inherent magical power (as, for instance, the Vedas are alleged to be). It is the individual human soul itself which, aided by the earlier teachings, comes to know the truth. Strictly speaking, then, worshipping or following the teachings of a particular Jina has no special significance; nothing new is taught, and the path remains always the same. Even so, it is natural that those teachers who most immediately precede the present age would be remembered more readily. Thus we find that the last few Jinas–Nemi, Pârsva, and especially Mahâvîra, final teacher of the current time cycleare often regarded as the teachers and taken as the objects of a certain veneration. Recent activities in the Jaina community celebrating the 2,500th anniversary of Mahâvîra's nirvana (final death) attest to this phenomenon.
Although the scriptures assert time and again that the Jina is a human being, born of human parents in the usual way, the Jaina laity is usually raised to regard him more as a superhuman personage. Certain fantastic attributes are popularly held to characterize the Jina-to-be. He is born with a special body, its frame having an adamantine (vajra) quality; such a body is considered necessary if he is to withstand the terrible rigors of meditation intense enough to bring salvation in the present life. As a psychic corollary to this physical aspect, he possesses supermundane cognition-avadhijnana— by means of which he may perceive objects and events at enormous distances. Similarly, a fixed and rather stylized set of supernatural occurrences is said to mark his career. Although he has practiced the virtues requisite to Jinahood during several previous lives, he is not spontaneously aware of his impending attainment in the present one. Hence the gods, appearing miraculously at the appropriate moment, urge him to a waken to his real vocation and thus to renounce the household life. And whereas ordinary men require a guru for
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