Parmatma Prakash

Author(s): Yogindra Acharya
Publisher: Central Jaina Publishing House

Page 18

INTRODI CTIO V.
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the climatic couditions, nor the productive powers of the earth, nor even morality escaping the march of time. In this way the process of decline continues in every department of life, till, by the end of the sixth kila, things become quite unbearable. The utsarpini is characterised by a similar arrangement, but in the reverse order ; it begins from the worst conditions of life which gradually improve, till extreme prosperity again marks the end of its last kala. We then have another Avasarpini to be followed, in its turn, by an Utsarpini, and so forth.
In the dukhma kala, the present era of time, all things undergo considerable change for the worse. Religion also suffers in the same way. It is not that religion then loses its intrinsic inerit, or becomes vitiated ; only its hold on the hearts of men is loosened, and people beconie too degenerate to understand or put it into practice. Those who have a long. ing to be saved also cannot derive full benefit from its knowledge, their physical powers not being equal to the strain of ascetisin required for final emancipation, and nerve and bone being equally deficient in respect of the requisite degree of endurance to render the process of pure Selfcontemplation a possibility of attainment. These are the causes which preclude the possibility of the attainment of Nirvana in the fifth and the sixth periods of Avaşarpini and the corresponding aras of Ulsarpini. But this is not the state of affairs all over the universe. In the region called the Videha Kshetra there are no periods of time corresponding to our fifth and sixth arms, and people still attain Nirvana from that region. In our part of the universe, also, spiritual progress, short of the attaiument of Nirvana, is possible, in all other respects, even in these bad periods of time. Those who are the most steadfast in their present lives, might be re-born in the Videha Kshetra and attain Nirvana from there, or go to heaven and reside there in the eajoyment of Olyinpiau bliss till these bad times b- passed, so that their next incarnations ou earth would place the coveted opportunity in their way.
The arrangement of times is based on a calculation of the effect of the motion of the heavenly bodies and on the planets revolving in the central region, called the Jambu Dvipa, of our universe. To some extent these effects have already begun to manifest themselves. For instance, the hold which religion had on the hearts of men two thousand