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22
Paramātma-prakasa
selves by begging should not achieve their spiritual good ? The souls wandering in Samsāra have suffered great miseries, and hence by destroying eight Karmas they should achieve liberation. The beings cannot put up with a bit of misery : then how is it that they can afford to incur Karmas which bring manifold miseries in the four grades of existence? The whole world being entangled in the turmoil foolishly incurs Karman, and not a moment is devoted to the rescue of the self. Till the great knowledge, viz. omniscience is attained, the soul, suffering misery and infatuated with sons and wives, wanders in millions of births. The souls should never claim ownership over the house, relations and body: they are the creations of Karman as understood from the scriptures by the saints. Thoughts about residence and relations bring no release: the mind should be applied to austerities (which bring about the destruction of Karmas) that Moksa might be reached. (113-124)
One has to suffer for the sins that one has incurred by killing manifold beings for the benefit of his sons and wives. One has to suffer infinitely more pain than that one has inflicted on the beings by crushing and killing them. Harm unto living being leads one to hell and the shelter unto them to heaven; these are the two paths all that are available: one should select whichsoever one likes. (125-127)
Everything here is ephemeral : it is of no use to pound the husk, even the body does not accompany the soul; the mind, therefore, should be directed to the pure path of liberation without any attachment for relatives and residence. Temples, (images of) gods, scriptures, Teachers, holy places, Vedas (religious texts, and poems and the tree that has put forth flowers : all this shall be the fuel (in the fire of time). Excepting one Brahman, (i.e., Paramātman) the whole world is earthly and ephemeral, and this should specially be remembered. Those whom one meets in the morning are no more in the evening ; so Dharma should be practised without any greed for youth and wealth. No religious merits are amassed and no austerities practised by this tree covered with skin (i.e., the embodied being); hell then is the destiny after being eaten by the ants of old age. The soul should be devoted to the feet of Jina; and the relations, even the father, must be abandoned, because they simply drag the soul into Samsāra. It is a Selfdeception if austerities are not practised with a pure mind in spite of one's having obtained human birth. The camels in the form of five senses should not be let loose; after grazing the whole pasture of pleasures they will again hunt the soul into the round-of-rebirths. Unsafe is the course of meditation; the mind cannot be settled at rest as it repeatedly reverts back to the pleasures of senses. The Yogin cultivates (Right) faith, knowledge and conduct, and being exempt from the influence of five senses meditates
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