Risabha Deva

Author(s): Champat Rai Jain
Publisher: Jain Mitra Mandal

Page 70

54
RISABHA DEVA
rain down on it fire and ashes and burning cinders; hot winds will scorch up all the surface of the soil, and it will be ripped open to a great depth. All living nature will be destroyed, excepting those who are able to hide themselves in deep ravines and caves, or who are accorded 'protection by some beings of the superhuman type. Thus will end the sixth kāla. The catastrophe however, will not be universal all over the universe. i.
At the commencement of the new order of things in the next half-cycle of time, the Utsarpini which is the reverse of the ascending ark, the course of events will be changed. It will be the period of prosperity, and increase and rise. The forty-nine days' destruction will be followed by a different and opposite kind of phenomena during a similar period of time. 'Cold winds will blow' on the earth cooling: things—-'curds' milk' etc.-will rain down on its surface; the signs of destruction will disappear from its face. ! Those who have survived will emerge from their hiding places, and inhabit the earth once more. The first Tirthamkara of the Utsarpini kāla will appear at the end of 42000 years from its commencemènt. He will re-establish". Religion in the world!
The above prophecy would seem to. admit of a retional explanation. Let us suppose that two huge revolving bodies of contrary natures, but of the comet type are slowly approaching our world, .