Trishasti Shalaka Purusa Caritra Part 3

Author(s): Hemchandracharya, Helen M Johnson
Publisher: Oriental Research Institute Vadodra

Page 279

250
CHAPTER TWO
People of the city and Sridattā went to pay homage to the muni who had broken his fast and was studying. After they had paid homage to him and had seated themselves in proper places, he delivered a sermon in a gracious voice.
Sermon (280-282) 'A being, wandering through the eighty-four lacs of species of birth-nuclei in worldly existence, attains a human birth by chance, like a blind man reaching a desired place.
The religion taught by the Omniscient, very difficult to obtain, is the foremost among all religious in it (samsāra), like the moon' among heavenly bodies. So, efforts together with right-belief must be made for it alone by means of which a soul in worldly existence crosses the ocean of existence easily.'
Sridattā bowed at Suyrata's feet and accepted the religion taught by the Omniscient together with rightbelief. After they had paid homage to Muni Suvrata all the people of the city and Sridattā, delighted, went to their own houses. For some time she practiced that religion; then a doubt arose in her mind from the development of her karma. 'I do not know whether or not I shall obtain the fruit which is said to be the highest fruit of the religion of the Jinas.' Because Sridattā felt such a doubt even with the instruction of such a guru, then the inevitable consequences were hard to prevent.
One day when she had started out to pay homage to Satyayaśas, she saw a pair of Vidyadharas in an aerial car in the sky. Confused by their beauty she went to her own house and died without confessing or repenting the doubt.
Now there is a mountain, Vaitādhya, in the province Ramaṇīya which is the ornament of East Videha in this very Jambūdvīpa. On it there is a city, Sivamandira, the abode of happiness, which is like a twin of Sakra's city. Its king was named Kanakapūjya, whose feet were worshipped by powerful Vidyadhara-kings. I was the son,