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Dikșa: Consecration
459
The place varies according to circumstances, all depending on the region where the group of sādhvis happens to be. A place in the area is chosen where the committee of the local saṁgha is willing to offer hospitality and which the ācārya can reach easily. Usually an astrologist is consulted and a śubha-muhurta or propitious moment - in this instance the date and the day - is selected. Often invitations are sent out, on which there is a photograph of the vairāgiņi accompanied by an elaborately or more simply worded notifiction; an announcement with photo is also inserted in the local paper.41 The vairāgiņi is permitted to spend several days with her family and to do the round of her relatives and friends.
The evening before the occasion arrives and the vairāgini prepares herself by a total fast until after the ceremony. While the guruņi, the sādhvis of the group and those who have come from neighbouring places busy themselves with preparations for the rite, the parents and committee-members of the local samgha see to the general preparations. Quite frequently, on the evening of the day before the dikṣā, there takes place an abhinandana, or welcome-gathering, to congratulate the vairāgiņi. This is an opportunity, especially in a city, for the members of the samgha to meet each other. Certain śrāvikās and śrăvakas make speeches in turn and then the vairāgiņi speaks to the assembly.
Often members of the samgha, whether they live near or far, arrive the previous day or in the morning of the day itself.42 A diksă is a great family festival. We read, for example, that in a town of Panjāba "the brothers and sisters (that is, of the spiritual family) numbered about ten thousand."43 Sometimes, the ācārya who is going to preside comes from the neighbourhood along with other monks; he can,
41 This is not obligatory and depends on the preference of the local samgha.
42 In February 1971, for the dikşā of Bharati, a disciple of Sadhvi Mrgavati, at Byculla, a district of Mumbai, an impressive number of śrāvakas and śråvikâs came all the way from Panjába, where Sadhvi Mrgavati is a wellknown personality, to be present at the ceremony.
43 Cf. Mahendrakumari, 1954, p. 59.
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