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DISCOURSE 84
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So, I do not propose to narrate it again. When one night that sadhu fell ill, the shravaks who had come to the Upashraya to perform the pratikraman rendered service to him after having completed the pratikraman. The sadhu was formerly a beggar and he used to go to the houses of those shravaks for alms. "Oh ! That beggar has become a sadhu because as a sadhu, he can get food easily. Now, probably he has become ill. Let him die.... We shall return home". If those shravaks had returned home thinking thus, would any noble and auspicious thoughts arise in his mind ? Do you know what the sadhu thought when they rendered service to him ? Listen to this,
"Oh! These people are touching my feet to salute me. They are very wealthy merchants.... They live in large mansions; and yet they are rendering service to me. Oh! This is the result of the dress of a sadhu, I am wearing. I have become a sadhu only to secure food easily. This great Acharya has placed my head in his lap and has been reciting to me the Navakar mantra. What a good fortune! I wish I had become a sadhu with a true mind and with the aspiration of attaining spiritual elevation". There arose in his mind, a tremendous reverence for the life of a sadhu. On account of this disguise, he developed an inner love for the life of a sadhu.
This was the result of the service rendered by the shravaks with a sense of the propriety of time and place.
This was a lofty and creative action carried out by the Acharya. That sadhu after dying in a state of exalted spiritual contemplations was born in his next life as Emperor Samprathi. As an Emperor, he rendered an extraordinary service to the Jin shasan by disseminating its noble doctrines. What a magnificent benefit resulted from that service rendered by the shravaks with a sense of the propriety of time and place.
You cannot render service to others with a sense of the propriety of time; you cannot spend money with an awareness of the propriety of time and you cannot carry out any action with a sense of the propriety of time just because you possess the means. You must possess intelligence and discretion to act
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