Trishashti Shalaka Purusha Caritra
by Helen M. Johnson | 1931 | 742,503 words
This page describes The doctrine of Maya (Vedanta) which is the eleventh part of chapter I of the English translation of the Adisvara-caritra, contained within the 鈥淭rishashti Shalaka Purusha Caritra鈥�: a massive Jain narrative relgious text composed by Hemacandra in the 12th century. Adisvara (or Rishabha) in jainism is the first Tirthankara (Jina) and one of the 63 illustrious beings or worthy persons.
Go directly to: Footnotes.
Part 11: The doctrine of M膩y膩 (Vedanta)
Then the fourth minister said: 鈥淚t is illusion; nothing is real. The visible world is like a dream or a mirage. A teacher and a disciple; a father and a son; virtue and vice; one鈥檚 own and another鈥檚; such things as appear, that is only a form of expression, not reality. Just as the jackal left meat, and ran after a fish on the bank, and the fish got in the water and a vulture got the meat,[1] exactly so those men are deceived and deprive themselves of both, who abandon pleasures of this world and run after those of the next world. After they have heard the false teaching of heretics,[2] fearing hell, they foolishly torment their own bodies, alas! by vows, etc. Just as a partridge dances on one foot, afraid that it will fall on the ground, so a man practices penance fearing a fall into hell.鈥�
Footnotes and references:
[1]:
This incident occurs in the Pa帽catantra, Bk. 4. Ryder鈥檚 translation, p. 413.
[2]:
P膩kha峁囜笉in is always used from the standpoint of the speaker and includes any one of another faith.