Trishashti Shalaka Purusha Caritra

by Helen M. Johnson | 1931 | 742,503 words

This page describes Incarnation as King Padma which is the first part of chapter VI of the English translation of the Candraprabha-caritra, contained within the “Trishashti Shalaka Purusha Caritra”: a massive Jain narrative relgious text composed by Hemacandra in the 12th century. Candraprabha in jainism is one of the 63 illustrious beings or worthy persons.

Part 1: Incarnation as King Padma

In the province Maṅgalāvatī, the ornament of East Videha in the continent Dhātakīkhaṇḍa, there is a city Ratnasañcayā. In this city there was a king, named Padma, like a lotus-home of Padmā, exceedingly powerful like the serpent-king in Bhogāvatī. Attended always by musicians who performed divine concerts, surrounded by courtesans who excelled the Apsarases, always distinguished by the beauty of his body adorned with beautiful divine unguents, ornaments, and fine garments, his commands observed by kings day and night, his treasury never exhausted, his subjects always prosperous, established in not being an abode of an atom of sorrow in any way, he, the chief of those knowing the Principles, attained disgust with living in worldly existence.

Under Guru Yugandhara he took the vow of mendicancy for destroying existence, like Hari taking a thunderbolt to destroy a mountain. Making many resolutions, subdued, with subjection of his senses accomplished, free from desire in his own person, he observed the vow for a long time. He acquired the body-making karma of a Tīrthaṅkara, which is very difficult to acquire, by some of the sthānas, like a choice jewel by much money. In course of time, after he had completed his life, the great ascetic went to the palace Vaijayanta, which was the first fruit of the tree of the vow.

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