Dharam Shiksha - Class 31

Jai Jinendra and welcome back, dear little learners! 🌼

We hope you had a wonderful time watching the animated stories of Bhagwan Mahavir Swami’s previous births and enjoyed learning from them. Each story was filled with beautiful lessons and we hope they inspired you to become a better person and a good Jain Shravak.

Now we are happy to begin this blog again with you! Get ready to explore more fun stories, interesting teachings, and simple ways to follow our beautiful Jain dharam.

Let’s continue this joyful journey of learning together!

25 BOL - A SHORT INTRODUCTION

Just like when we have doubts or confusion in our day-to-day life, we use Google, a dictionary or even ChatGPT to find answers. In the same way, when we don’t understand any word or idea mentioned in our Jain Aagams, we can refer to the 25 Bol.

They act like a special “dictionary” for our dharam and help us understand difficult concepts in an easy way.

1st Bol - Gati 4

In simple words, Gatis are the four possible places where a soul can be born in its next life. These Gatis are:

1. Narak Gati

   

In this gati, the soul is born as Naarki and experiences a lot of pain, suffering and unhappiness. It is the result of extremely bad actions done with strong negative feelings. Even if we don't physically don't do anything bad but our thoughts or "bhaav" are awful, we might end up in Narak Gati.

2. Tiryanch Gati

   

In this gati, the soul is born as animals, birds, insects, plants or other non-human living beings. Even the tiny green moss you see on surfaces falls under Tiryanch Gati.

Tiryanch gati jeevs can neither learn about dharam nor understand the difference between right and wrong.

3. Manushya Gati

   

In this gati, the soul is born as a human being. This is considered the most special and valuable gati because only humans have the ability to walk on the path of dharam and attain Moksha.

4. Dev Gati

   

In this gati, the soul is born as a Dev in Devlok and experiences a lot of comfort, happiness and luxury. Life here is very pleasant, but it is important to remember that since Devs live such happy lives, they do not feel the need to practice dharam. Therefore, they can't attain Moksha.

Now if you watched the stories of Bhagwan Mahavir Swami’s previous births carefully, you might have noticed something — even His soul travelled through all the 4 gatis, just like any other soul!

Yes, even a great soul like Bhagwan Mahavir had a long journey before becoming a Tirthankar.

Let’s see how:

• Narak Gati - After His birth as Triprishtha Vasudev, Bhagwan's soul went to 7th Narak because of all the bad karma it collected.

• Tiryanch Gati - We also saw how from 7th Narak, He was reborn as a lion (tiryanch gati) and then went to 4th Narak.

• Dev Gati - There have been many births in which Bhagwan's soul was born in Dev Gati. In fact, just before His final birth, He was a Dev in 10th Devlok.

• Manushya Gati - In many important lives, Bhagwan was born as a human (like Nayasaar, Marichi, Nandan Muni etc.)

Why is a soul born in Narak Gati?

When a soul keeps doing very bad actions again and again or even thinks about doing bad stuff repeatedly, it ends up in Narak Gati. There are 4 main reasons for the soul to go to Narak Gati:

1. Maha-arambh (Very harmful work) – This means doing work or business that destroys many tiny living beings on a large scale. It’s like causing harm millions and millions of small lives without thinking.

2. Maha-parigrah (Too much greed) – This is when someone keeps wanting more and more things even when they already have plenty. It’s like never feeling satisfied and always saying, “I want more!”

3. Panchendriya Vadh (Killing five-sensed living beings) – Living beings with all five senses are fall in the highest category of "Jeevs." So killing them on purpose creates very heavy bad karma.

4. Kunima Ahaar (Eating non-vegetarian food) – Eating non-vegetarian food means taking someone else's life just to satisfy your taste buds or to feel happy. This is cruelty at its worst.

Logasss Sutra

After learning about the Gatis, we moved onto the great Logassa Sutra and discussed the meaning of its first 2 lines.

Let's do a quick recap...

Logassa Ujjoyagare - The Ones who light up the entire Lok with their Kewal Gyan

Dhamma Titthayare Jine - Who establish Dharam's "Tirth," and Who have become "Jin" by overcoming Raag and Dvesh

Arihante Kittaissam - I will sing the praises (perform "kirtan") of such Arihant Bhagwan

Chauvissam Pi Kewali - 24 Tirthankar Bhagwan and Kewal Gyanis

Usabham Jiyanch Vande - I bow down to Rishabh Dev Ji and Ajit Nath Ji

Sambhav-Mabhinandanam Ch Sumainch - Sambhav Nath Ji, Abhinandan Nath Ji and Sumati Nath Ji

Pauma-ppaham Supaasam - Padam Prabhu Ji and Suparshva Nath Ji

Jinamch Chanda-ppaham Vande - And I bow down to Chandra Prabhu Ji

Dear kids, please don't forget to learn these lines by heart along with their meaning. And yeah, we hope you're all set to experience unlimited fun and excitement on the upcoming Dharam Shiksha Annual Day!!! 🌟

We can't wait to see your beautiful presentations! ✨💕