Letter from Mahavira Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Letter from Mahavira - Essay ExampleBy enduring entirely sorts of calamities, I was given over this name Mahavira, which means great hero or sunny and courageous.You have to learn how to conquer your desires and feelings, not be conquered by them. The only way to liberate yourself from all the pain is learning about the right faith (samyak-darshana), right knowledge (samyak-jnana), and right conduct (samyak-charitra). This ratiocination is based on the five vows. Do you remember the five great vows Nonviolence (Ahimsa)-do not disablement either living being Truthfulness (Satya)-to speak only the fairness Non-stealing (Asteya)- do not develop anything that was not given to you Chastity (Brahmacharya)-do not indulge in sexual pleasure Non-possession/Non-attachment (Aparigraha)- to detach from any material possession.These five principles leave behind help you achieve the blissful state. But you need to detach in all from people, places, and material things. That is why I spen t twelve years of my life in silence and darksome meditation. Sometimes, I spent days without eating, I had no place to live or clothes to wear, exactly I achieved Kevalnyan, enlightenment. When I learned this ultimate truth I decided to travel around India and voice this knowledge.Be careful with all the living beings, if you harm them, you pull up stakes be harming yourself. If you take something that was not given to you, it would be like stealing to yourself. Indulging in sensual or materialistic passion will only hold to vices like greed, lust, hatred and anger. These feelings are all violent and destructive they can lead you to kill. Your karma will accumulate.If you wish to become a monk, you will have to determine your vows strictly. Monks and nuns will have to be very strict about following the Jain philosophy. Everyone can achieve the ultimate happiness I do not make distinction between men, women, rich or poor. I divide my following in what is called a four-fold ord er monk (Sadhu), nun (Sadhvi), layman (Shravak), and laywoman (Shravika). I believe that the theories of Anekantvada and Syadvada, explain the relativity theory in the world. The world has an infinity of view points depending on the time, place, nature and state of the one who is the viewer and that which is viewed. The truth has many aspects, it depends from the points of view. What is true from one point of view may vary from another. Absolute truth cannot be obtained from any particular perspective alone. Absolute truth is the sum total of all the different-view points. Imagine for instance that you have your eyes filmdomed and that you come across a river while you walk. You step inside and the water system covers up to your knees, not too deep it seemed. When you go out and uncover your eyes, you discover that you were standing up on a rock inside the river, but that the river was in fact so deep that it would cover you up to your head. The perspective changed the way in whi ch you described the river.In order to obtain Moksha, you can follow the self-discipline methods I have preached and practiced. Some of them are disregard of worldly objects, moral purity, meditating without moving the body, self-denial, penance, austerity, renouncing to pleasure, and immunity from karma.Meditation is very important in the life of a Jain. It helps to discipline the mind and the body. Sometimes you will remain in deep meditation in a same position for a massive time, while your mind