Bhagwan Mahavir

Tirthankar Mahaveer was the last and the twenty-fourth Tirthankar of this epoch. There were twenty-three Tirthankaras before him e. g. Rishabhdeo and others.

Bhagwans (Gods) are infinite, but Tirthankaras in one epoch and in Bharatkshetra are twenty-four only. Every Tirthankar, as a rule, is a Bhagwan, but every Bhagwan is not a Tirthankar. A soul can attain godhood without being a Tirthankar. Every soul can become a God. That which leads to the attainment of perfection is called Tirtha and those who reach that supreme state themselves and show others the path of emancipation are called the Tirthankaras.

Bhagwan is not born, he grows to be one. Nobody is a Bhagwan since his birth. Mahaveer also was not a Bhagwan since his birth. He became a God, when he conquered himself. To conquer delusion, attachment and aversion is to conquer oneself.

Though the principles enunciated by Bhagwan Mahaveer are very deep, intricate, impressive and acceptable, his life is very easy, straight and eventless; there is no place for varieties in it. The story of his life, in brief is that he spent the first thirty years of life in the midst of wealth and splendour indifferently as a lotus in water. For the next twelve years he was engaged in the pursuit of the supreme soul and lived in jungles in deep meditation and during the fast thirty years, he expounded Sarvodaya i.e. the welfare of all living beings, propagated it and spread it throughout the four corners of the land, The life of Mahaveer is not eventful. It is vain to search for his personality in the course of events. However, there can be no event that did not happen in the infinite previous lives through which he had passed.

Mahaveer was born in Kundgram from the womb of queen Trishala, the wife of the Lichhavi King Siddhartha, the famous leader of the Vaishali Republic. His mother was the daughter of King Chetak, the President of the Vaishali Republic. He was born in the Nath family of Kshatriya clan, 2600 years back, on the thirteenth day of the second fortnight of Chaitra month. Looking at his constant growth, his parents named him Vardhman.

The festival of his birth was, celebrated with great zeal not only by his parents, relations and subjects of the kingdom, but also by gods and their lords, since he was going to be a Tirthankar. This festival is called Janma Kalyanak Mahotsava. The lord of the gods, Indra seated him on the elephant Erawat and performed the anointing ceremony with great pomp and show. The Jain epic texts give a vivid description of this event.