This is available online at InsidetheNavkar.com

Given that the Navkar Mantra connects all of us Jains – regardless of whether you are Digamber, Swetamber, Sthanakvasi or Terapanthi – these next few pages are for you regardless of the sub sect you are. To all Jains, the Navkar Mantra is the Bible. But did you ever open the book?

The Navkar Mantra: 9 lines of a message. Of a language. And within those words, within those 9 lines within the message, there is meaning. The last 2 lines of the Navkar Mantra mean ‘Of all things auspicious, treasured, valuable, and desired, the Navkar Mantra is the first and foremost.’ The Navkar Mantra is worth more than all of Bill Gates' wealth, more auspicious than all of the temple ceremonies you do, more to be desired than the CEO's chair of the company you work at, or the valedictorian’s position of the school you go to. Yet is this the way we feel? Ever cross your mind, 'Maybe I'm not completely doing it right...'? The Navkar Mantra is extraordinarily detailed, deep, and valuable, but only to those souls who can fully uncover it or correctly do it. So educate yourself. Not on just the meaning, but the actual perspective within the livelihoods of each of the 5 Panch Parmesthi.

And so, in order to benefit each person in this building during this time, you can read something that you have likely never been able to come across. A greater understanding of the Navkar Mantra. Upon understanding this, you can start to see the importance in learning the meaning behind the things you encounter. And it is important to invoke that meaning every time you say the Navkar Mantra – not just run through the words with no regard for the mind. The goal of this writing is to help you learn and understand the perspectives of the people we should always appreciate (the Panch Parmesthis) and guide our lives in the right direction. This is all written by someone who is three or four years within your age so have faith that you will understand how all the pieces fit together as you read further on. If you have any curiosity as to what you believe in so heavily but may not even know, you will read on; if not, look within yourself first.

First, what you may already know. The Navkar Mantra contains nine lines which are: Namo Arihantanam | I bow down to the (enlightened beings who know truth and establish religion) Namo Siddhanam | I bow down to the (enlightened, liberated souls free from suffering and karma) Namo Ayariyanam | I bow down to the (spiritual leaders that guide the community of the Jains) Namo Uvajjhayanam | I bow down to the Upadhyay (spiritual teachers who are wise enough to show the path) Namo Loe Savva-sahunam | I bow down to the Sadhu/Sadhvi (spiritual students who have given up the material world)

Eso Panch Namokaro | These five acts of bowing down Savva-pavappanasano | Destroy all sins, karma, and pain

Manglananch Savvesim | Among all things auspicious in the universe Padhamam Havei Mangalam | The Navkar Mantra is the first and foremost

The Navkar Mantra is split into 3 parts, at first glance. The first five lines are an act of respect for five different types of beings that exist in Jainism – the Panch Parmesthis. But if each is a line in the Navkar Mantra, there is a lot more to be understood about the perspective, accomplishments, and responsibilities of each of those five types of beings. The next two lines (6 and 7) are very similar to an if- then statement that serves as a guide describing how one should live life. If you take it for what it is – the two lines are a cause and effect: Bowing down to these five types of beings correctly |leads to| the destruction of your sins, your karmas. And this will really be understood later on. And the final two lines (8 and 9) try to urge the reader or hearer of these words that these simple words should be valued above all else in life – at whatever the cost it should be the listener or reader’s goal to treasure, fully understand, and then act upon the depths within these previous 7 lines.

Just take a second and think for a second: If 2 of the 9 most important lines that are meant to be kept sacred, remembered, and understood for centuries past and centuries to come – if two lines are spent just trying to state the amount of importance that should be placed on this, then isn’t it clear that the meaning and depth within the first 7 lines should be the main goal of every human being to uncover?

So the first five lines are an attempt to pay respect to the five types of beings known as the Panch Parmesthis: Arihant, , , Upadhyays, and Sadhus. The best way to pay respect to them: fully understand their role, fully realize who you are appreciating and why you are appreciating them, and hope that one day you can give back to the world what they had given to you. This is how the Navkar Mantra should be done – all of these sentences, these pages below should be ideas and thoughts that should go through your head on your own. The Navkar Mantra should be done so that the sentences below can be created from your mind on its own because that is the way you truly feel.

Let’s begin.

Namo Arihantanam. I bow down to all of the Arihants of the past, present, and future. I bow down to all of the beings that were able to rise up and teach from within themselves what is right and wrong to the rest of the world. I bow down to the beings who were able to free their souls by being victorious over their inner enemies that lie within each human being, allowing their soul to become enlightened to the truth and liberated from all suffering. The word Arihant means itself destroyer of inner enemies - the four main inner enemies are called the kashays which are anger, ego, deceit, and greed. I bow down to the Arihants because they were able to free the soul and allow it to become its true nature which it achieves when someone has no attachments, desires, worries, or greed.

Enlightenment, illumination of the truth – this is a different, higher level stage that is more than living a virtuous, good, non-violent life. It is more, and it is what makes the being of an Arihant so rare and reputable. To be able to overcome all of one’s attachments and desires, feelings of inadequacy and doubts about existence – the ability to stay completely calm no matter what one is faced with, always understanding that events in life occur for a greater purpose that isn’t immediately observable – to live in accordance with these ideas is extremely difficult to achieve.

Mahavir Swami is the most widely known and well known Arihant throughout Jainism, but there are many others that came before him (24 Tirthankars) and some that even exist today in other worlds. I bow down to those beings who were able to put into the most perfect words, who were able to say in the most perfect way, a message that would be received correctly by all future beings that may read or hear them.

I bow down to the 24 Tirthankars who were Arihants of the past of humanity who were able to change entire civilizations, who were able to directly influence the world with their thoughts. Not only were they able to spread the truth in the most easy to understand manner but they were able to extinguish all the doubts of the people around them and create a collective population of human beings that are able to live to their full potential, experience their full human-ness, and live in continuous peace and appreciation.

I appreciate the 24 Tirthankars and each of their 12 qualities specific to their being (108 beads on a Navkar Vali represent 108 qualities of the Panch Parmesthi – Arihants have 12, Siddhas 8, Acharyas 36, Upadhyays 25, Sadhus 27). I appreciate and bow down to the fact that these beings establish the Sangh – composed of monks, nuns, and common people (Sadhus, Sadhvis, Shravaks, Shravikas) to come together under an umbrella of truth and stop wandering in the ocean for answers on their own – I respect these beings for being the leaders and speakers of such truth that they are able to create such a thing.

Of those 12 qualities mentioned earlier, I bow down to some in particular. Gnanatishay – these beings are enlightened, supreme knowledge of the world and full understanding of the nature of reality and the nature of themselves. This is self-realization to a far greater extent where everything is seen from an objective point of view, they know all of the doubts that all humans face and all of the fears and ingrained flaws that are present in the mind that prevent us from reaching enlightenment. To have such powerful and valuable knowledge that can aid a human being to go from the dark depths of the world to a spiritual rebirth – I bow down to and respect. I appreciate that their words were able to be so highly valued by people that it was able to travel through hundreds of years, different writers, different interpreters – and finally reach me in the present moment and come into contact with my life. I appreciate each of those beings that put in the mental energy and effort to pass these messages through space and time to reach me because it so directly guides me down the path of awakening and liberation. I thank the Arihants so gratefully for their decisions and actions and in my appreciation I hope to be as much as I can like them – I hope to do what they have done.

Another of those qualities is Apayapagmatishay – which means that there are no diseases and there is no pain all around the Arihant. I bow down to the way that the Arihants of the past – Mahavir Swami and more – illuminated with a glow of compassion around them, radiating only the best of circumstances for all beings of the universe – being completely understanding of all souls’ nature and radiating nothing but positive energy (compassion and the desire for the betterment of others) all around. I hope to embody this level of compassion as best I can by understanding that I have no complaints or qualms with any other soul in this world, and no matter what anyone else has done to me I forgive them and want nothing but the best for them.

I give my respect to all of these Arihants who have and will rise up to monumentally change the world by spreading the truth and creating a community for that truth to be passed onwards – influencing countless lives positively, mine being one of them.

Namo Siddhanam.

I bow down to all Siddhas of the past, present, and future. I bow down to all of those souls that have risen up and gained enlightenment and liberation from the cycle of birth and death, the repeated process of peaks and valleys. They have overcome their karmas and their delusion about the world achieving 8 qualities of a state of Pure Being. They have seen the truth during the course of their lives and influenced many other human beings, who through the butterfly effect, have had an impact on my life. And I thank them for their words, thoughts and actions for indirectly and directly influencing me. I bow down to the message that they carry – so many Siddhas lives are encoded in simple stories of their lives – someone like Gautam Swami who during his lifetime overcame his attachments that remained in the world and for so long prevented him from attaining enlightenment. In the story of , another liberated soul and Siddha, the message is how he overcame his anger, asked for , and eventually gave up his pride and ego by understanding that everyone is equal to him – that all souls are equal.

I bow down to my parents themselves, because in a way, they are hopefully destined to one day in the future become Siddhas. I bow down to all the souls that rose up and propounded religion and Jainism, or even simple things such as love and compassion, that eventually it would benefit the human species and benefit my life. I fully respect the way that they overcame their delusions and hope to follow their path, be just like them. I thank them for suffering whatever negative events that befell upon them because they were huge learning lessons for their future and for the rest of the world. I thank Gautam Swami and Bahubali for those actions and for their choice to endure suffering on behalf of all future humans that were positively influenced by that event in itself – it taught humans to avoid attachment and to avoid allowing their egos from blinding themselves. It taught so many Jains that it’s important to question what you do, understand that all souls are equal, and gave so much power and influence right to the hands of the religious person who receives the message of the story of these Siddhas of the past. I bow down to all of the Siddhas that made these mistakes for our benefit, and I respect them wholeheartedly for all the great things that they contributed. From Sthulibhadra’s compiling of the Agams, to writing out Atma Siddhi. I hope to break my delusions as they did, break free from my karmas and bear whichever karmas are destined for me. And one day join them in Siddhashila, the space where you become at peace with the universe, eternally blissful and content, eternally knowledgeable and free from suffering. I hope to join them and align my life to reach that destination. Given all that I have been blessed to have come into contact with and experience, I wholly will make sure I overcome materialism, attachment, desire, and delusion as best I can. And I will hope to not commit any further karma and ask for full forgiveness for any harm I do cause to any other beings of the universe. I hope the best for all those souls that suffered for me, and I hope they end up in Siddhashila as well. I bow down to all of these souls, of the past, the present, and the future, for doing what doing what they do and going through what they go through for my benefit. I thank my own soul, which inherently stripped away from its karma could also be in Siddhashila, for dealing with my ingrained attachments and my ego, along with this life and its peaks and valleys. And I thank that I have come into contact with the message needed to progress and free the soul, and I will make sure never to forget it.

I respect that the Siddhas are beings who have overcome the 4 Aghati karmas (4 large categories of karmas – Naam Karma: concern with physical appearance, strength, and health; Gotra: concern with status above other beings who are all intrinsically equal; Vedniya Karma: concern with avoiding pain as much as possible, fearing pain or not living up to expectations, indulging in pleasure too much; Ayushya Karma: continuing through time and events in life that create pleasure and pain and lead to rebirth (more pleasure and pain). I respect that the Siddhas have overcome these fundamental ingrained beliefs and flaws that exist within human beings as they are raised. All the worries, concerns, and responsibilities that we have to keep up with in life – making sure that the future is meeting our expectations that we preset – the Siddhas have transcended and overcome and I hope to as well.

I fully appreciate the Siddhas, who they are and the qualities that they embody, and I hope to guide my actions according to a Siddha’s values and qualities. And there is no reason why you cannot get creative with the avenues that you take to correctly embody the lines in the Navkar Mantra. Remember, the purpose is to understand the perspective of these beings in order to more fully appreciate them. There are innumerable ways of doing this – but the most important thing is that you allow yourself to go down long streams of thought to do so.

Namo Ayariyanam: I bow down to all Acharyas of the universe. Here’s a more creative way of saying/thinking through the third line of the Navkar Mantra. Remember it is a possible belief/viewpoint that allows one to understand the perspective more wholly in order to appreciate more fully. If this gets too difficult to follow for you, skip to the end of Namo Ayariyanam. Keep in mind that in many Jain scriptures it is written that the Sun circles the Earth – that the Jain scriptures are more aligned with geocentrism.

Picture it to be 300 BC, 150 years after Bhagwan Mahavir’s nirvana when almost all things (stories, sutras, etc.) are still passed down by word of mouth. Nevertheless, the knowledge and information passed down from Mahavir’s sermons are some of the few things that have started to be written down on leaves. These leaves, which contain a treasure trove of wisdom, are kept in only one place – the hands of the leaders of the Jain religion – the Acharyas.

Now imagine this and put yourself in the shoes of the Head Acharya - You're in a room full of other Acharyas who are seated around a table, and are talking to each other about an urgent issue. "There's a crowd waiting outside for our answer to their question. The ‘scientist’, who society has paraded to be the smartest and the man on the pinnacle of new ideas and technologies and intelligence, said the Earth is at the center of the universe – he gave his proof to be some measurements that he took of the stars over a period of years, but unfortunately the common people have chosen to believe him...we have to make a decision...Our scriptures/sutras that we have been passing on since the time of Mahavir say that the Earth is actually flying around the Sun, which is a part of the solar system. But here’s the problem we face: we don't want Jainism to die out - if we announce that the Earth revolves around the Sun, the truth, like what is said in the scriptures, everyone outside will laugh at us and our religion, thinking it’s ridiculous because we have no proof except for our scriptures and sutras. One doubt in people’s minds will spread to other doubts, and all Jains’ faith will be naturally diminished. As a result, the Jain religion could die out from lack of truly faithful followers.” (Think about the feeling you get when you hear someone today, in 2013, say with conviction that the Earth is flat. You can’t even begin to accept that one notion because it seems so absurd. That sentiment is what the people of the civilization of 300 BC would have felt if they were told that the Earth was not the center of the solar system. How difficult would it be to faithfully follow a religion that propagates an idea that seems so bizarre and foolish?)

“We have to make a choice - if we go with heliocentrism – as what we have written in our scriptures and what we have been orally passing down since Mahavir Swami - then everyone outside that door wanting an answer will laugh at us. Their scientists that think they can observe the heavens with their limited knowledge are spreading that geocentrism is the right orientation, but that's not what Mahavir said and that's not what we have been passing down orally - we have been passing down the truth, heliocentrism. What do we do? Look - if we say heliocentrism, everyone will mock us, and then no one will have as strong faith in Jainism and therefore Jainism may as well die out. The sad part is that these scientists are what propagate our culture with technology, but they’ve become too powerful, too arrogant that they won’t consider that they could be wrong anymore. Any common person that listens to us, and then listens to the words of these scientists, will just disregard Jainism for lack of proof. They will laugh at it for something that they think is wrong but is so right, and they won't follow Jainism at all then. And with that, the current Jain sangh, this Jain culture that we as Acharyas worked our entire lives trying to successfully lead will be destroyed. Worst of all, we'll be known as the last Acharyas who made that awful decision because they couldn’t adapt Jainism with the times, and that's what caused the end of such a beautiful religion – and to add to the sorrow, it would be only a few hundred years after the enlightened Mahavir was around. We can’t be associated with that, I don’t want to be the Head Acharya who causes the end of Jainism so soon. So Acharyas, we must go along with the lie, with what the scientist and the common people wrongfully think is the truth, of geocentrism. We must slightly alter our many sutras that we've been passing orally, and these writings on these leaves. Mahavir was right, the 5th ara has begun – his truth and knowledge can only be passed on for so long. Without a Tirthankar in this ara, all human beings have no great leader who speaks only truth, faith has disappeared, and mental capacity has decreased. So let us go now, we must say the Earth is at the center of the universe and the sun revolves around it – because it is the only pathway we can take in order to ensure the survival of Jainism. Even though we are going along with this lie for now, I have faith that science will progress and realize for itself that heliocentrism is the correct theory.’”

So as all these Acharyas thought to themselves one last time, a courageous Acharya gave an overview of the crossroads Jainism faced. He said, “Look, here’s the decision we’re all thinking but no one wants to say - it's our job, our goal, and our purpose as Acharyas to propagate the Jain religion so it can last throughout the aras as long as possible. If we make the morally wrong decision (and say geocentrism is correct, but we know this is wrong, then we’re changing Mahavir’s words, and the people from the future who realize the truth with their even more advanced technology, say in 2014, are going to look back, and blame/associate us Acharyas for causing such a crazy thing like ‘geocentrism is correct’ to be labeled as the truth) --> If we go with this path, Jainism may pass through these times unscathed because everyone outside these doors will not laugh at us and lose their belief in Jainism. However, if we make the morally right decision (and go with our sutras, the truth, heliocentrism), Jainism won't propagate and will die out. Everyone outside will find science to trump religion, wrongfully so, and their faith in the teachings and knowledge within Jainism will be forever diminished. We only have one choice. We must propagate Jainism as far as we can, it must reach those in the 1000ADs. We must go along, adapt to the environment. We must what we are passing down, we must start telling a lie that Mahavir did not say, but we have no choice, we must do this, for the betterment of the Jain sangh and the contributions that they can give to the world. The sad truth is - if we don’t, Jainism will never even reach those souls in 2013 – it is for the greater good to make the morally wrong decision.”

“That was a huge decision, but we finally made it. I just hope that once science really evolves, around 1500AD, and they find out the truth about the structure of the universe with telescopes and such, we don't get too much association and negativity with the fact that we caused this little lie to spread within Jainism. Let's hope those future humans will have it in them to forgive us. We had to do what we had to do. It was not easy but ... it's what was necessary after taking every single possibility into consideration. We hope they just forgive us.”

Now come back to the present, and really understand that all of this is part of a setup to segway into one line of the Navkar Mantra. There’s no evidence that this whole thing happened in Jainism’s past, but Acharyas today and Acharyas for the last 2500 years have faced the same situation – how do we spread Jainism while dealing with the limitations of science and thought in the community that may harm people’s faith. And so having the knowledge to think through something like the scenario Acharyas may have once faced is the preparation you can do to say a really faithful, truthful line of the Navkar Mantra, and it must be within you to act upon what the line is and means: Namo Ayariyanam.

And so I bow down to all Acharyas of the universe and all that they stand for - I bow down to all the beings that helped propagate Jainism in the way they did, with the sutras, words, and changes that they made. Without them and their actions, who knows, maybe Jainism would never even have made it past 500AD, let alone 2000AD. I thank them for doing the best they could with the knowledge that there would be no more Tirthankars until the next cycle of the Kalchakra and they needed to try to make Jainism last as long as possible into the 5th ara. I bow down to all the Acharyas who stand for being leaders of perfection that every Sadhu hopes to emulate. I understand that every Sadhu hopes in his future life to be granted the childhood and upbringing to have the luck of having the brainpower needed to become one of those Acharyas. I thank all the beings who passed down Jainism after making the toughest decisions that would best keep Jainism alive while keeping it true to the soul, adhering to the truth, promoting the true principle of non-violence. While the heads of other religions possibly encountered the words of an enlightened leader, it was more important to them to massively spread the religion even if they were spreading violence and a vastly different message compared to the message of the enlightened being that had started the religion (Christianity). I thank the Acharyas of the Jain religion who dealt with the association of being the changers of complete truth – realizing that it was for the greater good - and having the courage to do so at a time when they had a great deal of responsibility. This is the duty and purpose of being an Acharya that you accept. I worship them, I respect them, I hope to be them, I hope to do what they have done.

Namo Uvajjhayanam – I bow down to all spiritual teachers of the past and all of the spiritual teachers that are out there today. All the teachers that have risen up and spent enough mental energy and effort in order to give back and impact other human beings positively through guiding them. I bow down the the spiritual teachers that have preserved the message of Jainism and have been able to transmit it to reach my ears and my eyes in a way that I can interpret and fully understand.

I give my full appreciation to all of those people in the world who give their time and energy teaching in some way – whether it is by directly providing knowledge to others in schools, or indirectly creating knowledge to help other through art such as movies or books, websites or research. Everyone is influenced by everyone before them who have created and organized all of the knowledge taught in schools. The spiritual teachers as well as the teachers who provide a lesson simply through their message. All beings in some way create this for you – all beings’ lives that you know about shape the thoughts you have and beliefs you create. In essence, this fourth line of the Navkar Mantra includes all of the other acts of respect in the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 5th line. All of them, such as the past Arihant Mahavir Swami made mistakes that we know and learn from today. He poured lead in the ear of a servant in a previous life and that servant came back to harm him a later life in the future; Mahavir Swami was so deep in meditation and cognizant of non-violence and full understanding of why this was happening (Karma) that he weathered the pain calmly and felt no anger. These events are today a message (non- violence and non-absolutism) – a message that can guide your beliefs and decisions. In that sense, I bow down to all beings who were spiritual teachers indirectly which composes of an innumerable number of souls from the past and present who have influenced how I have learned and acted in my life.

Right within this line of the Navkar Mantra can be an extensive appreciation for your parents, who guided so much of your future with their effort to positively shape your upbringing, or younger years.

As said many times before, the Navkar Mantra is a way to expand your mind’s abilities and create thoughts, not repeat memorized words or memorized, planned, preprogrammed thoughts and ideas. It is to create them on your own, create your own realizations of specific reasons that you appreciate these 5 types of beings. If done correctly, you will rarely need to follow any script or piece of writing like this to say the Navkar Mantra, it will be all done on your own inside your head. Again, the correct way to do a Navkar Mantra is through you creating personal, relevant realizations about how you appreciate these five types of beings, what/why you place value within them. There is no race, just a place where you can let time stand still, and you’ll finally begin to feel true appreciation flowing through you and in the process rewiring your psyche to make different decisions in your future based on what you’ve learned from the experience of the Navkar Mantra.

The main spiritual teacher that should definitely be respected is the spiritual guru; the Upadhyays are monks and nuns who have already taken that large step towards renouncing material possessions and luxuries in life and have gone above and beyond. They spent their time and energy studying the scriptures of truth – in Jainism these are the Agams – and have the wisdom and capability to spread that knowledge to another person leading them to spiritual upliftment. I give my respects to all the teachers of the past centuries in Jainism who worked so hard to preserve the Jain principles in books, scriptures, and stories. Without them, the entire field of truth within Jainism never would have been around today and the religion could have been a different religion completely if things were wrongly valued.

Teaching in itself is extremely difficult to perfect, it is surprising how taken for granted it really is. Not only do you have to be able to calmly remove any doubts from others about your beliefs and decisions, but you also have to be confident and knowledgeable about what you do and why you do it from every angle. All people new to a subject matter will come in with preconceived different (and usually wrong, based in ingrained beliefs or fear) notions. And to break those down (which deconstructs a piece of the reality that the person thought he knew, which can be highly difficult) is so valuable.

When a person from 2500 years ago would say the Navkar Mantra, they would think through concepts like the paragraph above all within seconds, within saying the words of Namo Uvajjhayanam. Their minds were far more powerful due to the focus, clarity, and meditative practices they used – it resulted in them really seeing the value in the Navkar Mantra and doing whatever it took to preserve it and pass on its meaning. Now that our brains are more geared to be problem-solving, quick, alert thinkers, we have to slow down and create these realizations, these understandings about how the pieces fit together in a simple way. This will be explained more (it’s all encoded in the 6th, 7th, 8th, and 9th line right in the Navkar Mantra) later on.

I bow down to the beings who are compassionate to do more than just understand and learn for themselves but rather do more to make an impact others – this is a real selfless act and something underappreciated. ‘Teachers’ that are people, ‘teachers’ that are movies, ‘teachers’ that are books, ‘teachers’ that are scriptures in religions: ‘teachers’ that help others see truth or spread selfless happiness were hours in another soul’s life spent trying to make a positive impact and I appreciate and give my respect to them. They teach how to overcome culture, overcome consumerism, overcome our emotions, our expectations.

Namo Loe Savva-sahunam

The great achievement of the monk, nun, or spiritually advanced student is this: realizing the futility of gathering material possessions and the transience of life’s relationships (and moments). Realizing that you cannot progress until you extinguish your responsibilities and worries (but most adults go on vacation which should be partially spiritually driven to turn their minds off, or even worse, go shopping, or even worse, watch television or do things that bore them). Realizing that there is a higher sense of self that can be achieved if you unplug yourself from being so engulfed and immersed into the concerns of your immediate reality).

I give my respect to the Sadhus / Sadhvis (monks/nuns) who are able to give up all of their possessions that they may have spent years of their lives – years of mental energy, effort, pleasure and dissatisfaction – to have the ability to just ‘let go’ of all of that takes great courage, faith and understanding in Jainism, along with a realization of how the nature of reality is imaginary – that’s it all just a game, a ride that has its peaks and valleys which you inevitably get attached to or fear and avoid.

I give my respect and hope to be like these Sadhus and Sadhvis because of their ability to maintain self- discipline. Of the 27 qualities of a Sadhu/Sadhvi, 12 of them are notable restraints/vows that they place upon themselves and strongly adhere to – and are called the 12 Vrats. There is lengthy reason behind each of these and if you spend time you can uncover them – just think about why such a vow would be created or brought forth on a human to human level (I’ll give an example below) – all of this you can do within the Navkar Mantra. Here is a short summary and pretty good details can be found here: http://www.sacred-texts.com/jai/12vows.txt

Something else you can do once you have an understanding of these Vows (to more fully respect and appreciate the perspective and embodiment of Sadhus/Sadhvis) is think deeply on which of these Vows plague human beings the most and prevent people from happiness and fulfillment.

In my opinion the biggest vow today that human beings are hurt by ignoring is Bhoga Upabhoga Vrat. Clearly the goal of this vow is to create self-restraint in your life. Be more disciplined in order to be more appreciative, self-aware, and able to make time for what really matters to us in our life rather than be distracted. Well distracted is what so many people are today – with our capability to be plugged in to a massive wealth of information through the Internet – with no limitations or restraints as to what you can view, watch, listen to, or communicate with others, we have become too in need for mental content, instant gratification, mental stimulation. You know when you are compelled to visit Facebook or Instagram and incessantly refresh the page, a part of you wonders why you keep going back when there is little that you get every time you visit the site. Because technology has reached everyone, we have such great power. Even more than that, because there is instant communication, jobs and schools will never allow time for extended isolated thought (meditation or contemplation). Because possessions have been available at our fingertips and handed to us instantly at our doorstep (Amazon), we become numb to staying aware of how much we consume and how grateful we should be after the novelty of a new thing wears off. Because there are infinite movies and television shows all at the click of a button, we stay hooked to too many things at once and never stray away to think on our own. All of this is delusion – it prevents us from realizing that the life you lead is not defined or constrained by what your career is, or what you have, or what you watch, or what you own. The ability to be fully aware of this comes with restraint and the vow to uphold that restraint in the Bhoga Upabhoga Vrat followed by the Sadhus and Sadhvis is a quality I respect and I hope I can develop.

The other vow/restraint that is so heavily lacking in today’s world is Full Truth. If you watch any television show today it is fueled by characters who embody drama, deception, or conflict. We have evolved as a species where physical violence has all but disappeared, but the violence we commit with our thoughts and words still affects us all day to day. I bow down to the Sadhus/Sadhvis for seeing how avoiding any form of deception or misguidance is at the highest of their priorities.

I bow down to all those spiritual seekers who were involved with the upkeep of Jainism and Jain knowledge for making its way through the centuries, through hard times and conflicts, through generations, to finally reach my own eyes. I appreciate their commitment and effort and hope to one day pay it forward.

6: Eso Panch Namokaro 7: Savva-pavappanasan | The Most Important Lines

The 6th line and 7th line give a cause an effect scenario that is possible to create. The meaning of the line is: Bowing down to these types of beings will lead to the destruction of all of your karma. This is the biggest line in the Navkar Mantra, the one that should guide every day, every moment of your life. And here is why: The line says that by bowing down to these types of beings correctly, karmas, sins, pain in your life will be eliminated. The biggest part of this sentence is the word correctly. The more depth and more appreciation you show, embody, understand, and internalize when you say the first five lines, the more you will destroy all of your karmas, the suffering in your life. And so right inside the biggest lines of the Navkar Mantra, being given 1 of the 3 main divisions of the Navkar Mantra’s purpose as a message, (Part 1 – I respect and appreciate these fives types of beings; Part 2 – Doing so results in enlightenment and freedom, the ultimate goals; Part 3 – This message is what should be valued the most in your life over all else) it is obvious how important it is to understand the importance of this line. It is saying – you must do Part 1 of the Mantra in the best manner you possibly can – if you are able to do so, you will be rewarded with the destruction of your karmas and the rise of your soul. Which is saying you must dive into the recesses of your mind and understand all the pieces of why you are bowing down to these five types of beings and why you are appreciating their actions. The more you understand, the more you realize, the better off you will be.

So once you understand that this line is a guide, a map, a manual on how to use the Navkar Mantra to maximize its power in influencing your life and soul positively, you have to act upon the meaning of the line by: saying it correctly.

The correct mental environment to say the Navkar Mantra is a whole different story. It involves eliminating all input from the senses, focusing the mind enough on a subject matter or a topic (such as to think of many, many different ways of bowing down to an Arihant) and contemplating upon that topic in order to release realizations about the importance of the subject matter. So when you say the Navkar Mantra, if you are to do so correctly, you should take a long moment to go through lines of thought that show that you are internalizing the meaning. And this should be done for each line. Spending a minute, five minutes, even twenty minutes on one line of the Navkar Mantra is okay.

To bow down to these five beings and know and understand how each of them has influenced and impacted your life in a specific way – if you do that correctly, with full passion, with extensions of thought – what will happen is that you will destroy all of your karmas by finding the path that frees you from the prison inside your mind. And this isn’t magic; literally the more you learn to place value on these 5 idealistic types of beings, these five idols, the more you will change the gears in your mind as you make decisions and react to events in your life.

All of this is contained within the 6th and 7th line. It is a map to the treasure or the destination – where the treasure is enlightenment and the destination is liberation – freedom from attachments, fears, worries, and suffering. Now you see how the Navkar Mantra is a puzzle that can be split into many divisions of different meaning – you can see the 3 parts and the most important being the second part (bowing down correctly leads to the destruction of your karmas) because it outlines the purpose of the journey and the value in the destination – all within these few words.

The 8th and 9th line say Manglananch Savvesim, Padhamam Havei Mangalam, or, that of all things auspicious in this universe, the Navkar Mantra is the first and foremost. What should be going through your head for an extended period of time here are trains of thought that allow you to fully understand how important the Navkar Mantra is. A train of thought that you construct on your own like this:

Of all things that are auspicious in this universe that you can perceive, that you can understand, that you can read, that you can desire or buy, the first and foremost above all of those, the first thing that you should value, is the Navkar Mantra. I value how lucky I am to have been one of the five million out of 7 Billion on this planet who was able to encounter this Mantra, this message. I value it so much, I feel so thankful and so lucky to be able to understand the meaning – that I have the mental capability to read and understand such a Mantra – so much that all the petty things such as materialistic possessions that I may want or all of the desires and expectations that I may want in my future: all of these things I could care less about when I feel the gratitude in my existence and experiences. In how lucky I am to be brought up the way I did with the luxuries I had, and with the circumstances and events that led to my present state. I am completely thankful and I am able to see how much lesser all of my desires and expectations are. I become free from suffering by understanding the power in the message of the Navkar Mantra – I finally fully appreciate all those who have given their mental energy and effort to bring about my existence and experiences which frees me from desire/worries/suffering by putting the desire/worries/suffering into a larger context that paints the bigger picture.

And how amazing is it that 2 lines of the 9 lines in the Navkar Mantra were chosen just to say – just to state – how important the first 7 lines were to the well-being and benefit of all souls all over the world who were trying to break free from their karmas, their egos, their expectations, desires and attachments.

Of all things that you specifically tend to desire or value, that you tend to desire, every dream or fantasy that you have, every thing that you could want – the fame, the power, the money, beauty – nothing comes close to the Navkar Mantra. To truly understand that, to truly believe in that sentence is the goal of the 8th and 9th line of the Navkar Mantra.

As it was said before: The Navkar Mantra is worth more than all of Bill Gates' wealth, more auspicious than all of the temple ceremonies you do, more to be desired than the CEO's chair of the company you work at, or the valedictorian’s position of the school you go to. But for everyone it is necessary to go through their own thought process of the things they most value, the things that they desire, and understand and accept an understanding of how the Navkar Mantra is incredibly far more valuable than all of those.

And in the Navkar Mantra is a guide for the spiritual life and journey itself. First as a Sadhu, you start by becoming self-aware, able to accept that there is a fully awakened state of pure peace and you are able to have such faith that you give up the materialistic world, your family, your possessions and luxuries. (Sadhu) And as you learn, you may have the ability to rise up and become experienced enough to teach others to rise onto or progress on a spiritual path. (Upadhyay) Once you are able to teach successfully and you understand the importance of the community, once you are able to lead, you may guide the direction of the spiritual followers and that community whilst upholding the truth and the message. (Acharya) And eventually you may become liberated from the cycle of pain and suffering, the rebirth of delusion. (Siddha) Finally, you should always appreciate and could strive even to become a future Arihant, a leader who learns and spreads truth in a time where there is none by becoming omniscient and compassionate for the well-being of the rest of humanity. Sadhu-Upadhyay-Acharya-Siddha-Arihant. This path is outlined right in the first five lines of the Navkar Mantra. A spiritual path forward for those who are ready to go down it.

The conclusion: The purpose of the Navkar Mantra is to respect these five beings to a point where you understand how to emulate them, why to respect them, you understand what their qualities are and you realize why to bow down to them. And so when you say the Navkar Mantra and you say the words but do not understand what you are saying, you are getting so much lesser value out of the Navkar Mantra. Even if you understand that you are to bow down to an Arihant, if you don’t know what the Arihant is, you are still getting less value out of the Navkar Mantra. The power comes from taking your time, going at a slower rate, thinking at your own speed if you want to understand something so much deeper and valuable in the world. Don’t think at all about getting to the end, getting to the finish line – life isn’t measured in numbers. At the end of your life you will not be saying, I counted 10000 Navkar Mantras or I spent 30 hours counting them. You wouldn’t be at the end of your life trying to claim that you did ‘this’ much. That in itself is an attachment to how much you did, to what you did, it is a part of an attachment to your past self and is inherently wrong. Instead, you would be appreciating the level of the impact that the Navkar Mantra had on the actions and decisions you made in your life. Something like ‘I am thankful I upheld non-violence and self-restraint and was able to pass those qualities onto my children’. Let time disappear, exit the dimension of time itself – when you say a Navkar Mantra don’t try to get to the finish, don’t force your mind from one line to the next. Instead, be at peace, let your mind think and appreciate to its full extent.

Life is about what you’re doing, when you’re doing it, not what you will have done when you’re done doing it. So take your time and forget about attachments and expectations from the next moment and just breathe, just be.

And so always be trying to break more and more free from your limited perspective and your current values and mindset about life – because there is something huge to all of the things that the Sadhus and Sadhvis live in, there is something huge to the state of mind of enlightenment and liberation that the Arihants feel, there is something huge to the level of compassion, bliss, and understanding you can feel if you overcome your ingrained wrong beliefs and inability to see from a grander perspective. There is something to it all, throughout the world, and it should be our goal to use this treasure to guide our decisions and become the beings that we train ourselves to truthfully idolize (the 5 types of beings, the Panch Parmesthis). And at the least, believe in there being something huge and maybe you’re just unable to see it yet.

If you want to reread, remember, or spread these ideas in the Navkar Mantra, and more importantly, the power and truth that lies in the most powerful Jain sutra, remember that you can read the whole thing online at InsidetheNavkar.com.

Now you know that there is a lot within Jainism that you may not know, may not have learned because there was never a chance in your past where you had the ability to learn easily (even if you went to Pathshala, you were probably too young to really understand the meaning in things). Well, you can change all of that by spending just a small part of your life actively learning about tenets and parts of Jainism that you hadn’t previously known. The more you know, the more you can connect it all together in order to internalize principles of truth and principles that describe the nature of reality more easily. But it takes the base of knowledge to reach the illumination at the top of the pyramid. Mahavir Swami, the being of the past that we regard so highly and should desire to emulate, spent 12 and half years in the forest in order to realize and tell us all of this, so there must be something incredibly powerful to the principles within Jainism. Start simple, with something like the Navkar Mantra or 9 Tattvas (Universal Truths of Life), then move on to more such as the 12 Bhavanas, then move on to understanding the English version of Atma Siddhi Shashtra – but keep going until you can make really important connections between your reality, your life, and how the principles of Jainism play out in your life. And once you can – when you enter a Derasar you will feel a glow around yourself for really understanding the purpose of it all, the purpose of each piece within religion itself. You will feel immense gratitude for all that came together for you. And this alone can easily make the journey worth it. If you read through this whole thing then you already know what great potential lies within you because you have the focus and spiritual/religious/philosophical/scientific curiosity that will help you pioneer, create, develop, and fulfill great projects and ideas. You see the fragility of your existence and just how many souls, lives, and minutes were spent on creating the various circumstances that is your life and your experiences – how you are the product of the work of so many others before you and around you. Faith will take you further, faith that spending the time learning something new will pay off in the end. And with that faith and compassion you see in the world, doors will unlock for you, unraveling new opportunities for you, and you’ll find yourself on the most beautiful paths you never could have foreseen.

But…

If you decided to skip to the end after couple pages to see where it would conclude, maybe this will ring more loudly to you in the future. Or maybe you can’t yet see the value in the end result, or maybe you just don’t know how to take the first step. No worries, eventually you’ll wade through the ocean and find yourself on land. Just hope the storm stays as far away from you till you get here.