Wellness Curated
On Wellness Curated, Anshu Bahanda gets world renowned experts on physical and mental health to guide you pro bono. Packed with content that helps people to understand their bodies and minds better and to find relief from the pain and restrictions that have long prevented them from living their best lives, this show is a go-to resource for anyone who wants to improve their quality of life.
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Wellness Curated
The Agamas of Jainism: Lessons That Still Matter
What if the key to understanding life’s biggest questions had been passed down for centuries—but nearly disappeared along the way?
In this episode of Wellness Curated, host Anshu Bahanda sits down with Manish Modi, a custodian of Jain literature and the great-grandson of Pandit Nathuram Premji, a pioneer in Jain publishing and social reform. Manish continues this legacy through Hindi Granth Ratnakar Karyalay, a prestigious publishing house founded in 1912. His passion for preserving and sharing Jain teachings has led him to translate, publish, and lecture extensively on the subject.
But these texts weren’t simply written and preserved. They survived secrecy, memory lapses, and even opposition from within the Jain community itself. What happened when knowledge was entrusted to memory alone? Why were ancient manuscripts hidden away in Karnataka for centuries? And how did a group of determined scholars convince a wealthy patron to fund their revival instead of another temple?
Beyond their history, these scriptures hold profound lessons about how to live with purpose, balance, and clarity. Mahavir’s teachings weren’t just for his time—they speak to challenges we all face today. Join us as we uncover how these ancient insights continue to shape lives, offering wisdom that remains as relevant as ever.
For a transcript of this show, go to https://wellnesscurated.life/the-agamas-of-jainism-lessons-that-still-matter-2/
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Anshu Bahanda: I was told a very interesting story by my great-grandmother. And this is the first time I heard the story about Vardhamana. I must have been three or four years old. And she told me that about two and a half millennia back there was this young boy called Vardhamana. He was a prince, and he had every form of comfort you can think of, comfort, leisure but he kept feeling there was something missing. He would look around him and see suffering. And he didn't understand that. And he didn't understand the meaning of life. He didn't understand what happens after death and he didn't quite find peace within him. So when he was about 30, he decided to give up this whole princely life that he had and he became a seeker. So he wandered around the country seeking, looking for meaning. And he would spend hours in deep meditation. And then finally one day something quite miraculous happened. He received what was called Keval Nyana which was the ultimate illumination and awareness and that is when we would say he became enlightened.
Manish Modi: Yes.
AB: And he overcame at that point this whole bondage of karma and life and death. And his teachings which were oral at that point later became scriptures called the Agamas. This was Mahavir, the 24th Tirthankara of Jainism. His main teachings were about non violence, truth and self discipline. And we are going to explore the Agamas today and the relevance of the Agamas in our modern life today and how they have been preserved over many, many years.
For that we have someone very special. We have Manish Modi here with us today. He is the great grandson of Pandit Nathuram Premji who was a pioneer in the publishing world of Jainism and he was a social reformer. And Manish runs the prestigious Hindi Granth Ratnakar Karyalay.
MM: Yes.
AB: Which started in 1912. He's very passionate about promoting Jainism through translation, through publishing, through lectures. Thank you Manish for taking the time to be with us here today.
MM: Jai Jinendra. Thank you so much for inviting me here.
AB: Thank you. Now Manish, I want you to start by telling me what are the Agamas and how are they relevant today?
MM: So the Agamas are the teachings of the Tirthankars now, when the Tirthankaras taught, there was no writing. This is prehistoric era, so people heard them, but they had the Gandharas, who were some such elite intellectuals that they would retain everything. So this was the oral process. And this process went on for generations. Bhagavan Mahavir retained Nirvan in 527 BCE, that's Before Common Era, before Christ. And for about 5-600 years, the oral tradition continued and his disciples remembered every bit of the teaching. With time, the teachings, the memory was diminishing, so the teachings were going away. So at that point they started and decided to sit down and start recording what was left. You had Acharya Bhadra Bahu, who was the last Shruta Kevali. Now, Kevali is an omniscient being. So Bhagavan Mahavir was a Kevali. There were three other Keval Gyanis after him. The last one was Jambu Swami. Now, after that there was no more omniscience left, but there were people called the Stuta kevalis. They remembered they had the memory of an omniscient, but they did not have the experience of that knowledge. Now, with Jainism or any kind of.
AB: Explain that.
MM: Okay, yeah. With Jainism or any kind of tradition, it's not just the verbal knowledge, not just the scriptural knowledge, but the experience of that knowledge. When you experience it, when you imbibe it and when it becomes one with you, that is when you become omniscient, where it becomes part of who you are. After Jambu Swami, there were no more people who had that realisation of that knowledge. They had the information, but not the realisation of that.
AB: So you're saying that they learnt the knowledge, it wasn't downloaded to them?
MM: Yes, exactly. The spiritual download hadn't taken place, but at least they carried the hard data with them. So that hard data continued till about 100 years before Christ, or around the time of Christ. At that point they realised that even the hard data was going to get lost. So that's when they started to start writing it down. It's called recension. So they began writing it down. So a lot of the original Agama was lost, but parts of it were significant parts were retained. Now, we have two traditions in Jainism, the Digambars and the Shwetambars. The Digambars believe that there were the 12 Angas, they were the 12 limbs of the Agama. So Shwetambas believe that the first 11 Angas were retained, the 12th one was lost. The Digambars believe that the first 11 were lost and the 12th was retained. However you see it, the Shwetambas have retained the first 11, the Digambas have retained the 12th one. You combine that and you still have an Agama. See there will always be didactical people who say that let's have this quarrel. But Jainism is about self realisation. It's not about quarrelling and ultimately it's about the inner experience.
AB: Absolutely.
MM: All of the external knowledge is merely a takeoff point for the internal wisdom. Once you have the internal wisdom and that's where…
AB: Then it doesn't matter what anyone says to you outside.
MM: Exactly. So that's why anyone who's learned Jainism properly or believes in the spiritual world will not get into these arguments about Digambar in Shwetambar or Hindu or Jain, or Islam or Christianity, it's all, it's all about the internal inner experience.
AB: Absolutely, absolutely.
MM: So these are external labels that you take off point. One person's take off point, maybe an airport, another person's take off point, maybe say a railway train. A third person will be, say, a car or bike..
AB: But the destination is the same.
MM: Exactly. So all the Agamas give you that inner picture. With the Digambars the story is very interesting. There are two gurus, Acharya Dharasen and Acharya Gundhar. Each of them knew part of the scripture. So then there are these very learned monks who went to them— Pushpadant and Bhut Bali and these gurus tested them to see if they were capable of carrying this information. So the guru deliberately gives them a wrong sutra, a wrong Shloka, so they memorise it. So then they end up with weird hair and weird teeth. So then he says look, if you memorise it correctly, all this disappears. So then they memorise correctly, it's done flawlessly. So after testing them, testing their memory, then he starts giving these very deep, very detailed descriptions of karma and how karmas bind to the soul. Now this is directly the knowledge of Bhagavan Mahavir who's an omniscient. So this is sacred knowledge, it's also very, very important knowledge. Now unlike other systems, Jainism has always believed that knowledge must be disseminated with everyone. It's meant for everyone. Right? So all the laws of Jainism are basically universal laws meant for, for the well being of all human beings, all living beings, not just human beings.
There's no caste system or no gender…
AB: No differentiation.
MM: All people have souls. Right? Everyone who has a soul wants happiness.
AB: What I find amazing about Jainism is that it's not just for the benefit of all human beings, it's for the benefit of everyone. Not just all beings, but all objects. It's for the benefit of everyone and everything. That is what is so powerful about Jainism.
MM: Because the omniscient saw that everyone is in pain, everyone wants happiness. So give them the path of happiness. If I were to put it in two sentences, it is know yourself and be yourself. That's the path. Very simple.
AB: Everyone is energy, we're energy. The objects are energy, the animals are energy, we're all energy. So it's coming back in a way to what Jainism taught.
MM: Exactly.
AB: Centuries ago.
MM: Yeah. So basically, the thing is we have the energy, we have to purify the energy. How do you do that? You look at what are the driving forces that sort of scar your energy. The driving forces are Ahar Sangya, Maithun Sangya, Bhaya Sangya, and Parigraha Sangya. The desire for food, desire for sex, desire for collecting external material objects and fear.
AB: And fear Bhaya Sangya.
MM: Yeah, Bhaya Sangya. So these are the four driving forces that impel you into Sansar, into transmigration. So what Mahavir is saying is work on these. So Mahavir does not say you starve. Eat. Don't be attached to it. Drink. Don't be attached to it, and find a way of living which doesn't harm others.
I have a guru, Jayesh Bhai Sheth. He came up with this beautiful thing called the universal laws. And these are basically the teachings of Bhagavan Mahavir in the simplest form. And the first universal law is I am here to give.
AB: Lovely, lovely.
MM: It's just the idea that if I'm here to give, then there's no problem. I am here to give and whatever happens to me is a consequence of my own actions. It's very simple. If you have money in your bank account, withdraw it. Right. If you don't have money, you cannot withdraw it. So if you have given in the past, you will get it now. If you haven't given in the past, how will you get it now?
AB: So Manish, then I have a question for you. There's a lot that says when you study about the Agamas or about Jainism that the scholars worked very hard and the monks to preserve the argument.
MM: Yes, of course.
AB: Why? Why did they need to, firstly, preserve it? Why was it different from, you know, the other scriptures? Why did it need to be preserved? And secondly, give us some examples of what was done.
MM: Sure. So what happened is as I said, the scriptures were being lost because of the diminishing memory.
AB: Right.
MM: So they had to work hard to restore that. And once they did that, it was written down in the Brahmi font, which is the earlier font. And with time those scrolls started getting damaged. Right. So every two, three hundred years there would be some kind of renaissance. And we say, okay, let's rewrite these scriptures. Then they would write it on another set of palm leaf scrolls. Another set of palm leaf scrolls. Till about the 14th, 15th century common era, the 10th century common era, when we had paper coming into India, thanks to China. So then they started writing them. By then, languages that evolved from Prakrit to Sanskrit and on the other side, from Prakrit to upper branch, from upper branch to Hindi, Marathi, Punjabi, Haryanvi, all of these languages have begun evolving. In the south.
The Dakini languages. You had Tamil first of course. Tamil is earlier than modern Sanskrit. Sangam, Tamil. Okay, so you had Tamil then you had Malayalam coming in Telugu, Kannada, then Marathi came from Kannada and Maharashtri, Prakrit. With time these scriptures written in Prakrit were noted in the Kannada script. So the language is Prakrit but the script is Kannada. So the dichotomy is that you have scholars of Prakrit in northern India, they don't know Kannada and scholars of Kannada in Southern India, but they don't know Prakriti. Typically in India, we turn conservative. Very often the people put in charge of taking care of the scriptures or temples are the most conservative people. They may be decent people, I'm not questioning their motivation, but they turn conservative. Their fear is that if someone touches them, they will become less sacred, all that kind of thing, which is very illogical to begin with, but that's how it is. So these are people, well meaning people who stop scholars from referring to these things.
So the first challenge was to get these guys to give up the scriptures. “Hey look, we're not taking them, we're not stealing them.” We are Jains. We need to study these scriptures because they've been lost for so many years. And we have recordings where after the same 10th century Common Era, these scriptures are not found anywhere in northern India. No one knows where they are. In the 20th century, with better communication, they find out that these scriptures were lying in Karnataka, relatively well preserved, right in Muda Bidri and Shramana Bedugur. So you have these scholars like my great grandfather Pandit Nathuram Premi and his scholar friend Dr. Hiralal Jain. There was this sub judge, Jamna Prasad sub judge. Back then even a judge was strong but even a sub judge was a very important person in the community. So they got hold of other rich people, said, okay, please, we need to get these things done. We need to get these scriptures translated into Hindi because we've been lost without them for 800 or 1000 years. So initially at the Saith Hira Chand sent Manikchand from Bombay, he paid someone to clandestinely record these scriptures because the people in charge of them were very conservative and they felt that if you touch them they'll become less holy. Which is crazy, but that's how it was. So it took them decades to convince those guys that hey look, we are well meaning people and we just want to transcribe these scriptures from Kannada script to Devanagari script and we need to understand and analyse and translate them into Hindi for the well being of the common man, for everyone, for scholars, for everyone. Because we have lost them. We are Jains, we claim to have these scriptures and they've been lost. So it took 20, 30 years to convince the people, right, to allow them to transcribe them. So you have scholars who would transcribe them from ancient Hale Kannada to modern Kannada script. Now the guy who's doing the transcribing was not a scholar.
So the problem with Indian manuscripts is there are no full stops and commas. You have to understand the subject matter to understand whether full stop is appearing where next sentence.
AB: No, there might not be full stops, but there's enough. I don't know, there's those lines.
MM: No, those come not everywhere. And if it's Shlokas, the lines are there. Yeah, when it's prose there are no lines. Okay, that's interesting. So there was a gentleman who started doing the transcribing and he brought it to North India. I said, “Okay, I wrote this down” and I was like, “Dude, where are the full stops?” He randomly puts, raat ko baith ke, puts the full stops anywhere he thinks appropriate. The sentence doesn't make sense.
AB: So you're saying it was very difficult to get them transcribed back to the northern languages.
MM: Not just the language, just the script.
AB: And to the script. Oh, I see.
MM: Now we're not even reached the language part yet. We're still stuck with the script. And then these pandits, what they would do is they would do one edition for the sage and then one secret edition to be sold off later. So all of these were full of mistakes. At some point they said we need to have Kannada scholars as well, otherwise we will never be able to interpret these properly. So then there's a team of two editors. Dr. Hiralal Jain and Dr. A. N. Upadhyay. Dr. Hiralal Jain is from Bundelkhand. So his mother tongue is Hindi, Bundelkhandi. He's a scholar of Sanskrit and of course, he knows Prakrit. And Dr. A. N. Upadhyay is a Kannadiga. He knows Prakrit and Sanskrit and English and he knows Hindi also. So these guys are the two editors. And on the other hand you get actual translators who will do the work and have Pandit Phulchand Shastri, a giant scholar. He translates about 7,000-8,000 pages like that. Charging one rupee per page, one large page. Imagine that ancient language from Prakrit into Hindi, from Sanskrit into Hindi and all of that proofreading, understanding is such a technical subject. Over 7,000 pages were done. Took a period of 20, 30, 40 years. But once it was done, there was no money to print it. People were not interested. People want ornate rituals because that's fun. No one was interested in scriptures. So then these guys, Pandit Nathuram Premi, Dr. Hiralal Jain, Jamna Prasad Sabjaj, catch hold of this very rich man in Vidisha called Seth Sitabh Rai Gulab Rai. And he wanted to spend 30,000 rupees to build yet another temple, you know. And they said, we have enough temples now. The thing in Bundelkhand is we have this system, these titles. Seth, Sriman Seth. How do you get a title? When you build one temple you're called a Singh. You build two temples, you're called a Seth.
AB: They give you a title.
MM: When you build three temples you are called a Seth. You built four temples called Sriman Seth. Sriman Seth is the ultimate acme. It's like a Rolls Royce.
AB: Oh, so that's why he wanted to build more and more temples.
MM: So they said, we'll give you the title of Sriman Seth don't worry. You give us this money, we'll publish this book. So he gives the 30,000 rupees to these guys, they get these scholars working and they give the title Daanveer Srimanth Seth Sitab Rai Gulab Rai Lakshmi Chand Jai Vidhisha. That's how they got the money.
AB: That's how they got the money and got it done. And talk to me Manish, about the themes and talk to me of the structure of the Agamas and any key themes that you want to mention.
MM: Okay. The Agamas work on various topics and they are divided into four aniyogas, the Pratham-anuyoga, Charn-anuyoga, Karan-anuyoga and Dravy-anuyoga. The Pratham-anuyoga is dharmic stories, inspirational stories, which is the most popular. They have the Charn-anuyoga which gives rules of conduct of proper appropriate conduct. Then you have the Karan-anuyoga which gives you details about the universe, how it works, how karmic bondage works, how many heavens there are, there are 16 heavens, there are seven kinds of hell, what you do, what gets you there. And then you have the Dravy-anuyoga which talks about the soul bondage and how to get rid of the bondage. So as Jains we are taught that you read all four anuyogas. If you just read one anuyoga you have partial knowledge. You should read all four to get a proper nuanced understanding.
AB: And what is being done in terms of the young kids? Is there a school that they go to to learn it? Is it up to the parents to teach them? How is a young child made to read it?
MM: Okay. The beauty with all Indian religious systems, especially India, is that we are very free. There's no pope authority which says you've got to do this. So all parents are free. So most of the time, largely till 30, 40 years ago, Indian families had three generations. It was a grandparents duty to give religion to their children. That's how it worked beautifully. Over the years with more influx into cities, more of this, only two generations living under one roof now the need was felt to impart religious instruction. So initially, say 100, 200 years ago, yet very few Paathshalas where children were taught. But now the system 20, 30 years ago was revived very strongly, especially in larger cities like Bombay where we have a large population of Jains. But even otherwise Jain monks, wherever they give, they know they're more particular about reviving the system of Paathshala so children have the opportunity to go there and study. But again it's optional. Not every child goes, not every parent wants to send his child there, but the system is there. If you're interested, in my case, we didn't have Paathshala back when I was growing up, so then I started studying at the age of 20. I mean I am a Jain by birth and by practice. We were vegetarians and all of that and I used to listen to lectures occasionally but it never sparked an interest. At the age of 20 there's this very beautiful poem in Jainism called the Bhaktamar Stotra. So Bhaktamar Stotra I started learning it. Now this talks about miracles where this sadhu is put under 48 chains and each shloka he recites opens one chain. I'm like, this is not Jainism, boss. We don't believe in miracles, we don't believe in Chamatkar. So then I started asking people, look, I'm happy to. Now my Nanaji was very keen on Bhaktamar stotra. He said he had eight grandchildren. My mother has two sisters. Between the three girls, they had eight children.
So all of my first cousins and I, we were all taught the Bhaktamar stotra. Now when I was taught at the age of 20, it's a beautiful shloka in Sanskrit, 48 shlokas. Now when I was taught, I started questioning, boss, I don't believe that— taala tut gaya hain. So then I started asking people what this is about. I learned about the Sanskrit system of poetics where they say you have three types of statements. Abidha, Lakshana and Dhyanjana. Abidha is a literal statement. Lakshana is the symbolic understanding. Vanjana is when you allude to a person. I'll explain this with an example. Take the name Aparna. It's a very common name. Now Aparna, literally in Abidhayat, what does it mean? A non leaf. Why would you name your daughter non leaf? Doesn't make sense.
Lakshana, what does it mean? Now leaf in Indian literature means Paranakuti is where a sadhu lives, in poverty, in simplicity. So when I name my daughter Aparna, it means I want her to live not in simplicity but in luxury. Simplicity to live in luxury. So there Goddess Parvati is called Aparna. So that's why I named her Aparna, not because of non leaf.
AB: Interesting. Very interesting.
MM: So when you understand the Abhidha, Lakshana, Vyanjana system, then you understand the Bhaktamar stotra. He's talking symbolically.
AB: And also Jainism has this rich tradition of interpretation and commentary.
MM: Yes.
AB: So talk to me about some of the commentaries which you like and something that's particularly relevant today.
MM: Okay. So we have this very detailed system. We have the Churni, we have the Bhashya, we have the Tika, we have the Avachurni, we have the Tabba.
AB: Okay.
MM: There are seven of them. Okay. All seven explain the text in a different manner. All of this is hermeneutics. My son is studying this now. He's doing his PhD in religious studies at University of California, Riverside.
AB: Wow.
MM: So he's studying hermeneutics right now. He just wrote a paper on the Satkhandagama's evolution. So hermeneutics, why? Because just words will not convey the sense. For instance, you and I, we've seen Sachin Tendulkar backtracks. So when we say he's a Sachin Tendulkar in his field, we mean he's an excellent proponent of his field, right? Now if someone were born in the year 2020, he may not know Sachin retired in 2012, he may not know of Sachin Tendulkar. And for instance, now you know you have this system called deliberate archaism, a text where you're saying that this was much older than it actually was. This has been done, it's being done in India. So then you catch them out in this manner. Like he says, this was written in the 1970s, but he refers to Sachin Tendulkar. Right. There was no Sachin Tendulkar. So that's how every commentary will help you situate the text in its logical context.
AB: Okay.
MM: Without that, it's impossible to understand anything. There's this beautiful text called Tattvartha Sutra, written in the 1st or 2nd century Common Era by Acharya Umaswamy, which is commonly accepted by both Digambars and Shwetambas as being the most important text of Jain doctrine.
AB: Right.
MM: So this text, there's a modern commentary done by Dr Duli Chandra Jain of New York. And he says it in a very, very scientific manner, explaining everything. See, this is one very one way of explaining religion, which is like, it's all sacred. We can't analyse, it's beyond us. We cannot understand. The other way is a more logical way where we say we'll understand everything. So Jainism has room for both. We have the Agya Pradhani and the Pariksha Pradhani. The Agya Pradhani person will say, okay, God said it, I believe it, I will accept it, which is fine. The other guy is the Pariksha Pradhani people. We will examine it and we will only accept it if we are convinced. Right. So true Tattvat Sutra. So Bhaktamar Sutra is for Agya Pradhani.
AB: Okay.
MM: Tattvartha Sutra is for the Pariksha Pradhani, where I want to analyse, understand, and I will only accept it once I'm convinced.
AB: Wonderful.
MM: So Dr Duri Chandra Jain's commentary is beautiful. It explains things in the simplest manner.
AB: And tell me, in terms of the practices of Jainism, I mean, something that people talk a lot about is the mindfulness and the ethics [in Jainism].
MM: Yes.
AB: So give me some examples again that could be relevant today of the mindfulness and ethics practices.
MM: Yes. So here we are taught in Jainism that you see things from four perspectives for the rest of the world. For yourself you have the Bara Bhavana. For the others you have the Char Bhavana. What are they? Maitri Bhavana, Pramod Bhavana, Karuna Bhavana and Madhyastha Bhavana. So Maitri is a universal friendship with all living beings no matter what. He's a human being, he's a creature. He's an ant, caterpillar, crocodile. It's a being. It has a life form. It could one day attain moksha.
AB: Yes.
MM: Therefore, Maitri with all living beings.
AB: Right.
MM: Maitri with all creatures.
AB: Right.
MM: Also Maitri with this table, with the stand. Because if I have hatred holding me back.
AB: Yes.
MM: So Maitri with all thoughts, all ideas, all people, all objects. Universal Maitri. Maitri Bhav.
Second is Pramod Bhav. Pramod Bhav is where you genuinely appreciate someone's good qualities. Every bad person will have some good qualities. Every good person will have bad qualities. You look at the good, ignore the bad.
AB: Right.
MM: So Satveshu Maitri Guneshu Pramodam Klishteshu Jeeveshu, Krupa paratvam, Madhyasth Bhavam, vipirit Vrittav Sada, Mamatma, Vidyadhatu Deva.
The first thing is Maitri. Second is Pramod. When you genuinely appreciate someone's good qualities, you start imbibing it. You prepare yourself spiritually to accept those good qualities inside you. And when you start criticising, you're accepting bad qualities.
AB: Yes.
MM: If you don't want to do that, do Pramod Bhav.
AB: So focus on the positives.
MM: Always. Third is the Madhyasta Bhav. Madhyasta Bhav is equanimity. No matter what happens. Madhiya mei rahiye. Jo ho raha hai hoga. Mere karm k anusar ho raha hai.
There's nothing that will happen that was not part of my karmic what I have earned. The fourth is Karuna Bhavana. Karuna is kindness, compassion. Compassion for those who are less. Another thing we have to do is be gentle with others, firm with ourselves.
AB: So you said Maitri Bhav, Pramod Bhav, Madhyastha Bhav, and Karuna bhav. Beautiful. That was beautiful. That was amazing. Now also tell me, with the digital revolution now, I mean, I know that in the past there's been all these issues in translation and I'm sure there were bits that got lost or got misplaced in the process. But how have things changed? Now is it easier to dispel knowledge? How has it affected Jainism in particular?
MM: See I remember when I was living in Dubai, this was ‘94 to ‘99 and there's a gentleman called Vinod Daria Purkar, his daughter Shivali was I think 10 or 11 years of age says look, he was an IT professional. He says “look, the digital world is here. There was this English translation. Beta, start typing it.” We didn't have a lot of sources, we didn't know a lot of things. The girl starts typing the entire text. English translation and we upload it on Jainworld.com. Over the years, 25 years, 30 years, there's been so much of [advancement] in technology. So a lot of Jain texts are available on AI. A lot of text, we are working on ocr, optical character recognition, we're working on that. And a lot of websites are there. Wikipedia is usually very reliable. There's Jainpedia.org, there's a lot of websites which give you very good information on Jainism. Lots and lots of books being printed. A large chunk of Jain texts have been translated reliably into English. I've done about 70 text translations myself and there are lots of people who are doing this kind of work because people realise that ultimately, 1960s onwards, India thinks, writes and speaks in English. So if you don't have it in English, you're lost.
AB: So Manish, you're such a wealth of information, you know, in terms of Jain knowledge it's amazing. Tell me like you were telling us that when you were 20 and you heard that story about those, the chains and you know the miracle. That's when you know that excited you into going further. Tell me your favourite anecdote or your favourite story about Jainism from your, from your life of learning.
MM: Okay. One of my turning points was the Bhaktamar Stotra. The other turning point in my life was, I used to work for Bvlgari in Dubai. Beautiful jewellery, amazing jewellery. So I was in charge of inventory. I would keep the keys to 12 million dirhams worth of jewellery and watches. So there was this beautiful watch, it cost AED 385,000. So more dirhams than there are days in a year. And I was in charge of this gorgeous Bulgari watch. Very elegant and diamonds and stuff. I used to think this watch is the key to happiness. Anyone who owns his watch is happy for the rest of his life. And sure enough, one day some wealthy sheikh from some minor province, not Dubai and Abu Dhabi, a tiny province. Some Sheikh came and bought the watch. Lovely. And I thought, this guy is the luckiest man in the world. And six months later, he comes back. The watch is battered, full of scratches. Like, what the hell happened? It was. It kind of shattered my illusion. This is not happiness. Because this watch looks horrible. I wouldn't wear it today. If this was my idea of happiness, then. It's not. It doesn't work. I start thinking to myself that having more is not a sign of happiness. It's not the object that gives happiness. It's your concept of happiness. So you work on that concept and you're assured of happiness. Happiness andar se aa rahi hai na bahar se toh nahi aa rahi. So then you work on the inside.
AB: Absolutely. It's all internal.
MM: It's all internal. Everything is internal. So when you realise that four Bhavanas, Maithi Pramod, Karna, Madhyasta, you start internalising things. There's another magic formula. It's called the. ‘Sorry. Sorry. Never again. Thank you.’ So how does it work? Now there are many times when people have offended you, hurt you, or said or did something that you didn't want them to do. What do you do here? Aap apne andar sorry sorry karne lagihe. Yaar I must have done this. Had I not done it, no one, I would not have witnessed it in front of me. You see someone beating someone up. There's something happening which is bad. Apna sorry, sorry kar loge. I must have done it in the past. That's why I saw it. Either I did it myself or I asked someone to do it. I did it myself, I asked someone to do it. Or I aided and abetted someone in doing it. Or I said, well done. When you do these things, you're binding karmas. So when you stop doing that, Aap Sorry, Sorry. Karlo, aapka ho gaya. The next thing you do is never again. Never again… If we say you make a resolve. I must have done something bad in my past. I will never ever do it again. Now you have stopped yourself. Past ka aapne clean kar diya, aage ka rok liya, aage mai nahi karuga. Third is thank you. Welcome. You said thank you. When someone does something bad for you, he's cleaning your bad karma. What are you going to say? Thank you.
AB: Thank you. What a great way of looking at things. Now tell me. You've given us some really great things to go back with, you know, like this. ‘Sorry, Sorry’.
MM: ‘Never again.
AB: Never again. Thank you. That's amazing. That actually reminds me of this Hawaiian ho'oponopono saying always. Yes, it's very similar. And also the four Bhavanas. If there's one message at the end that you want people all over the world to listen to, what would that be about Jainism and the Agamas?
MM: If you can keep in mind, I'm here to give. Whatever happens to me is a result of my past karmas. What I do will come back to me. If you're clear about that, you're sorted. You don't have to read lots of scriptures, but internalise the practice. The whole idea is not just knowing the thing, you got to live it and live it with this understanding of ‘Sorry, sorry, never again. Thank you. Welcome.’ See, the one thing that all of us do realise, you know, say you travel from London to this place, you took a plane, right? Now you're not attached to the plane, right? Plane hai toh thik hai, aap baithe comfortably and now you're here. I took a cab and I came here. Now the cab is gone, it's fine. Similarly, this body is a role that I'm playing. I'm not really Manish Modi. This is a role that I'm playing. So this role I play to the best of my ability. Like Amitabh Bachchan in Sholay, he did not hit Amjad Khan. He was playing that role.
AB: Lovely. Thank you, Manish. That was such a wealth of knowledge. Thank you for coming here and talking to our listeners today. And to the listeners, I hope you'll take away some of these pearls of wisdom that we've learned about Jainism and the Agamas from Manish. The one that I'm going back with is the four Bhavanas, what you said about the ‘Sorry, sorry. Never again. Thank you—’ was also amazing. All that is very powerful. I'd like to end with a little bit of something that Mahavir had said, one of his teachings which says, “One who neglects or disregards the existence of earth, air, fire, water and vegetation disregards his own existence which is entwined with them.”
Thank you for being here. I hope you go back with a little bit of this amazing precious knowledge that has been passed down to us. This is Anshu Bahanda. Thank you for tuning into Ancient Wisdom for Modern Living— Sacred texts, Timeless wisdom. Until next time.
