जै · The Jain Encyclopedia
Why the samudghāta happens

The four made equal

आयु-सम

Lifespan, feeling, body-making and status must run out in the same samaya. When the last three are longer than the life left, the soul spreads itself across the universe and burns them down to size.

A kevalī has destroyed the four ghātiyā karmas; what remains cannot obscure anything, but it still has duration. The Tattvārtha-bhāṣya on 10.5 puts it plainly: when the lifespan-karma is shorter than the other three, the omniscient performs the samudghāta so that all four are made equal, and then the yogas are stopped. If they are already equal, there is nothing to level.

The Prajñāpanā adds the six-month rule - a kevalī with that much life left at omniscience necessarily does it, one with more may or may not - and the commentaries argue which way round the necessity runs. The atlas prints the eight samayas, which do not depend on the answer.

The eight samayas of the kevali-samudghātaa rod, a door, a churn, the whole universe, and back - Prajñāpanā 36the soul extended, never moved: its innumerable points on the loka's, one to onestep it; nothing here plays by itself0 · the body1 · daṇḍa2 · kapāṭa3 · manthāna4 · loka-pūraṇa5 · manthāna6 · kapāṭa7 · daṇḍa8 · the bodybacknextsamaya 4 of 8in elevationin plan · schematicSAMAYA 4 OF 8loka-pūraṇayoga: kārmaṇatakes nothing in - anāhārakaloka-pūraṇa: the corners fillone soul on every space-point of the universe, for one samayawhy: lifespan, feeling, body and status must end in the same samaya -spread across the loka, the longer three are shed down to the shortest
The eight samayas - The four made equal highlighted

Measurements and counts

Karmas at omniscience4 - the aghātiyā
Shortest, usuallyāyu, the lifespan
Made equal to itvedanīya · nāma · gotra
The rulesix months - read both ways

Connected

Open in the interactive atlas →

समयं गोयम! मा पमायए

Do not be heedless, Gautama, for even a single samaya.

Uttarādhyayana Sūtra 10