Pratikraman: The Key That Resolves All Conflicts (Full Version) Pratikraman: The Key That Resolves All Conflicts | Page 108
[3] These Are Not Lord Mahavir’s Pratikramans
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padakmanu, they will reply that it has to do with doing
pratikraman, but not a single mistake gets cleansed. If, despite
using soap and clean water, the stain on the cloth does not go
away, is it because one used the wrong soap, or was there
something wrong with the water, or is the one doing the washing
at fault? Not even a single mistake is reduced. Why is that? One
does so many pratikramans every day; you are aware of that,
are you not? Have you gone to a maharaj to do pratikraman?
Questioner: Yes, I have.
(46)
Dadashri: Despite doing padakmanu, why has not a
single mistake been erased? It is because the pratikraman is
done in the Maagdhi language. Even when a parrot says, ‘Ram
has come…Ram has gone…’ even when the parrot speaks of
moksha, etc., what good does it do for us? So to take the
Lord’s name like a parrot is the same as doing pratikraman
without the understanding.
Mistakes can only be cleansed if pratikraman is done
with the understanding. That is why I told the maharaj to conduct
pratikraman in Gujarati. Only if people understand it will they
realize that they are doing pratikraman, and that previously
they did not do it correctly. Should there not be a benefit of
doing pratikraman?
One Attains According to the Goal
Questioner: You said that during the time of the middle
twenty-two Tirthankars, people used to do ‘shoot-on-sight’
pratikraman, they were aware from moment to moment, and
they used to do pratikraman for both worldly happiness and
moksha.
Dadashri: No, not for that kind of happiness. Many did
it to attain liberation, many had other intents and for some it was
happiness. With this pratikraman, whatever one’s intent was,
he derived the benefits accordingly.