Lord Neminath or Arishtanemi, the 22nd Tirthankara

 Lord Neminath or Arishtanemi, the 22nd Tirthankar

Arishtanemi or Lord Neminath was the 22nd Jain tirthankara of the avasarpini time cycle. The historical date of Lord Neminath was around 3100 BC. Jain tradition place him as a contemporary of Lord Krishna, the ninth and last Vasudeva. He is mentioned in Rigved Sanhita as an important personality.

The complexion of Arishtanemi is black and symbol is conch (sankha). The chaitya tree under which he got omniscience is vetasa.

Lord Neminath had eight previous incarnations, among which four times he was incarnated as God (2nd, 4th, 6th, 8th).

The father of Lord Neminath was Samudra Vijaya, who was king of Sauripura and mother Siva Devi. He was born on Shukla Panchami i.e., fifth day of bright moon in the month of Shravana. While he was in mother’s womb, his mother saw a wheel (nemi) of black jewels (arishta) in her dream. Therefore, his father decided his name to be Arishtanemi which later on became popular as Neminath.

Lord Krishna and his brother Baladeva were his cousins. Arishtanemi was very brave and strong. He had the power to lift and blow Panchajanya conch which no one could, except Lord Krishna. To test the strength of Arishtanemi, Lord Krishna called him for a battle. The test was to bend each other’s arm. Arishtanemi bent Lord Krishna’s arm but Lord Krishna could only clung to his arm and could not bend it. The arms of Arishtanemi were like pillars.

The marriage of Arishtanemi was fixed with Rajimati, daughter of king Ugrasen. On the day of marriage, while he was moving in a chariot and was near the house of bride, he heard a loud noise of animals crying in fear of death before slaughter. The meat of these animals were supposed to be cooked for the guests who were invited for the marriage ceremony. Arishtanemi was awfully shocked hearing this information and immediately released the animals. At that time, he decided not to marry but to renounce the worldly pleasure. He set a great example of practicing celibacy.

On the 6th day of bright moon, in the month of shravana, he accepted mendicancy after tearing his hairs in five handfuls and began samayika. He attained omniscience after fifty four days in the forenoon of Amavasya (no moon) in the month of Aswin under the  bamboo tree near sahasravana on Mt. Girnar when moon was in Chitra constellation. He attained nirvana on the Girnar mountain with many other monks after fasting for 30 days. He had 11 Ganadharas and a large number of followers under four tirthas ie. sadhus, sadhvis, shravakas and shravikas.

Gomedha Yaksh was his male messenger deity and Ambika Devi was his female messenger deity who accompanied Lord Neminath till the end of his life.

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