Tag Archives: madhya lok

The Madhya Lok

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Gati, Kāy, Tatva, Ātmā, Danḋak, Dravya were enjoying a break between their classes at the campus coffee house.

“After the last session on the structure of lok, I am still wondering where are we in it”, triggered Ātmā.

“In madhya lok. Where else?”, replied Gati.

Ya ya that was clear. But where in madhya lok? You remember, even the madhya lok is 1 rajju wide, right?

“What a unit? Innumerous yojan. Did you guys check the video? I had never thought, if anything like that would exist: finite but inexpressible”, added Dravya.

Most of them nodded yes.

“Yes yes, I think inummerous was curious enough, for us to watch it”, supported Tatva.

“Did you go through the reference book as well?”, further asked Dravya.

“You mean ‘Enigma of the Universe‘, right?. I have just started reading it”, answered Kāy.

“I had done some selected multiple book readings in search of where in madhya lok are we”, said Danḋak.

“Hey, then why don’t you share that with us?”, requested Ātmā.

Not yet completely understood.

That’s fine. You share what you have read and let’s discuss and see if we can find more insights. Otherwise, anyways we’ll go to the professor and ask him.

“That sound’s great”, came a chorus.

“The madhya lok consists of inummerous islands and oceans, alternately”, started Danḋak.

“Again innumerous?”, expressed a bothered Dravya.

Yes. Reference to innumerous would be coming back so much in understanding the world we live in, that guys who have not seen the suggested video, must watch it and convince yourself about such thing called innumerous.

And does alternately mean that islands & oceans alternate?

Yes. The centre most island is jambū-dwīp, 1 lakh (i.e. 100 thousand) yojan wide.

“yojan is same 4000 miles, right?”, confirmed Tatva.

Yes. Around it is the ocean lavaṅ-samudra, 2 lakh yojan wide. Then comes another island dhātki-khand, 4 lakh yojan wide around the lavaṅ-samudra. Then, again an ocean kalodadhi-samudra, 8 lakh yojan wide around the dhātki-khand …

“Yes, yes. We understand and such thing continues for innumerous islands and oceans”, interrupted Gati.

Yes. But, I’d mention just one last more.

“What’s so special about it?”, again interrupted Gati.

Let me speak. Around the kalodadhi-samudra is the island puṡkar-dwīp, 16 lakh yojan wide. Now, out of all innumerous islands & oceans in madhya lok, humans exist only in this set of ḋhāī-dwīp, meaning two and a half islands, making these special.

But what is this two and a half, they are three islands, right?

Yes, but only half of the third is inhabited by humans.

“What about the remaining half, or for that matter all other islands? Does no life exist there?”, quizzed Ātmā.

No, no. Only humans don’t exist there. Tiriyanch would be there. And as per the various width just mentioned, ḋhāī-dwīp spans across 1 (jambū-dwīp) + 2 * 2 (lavaṅ-samudra) + 2 * 4 (dhātki-khand) + 2 * 8 (kalodadhi-samudra) + 1/2 * 2 * 16 (half puṡkar-dwīp) = 45 lakh yojan.

Based on the dimensions, these islands seem to be not our usual islands, but some other big universal piece.

Yes, for me too. And so even the reference to ocean seems to be something other than the usual earthly oceans. Need to research more details on that. And, it could possibly mean that there is extraterrestrial life.

“And we may possibly be able to interact with them”, said excited Tatva.

May be. But not immediate, as the distances are huge compared to our reachability today.

“At least, do we know, which of the three islands are we inside?”, continued Ātmā.

Yes, we are inside jambū-dwīp. Not only that, there is further detailing of where we are. Each island consists of two types of regions: karma-bhūmi and akarma-bhūmi. First one where people earn their living, and second one where living needs are satisfied directly by nature, especially kalp-vrikṡ.

“Wow! What a relaxed life would be there in the akarma-bhūmi?”, expressed Dravya.

“What relaxed? It would be so boring – nothing to do”, interrupted Gati.

“Actually, the humans there are yougalik, who live in quite a blissful life, in pairs, without much of needs – hence the question itself of earning, boring etc doesn’t arise”, continued Danḋak.

“Yeah, you seem to have figured out a lot”, praised Ātmā.

No yaar. Just what I have read and understood. In fact, in our region also, we had such a situation in the past. But in our region, the situation keeps changing – in akarma-bhūmi it doesn’t.

Meaning we are in one of the karma-bhūmi.

Yes. There are three types of karma-bhūmi: bharat, airāvat, mahāvideh; and six types of akarma-bhūmi: devkuru, uttarkuru, harivarṡ, ramyakvarṡ, hemvat, hairaṅyavat. We are in bharat karma-bhūmi of jambū-dwīp.

You mean other islands have also similar regions.

Yes. Both dhātki-khand and half of puṡkar-dwīp has two of each of the above nine types of regions, thus making total of 9 + 18 + 18 = 45 regions in the ḋhāī-dwīp. Also, there is a mention of 56 more regions above lavaṅ-samudra (called antar-dwīp) for yougalik, thus making a total of all human residing regions as 45 + 56 = 101.

“Are the other regions, at least within jambū-dwīp, reachable by us?”, asked Tatva.

No. I guess not, because as per the dimensions, they also seem to be extraterrestrial.

“Then, seems like reaching out to the extraterrestrials within jambū-dwīp, might be the first step”, commented Tatva.

“Just a curious question, as the situation keeps changing in our region, could we get the blissful situation again?”, asked Dravya.

Yes, but I think the timeline for that to happen is huge – in inummerous units again.

“Hey guys! Let’s go, it’s time for the next class”, interrupted Gati.

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Structure of Lok

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With a broad enough idea of everything that exists – living and non-living from our previous three sessions dealing with classification of everything, a fundamental question persists where do all these exist. In one of the previous sessions, we had briefly touched upon the same. Anyone for a refresher?

“Everything exists in lok, which is humongous but finite”, recalled Dhyān.

Good. All except ākāshastikāy, which exists both in lok and beyond, in the all infinite alok, as well. So, if we leave out the alok ākāsh, then all matter, energy, infinite living beings exist in the finite lok.

But, how do infinite exist in the finite?

How many points are there on a line?

Infinite.

What if the line is of fixed length?

Even then infinite.

Now you see that’s how infinite (points) can exist in finite (length line).

But points are infinitesimally small to fit in.

Similarly, the infinite living beings are also infinitesimally small compared to the size of lok.

But we human beings are so big?

But then we are not infinite.

So, being finite, lok must have some definite shape as well.

Yes, it has. And that’s what our topic of discussion today would be – structure of lok.

“Wow! So I hope, today we are talking about our unanswered questions also”, interrupted Ātmā.

Which questions?

How big actually is the lok?

“And yes, where exactly in the lok, do the various beings, especially celestial & hellish beings live?”, added Danḋak.

“Seems like, you guys are totally into it, holding onto getting all the answers to the unknowns”, smiled the prof.

Couldn’t help, the way you have created the curiosity for the world around us – making us feel that how little do we know about it.

Okay. So, coming to the point, the shape of lok is sort of one and a half sand clock. Imagine a sand clock and then bottom half of an another sand clock placed over the first sand clock, making it one and half sand clock.

Beautiful. How tall would be this structure, I mean the lok?

It is 14 rajju. However, the middle point is the slimmest part of the sand clock. The bottom half sand clock is 7 rajju and the upper half plus the another half at the top is 7 rajju.

What is this rajju?

Just hold on. For time being, just assume some unit of length. 1 rajju height of the slimmest portion is the madhya (middle) lok, with its width also of 1 rajju. The portion below it, is the adho (bottom) lok, with the seven hells, one after the other – seventh one being the bottom-most, with the maximum width of 7 rajju. The portion above the madhya lok is the ūrdhva (upper) lok, having maximum width of 5 rajju at its middle and topmost width of 1 rajju again, where the mokṡ-shilā is situated. Between the madhya lok and the mokṡ-shilā are the planetary, moon, sun, and star systems, followed by the 26 heavens one after the other.

Everyone was mesmerized, visualizing the lok in all its glory, interrupted by, “Hey friends, don’t just get lost in the heavens. Come back. Your goal should be not that but beyond that.”

“Yes! yes! we know – it should be mokṡ”, came a chorus, after an awakening.

“Where do the bhavans of the bhavanpati beings exist?”, jump started Gati.

They are in the adho lok above all the hells but below the madhya lok.

With such a detail and I guess there is more to it, we should definitely be able to reach at least the closest ones.

Not really, because even they are away in rajju.

Tell us what rajju is and possibly over time, humans would work out, how to reach there.

We are not yet able to reach beyond our solar system itself – so reaching even a fraction of rajju is unimaginable. One rajju consists of an innumerous (mahā) yojan, where a (mahā) yojan is 4000 miles.

But what is this abstract innumerous? How do you even define this?

That’s what – it is so huge that it is inexpressible.

Meaning infinite.

No. It is finite, but huge.

How can that be? If finite, it has to be expressible.

Not really. If you want to just get a feel of innumerous, mathematically, check this video out:

Morover, the overall volume of the complete lok is 343 cubic rajju. In case you are interested in more details like the curve equation of lok, volume calculation of lok, how to define innumerous, varieties of infinity, you may refer to the book: ‘The Enigma of the Universe’ by Prof. Muni Mahendra Kumar.

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