Though the principles of Jainism and Buddhism are based on AHIMSA, Buddhism spread fast globally in this Kali-yuga. As Lord Buddha opposed Sanskrit to encourage vernacular (local language or dialect) dialects, his teachings were written in Pali (which was prevailing language at that time) which was known as bootha baashaa (paisachi baashaa). It was written on palm leafs during the fourth Buddist council in Sri Lanka in 29 BCE, approximately 450 years after mahasamadhi of Gautam Buddha. This pali was written by Sanskrit scholar recited by paisachi scholar. According to some legends Maharshi Patanjali had composed yogasashtras in Paisachi and changed to Sanskrit language.

Patanjali was incarnated to earth to teach yogasashtra to humans. Like 1000 headed snake he descended to earth to teach 1000 disciples at a time without any interruptions till the complete knowledge is tranmitted by putting screen between them and laid a condition that If anybody interrupts by any manner, person would be cursed to be a paisachi. As disciples were children and enthusiastic to find who were behind the curtain, when they were about to open the curtain one boy left for nature’s call, once opened the remaining 999 boys were burnt. By the time boy returned sage was saddened and forgave the boy for dis-obedience and transmitted all the knowledge to boy. As the boy violated rules set by maharshi, the boy was cursed to become a demon and would be relieved of the curse when he would transmitt the knowledge to some other person. The demon was hanging on the tree upside down for thousands of years for a suitable person to transmitt the knowledge. Maharshi felt very sad and once again he was born as a humanbeing by the name of “ Chandra Verma “ and became the disciple of demon and had written the yoga sutras on the tree leaves with his blood continuosly for 7 days and 7 nights. As he was very tired he slept, then some of the leafs fell down and eaten by the goats and remaining leafs have given world ‘ Yoga Sutras ‘ which presently we are learning and practicing. Here the language of demon [ bhooth bhasha ] mixed with the language of the scholar [ Sanskrit ] gave the origin of “ PALI “ language. Pali was written in variety of scripts.

According to another legend Chandra Verma after writing continuosly without any rest, became too sick to move and was taken to hospital when he was found by daughter of the Ujjain kingdom’s physician and was nursed by her [ as he was unable to eat or drink, he had to be applied the food paste to the body ]. As per customs of the kingdom at that time he had to marry physicisn’s daughter. As he was very handsome, intelligent and wise, king’s daughter and minister’s daughter also wanted to marry him. According to the prevailing customes at that time he married all the three girls. Famous king Vikramaditya was the son of king’s daughter and his aide Bhatti was the son of minister’s daughter. After the children were born, Chadra Verma became sanyasi, left the kingdom and went to the forest to perform penance. King vikramaditya was very intelligent and wise, With the help of his minister Bhatti he ruled very efficiently and he started “ Vikrama Sawant “.

Lord Rama’s brother Bharata ruled the city of Takshasila presently called Taxila in Pakistan. Laxmana ruled Laxmana puri presently called Lucknow. Shatrugna ruled the forest named Madhuvana presently called Mathura. Lava, son of Lord Rama ruled present day Lahore (Pakistan) originally named Lavapuri. Present day LAOS was originally named Lavapuri after Lava. In 7th A.D Kalavarnadish, King of Takshasila founded the city in Thailand named Lavapuri, presently called Lobpuri which is 130 km from Bangkok. Kusha ruled entire Kashmir valley with Kasur in Lavapuri. Present day Combodia name in Khmer language is Kampuchia which derives from Sanskrit Kambujadesa. According to the inscriptions dated A.D. 947, an Indian sage Swayambhuva Kambhoj reached peninsula and married to naga princess Mera, which led to the Kambuja descendents. Khmer kings ruled Combodia from 9-15 A.D and at time of King Suryavarman 11 in 12 A.D, ANGKOR WAT (city of temples) was built in which all the gods like Vishnu, Shiva, Krishna, Samudra Manthan etc were sculpted on the rock, later on tranformed as a Buddhist temple. Even today it is oldest, most popular, interesting destination for tourists, it is listed in UNESCO World Heritage Centre.

Sage Vyasa had compiled Mahabharata in Sanskrit and later it was written in some Indian languages also. In the period of Moghul king Akbar Maharabhara was translated in Persian named RAZMNAMA (book of wars). Ramayana and Atharvana veda, LeelaGanitam (book on mathematics) were also translated in Persian. Bhagavadgita was translated in almost 80 languages appro. (all Indian languages, European, Asian, Simhali, Swahili, Afrikaan languages) and different dialects like Awadhi, Brij so on. In the period Akbar’s great grand-son Dara, Bhagavadgita and Upanjshads were translated by Allam-Abul-Faizal into Persian. First translation of Bhagavadgita named AL-KITA (there is no letter “ GA” in Arabic) in Arabic was published in 1918 A.D. Sage Vyasa had compiled Harivamsam (from Krishna’s birth to Niryana). In Kurukshetra (Haryana, India) Sri Krishna Museam was established in which all the important incidents from birth to Samadhi of Lord Krishna were depicted by paintings and sculputures. Bhagavadgitas, Ramayanas in different languages and dialects in different sizes (very small to big) are stored here.

Presently appro. 500 different Ramayanas in different languages and different dialects exists. Mostly Valmiki Ramayana, Adhyatma Ramayana, Vashishta Ramayana (yoga vasishtam) in Sanskrit, Tulasi das’s Ramacharitamanas in Awadhi (a dialect of Hindi) are famous. Two Ramayanas named Bhanubhakta Ramayan by Bhanubhakta Acharya in 19th century, Siddhi Ramayan by Siddhidas Mahaju in 20th century were compiled in Nepali. Ramayanu was written by Krishnadasa Shama in 15th century in Konkani (Devanagiri script) language in Goa (Konkani is written in 5 scripts which are Devanagiri, Roman, Kannada, Malayalam, Perso-Arabic). The first English translation of Ramayana was in 19th century by Ralph T.H. Griffith. Urdu translation Pothi Ramayan was written in 17th century. As Hinduism spread to South East Asia, some more Ramayanas were written in Reamker in Combodia, Ramakien in Thailand, Phra Lak Phra Ram in Laos, Yama zatdaw in Burma (Myanmaar), Hikayat seri Ram in Malaysia, Kakawin Ramayana in Java (Indonesia), Rajah Magandiri in Philippines. Ramacharitamanas had been translated into English in 1875 by F.S.Grouse and it was translated into Russian, German and other European languages (Book review, Hindu Feb 2003).

As world is quite big, SUPREME BEING was incarnated in different regions in different forms with their respective set of instructions which led to different religions (Hinduism, Jainism, Buddism, Judaism, Zoroastrianism, Taoism, Islam etc) and cults (Swaminarayana, ISCKON etc) with the same essence. In Hinduism BHAGAVADGITA played major and important role. Lord Krishna stated in Bhagavadgita that he is solely responsible for good and bad deeds of every living, non-living beings. The number “18“ has great importance in Indian Mythology.

1. Mahabharata epic is written in “18 “ sargas (sarga = part)
2. In Mahabharata ”18“ lakh words were written.
3. Kurukshetra war was fought for “18“ days (1 hour in Dwapara yuga is equal to 2 hours of Kali yuga)
4. War was fought with army of “18"  Akshauhinis [ Kauravas had 11 akshauhinis and Pandavas had 11 akshauhinis ]

Akshauhini is an army consisting of 21, 870 raths ; 21, 870 elephants ; 65, 610 cavalry (soldiers on horse back) and 109, 350 infantry (soldiers marching on foot). Add up all the digits in each category it will be “18“.

Lord Krishna narrated the “ Bhagavad Gita “ to Arjuna on the beginning of the 1st day of Mahabharata war which has “ 18 “ chapters. On the advice of Lord Krishna, Bheeshma pitamaha narrated “ Vishnusahasranamam “ [ 1000 names in praise of Lord Vishnu in 108 = 6×18 slokas ] on the end of the 18th day of war to King Yudhistira (Dharma Raja). Lord Krishna narrated 1000 names of Lord Shiva which he learnt from Sage Upamaanyu to Dharma Raja. In Ashwamedha parva when Arjuna requested Lord Krishna to repeat Bhagavadgita, Lord narrated the same in brief as ANUGITA. In another epic “ Ramayana “ the war between Rama and Ravana was fought for “ 18 “ days (I hour in treta yuga is equal to 3 hours of Kali yuga).

Krishna narrates in Bhagavadgita:

Paritraanaaya saaduunaam vinaashaayacha dushkrutaam |
Dharmasamsthaanaaya sambhavaami yuge yuge ||

In this sloka Lord Krishna explained to the devotees through Arjuna that whenever, wherever, however they need, he will rescue them.

Patram pushpam phalam toyam yo me bhaktya prayacchathi |
Tadaham bhaktyuprahrutam ashnami prayataatmanaha ||

In this sloka Lord Krishna explained to the devotees through Arjuna that whoever offers anything (patram=leaf, pushpam=flower, phalam = fruit,toyam=water) with bhakti, he appears in Saguna Rupa and consume.

LORD KRISHNA IS BHAKTI, RAKTI (PLEASINGNESS), MUKTI.

Conclusion: Set of instructions orally by SUPREME BEING in Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism were mostly written on medium of Tala-Patra (tada or tala means cured palm, patra means leaf) used in Southeast Asia around 5th B.C to 19th A.D, transmitted the set of instructions to medium of paper (19-20 A.D), presently transmitted through computers, should be transmitted to future generations through the medium available at that time. It is a continuous process.

References: Puranas, google search, blogs, books, pravachanams, My visits to places.

Thank The Google for helping in compiling the article.