kalpa

In the Puranas creation is a process renewed after each kalpa, or vast mundane period.

The Purṇa rightly starts in the previous Kalpa, rightly starts the manifestations with the manifestation in the form of the fish.

His birth is supernatural and had he willed it he could have lived until the end of the present Kalpa.

"There is no god superior to the Arhat," says the Kalpa-sūtra (Stevenson, p. 10).