Work · South Asian & Tibetan Philosophy
Acaranga Sutra
The oldest text of the Jain canon, handed down as Mahavira’s teaching and compiled by his followers: the conduct of a monk who harms no living being, down to the smallest creatures.
Introduction
The Acaranga Sutra (“Book of Conduct”) stands first among the Angas, the “limbs” of the Shvetambara Jain canon, and is written in Ardhamagadhi, an old Middle Indian language. It has two books. The first, regarded as one of the oldest layers of the canon, mixes prose and verse on renouncing the world and on not harming the six classes of living beings, which include earth, water, fire, air and plant beings; it also describes Mahavira’s own austerities. The second, later book gives detailed rules on begging for food, clothing, walking and speaking. The Digambara Jains consider the original Angas lost and do not accept this text as canonical. Hermann Jacobi’s English translation of 1884 introduced it to Western readers.
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