The Angaciliya, a sacred text of the Jainas

Summary

The Angaciliya (also called Aṅgaculiya) is a little‑known Jain canonical text that belongs to the ‘anga‑bahira’ or ancillary scriptures. The article introduces this Prakrit work and compares it with related texts such as the Nirvanakalika, Samayarivibhakti, Vaggacāliya, Viyābhacāliya and Vibīmagga‑pavā. Two principal versions of the Angaciliya are described: a Berlin manuscript written in small characters (AyB) and a printed edition published by the Āgamodaya Samiti in Mehsana (AyM), both of which preserve the same core text with minor appendices. After surveying earlier scholarship, the author summarises the narrative content. The story begins with twenty‑two admirers of the courtesan Kamalāya attacking the monk Aggidatta near Mithilā. Before they reach him, they fall into a well and die on their own swords. Aggidatta consults his teacher Jasabhadda, who prophesies their sixty‑three future births. Kamalāya becomes a nun at seventy‑eight and eventually converts her former lovers when they are reborn as chāṇḍālas in Avanti. In subsequent existences they ridicule Jain monks, become merchants and finally suffer long torments in hell. The tale is allegorical: the group’s successive births illustrate the decline of Jain doctrine when heretics abandon the guru‑paramparā (teacher‑disciple lineage). The main part of the Angaciliya is organised into sections in which the monk Suhamma answers questions from his disciple Jambū about the importance of lineage, correct initiation rites, the dangers posed by self‑constituted ascetics and the signs of heterodoxy. Secular monks who refuse to acknowledge teachers are compared to crows and donkeys, while orthodox monks trace their spiritual descent to Mahāvīra. The article compares the Angaciliya with other anga‑bahira texts, noting that although the themes of heresy and doctrinal decline recur in Vaggacāliya and Viyābhacāliya, the Angaciliya alone combines narrative with detailed prescriptions about monastic conduct. The author concludes that this text was composed to reinforce discipline during a period of factionalism and that its didactic tone reflects concerns about preserving the purity of the Jain community.