Jaina Sutras
Body of canonical texts of Jainism, one of the oldest religions and philosophical traditions of India, originally transmitted orally in Ardhamagadhi Prakrit from the teachings attributed to Mahavira (6th century BCE), the last of the twenty-four tirthankaras or 'ford-makers' who, according to Jain tradition, have periodically revealed the path of spiritual liberation across infinite cosmic cycles. The Jain Sutras were definitively compiled in writing at a council held at Valabhi around the 5th century CE, though their transmission differs substantially between the two major branches of Jainism: the Shvetambara ('white-clad') accept an extensive canon known as the Agamas, comprising several dozen texts grouped into categories such as the Angas (twelve foundational texts, one of which has been lost), the Upangas and other supplementary collections, while the Digambara ('sky-clad', i.e. naked) hold that the original canon has been irretrievably lost and grant supreme authority to later texts such as Umasvati's Tattvartha Sutra, a systematic compendium of Jain doctrine composed in Sanskrit that enjoys near-canonical status for both branches. The doctrinal core of these texts revolves around central concepts such as ahimsa (absolute non-violence towards all living beings, carried to extremes of ethical scrupulousness unparalleled in any other religious tradition), anekantavada (the doctrine of the multiplicity of perspectives, according to which reality can only be known partially and relatively from different points of view), and a detailed theory of karma as subtle matter that literally adheres to the soul (jiva) as a result of passions and actions, soiling it and binding it to the cycle of rebirths, from which only rigorous asceticism and extreme ethical purity can definitively free it. These texts also regulate Jain monastic and lay life in minute detail, establishing codes of conduct, diet and ascetic practice that have shaped, for more than two millennia, one of the most coherent and rigorous religious traditions of the Indian subcontinent.