The Oldest Digambara Scripture

The Shatkhandagama, the "Scripture in Six Parts", is the most ancient and revered sacred text of the Digambara Jain tradition. The Digambaras hold that the original teaching of Mahavira, transmitted orally, was gradually lost over the centuries after his liberation, so that no part of the old canon claimed by the Svetambaras survives intact; against this background the Shatkhandagama has special importance as the earliest surviving systematic scripture the tradition possesses. It is attributed to the monks Pushpadanta and Bhutabali, disciples of the teacher Dharasena, who is said to have imparted to them what remained of the ancient knowledge, which they set down probably around the second century CE in the Prakrit language.

The text is a highly technical exposition of the Jain theory of karma and of the states and stages through which the soul (jiva) passes on its way from bondage to liberation, organised around the doctrine of the "stations of virtue" (gunasthana) and the minute analysis of the soul's entanglement with karmic matter.