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PUBLISHER'S NOTE
The fifth Jaina Agama, popularly called the Bhagavati Sutra, is an encyclopaedic work produced by the traditional Jaina scholarship which, because of its colossalness, is also called Viahapanṇatti. Other titles by which the work is known are Bhagavati-Viyahapaṇṇatti, Vivahapaṇṇatti, or simply Pannatti. The title Bhagavati, which perhaps arose later, is originally an adjective meaning 'holy', which is an honorific title to signify its importance. In the main, the text contains questions and answers, Mahāvīra replying to the questions of nis chief disciple Indrabhūti, but it also contains material in the form of dialogue-legend (itihāsa-samvāda). The Sutra gives a very good account of the life and work of Mahāvira, whose dissertations on samsara and karma, on niyativāda, and many others, are worth noticing. The Fifteenth Book of the Sūtra contains legendary or semi-historical material relating to Mahāvīra's life and his relation with some of his predecessors and contemporaries. The text makes frequent references and cross-references to the Pannavaṇā, the Jivābhigama, the Uvavāyiya, the Rāyāpasenaijja, the Nandi and the Ayāradasão Sutras.
The Sutra in its present form has come down to us from Vira Samvat 980 (approximately A. D. 553) according to the followers of Skandila, and from Vira Samvat 893 (A. D. 466) according to the followers of Nāgārjuna when the fourth and the last Jaina Council met at Valabhi in Saurastra under the Chairmanship of Devardhigaņi Kṣamāśramaņa. At this Council, not only this Sūtra, but all the Canonical texts that have come down to us in later period took shape. Abhayadeva Suri wrote a Vrtti on the Bhagavati Sūtra in A. D. 1071. In his Jiņa-ratna-koşa, H. D. Velankar mentions about 10 more commentaries on this Sūtra.
Because of its enormity and complexity, even in the monastic order, the reading of the Bhagavati Sūtra is usually permitted to those who are well-advanced in age and learning. In recent
