Anguttara Nikaya

Category: Sutta Pitaka

From Buddhist Encyclopedia

The Anguttara Nikaya ("Gradual Collection") is the fourth of the five nikayas, or collections, in the Sutta Pitaka, which is one of the "three baskets" that compose the Pali Tipitaka. This nikaya consists of several thousand discourses by the Buddha and his chief disciples arranged in eleven nipatas, or books, according to the number of Dhamma items referenced in them.

A new translation by Bhikkhu Bodhi is expected around 2008.

A similar collection, apparently translated from an earlier version in some other Indian dialect, appears in the Chinese Buddhist canon. This is known as the Ekottara Agama or the Ekottara-āgama-sūtra, or Zēngyī Ahánjīng (增一阿含經).

Divisions

The nipatas in this nikaya are:

• The Book of Ones
• The Book of Twos
• The Book of Threes
• The Book of Fours
• The Book of Fives
• The Book of Sixes
• The Book of Sevens
• The Book of Eights
• The Book of Nines
• The Book of Tens
• The Book of Elevens