What are the important Vaikhānasa texts?

Question

Vaiṣṇavas usually use Pāñcarātra āgamas. However, there is also another South Indian Vaiṣṇava tradition, that worships according to Vaikhānasa āgamas. What are the principal Vaikhānasa āgamas? If possible, please give an exhaustive list of Vaikhānasa āgamas. Please mention authentic sources.

Answer 1

The Vaikhānasa āgama-s were composed by 4 r̥ṣi-s viz. Bhr̥gu, Kāśyapa, Atri and Marīcī.

Atri's āgama-s:

1.Atreyatantra

2.Purvatantra

3.Uttaratantra

4.Visnutantra.

In total his āgama-s come out to be 88,000 verses.

Bhr̥gu's āgama-s:

1.Arcadhikara

2.Citradhikara

3.Khiladhikara

4.Khilatantra

5.Kriyadhikara

6.Manadhikara

7.Niruktadhikara

8.Prakirnadhikara

9.Prati-grhyadhikara

10.Puratantra

11.Varunadhikara

12.Vasadhikara

13.Yajnadhikara.

These come out to be 64,000 verses long in total.

Kāśyapa's āgama-s:

1.Jnanakanda

2.Satyakanda

3.Tarkakanda.

These also are 64,000 verses long in total.

Marīcī's āgama-s:

1.Anandasamhita

2.Jayasamhita

3.Jnanasamhita

4.Samjnanasamhita

5.Vijayasamhita

6.Vijitasamhita

7.Vimalasamhita

8.Virasamhita.

This is by far the bulkiest of the āgama sets, at 1,84,000 verses in total.

Out of these 28 texts, only 10 are available, and the Tirupati Tirumala Devasthanams publication has only published around 9 so far.

The surviving āgama-s are:

1.Marīcī's Anandasamhita and Jayasamhita

2.Bhr̥gu's Khiladhikara, Kriyadhikara, Prati-grhyadhikara and Yajnadhikara.

3.Kāśyapa's Jnanakanda

4.Atri's Uttaratantra

Though I must mention that the Vaikhānasa-s also use the Tāittirīya-şākhā́'s texts. They also have their own Vāikhānasa-şrāuta-sūtrá, gr̥hya-sūtrá, and dharma-sūtrá all belonging to the Kr̥ṣṇa-yajur-vedá.

References:

1. https://web.archive.org/web/20110319052614/http://www.vaikhanasa.com/publications.html

2. https://web.archive.org/web/20110320014142/http://www.vaikhanasa.com/TTD-publications.html

3. http://rkmathbangalore.org/Books/Vedanta%20Kesari/(2006,%20July).pdf