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CRITICAL TIMES lhat, as an inscription of A.D. 1129 relates, it was through Samantabhadia that "the auspicious Jaina faith became again and again auspicious on all sides."1 Even so late as A.D. 1432 he is called “the promulgator of the doctrine of Jina.”2
It was also in the Tamil land that another celebrated Jaina preceptor won a great victory, thereby planting firmly thc Jina faith in the southern parts of the country. This was the famous Akalankadeva about whose personal history no particulars are available. Jaina tradition relates that he was the son of a Brahman named Puruşottama, who was the minister to the king śubhatunga of Mānyakheța. This is related in the Ārādhanakathākośa by Prabhācandra, versified by Brahma Nemidatta.But Akalankadeva himself in his Rājavārlika tells us that he was the son of a certain king called Laghu Havva.*
An equally inconclusive detail is in regard to the king in whose court Akalanka won a great victory. While there can be no doubt that he did win a notable victory in disputation, there is some discrepancy concerning the kingdom over which the monarch ruled. The earliest reference to the victory is in a stone inscription assigned to the tenth century A.D. In this record we are told that after Guñanandi Sabdabrahmä сame Akalankasimhāsana, who defeated the Bu dhists and the Sānkhyas in a religious dispute. The name of the place where the dispute was held is not given in the record. Gunanandi mentioned in this inscription was pro
1. E. C. II 67, p. 25. 2. Ibid, 258, p. 117. 3. Hiralal, Cat. of MSS., Intr. p. xxvi. 4. Ibid, p. xxvii. 5. M. A. R. for 1923, s. 15,
