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INTRODUCTION
The date of Prabhācandra, the author of PKM and NKC is fixed from 980 A.D. to 1065 A.D.1. Prabhācandra has copied almost verbatim from BSS of Anantakīrti, in the chapter on Şarvajñasiddhi in his works NKC and PKM. The last pages of BSS (Pp. 181-208), with little variation, have almost the identical appearance with the chapter on muktivāda of NKC (Pp. 838-847); even casual reading will show as if one is copied from the other. It appears to me that it is NKC that is developed on the lines of BSS; because, śāntisūri, the contemporary of Prabhācandrà refers to Anantakirti.
Abhayadevasūri, the commentator of Sanmati-tarka, was contemporary of Dhārādhipati Muñja ; his date, according to Pt. Sukhalalji, lies in the last quarter of the 10th c. and the first quarter of eleventh centuries of Vikramal. Abhayadevasūri, in chapter on Sarvajñasiddhi in Sanmatitarka gives the main arguments in the same terms as those of Sarvajņasiddhi and also quotes kārika.
"nakșatrāgrahapañjaramaharniśam lokakarmavikșiptam
bhramati śubhāśubhamakhilam prakāśayatpūrvajanmakrtam" which is found with some other verse in BSS (p. 176); one thing becomes clear that there is influence of one over the other. From the evidence of Sāntasüri's quotation it can be proved that Anantakirti must be earlier than 990 A.D., it is also probable that the contents of BSS might have been borrowed by the author of Sanmati-tarkațikā.
Ācārya Vādirāja in his Pārsvanātha-carita refers to Anantakīrti in the following terms :
ātmanaivādvitīyena jīvasuddhin nibhadhntā,
anantakirtinā muktirātrimārgeva laksyate,-v. 24. From this it can be inferred that he wrote a treatise named Jīvasiddhi. Pt. Nathuram Premi conjectures that Anantakirti must have written a commentary on Samantabhadras' Jivasiddhi which is quoted by Jinasena. Vādirājasuri relies on the same main arguments which are found in BSS of Anantakirti ; he is the same Anantakirti who is referred by Vădirāja in Pārsvanātha-carita.
2. Epigraphical evidences :
The stone inscription of Candragiria hills refers to Anantakirti as the grand disciple of Meghacandra Traividya of Pustakagaccha, Desigana and
1 NKC, vol. II, Intro. Pp. 48-58. 2 JSI, p. 404.
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