I'm not sure Mt. Gox should have even declared bankruptcy. Although it allegedly once held 850,000 btc, as now 220,000 have been admitted found, then the company could have continued operating on a fractional reserve basis like a bank. If the real reason for the bankruptcy was a freeze placed on their fiat bank accounts, and not "disappeared" bitcoins, then that issue should have been negotiated with Mizuho Bank before declaring bk. Mt. Gox may have been the recipient of very poor legal advice, and it would make more sense now to somehow roll back the bankruptcy proceeding instead of proposing a sale of assets.
From what I know, the purpose of bankruptcy (full name: "bankruptcy protection") is to halt all individual lawsuits by employees, creditors and investors against the company, so that a single court (1) gets to evaluate whether the company has a reasonable chance of recovering financially and paying off all its obbligations, or, if not, (2) orders that the company be closed, all its assets be sold or auctioned, and the proceeds be distributed fairly among all claimants.
I had understood that MtGOX was forced to file for bankruptcy protection because many clients were already suing it or were about to do so. The Japanese court easily concluded that MtGOX could never recover from such big losses, even after Mark found the 220'000 BTC that he had "forgotten about", so it determined liquidation.