Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam: History, Religion and Muslim Legitimacy in the Delhi Sultanate [Illustrated] 1848855672, 9781848855670

Citation preview

Blain H. Auer is Assistant Professor of Islamic Studies at Western Michigan University, Michigan. He specializes in Islam in the context of pre-modern South Asia. In particular, he studies the representations of Islamic authority exhibited through the use of the Qurʾān, Ḥadīth, exegesis, and history writing produced during the Delhi Sultanate. A second area of research focuses on modern ritual, pilgrimage, and relics connected with the burial places of the special dead in Islam.

Auer-12.indd 1

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Auer-12.indd 2

6/10/12 1:26 PM

SYMBOLS OF AUTHORITY IN MEDIEVAL ISLAM History, Religion, and Muslim Legitimacy in the Delhi Sultanate Blain H. Auer

Auer-12.indd 3

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Published in 2012 by I.B.Tauris & Co Ltd 6 Salem Road, London W2 4BU 175 Fifth Avenue, New York NY 10010 www.ibtauris.com Distributed in the United States and Canada Exclusively by Palgrave Macmillan 175 Fifth Avenue, New York NY 10010 Copyright © 2012 Blain H. Auer The right of Blain H. Auer to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by the author in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patent Act 1988. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or any part thereof, may not be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Library of South Asian History and Culture, vol. 6 ISBN 978 1 84885 567 0 A full CIP record for this book is available from the British Library A full CIP record for this book is available from the Library of Congress Library of Congress catalogue card is available Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Antony Rowe, Chippenham Edited by Valerie J. Turner, www.valeriejoyturner.com Typeset by Muhammad I. Hozien, www.scholarlytype.com

Auer-12.indd 4

6/10/12 1:26 PM

To my daughter Camilla Auer

Auer-12.indd 5

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Auer-12.indd 6

6/10/12 1:26 PM

List of Abbreviations

EI2 EI3 EIr EQ ER FJ

The Encyclopaedia of Islam, Leiden: Brill, 1954–2004. The Encyclopaedia of Islam, Leiden: Brill, 2007–. Encyclopaedia Iranica, London: Routledge, 1982–. The Encyclopaedia of the Qurʾān, Leiden: Brill, 2001–2006. The Encyclopedia of Religion, Detroit: Macmillan, 2005. Baranī, Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn. Fatāvá-yi Jahāndārī. Edited by Afsar Salīm Khān. Vol. 25, Intishārāt-i Idārah-‘i Taḥqīqāt-i Pākistān. 1st ed. Lahore: Research Society of Pakistan, 1972. KM Hujvīrī, ʿAlī b. ʿUs̱mān. Kashf al-maḥjūb. Edited by V. A. Zhukovskii. Vol. 89, Zabān va farhang-i Īrān. 8th ed. Tehran: Ṭahūrī, 1381Sh. TFS1 Baranī, Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn. Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī. Edited by Sayyid Ahmad Khan. Vol. 33, Bibliotheca Indica. Calcutta, 1862. TFS2 ʿAfīf, Shams Sirāj. Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī. Edited by Vilāyat Ḥusayn. Vol. 119, Bibliotheca Indica. Calcutta: Asiatic Society, 1888. TN Jūzjānī, Minhāj Sirāj. Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī. Edited by ʿAbd al-Ḥayy Ḥabībī. 2 vols. 2nd ed. Kabul: Anjuman-i Tārīkh-i Afghānistān, 1342–1343.

Auer-12.indd 9

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Auer-12.indd 10

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Illustrations and maps

Maps 1. The World of the Delhi Sultanate 607–801/1210–1398 2. Delhi Sultanate

xx 23

Figures 1. Quṭb mīnār 28 2. Fīrūz Shāh tablet inscription 31 3. Tomb of Ghiyās al-Dīn Tughluq 92 4. Delhi Sultanate coin (ca. 607–33/1210–35) 109 5. Qurʾān manuscript 112

Auer-12.indd 11

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Auer-12.indd 12

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Acknowledgments

After having reached the end of a long road of research and writing it is a great pleasure to look back and acknowledge those who have made the journey less arduous and in some cases, dare I say, pleasurable. This book began as a doctoral dissertation completed in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations at Harvard University. I would like to show my deep appreciation to the scholars there who supported and offered valuable advice at many points along the way. Ali Asani, Sunil Sharma, Roy Mottahedeh, Cemal Kafadar, Baber Johansen, Davíd Carrasco, Wheeler Thackston, and Kimberley Patton were all influential in making this book a reality. Ideas for this project began even earlier while I was pursuing a Master’s degree in the Department of Languages and Cultures of Asia at the University of Wisconsin. While there I benefited from the instruction of André Wink, Michael Chamberlain, Velcheru Narayana Rao, Charles Hallisey, and Muhammad Umar Memon. In addition to those individuals there are a number of friends and colleagues who have shared their valuable time and energy commenting on various portions of this work, and wittingly or unwittingly influenced it along the way to its conclusion. Recep Guptas, Christian Lange, Travis Zadeh, Greg White, Supriya Gandhi, Martin Nguyen, Aliya Iqbal-Naqvi, Charles Stang, Licsi Szatmari, Luis Girón-Negrón, Eric Beverley, Mana Kia, Chanchal Dadlani, Michael

Auer-12.indd 13

6/10/12 1:26 PM

xiv

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Grossman, Dan Sheffield, and Hussein Rashid. Allen Webb and Brian Wilson, two Western Michigan University colleagues, provided valuable edits of the manuscript at the end of the project. A major thanks goes to one of my oldest friends, Phong Tran, who applied his refined librarian’s skills to realign each crooked punctuation mark, jumbled phrase, and misplaced word. I would also like to thank my copyeditor Valerie Joy Turner who helped bring this book into its final form and Jess Zimmerman for producing the maps that appear in the book. Finally, none of this would have been possible without the support of family. I would particularly like to thank Howard and June Straiton as well as Linda and Bruce Matthews. My deepest appreciation goes to my wife, Amy Auer, for her unwavering support, unbounded optimism, and loving affection. A Note on Transliteration, Translation, and Terminology On the whole I have followed the Library of Congress system of transliteration for Persian and Arabic, with the exclusion of the use of the prime that has been substituted with a hyphen, along with other minor changes. Unless noted otherwise all translations are mine. There are two terms used in the book with a sense of discretion. One is premodern. Even with all its follies, the “modern world” implies that everything is advanced. It is the challenge of scholars to provide a picture of premodern societies that do not fall into the trap of broad comparisons across different times, comparisons that fail to capture the unique qualities of earlier ages. I retain the term in its most general sense to refer to the time prior to the mid-thirteenth/nineteenth century, marking the change created by the second industrial revolution and the consolidation of British colonial historiography, a development significant for this study. The second term, equally problematic, is medieval, which has long carried the negative burden of the Dark Ages. It also has a particular weakness as a term applied most frequently to European contexts. This creates the predicament that developments across the Muslim world, geographically and demographically more diverse than Europe, are often seen in comparison to events that have no relation. To the degree possible I have avoided the use of the term,

Auer-12.indd 14

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Acknowledgments

xv

being persuaded by Daniel Martin Varisco who argues that when it is used in relation to Islamic history, the term is “anachronistic, misleading, and disorienting.”1

Auer-12.indd 15

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Auer-12.indd 16

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Preface

At times tracing the narratives found in Islamic historiography is like documenting history from the work of Jorge Luis Borges. This struck me as I thumbed through the pages of Borges’ first collection of short stories evocatively titled Historia universal de la infamia. I was particularly captivated because the work appears, on the surface, to deal with “historical” subjects. Most intriguing is a story titled “Hakim, the Masked Dyer of Merv,” first published in Crítica in 1934. The form of this fanciful yarn is unusual because it is a short story structured as a biographical entry to a reference work, something akin to what you find in the Encyclopedia Britannica and the Encyclopaedia of Islam. In this story, the reader is surprised by the way Borges sets forward his scholarship and erudition. He begins his sketch meticulously detailing the Arabic textual sources utilized to retrieve the life of the mysterious figure of Hakim.1 Of those sources he lists “The History of Caliphs” by Balādhurī, the “Manual of the Giant,” or “Book of Precision and Revision” by the ʿAbbāsid historian Ibn Abī Ṭāḥir Ṭayfūr, and an Arabic codex titled “Annihilation of the Rose.” Aside from a slight, guarded curiosity about these works, I did not pay much attention to them at first. On second reading, it was not so easy to skip past them without a little investigation. That was when I discovered the cause of my initial skeptical twinge. Borges

Auer-12.indd 17

6/10/12 1:26 PM

xviii

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

fabricated these historical sources. Early on, a few literary critics were suspicious, but the hoax was only discovered in 1971, when Norman Thomas di Giovanni was producing the first English translation in consultation with Borges. Without success, di Giovanni tried to find the original sources to the story of Hakim so that he could provide an accurate English translation. He could not find any sources, so he confronted Borges, who then admitted his literary invention saying, “We mustn’t spoil the joke by letting the cat out of the bag.”2 Borges’ intention becomes clear with this casual admission: history is an act of writing. Amīr Khusraw, an author who, in fanciful fashion, could be considered the Borges of a different time and place, further drove this simple point home. Indisputably one of the greatest Persian authors of the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/fourteenth centuries, Amīr Khusraw produced some of the most enduring literary masterpieces of his era. He frequently blurred the lines between history and fiction, a fact that has confounded both historians and scholars of comparative literature. The story that drew my attention to the meaning of “history” comes from his work Nuh sipihr [The nine spheres]. In it, Amīr Khusraw documents Adam’s first days on earth, which were spent, not incidentally, in India, a land Khusraw identifies as Paradise (jannah). According to Amīr Khusraw, one of the proofs (s. ḥujjah), which he demonstrates with delightfully circular logic, that India was akin to Paradise is that it was Adam’s first abode on earth. From this genesis he describes the events of Adam’s departure from India, saying: On this new journey he travelled for two or three days, and had no food until he was inside the border of Syria. The delicacies of Paradise which filled his stomach poured out onto that barren country. That which flowed out from him came down, and rose up like a tall mountain. It became the oasis of Damascus (Ghūṭah-yi ṣaḥrāʾ-i Dimashq),3 as is known by everyone since that time. Even though it was the delicacies of Paradise,

Auer-12.indd 18

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Preface

xix

it did not fall in the land of India. There is no doubt that it is a second Paradise, it would be evil to deposit such a ripe sign. If all India were not a Paradise, then why not leave that encumbrance within its borders? 4 Khusraw humorously depicts Adam as setting out on a journey from India to Syria with a full belly. When he arrives in Syria he relieves himself and the remains of his bodily waste fertilize the desert region. In his mythological retelling of Adam’s first days on earth, Khusraw, in witty and inventive fashion, wanted to convey something special to his readers about his understanding of India. India is Paradise on earth and as such it cannot be denied a central place in the sacred history of Islam, a place that had been claimed by Arabs (Khusraw was just about as far from being Arab as a Muslim could be for his time and place). The confluence of discoveries brought on by an unexpected reading of Borges and Khusraw instigated my inquiry into the relationship between religion, history, and historiography. Both authors are acutely aware of the irony in the “fictions of factual representation.”5 What I discovered in Borges and Khusraw’s retellings of sacred history was that the problem of fact and fiction is not a problem at all; it is rather a problem of history, or at least a particular understanding of history. The struggle over history is more about meaning and narrative than fact. Historiography in India is first and foremost about the centrality and originality of India’s place in Islamic history. This fact is of consequence to any “historical” reading of the subcontinent of the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/fourteenth centuries. In light of the deeply entwined enterprise of Muslim historians of the Delhi Sultanate, the current volume attempts to navigate the waters of writing and representation and take up the challenge of understanding the peculiar relationship between history and historiography.

Auer-12.indd 19

6/10/12 1:26 PM

iterran

ph

R

ed

Se

500 miles

r

Gul

n

A f of

lf

Fars

Gu

den

ia

0

R

rs

Mecca

Baghdad

er

Medina

Riv r

Pe

500 kilometers

s i ve

Sea

0

ri

Jerusalem

ig

Damascus

es

T

Sea

at

an

Cairo

ean

Eu

pi

The World of the Delhi Sultanate 607-801/1210-1398

Med

Black Se a

s Ca Ox us

Thatta

ver

us

Ri

Gujarat

Delhi un

Plateau

R iv er

Ya m

Deccan

Narm ad a

R ann of Kutch

O c e a n

Sindh

nd

lam River

Jhe

Lahore Punjab

Balkh

Multan

Ghazna

Riv er

ian a Bukhara

er

Arabian Sea

I n d i a n

Kirman

s R iv

ox

rt e

ns

J ax a

Khurasan

Nishapur

Merv

Khwarazm

Aral Sea

I

Auer-12.indd 20 a Tr

a

6/10/12 1:26 PM

a R iv e r

G an

er

Bay of Bengal

Bengal

Lakhnawti

ge s Ri v

1 Delhi at the Center of Islamic Authority

Introduction The kernel of Delhi’s enduring legacy as a center of Islamic authority dates back to the Ghūrid ruler Muʿizz al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Sām (r. 569–602/1173–1206) and his victory at the Battle of Tarain which led to the capture of Delhi in 588/1192. Over time Delhi evolved from a peripheral outpost in a disintegrating imperial realm to become the focal point of a vast empire that would last, in one guise or another, until Amīr Tīmūr’s (r. 771–807/1370–1405) invasion, occupation, and ransacking of Delhi in 801/1398.1 The two-century period spanning these points of entry and exit remain the formative phase in the expansion of Muslim political, social, and cultural hegemony in Northern India. From an even broader perspective, the actions of Muʿizz al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Sām helped initiate a period of Islamic kingdoms centered in Delhi that endured until the British colonial period, ending in 1274/1858 with the deposal of the last Muslim “emperor” of Delhi, Bahādur Shāh II (r. 1253–74/1837–58). When viewed in light of the Islamic world, the sultans of Delhi were situated at a crossroads in time. Mongol rulers spread their influence across Central Asia and the Middle East. At the hands of the men of Hūlāgū (ca. 613–63/1217–65), grandson of Chingiz Khān, the ʿAbbāsid

Auer-12.indd 1

6/10/12 1:26 PM

2

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

caliph al-Mustaʿṣim (r. 640–56/1242–58) was executed, marking the virtual end of the edifice of Sunnī authority and legitimacy. Anointed as the capital of Islamic courts in Northern India as the influence of Baghdad (the base of the caliphate) disintegrated, Delhi and its sultans stood in a newly elevated relationship to the Muslim world. This was equally true for the rising power of the Mamlūk sultans in Cairo.2 Amidst these global shifts in the centers of Islamic authority, Delhi became a new hub for the development of Islamic societies. In light of the wide-ranging political transformations of the seventh/thirteenth century, many scholars of that age participated in deeply contentious debates on an array of questions concerning the legitimacy of the political and religious foundations of the Delhi Sultanate. What was the conceptual basis of political power at the inception of Islamic empire in India? How was authority structured in relation to Sunnī caliphal hegemony constructed under the ʿAbbāsids, particularly in a period of decline? What connections existed between political power and religious authority in the Delhi Sultanate? Based on readings of often-conflicting medieval histories, advice literature, and legal texts, scholars of Islam have struggled to understand the expressed relationships between religious authority and political power in Muslim societies. Questions of legitimacy, religion, and power have proven thorny in a variety of premodern historical contexts. This is particularly clear in the work of Patricia Crone and Martin Hinds in their study of the early caliphate. They argue that caliphal religious authority extends through the Umayyad period and into the early ʿAbbāsid period. They write, “The early caliphate was conceived along lines very different from the classical institution, all religious and political authority being concentrated in it; it was the caliph who was charged with the definition of Islamic law, the very core of religion.”3 It was after the miḥna, or “inquisition,” of the caliph al-Maʾmūn (r. 189–218/813–33) that the caliphs’ religious function decreased: “In practice, then, the caliphs continued to play a role in the definition of orthodoxy, but only as the powerful (or at least prestigious) arm of the scholars, not as a divinely inspired institution set up to guide them.”4

Auer-12.indd 2

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Delhi at the Center of Islamic Authority

3

In his general discussion of the relationship between religion and the state in Muslim societies, Ira Lapidus acknowledges that “there are ambiguities concerning the distribution of authority, functions and relations among institutions.”5 However, he stresses that there is a significant distinction to be made between state and religious institutions following a break that occurs, in his view, around the year 334/945 when the Būyid emir, Muʿizz al-Dawla, wrestled control of Baghdad away from the caliph.6 In contrast to these views, Muhammad Qasim Zaman challenges any analysis that postulates a rigid and absolute separation of religious and political authority in the early and later ʿAbbāsid periods. He says, “The caliph’s participation in religious life was not in competition with, or over and above that of, the emergent Sunnī ʿulamāʾ, but in conjunction with them.”7 The debates over the evolving relationship between religious and political authority during the ʿAbbāsid period are, in many instructive ways, similar to the debates surrounding the early Delhi Sultanate, though the latter are more exaggerated. One perspective in the scholarly discussion postulates that there is a total separation between “secular” governance and religious institutions. From this standpoint, the political and military arm of the Delhi Sultanate is divested of religious authority. K. A. Nizami, a major proponent of this view and author of a frequently cited historical study on the Delhi Sultanate, offers a sweeping assessment of the relationship between religion and politics in Muslim societies, “All Muslim governments from the time of the Umayyads have been secular organizations.”8 Nizami postulates the fundamental illegitimacy of the Sultanate: “It had no sanction in Shariʿat; nay, it was a non-legal institution.”9 He clearly held on to that view as he reiterated it in an essay more that thirty years later.10 Nizami’s views can also be found in the scholarship of other prominent historians. Mohammad Habib wrote of the Delhi Sultanate, “It was not a theocratic state in any sense of the word. Its basis was not the sharīʿat of Islam but the zawabit of state-laws made by the king.”11 Indeed, this idea has been perpetuated to such a point that the modern “secularization of the Indian state,” is seen as originating in the Delhi Sultanate.12

Auer-12.indd 3

6/10/12 1:26 PM

4

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

On the whole, views of this kind reflect a modern political sensibility that favors the preservation of legitimate Islamic rule following two events: the waning power of the ʿAbbāsid caliph and the evolving status of “slave” rulers, represented by the Mamlūks of Egypt and the Sultans of Delhi. P. M. Holt notes that “The Mamluk sultan was an autocrat with arbitrary discretion but technically he was neither absolute nor sovereign.”13 Muslim jurists were equally uncertain about the foundations of Islamic political power in a post-caliphal world. However, their concerns were addressed, to the satisfaction of many, in the works of individuals like al-Māwardī (364–450/974–1058) and al-Juwaynī (419–78/1028–85), who established the legitimacy of power (sulṭah) and leadership (imāmah) beyond the caliph.14 In a Sunnī context, and in relation to the power and authority of God’s caliph (khalīfat Allāh), sultans were the right hand of God’s caliph (yamīn-i khalīfat Allāh). They were in an absolute sense the arbitrators of justice and punishment, nothing less than God’s shadow on earth (ẓill Allāh fī ‘l-ʿarḍ). This idea of Islamic power and authority was invented and sustained in prominent writings produced in the fifth/ eleventh century. It contributed to the understanding of the Delhi Sultanate not as an “expediency,” but as an ideal of Islamic power embodied and united in the figure of the sultan.15 On the other side of the legitimacy debate, some scholars have staked out a “sharīʿah position.” Bold proclamations such as, “The Sultanate of Delhi was a theocracy and not a secular state,” are frequently found in secondary literature on the subject.16 One prominent example of this position comes from Aziz Ahmad, who wrote specifically of the later Sultanate, “The Tughluq revolution (1320), which overthrew the apostate usurper Khusraw Khān, was to some extent basically pietistic.”17 Conveniently skipping over the “enigmatic” Muḥammad b. Tughluq, he goes on to discuss the reign of Fīrūz Shāh in the following manner, “Fīrūz Tughluq’s theocracy could not have existed in theory or in practice without the assistance of the ʿulamāʾ. The very theocratic nature of his regime presupposes their preponderant influence on the state administration under him.”18 What should be clear is that debates about the nature of religious and political power in the Delhi Sultanate are marked by starkly

Auer-12.indd 4

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Delhi at the Center of Islamic Authority

5

contrasting views. A lack of recognition of fundamental ambiguities in the Delhi Sultanate authority has led to a polarized understanding of the relationships between religious authority and political power in a variety of historical contexts. A nuanced reading of the complex relations that existed between religious institutions and Muslim courts calls for a critical reevaluation of the arguments and a reinterpretation of the relationship between religious and political authority in the Islamic world. Making the Image of the Sultan It would seem that the project for historians today has as much to do with unraveling complicated historiographies as it does with writing histories. Perhaps one cannot even separate the two.19 To better investigate the relationship between religion and power one must look at historiography, the dominant literary mode utilized in presenting the image of the sultan, in the Delhi Sultanate. The crafters of history employed certain kinds of historiography to draw up an idea of the Islamic heritage that replicated, reinvented, and reinterpreted conceptions of Muslim authority. On a fundamental level they were the architects of the rhetoric of Islamic empire. However, many contemporary historians of Islam have failed to acknowledge the way religion is mobilized ideologically in medieval Islamic historiography. Beginning in the nineteenth century, when historians looked back at historiography produced centuries earlier, they saw a style of writing no longer acceptable to their standards of fact or palatable to their sensibilities of scholarship.20 Hayden White identifies a shift in the historical sensibility of the period, saying: “Thus was born the dream of a historical discourse that would consist of nothing but factually accurate statements about a realm of events which were (or had been) observable in principle.” The perceived failings of premodern historiography are neatly summed up by Gabrielle Spiegel: (1) historiography forms a literary alliance with rhetoric;

Auer-12.indd 5

6/10/12 1:26 PM

6

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

(2) it involves the stereotypical use of historical events and persons; (3) it utilizes experience, custom, and repetition against reason, individuality, and process; and (4) it is absent from the curriculum of medieval pedagogy.21 These concerns have boiled down to, on some level, a fundamental question: What are the “true” events of history? This basic question has severely limited the modern historian’s range of approaches to premodern historical texts and historiographical genres. For instance, in regard to early ḥadīth, maghāzī texts, and Islamic studies, Muhammad Qasim Zaman states, “Works of a particular genre can and often do differ quite significantly from one another in how they treat their subject matter and to what end, even as they discuss the same subjects or handle similar materials, is a realization that has been slow in coming to many areas of Islamic Studies.”22 The lack of sensibility to genre is displayed in statements on the low “quality” of Persian history writing in India. One of the most profound misunderstandings about genre and premodern historiography is the role of mythical elements and religious modes of expression found in historiography. Hayden White noted in his critique of the nineteenth-century European and American positivist historiography that “In order to understand this development in historical thinking, it must be recognized that historiography took shape as a distinct scholarly discipline in the West in the nineteenth century against a background of a profound hostility to all forms of myth.”23 In the process of reading Islamic historiography, historians have frequently decried, ignored, and overlooked narratives, motifs, and themes drawn from the Qurʾān, ḥadīth, and tales of the prophets. This can be seen in early English translations of Persian histories written in India, in which translators omitted religious narratives from their translations. For example, Henry Raverty (1825–1906) left out the first chapter of the all-important Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī of Minhāj Sirāj Jūzjānī (b. 589/1193), a chapter that dealt with narratives of pre-Islamic prophets such as Noah, Moses, and Abraham. In fact, Raverty left out the first six chapters of Jūzjānī’s Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī that include the histories of the “rightly-guided” caliphs (rāshidūn), the Umayyad caliphs, the

Auer-12.indd 6

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Delhi at the Center of Islamic Authority

7

ʿAbbāsid caliphs, the pre-Islamic Persian kings, and the pre-Islamic kings of Yemen. Raverty explains their exclusion, saying, “The first six, with the exception of the History of the early kings of Īrān, are not of much importance by reason of their brevity.”24 This was equally the case for the monumental work The History of India as Told by its Own Historians: The Muhammadan Period carried out by Henry Elliot (1808–53) and John Dowson (1820–81). Henry Elliot, who began the task of selectively translating passages from historiography written by Muslims in India, excised Qurʾān and ḥadīth quotation from his collection. Neither Elliot nor Dowson provided a rationale for their chosen historical selections. In this connection it is important to understand the low esteem with which Elliot held Persian historiography in India. This can be seen in the purpose he assigns to his random selection of historical writings, “They will make our native subjects more sensible of the immense advantages accruing to them under the mildness and equity of our rule.”25 A related shortcoming can be seen in those who approach historiographical texts with a scholastic naïveté, applying little critical acumen to the analysis of history writing. Frequently, texts of history are read at face value and utilized as direct sources, assuming in some fashion or another that premodern historical narratives represented the “real.” Carl Ernst astutely sums up this critique, saying: “Modern historians of medieval India, whether British or Indian, have tended to focus on medieval historical chronicles from an exclusively political point of view, treating these works as ‘sources’ and ‘authorities’ from which history may be constructed by the ‘cut and paste’ method.”26 On the whole, historiography produced in the premodern Muslim world has been largely confined to the “sources” approach. This can be seen in the pioneering work of Franz Rosenthal who published A History of Muslim Historiography in 1952, an attempt to understand “Muslim historiography as a whole.”27 While providing a number of insightful comments on the development of Islamic historiography, he reiterates the source-based approach. He concludes his study, saying, “If there is a basic truth which Muslim

Auer-12.indd 7

6/10/12 1:26 PM

8

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

historiography could teach us after all historiographical efforts, would it not be that the simple approach to history as a source of facts and examples, both useful and informative, might still be the best key to historical understanding?”28 This myopic approach to historiography has also led contemporary historians of South Asia to assign modern cultural and religious controversies to the premodern period. For instance, the topic of religious violence has found an awkward place in scholarship of the Delhi Sultanate. It is primarily discussed in the context of scholars seeking to understand the condition of Hindu subjects under Muslim rule. Peter Hardy writes, “Many modern commentators upon the history of medieval South Asia have believed it to be crucial . . . whether the Muslims . . . held that the unprovoked use of force or violence against non-Muslims was a duty laid upon them by Islamic law.”29 He argues that this question is more relevant to the modern than the medieval period and that these contemporary scholars have put Sultanate historiography in the service of communal politics in South Asia, interpreting contemporary events in light of what is, in many cases, an imagined past. This has played a role in controversies surrounding the delicate issue of temple destruction.30 These debates are, in particular, a symptom of the construction of Indian and Pakistani “nationalist” historiography produced in the mid- to late-twentieth century.31 The deficiencies of critical approaches perpetuate a misunderstanding of the relationship between religion and politics. This is exemplified in statements such as, “The general disposition of Persian historians was to record not to explain. This was perhaps partly due to the assumption that divine sanction corroborated world order— that God’s cause triumphs in Islam.”32 Indeed, Muslim historians, on the whole, saw the historical process as the fulfillment of divine will. However, these statements fail to capture the pervasive interpretive dimension of that understanding of history. The fact (in the historian’s mind) that “God’s cause triumphs in Islam” is not only an explanation of history; it is the reason for history. However, it is an oversimplification to say that medieval Muslim historians did not see men, in particular, as actors in history.

Auer-12.indd 8

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Delhi at the Center of Islamic Authority

9

Things began to change with the development of a historical– critical method of Islamic historiography, given impetus by Marilyn Waldman’s Toward a Theory of Historical Narrative: A Case Study in Perso-Islamicate Historiography. Her work benefited from the larger discourses of narrative theory emerging from the works of Peter Gay, Hayden White, and Mary Louise Pratt. Since then, a number of important studies have appeared that take a critical look at Islamic history writing, for example, Tarif Khalidi’s Arabic Historical Thought in the Classical Period, Fred Donner’s Narratives of Islamic Origins: The Beginnings of Islamic Historical Writing, Julie Meisami’s Persian Historiography to the End of the Twelfth Century, and most recently, Chase Robinson’s Islamic Historiography. This collective effort has opened new avenues for the interpretation of history and history writing of the premodern period of Muslim societies. In terms of studies of Persian historiography in India, the standard works remain Peter Hardy’s Historians of Medieval India: Studies in Indo-Muslim Historical Writing and Khaliq Ahmad Nizami’s On History and Historians of Medieval India. Carl Ernst contributed to the critical understanding of Sultanate historiography in a section of the Eternal Garden: Mysticism, History, and Politics at a South Asian Sufi Center. Similarly, Sunil Kumar has explored the constructed nature of historical narratives on the Delhi Sultanate in an appendix to The Emergence of the Delhi Sultanate 1192–1286 titled “Persian Literary Traditions and Narrativizing the Delhi Sultanate.”33 More recently Iqtidar Husain Siddiqui has published Indo-Persian Historiography up to the Thirteenth Century. However, to date, there is no sustained attempt to focus on the rhetorical and didactic contents of historical narratives of religion and myth. These texts are critical to understanding the fundamental ideals of Islamic rule. This study proposes to apply historical–critical methods to historiography of the Sultanate period in order to interpret the religious representations and Islamic ideologies of rule.

Auer-12.indd 9

6/10/12 1:26 PM

10

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

The Religious Shapings of Persian History Writing in India It is often remarked that history writing was a development of the rise of Islam, as there was no previous Arabic historiography. In his study of Islamic historiography H. A. R. Gibb asserts, “The beginnings of scientific history in Arabic are associated with the study of the life and activities of the Prophet.”34 Chase Robinson writes in his own study of origins, “The rise of the historiographic tradition is thus related to the rise of Islam.”35 The development of Arabic historiography is widely credited to the Qurʾānic sense of linear time and the attending concept of history as a record of the cumulative development and fulfillment of God’s will.36 Yet, when one considers the traditions of Byzantine and Sasanid historiography, this association of Qurʿānic thought and historical thinking may be overstated. Nonetheless, scholars have argued that in a theological and absolute sense “Islam and history are coeval.”37 The purposeful time imprint of the Qurʾān is meant to demonstrate the interconnectedness of past action and future event: The Qurʾān expounded a serious conception of the past, called attention to the limitations of the Arabs’ earlier recollections, and traced history back to the beginnings of Creation. The Qurʾān stressed the lessons and warnings provided by the history of bygone times, and recalled the experiences of past nations and peoples in order to emphasize the spiritual and ethical precepts they involved.38 From the beginnings of the historiographic enterprise of Islamic societies, historians put to use Qurʾānic themes and motifs in endeavors that were as much literary as scholastic.39 Qurʾānic narrative served as an interpretive lens for understanding historical action, and provided powerful arguments for the didactic purpose of history writing. In order to support their histories with the Qurʾānic ethos of morality and eschatology, historians copiously adorned their narratives with direct quotations and indirect references to

Auer-12.indd 10

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Delhi at the Center of Islamic Authority

11

the Qurʾān, resulting in a profusion of Qurʾānic passages in Arabic historiography of the period. Not surprisingly, the Qurʾān plays a central role in the stylistics and symbolism of Persian historiography in India. The frequent use of the Qurʾān demonstrates that the historian’s method was in certain ways increasingly informed by an exegetical tradition, a fact rarely acknowledged in the scholarly literature. Reading passages from Persian historical narratives requires an exegetical approach that entails a background in the history of Qurʾānic interpretation. Qurʾānic references also make explicit the intended meaning of what is only implicit in the historical text and, at times, supply readings at variance with exegetical literature.40 Certainly, Qurʾānic passages were inserted into histories to flatter and legitimate the actions of sultans, lending them an air of religiosity and authenticity. At the same time the infusion of Qurʾānic quotations gave specific interpretive meaning to historical events. Take for example the Qurʾānic vision that contextualized Islam as a primordial religion originating with the “father of humanity” (abū ‘l-bashar), Adam, and exemplified in a succession of prophets culminating in Muḥammad.41 Narratives of pre-Islamic prophets were largely transmitted orally but found their textual form in the Hebrew Bible, Talmud and Apocrypha, and later in a body of Arabic literature known as the stories of the prophets (qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ). In the hands of early Muslim historians such as Abū Jaʿfar al-Ṭabarī (224–310/839–923), author of the Taʾrīkh al-rusul wa’l-mulūk [The history of prophets and kings], pre-Islamic prophetic history became universal history, a core historical style employed by historians in their myth-making enterprises.42 Uri Rubin writes, “In this manner, they wished to indicate that Muḥammad’s Islamic legacy was identical with the divine legacy that was transmitted from generation to generation since Adam.”43 This universal history approach represents one of the earliest attempts to sacralize history, exemplified in the Qurʾān, connecting the beginnings of Islam with subsequent political and social narratives. Stories out of time were linked with history (taʾrīkh), the dateable and attributable reference to events in time. Sultanate

Auer-12.indd 11

6/10/12 1:26 PM

12

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

historians consciously interwove images, motifs, and narratives from the lives of prophets, splicing them into their own histories. To project an Islamic religious identity for their sultans, historians constructed symbols and metaphors that linked the present to the sacred past. In historiography this was accomplished on an ideological level through the appropriation and construction of ideal religious types, embodied in the paradigmatic exempla of pre-Islamic prophets, Muḥammad, the friends of God (awliyāʾ), and the caliphs. Toward this end writers performed a kind of typological interpretation in their renditions of history. In the language of comparative literature, a typological interpretation understands earlier events and individuals to be “signs” of future events, such that, “The first term is a ‘figure’ (figura) and a ‘foreshadowing’ (umbra) of the second which is its fulfillment, its clearer image (imago).”44 Thus, historians compared the exemplary figures from the Islamic past to the sultans of Delhi. For their patrons this was an education on the proper, religiously sanctioned, exercise of power. For rivals of the Delhi sultans and others these histories served as a warning against their failings and a delegitimization of their rule. In the historian’s language the sultans of Delhi became the “kings of Islam” (bādshāhān-i Islām) who upheld the “rulings of sharīʿah” (aḥkām-i sharīʿah). They were the “religion-seeking sultans” (salāṭīn-i ṭālibān-i dīn) and the “sultans who protect the faith” (sulṭānān-i dīnparvar). At times their religious identity was given a more specific sectarian flavor. Following Sunnī Islam, historians projected an image of religious orthodoxy in which the sultans of Delhi became the “path-followers of the predecessors” (sunniyān-i salaf) who stand against the “bad religionists” (bad mazhabān). Here the rhetoric of empire was coded with the polemics of religious difference, in which Shīʿah and Hindu identities were marginalized and denigrated. An ideological partner to the Qurʾān and universal history was the example of the behavior (sunnah) set by the Prophet Muḥammad. No other figure from the annals of Islamic history served as historical exemplar to the same degree. Muḥammad’s example was definitive on the level of ethics, law, and custom. The massive corpus of his

Auer-12.indd 12

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Delhi at the Center of Islamic Authority

13

sayings became the living embodiment of that example. Historians drew extensively and selectively from the ḥadīth of Muḥammad to authorize and explain historical events. They used them to highlight sultanic action and to create an affinity between the sultans and the Prophet. Understanding the manner in which historians employed ḥadīth reveals much about the interpretation of prophetic sayings and the predominant religious and moral standards by which sultans were judged. Second to Muḥammad, and in many cases equal to him, Sultanate historians utilized the figure of the Sufi shaykh as a model of behavior for the sultans of Delhi. The establishment of the Delhi Sultanate occurred during the critical and most expansive phase in the evolution of Sufi orders (s. ṭarīqah). During the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/fourteenth centuries two of the major Sufi orders of South Asia were institutionalized in the lineages of the Chishtiyyah and Suhravardiyyah, so named after their “founders” Muʿīn al-Dīn Chishtī (536–633/1141–1236) and Shihāb al-Dīn Abū Ḥafṣ ʿUmar Suhravardī (539–632/1145–1234).45 Historians documented the manner in which sultans paid homage to the great shaykhs through visitation and construction of their tombs. They also attempted to create resonances between the figure of the sultan and the shaykh by indicating, in a variety of ways, that sultans and shaykhs shared similar traits. Another important source of religious legitimation for the sultans of Delhi was the centuries-old idea of the Sunnī caliphate. The Sunnī caliphate traced its lineage back to the first successor of Muḥammad, Abū Bakr, and down through the ʿAbbāsid caliphs, providing the ultimate source of Islamic authority for those who chose to recognize it. Over the course of their history, the Delhi sultans acknowledged the authority of the ʿAbbāsid caliphs, ascribing their names and titles onto their own coinage, and seeking out their investiture (manshūr) to secure their authority along classical Sunnī lines. Some Delhi sultans even went even so far as to declare themselves caliph, as was the case during the short reign of Quṭb al-Dīn Mubārak Shāh (r. 716–20/1316–20). Historians of the Delhi Sultanate were

Auer-12.indd 13

6/10/12 1:26 PM

14

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

very careful to narrate the variety of ways in which their sultans’ authority belonged within this broadly cast Sunnī understanding of Islamic legitimacy. Finally, the propagation of a legal system based on the sharīʿah was another means by which the sultans of Delhi established their Islamic credentials. Historians of the Delhi Sultanate commented on those kings who were diligent in enforcing sharīʿah, praising them as religion-protecting sultans and as the beacons of the sharīʿah, while excoriating those sultans who stretched the boundaries of their authority by preferring the legal rules, known as z̤avābiṭ, granted to them as kings. These rules were often seen to be in conflict with the sharīʿah, particularly in regard to punishment (siyāsah) as enforced by the king. The legitimating Islamic ideology that sustained the Delhi Sultanate was constituted by the establishment of courts ruled according to the sharīʿah; by recourse to Sunnī authority embodied in the caliphate; and by following the exempla of Sufi shaykhs, the Prophet Muḥammad, and the pre-Islamic prophets. The emphasis placed here on the religious models that sustained the legitimacy of rule is not to suggest that religion was the only source of authority. In his monumental work, The Venture of Islam, Marshall Hodgson attempts to capture the multitudinous ways Islamic societies comprise an ethos beyond what can be thought of as just the religious dimensions of life, a phenomena he termed “Islamicate.”46 In their quest for empire, the sultans of Delhi relied on multiple sources of legitimation: ethnicity, social hierarchy, genealogy, language, and force. One of the most dominant legitimating motifs of Sultanate historiography is propagated through allusions, analogies, and narratives of pre-Islamic Persian kingship exemplified by figures such as Jamshīd and Anūshīrvān. This tradition was transmitted through important Pahlavī works such as the Khvadāy-nāmag, the “Book of kings,” translated from Pahlavī into Arabic, most notably by Ibn al-Muqaffaʿ (ca. 102–39/720–56), and found in various later Persian recensions.47 The manner in which this pre-Islamic Persian epic poetic tradition made its way into Muslim courts is best exemplified by Firdawsī’s (ca. 329–411/940–1020) unparalleled Shāhnāmah, and

Auer-12.indd 14

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Delhi at the Center of Islamic Authority

15

the Iskandarnāmah of Niẓāmī (b. ca. 535/1141). The Shāhnāmah was reinterpreted in the Indian context by ʿAbd al-Malik ʿIṣāmī (b. ca. 711/1310–11) who wrote the Futūḥ al-salāṭīn, a history in verse fashioned in the style of Firdawsī’s Shāhnāmah, also known as the Shāhnāmah-yi Hind. The pre-Islamic Persian tradition was also transmitted through the important works of Pahlavī literature, such as the ʿAhd Ardashīr and the Tansarnāmah.48 These ideas were transmitted into Arabic in the work of Ibn al-Muqaffaʿ, the Kitāb al-ṣaḥābah, the Adab al-kabīr, and Adab al-ṣaghīr. The whole genre of advice literature offers a repository of Islamicate modes of legitimacy crafted in a variety of cultural contexts. For instance, the ideas found in the famous Siyāsatnāmah of Niẓām al-Mulk (408–85/1018–92) helped shape the political ideologies that sustained Saljūq dynasties.49 Other major contributions to the genre of advice literature include Kay Kāʾūs’ Qābūsnāmah, written in 475/1082–3, the Naṣīḥat al-mulūk of al-Ghazālī (450–505/1058–1111), the Sirāj al-mulūk of al-Ṭurṭūshī (d. ca. 520/1126), the Baḥr al-fawāʾid, written between 552/1157 and 557/1161 by an anonymous author and dedicated to Alp Qutlugh Jābughā Ulugh.50 Early advice literature had continued relevance centuries later. This is true of the Akhlāq-i nāṣirī of Nāṣir al-Dīn Tūsī (597–672/1201–74) which, as Muzaffar Alam demonstrates, had an impact on Mughal governance.51 In the Delhi Sultanate, advice literature is represented by important works, such as the Ādāb al-ḥarb wa ‘l shujāʿah of Fakhr-i Mudabbir (ca. 552–633/1157–1236), dedicated to Iltutmish and written sometime after 626/1228, the Zakhīrat al-mulūk of ʿAlī Hamadānī (714–86/1314–85), and the important contribution of Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn Baranī (ca. 684–758/1285–1357), the Fatāvá-yi Jahāndārī. Not always complimentary, pre-Islamic Persian modes of legitimacy were carefully juggled in relation to the Islamic modes of legitimacy— that which relied on the Qurʾān, ḥadīth, the teachings and lives of Sufi shaykhs, the caliphate, and the sharīʿah. This was at least an equal, if not more important factor, in the complex web of legitimacies that sustained the Delhi sultans. This work seeks to understand the

Auer-12.indd 15

6/10/12 1:26 PM

16

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Islamic modes of legitimacy that Sultanate historians used to craft their images of the sultans who ruled from this emerging center of Islamic authority. The Makers of History As prominent leaders and holders of high office in the courts of Delhi, historians were themselves collectively engaged in the sultans’ imperial project. Although there was no titled position of court historian in the Delhi Sultanate (and, in that limited sense, there were no “official” histories), historians held influential posts in the government and acted as advisers. In the capacity of court counselor, historians advised sultans on matters of state from war and diplomacy, to law and the economy. They utilized their understandings of history to influence the course of the sultan’s judgment and they shaped their own histories for these didactic purposes. Both sultans and historians understood the power of historical narratives in establishing and sustaining political rule. Significant links had been established between historians in courts under Būyid and Sāmānid rule and then on through the Ghaznavid and Saljūq periods, and these links had an influence on the Delhi Sultanate.52 In a very real sense, historiographical production was deeply entangled with the creation and maintenance of ruling institutions. Along with architecture, poetry, royal ceremony, titles, and dress, historiography was a significant element in the “articulation of authority” of the Delhi Sultanate.53 Delhi courts were so successful in their articulations of authority that “Hindu” courts of South India adopted the image of the sultan. Rulers in the courts of Vijayānagara adopted the Sanskritized title of “Sultan among Hindu kings” (hiṃdurāya suratrāṇa) and employed courtly dress in the fashion of Delhi.54 Historiography was exclusively the record of sultans, kings, princes, ministers, and religious leaders; in other words, the elite members of the institutions of authority. It was the affairs of great men and their accomplishments that attracted the attention of historians. The historical narratives of this privileged class of society were created with the assistance of court patronage. There is nothing subaltern about it.55 Unfortunately, the biographical details on the historians

Auer-12.indd 16

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Delhi at the Center of Islamic Authority

17

of the Delhi Sultanate are quite slim. In most cases we are limited to what can be gleaned from scattered notes within the pages of their own writings. The dearth of information has often led to more controversy than clarity. Therefore, it is tantalizing to look outside of the context of the Delhi Sultanate for scholarly works that can be viewed in a comparative light, as no scholar to date has written a social history of the literati of Delhi. Richard Bulliet’s excellent study, The Patricians of Nishapur, is a useful starting point for comparison, as it evocatively brings to life the social class he refers to as the patriciate and the urban environment in which they flourished. His work provides insight into the oligarchy of Nishapur of the fourth/tenth through sixth/ twelfth centuries, dominated as it was by landholders, merchants, and clerics. Bulliet says of his choice of the term patrician, the individual component in the social class called the patriciate, “The word ‘patrician’ was arrived at by the elimination of the usual alternatives and by the desire to denote high social rank combined with local identification and loyalty.”56 It was an exclusive and inbred cadre that sustained itself on heredity, loyalty, and wealth. Bulliet provides example upon example of the substantial political power and influence the patriciate wielded, as individuals and as a collective, and on the decision making of rulers. It was a scholarly society that supported the nobles with etiquette and learning. Also, there were important sectarian dimensions of that knowledge that segmented the patriciate between Ḥanafī, Shāfiʿī, and Karrāmī schools of legal thought. The social history of a class of Nishapur’s society is relevant to the understanding of the cosmopolitan elite that sustained the historians of the Delhi Sultanate and to which they themselves belonged. At the same time that this kind of comparison and generalization is alluring, it can also be deceptive. Richard Buillet acknowledged this at the outset: Of course, the existence of a similar class in the cities of western Iran, Iraq, Syria, Egypt, and North Africa has been abundantly demonstrated . . . It would take an extensive comparative study

Auer-12.indd 17

6/10/12 1:26 PM

18

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam to show just how the Nishapur patriciate differed in composition and function from the Damascus patriciate, if the use of that term could be justified in Damascus; but there seems to be sufficient evidence that important differences did exist.57

Similarly, one might search for comparison in the singular work, Bureaucrat and Intellectual in the Ottoman Empire, by Cornell Fleischer, who reconstructs the career of the noted Ottoman historian Muṣṭafá ʿĀlī (948–1008/1541–1600). In this work we gain access to the inner workings of an empire seen through the eyes of one of its most talented bureaucrats. Pulling back the veils of time we glimpse behind the scenes and into the mind that created the Künh ül-ahbar [Essence of history], the most important Ottoman historiographical work of the tenth/sixteenth century. We learn of the institutional functions and constraints of a professionalized bureaucracy that managed one of the largest imperial projects of its age and of all history. Through this study we come to understand the ideological proclivities that motivated an acute thinker and shaper of historical ideas. While there are certainly important resemblances between the later Ottoman and Delhi Sultanate periods, there are challenges to comparing the vastly different contexts of the Ottoman Empire and its master historian, and the Delhi Sultanate and their historians. It is vital to recognize the distinctive context of North India and the distinctive place of Delhi in the broader Muslim world, particularly in regard to emerging Mongol realities and diminishing caliphal authority. A definitive social history of the Delhi Sultanate is needed. For now we will have to be satisfied with glimpses taken askance into the courtly lives of Sultanate historians. While the sources for the social context of historians may be lacking, it is still possible and instructive to examine the ideologies that sustained and motivated these men. The Sources Persian historiography of the Delhi Sultanate offers a unique case of history writing. The Delhi Sultanate offers three major works, from three authors that define the alpha and omega of the formative

Auer-12.indd 18

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Delhi at the Center of Islamic Authority

19

period of Islamic courts in South Asia. These three authors engaged, wittingly and unwittingly, in a common goal of writing a collective history of Delhi and the sultans who ruled from there. Their work forms a kind of literary triptych with a unifying theme and mode of presentation throughout. At the same time each panel is distinct and stands alone with an individual style and technique. Minhāj Sirāj Jūzjānī crafted the first panel in the triptych of Persian historiography in India and titled it the Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī.58 A refugee of Mongol military successes across Central Asia, Jūzjānī migrated to the Indian subcontinent in the service of Ghūrid rule, where he witnessed and participated in the foundation of Delhi. He had a long and distinguished career in which he held the high offices of chief judge (qāz̤ī al-quz̤āt) and received the exalted title of ṣadr-i jahān. He applied his skills in the employ of the progenitor of the first Muslim dynasty of Delhi, Shams al-Dīn Iltutmish (r. 607–33/1210–36) and his son Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh (r. 644–64/1246–66). Jūzjānī was the most accomplished of the historians of the early Delhi Sultanate; he produced the Ṭabaqāt at the end of his life and dedicated the work to Sultan Nāṣir al-Dīn. It remains the most important historiographical piece from the early Sultanate period. The impulse to universalize history in a specific context found a willing author in Jūzjānī. His Ṭabaqāt weaves a narrative beginning with pre-Islamic prophetic history and concludes with the narrative of Muslim rule in India, ending in the year 658/1260. It also contains a major section of the activities of the Mongols during the period. Understandably, because of its breadth, the Ṭabaqāt is the most voluminous of the Sultanate histories. The work is comprised of twenty-three chapters (s. ṭabaqah) and is composed in succinct and clear Persian. As mentioned earlier, the need to recreate or reorient historical identity in relation to sacred narrative appears at a number of entry points on Muslim conquest, migration, and transition across the Middle East, Central Asia, and South Asia. After Jūzjānī achieved his goal of writing a universal history, subsequent Delhi historians did not see the need to produce such histories until the ninth/fifteenth century; indeed universal history writing in India was not taken up again until after Amīr Tīmūr’s conquest of Delhi.

Auer-12.indd 19

6/10/12 1:26 PM

20

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Muḥammad Bihāmad Khānī’s Tārīkh-i Muḥammadī is a history that begins with the life of the Prophet and ends in the year 842/1438, thus signaling a new cycle of historiography of Muslim rule in India.59 Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn Baranī picked up Jūzjānī’s literary strand and contributed equally, and in some ways more significantly, to the historiography of the Delhi Sultanate. Baranī is noted as a genuine historical thinker, someone who contributed to historiography as both compiler and theorist. Scholars of his Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī have generally agreed with Baranī’s own versified bravado: It is useless to say there is no history like mine in this world, when there is no scholar in this field of study who can affirm my claim.60 Peter Hardy, British historian of Muslim India, wrote of Baranī’s history, “[The] Taʾrīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī, completed in 758/1357, is the vigorous and trenchant expression of a conscious philosophy of history which lifts Baranī right out of the ranks of mere compilers of chronicles and annals.”61 Like Jūzjānī, Baranī had direct access to the inner workings of court life and the decision making of sultans and their subordinates, holding the position of court counselor (nadīm) to Muḥammad b. Tughluq (r. 724–52/1324–51) for seventeen years of his reign. Unlike Jūzjānī, who migrated to North India from Ghūr, being born into a family of high officials serving in the Ghūrid imperial project, Baranī represents the first generation of Muslim historians born in North India. Like his predecessor, he was born into a family of patricians who had long served in the courts of Muslim kings. The Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī is a history of the sultans of Delhi from Ghiyās̱ al-Dīn Balban (r. 664–85/1266–87) to the sixth regnal year of Fīrūz Shāh (r. 752–90/1351–88), for whom the history was named. Baranī was the author who initiated the collective historiographical enterprise of the Delhi Sultanate. He invoked Jūzjānī, acknowledged the great contribution of the Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī and indicated that he would begin where Jūzjānī left off, so as to not overlap with his good work.62 Baranī saw himself engaged in a coherent historiographical

Auer-12.indd 20

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Delhi at the Center of Islamic Authority

21

tradition extending the historical project of Islam. Of all the historians of the Delhi Sultanate, Baranī has been the most studied, yet he remains the least understood. Moreover, he has received little attention in the broader fields of Islamic studies and history. Baranī stands out for his highly theoretical approach to historiography, and is clearly recognized within the field of South Asian studies.63 His history draws on a richly contextualized style and complex narrative frameworks. While speaking of the literary production of Baranī, it would be an oversight not to mention the Fatāvá-yi Jahāndārī, his contribution to the important genre of Persian advice literature.64 In this work, he attempts to design a blueprint for the administration of Muslim dynasties and addresses a wide variety of subjects, including kingship, economics, citizen rights, religion, politics, justice, and punishment.65 The work is a companion to the Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī and offers insight into the underlying ideas of Baranī’s historiographical narratives. There are only two other works extant from Baranī’s pen: the Akhbār-i Barmakiyān, a history of the Barmakids, whose story served as an example of the dangers faced by high officials in the court, and the Ṣaḥīfah-yi naʿt-i Muḥammadī, a work of praise dedicated to the Prophet Muḥammad.66 The final panel in this triptych comes from Shams al-Dīn Sirāj ʿAfīf (b. 757/1356). Like Jūzjānī and Baranī, ʿAfīf was an affiliate of the court at Delhi, a status achieved through hereditary privilege. For generations, members of his family, including his father and uncle, held high posts under the reigns of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh (r. 695–715/1296–1316), Ghiyās̱ al-Dīn Tughluq Shāh (r. 720– 24/1320–24), and Fīrūz Shāh. As a young man ʿAfīf worked in the royal storehouses (kār khāna-hā) for the imperial standards and the horse and elephant stables.67 ʿAfīf never had the opportunity to rise to the level of his intellect and ability, as he had the misfortune of living during the demise of the Delhi Sultanate, when it was given a fatal blow at the hands of Amīr Tīmūr’s armies.68 ʿAfīf picked up the historiographical thread left by his predecessor, just as Baranī had done.69 He assumed the position of the final link in the chain of history writing on the sultans of Delhi, bringing the

Auer-12.indd 21

6/10/12 1:26 PM

22

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

collective narrative to a conclusion. The Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī covers an important period of Fīrūz Shāh’s thirty-seven year reign; the work is a distinct history of the career of a single ruler.70 ʿAfīf composed his history using the form common to manāqib literatures, a genre that generally focuses on the pious traits of religious figures. ʿAfīf was apparently the first author to apply this genre to the life of a sultan. Peter Hardy notes that “Of the twenty-six separate works having manāqib as part of the title, listed by Storey in Bio-biographical Guide to Persian Literature, London, 1953, p. 1369, twenty-three relate to the lives of ṣūfīs, other members of the religious classes, prophets, and ʿAlī ibn [Abī] T̤ālib and none to those of sultans.”71 Nevertheless, this work has not received the same critical attention as Baranī’s history, partially due to its narrow time frame and perceived literary failings.72 ʿAfīf gravitates toward the dramatic elements of narrative style, punctuating his tales with poetic verses to summarize the point of his story, a technique he employs with greater frequency than Jūzjānī and Baranī. It is the shortest of the histories considered here. ʿAfīf divided his history into five parts (s. qism), each with eighteen sections (s. muqaddamah). The last three sections of part five are no longer extant in the manuscript tradition. ʿAfīf wrote the Tārīkh-i Fīrūz-Shāhī in 800/1396.73 He is responsible for at least four other historical works all now lost.74 This historiographical triptych covers the cumulative reigns of nearly two-hundred years of Delhi Sultanate rulers. Historical writing produced during the Delhi Sultanate represents a confluence of literary styles. On one end of the spectrum, if it can be considered a spectrum, there is tārīkh, written in the strict sense of a chronicle. On the other end, the ṭabaqāt, manāqib, and sīrah are biographical varieties. In addition to the prose narratives, there is also a genre of verse histories exemplified by the writings of ʿAbd al-Malik ʿIṣāmī and Amīr Khusraw.75 Other historians may be noted as well. Fakhr-i Mudabbir completed the Shajarah-yi ansāb in 602/1206. The second part of the work describes the life of Quṭb al-Dīn Aybeg (r. 602–07/1206–10), and is a record from the earliest period of the Delhi Sultanate. Fakhr-i Mudabbir also wrote the

Auer-12.indd 22

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Ghazna Lahore

Punjab

Multan

I

u nd

s

ve Ri

Ajudhan

r

Hansi

Delhi Ya m

Sindh

Rann of Kutch

Thatta

Gujarat

un

a

Bahraich Ri

ver

Ga

nges Rive r

Lakhnauti a Narm

iver da R

Bengal

Dawlatabad

Deccan Plateau

Warangal

Delhi Sultanate Shamsid Dynasty (r. 607–689/1210–1290) Khalji Dynasty (r. 689–720/1290–1320) Tughluq Dynasty (r. 720–801/1320–1398) 0

400 kilometers

0

400 miles

Auer-12.indd 23

6/10/12 1:26 PM

24

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Ādāb al-ḥarb wa’l-shajāʿah [The etiquette of war and valor], a major contribution to Persian advice literature. In many ways the work of Fakhr-i Mudabbir foreshadows that of Baranī. Another important history is the Tāj al-maʾāthīr of Ḥasan Niẓāmī (fl. 602/1206). It generally fits the manāqib genre and covers the reigns of Sām, Aybeg, and Iltutmish: the emergence of the Delhi Sultanate. All of these works had a continuing influence on historians in centuries to come.

Auer-12.indd 24

6/10/12 1:26 PM

2 Pre-Islamic Prophetic Paradigms in Delhi Sultanate Historiography

Origins and the Flood of Noah In 601/1204 Muʿizz al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Sām, the last Ghūrid sultan ruling from Ghazna, was returning from Khwārazm when he suffered a terrible defeat at the hands of the Qarā Khiṭāi on the battlefield of Andkhud along the banks of the Oxus River.1 Muʿizz al-Dīn managed to return to Ghazna, but news of his defeat spread and rebellion broke out in southern areas of his kingdom in a region along the Jhelum River occupied by Khokar tribes.2 He decided to make war (ghazv).3 In order to put down the challenge to his authority he gathered his troops and set out from Ghazna in the autumn of 601/1205. He commanded one of his military officers, Quṭb al-Dīn Aybeg, to assemble the armies from Hindustan.4 Shams al-Dīn Iltutmish, the “slave soldier” (ghulām) of Quṭb al-Dīn, was to join them from Badāʾūn, the valued province Quṭb al-Dīn had conferred upon Iltutmish for his able service. In the ensuing confrontation between the Ghūrid armies and the Khokar tribes it is reported that Iltutmish distinguished himself with valor and bravery. At the turning point of the battle, Iltutmish

Auer-12.indd 25

6/10/12 1:26 PM

26

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

rode his steed into the Jhelum River, in full armor, to confront the rabble (makhāzīl) that had made camp nearby.5 He sallied forth against his enemies and drove them off with great force. He routed the infidels (kuffār) with wounds he inflicted with his arrows. His charge was so powerful that “the crest of the wave sent the infidels (kuffār) down to the bowels of hell.”6 The chronicler concludes his narrative with a Qurʾānic literary flourish:

َ ْ ُ َُۡ ْ ُ ۡ ُ ٗ ٢٥ ‫أغرِقوا فأدخِلوا نارا‬ They were drowned and brought into the fire.7 This is the lively description of Minhāj Sirāj Jūzjānī, court historian, high official, qāz̤ī, and imām to Iltutmish and subsequent sultans of Delhi. Jūzjānī was not an eyewitness to the events described. He would have been a young boy at the time, though it is possible and even likely that he heard about Iltutmish’s battle with the Khokar tribes from individuals who were present. Behind the evocative imagery and stylistic writing there is a very carefully crafted narrative. Style, narrative, and symbolism are part and parcel of the rhetorical strategies that promulgated an ideology of power integral to the construction of the Delhi Sultanate. Thus, we can see in this “historical” tale of battle a few of the central motifs found in “institutional” accounts of Muslim political authority in India. The most obvious feature of this passage is its skillful treatment of the conquest motif. John Renard has described the important social function heroic tales play in Islamicate societies. Significantly, he points out, “Such heroic accounts supply a great deal of what many Muslims know about their faith traditions.”8 This is represented in the heroic deeds of the idealized ghāzī warrior.9 The idea of the ghāzī sultan was central to the Muslim authority of the Delhi Sultanate. In the hands of historians it was given Qurʾānic proportions. Jūzjānī punctuates the battle scene on the banks of the Jhelum River with a direct quote from “Sūrah Nūḥ” (Q71:25). He raises the military prowess of Iltutmish to that of the apocalyptic destruction of the great

Auer-12.indd 26

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Pre-Islamic Prophetic Paradigms

27

flood sent by God. In judicious fashion Jūzjānī evokes two didactic elements of the Qurʾānic narrative: the sure triumph of those who stand fast in their obedience to God’s will and the swift punishment for those who choose to ignore God’s warnings. Iltutmish’s victory over the forces of disbelief is given supernatural proportions, just as the flood served as a validating miracle for the prophet Noah (Nūḥ). The Qurʾān’s central role in Muslim historiography is certainly not new. Stephen Humphreys discusses the way in which Qurʾānic motifs and narrative structures were influential in early Islamic historiography, which, according to Humphreys, is organized around a set group of paradigmatic events crafted in an idealized form. One of the primary Qurʾānic themes he notes is the emergence of Islam as “a decisive break in world history.”10 Drawing on the imagery of the great flood of Noah, Jūzjānī appropriates the motif of the “decisive break.” Iltutmish’s demonstrative victory against the Khokar is the reversal of one social order for another, achieved through the divine will of God. Jūzjānī concludes the story of the battle with a description of how Iltutmish was raised to his exalted position as sultan of Delhi. Muʿizz al-Dīn was obviously impressed with Iltutmish’s exploits on the battlefield. Jūzjānī records that he called Quṭb al-Dīn before him and commended the “bravery” (jalādah) and “boldness” (shāhāmah) of his “slave” Iltutmish. He ordered him to prepare Iltutmish’s “papers of manumission” (khaṭṭ-i ʿitq). Jūzjānī says that he was honored in the “eyes of kings” (bi-naẓar-i bādshāhān).11 Not long after these events, both Quṭb al-Dīn and Muʿizz al-Dīn died, leaving Iltutmish with the reins of power. Peter Jackson refers to the evolving political order of Islamic kingdoms in India saying, “Aybeg’s action marks the emergence of an independent Muslim power in India; that of Iltutmish, the creation of the Delhi Sultanate.”12 Jūzjānī’s approach to Iltutmish’s battle narrative along the lines of the Qurʿān and the Prophet Noah was not necessary. In an earlier account of the same event Ḥasan Niẓāmī describes Iltutmish as sending the enemies to the “fires of hell” (ātish-i dūzakh) and causing a “wave of a river of blood” (mawj-i daryā-yi khūn) to reach up into the

Auer-12.indd 27

6/10/12 1:26 PM

Figure 1. Delhi, Quṭb mīnār, 595–635/1199–1236. The construction of this mīnār was begun under Quṭb al-Dīn to commemorate the establishment of Delhi as a center of Islamic authority and to function as part of a mosque complex. (Photo by Travis Zadeh)

Auer-12.indd 28

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Pre-Islamic Prophetic Paradigms

29

sky. He does not, however, make a direct Qurʾānic reference. Rather, Niẓāmī elevates Iltutmish’s skills on the battlefield, referring to him as “Alexander the Second” (Iskandar-i s̱ānī) and utilizing pre-Islamic Persian notions of kingship.13 It is clear that Jūzjānī read the Tāj al-maʾāthīr and was inspired by elements of Niẓāmī’s narrative, but deliberately chose to use the Qurʾān and prophetic example in the representation of Shams al-Dīn Iltutmish, the future sultan of Delhi. It was during the sixth/twelfth and seventh/thirteenth centuries that Turkish rulers across Central Asia legitimated their claims to authority through conquests framed in the ghazā context.14 Ghazā was understood as raiding for the purposes of gathering wealth and seeking military glory; this can be understood in distinction to jihād, which, in a technical sense, was the defense of Islam. Thus, Cemal Kafadar notes that in the Ottoman context, “the word ‘jihad’ is rarely used in the frontier narratives . . . the sources clearly maintain a distinction.”15 In Jūzjānī’s narratives, ghazā is frequently used in reference to the military threats posed by Mongol conquests across Central Asia and their incursions into the Indian subcontinent. Linda Darling documents a number of these narratives from the Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī saying, “The ghāzīs of the Delhi Sultanate turned from the conquest of India to its defense, and in some chronicles the term ghazā came to refer only to warfare against the pagan Mongols, in which Muslims and Hindus both participated.”16 Darling further argues that in using ghazā in this defensive sense, the Delhi Sultanate narratives differed from the Ottoman. However, ghazā in the Delhi Sultanate was not utilized solely for defensive war, but also for offensive war, as the preceding example illustrates. Whether Iltutmish was a charismatic ghāzī warrior striding headlong into the Jhelum River to confront the “rabble” and the “infidel” is incidental. Jūzjānī initiated the imagery of the Delhi sultans as ghāzī warriors and substantiates it with Qurʾānic motifs. Ghazā remained significant throughout Delhi Sultanate historiography, a tradition that was carried on by the Mughals.17 To this end, Jūzjānī’s narrative was an essential part of the invention of tradition that made Delhi and its sultans the center of the Muslim authority of the “eastern” Islamicate world.

Auer-12.indd 29

6/10/12 1:27 PM

30

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Moses and Miracles in the Representation of the Sultans of India Long after the recording of Iltutmish’s great victory in the Punjab, at the tail end of Sultanate historiography, Shams al-Dīn Sirāj ʿAfīf crafted a related interpolation of prophetic imagery and sultanic action. In contrast to Jūzjānī’s narrative of victory written at the very inception of the Delhi Sultanate, ʿAfīf composed a story of defeat. Instead of the flood imagery associated with the military prowess of Iltutmish, ʿAfīf employed a desert motif that drew upon tales of the Jewish exodus and the legendary exploits of the Prophet Moses. The historical event crafted by the pen of ʿAfīf concerned the fourth year of Sultan Fīrūz Shāh’s reign as the “Supreme Sultan” (sulṭān al-aʿz̤am) of Delhi.18 Around 767/1365–66, Sultan Fīrūz Shāh embarked on a major military campaign in Sind. Before this time the eastern and western frontiers of the Sultanate had been only fitfully within the orbit of Delhi’s authority. During the reign of Muḥammad b. Tughluq, the eastern frontier of Bengal was integrated, for a time, into the Delhi Sultanate. In 743/1342 Shams al-Dīn Ilyās Shāh (r. 743–59/1342–58) secured his own autonomy in Bengal and in 754/1353 Fīrūz Shāh tried to dislodge Shams al-Dīn Ilyās Shāh, but without much success.19 Subsequent campaigns in Bengal were more successful and Fīrūz Shāh commemorated his victories in stone inscriptions installed across the empire.20 On the western frontier, independent kingdoms in southern Sind had largely eluded the grasp of Fīrūz Shāh’s predecessor. According to the contemporary account of the renowned traveler and qāz̤ī to the court at Delhi, Ibn Baṭṭūṭa (703–70/1304–69), the Sūmra rulers with their capital at Thatta had accepted a degree of Muḥammad b. Tughluq’s sovereignty.21 However, it is likely that they broke off from Delhi after that time. By 752/1351 the Sammā Dynasty (r. 752–926/1351–1520) had usurped the Sūmra throne. During Fīrūz Shāh’s reign, the region was in the control of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Jām and his nephew Ṣadr al-Dīn Bānbīna. ʿAfīf describes the Sultan’s enemies in flattering terms. He reports, “Their strength and bravery was known throughout the world.”22 Around the year 767/1365, Fīrūz

Auer-12.indd 30

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Figure 2. Sandstone tablet inscription commemorating Fīrūz Shāh’s second campaign in Bengal and against the ruler Bhānudeva III in Orissa. The memorial was likely one of two erected at the mosques in Bharuch and Khambhat, Gujarat in 762/1361. (Courtesy David Collection, Copenhagen, Denmark)

Auer-12.indd 31

6/10/12 1:27 PM

32

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Shāh decided to initiate a campaign against the Sammā rulers to regain some of the former territories of Delhi. ʿAfīf describes how the Sultan’s forces were not prepared to encounter such a formidable enemy during the siege of Thatta. Consequently, the assault on the Sammā rulers failed and Fīrūz Shāh was forced into a long retreat into Gujarat to replenish his army’s supplies and prepare for a second battle.23 Things went from bad to worse as precious grain stocks dwindled and the cavalry’s horses were afflicted with disease. ʿAfīf narrates that the situation was so dire that the soldiers were forced to eat the dead horses. On top of these hardships, the army’s guides (rahbarān), who were from Sind, deceived the soldiers and the Sultan, leading them into the Rann of Kutch (kūnchī ran), a vast desolate salt marsh. The Gazetteer of Sind describes the region in this fashion: It forms the southern or south eastern boundary of Sind from Rajputana to the sea. It is now a vast salt waste flooded a great extent for several months of the year by waters of the sea driven into it by the force of the south west monsoon, which converts it into a salt lake. At other season, it is a desert flat, firm and quite bare except for a few islands, where there is scant herbage.24 In this wasteland, ʿAfīf lists four great calamities (balāʾ) that afflicted the Sultan’s party: starvation (qaḥṭ), marching on foot (piyādagī), the life-consuming desert (ṣaḥrāʾ-i jān-gudāz), and the separation of comrades (furqat-i aḥbāb).25 In dire straits the soldiers lost all hope. ʿAfīf describes how, when he realized his situation, the Sultan shed tears (āb dar chashm mīgardānīd).26 ʿAfīf reaches the climax of his narrative with an observation that he fleshes out with the help of an analogy. He equates Fīrūz Shāh’s disastrous adventure in the Rann of Kutch to the wanderings of Moses in the desert following the exodus from Egypt.27 He writes, “What a wondrous secret, [it is] just as the Elder Moses faced the desolate land (ʿālam-i tīh) whose tales are mentioned in the celebrated commentaries.”28 Confronted by a hopeless situation, ʿAfīf narrates that the Sultan, being divinely inspired (bi-ilhām-i ilāhī), began

Auer-12.indd 32

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Pre-Islamic Prophetic Paradigms

33

a night vigil. He cried out to heaven, “Oh God! Send the rain of mercy out of the blessing of the merit of someone in the army, he who is of the rank of the people of holiness. Deliver [us] out of this desolate land through the blessings of his merit and the grandeur of the dust of his feet!”29 Immediately following the Sultan’s prayer the skies clouded over and the “rain of mercy” (bārān-i raḥmah) came down. The Sultan’s struggles in the desert of the Rann of Kutch end with a miraculous act of divine intervention. Translators of ʿAfīf ’s tale chose to ignore the details of Fīrūz Shāh’s conversation with God.30 In the process they glossed over important narrative moments in Sultanate historiography. ʿAfīf envisioned Fīrūz Shāh as a ruler who embodied prophetic traits. His reference to Moses supplies the narrative framework for Fīrūz Shāh’s desert wanderings.31 The major themes of Moses’ prophetic qualities are his patience, the idea that he was guided, and the miraculous signs he was given; these are all evidence of his divine calling.32 In this account, ʿAfīf evokes two Qurʾānic events with interlinking themes. One is the striking of the rock with the rod that brings water and the other is the raining down of food from the sky through prayer in Q7:160.33 ʿAfīf also tied his narrative to the important quality of Moses’ leadership. Indeed, the Qurʾānic subtext of the sojourn through the desert in search of the promised land is one of punishment for the Israelites who were not obedient to Moses; “God said, ‘Therefore, it will be forbidden to them for forty years. They will wander through the land.’”34 ʿAfīf hoped to evoke the leadership embodied in the figure of Moses in the imagination of his readers. The Qurʾān is clear on this point. Moses’ role as guide and leader to the community is founded on his “clear authority” (sulṭān mubīn). Evidence for this is given in Q23:45, which says, “Then we sent Moses and his brother Aaron with our signs and clear authority (sulṭān mubīn).” This authority is also reiterated in Q28:35, “He said, ‘We will certainly strengthen your arm with your brother, and invest you both with authority (sulṭān).’” The “clear authority” of the sultan was already part of the stock imagery of the Delhi sultans. Earlier, Amīr Khusraw appropriated Q4:91 to

Auer-12.indd 33

6/10/12 1:27 PM

34

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

augment the ascension of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh, a passage that also references “clear authority.”35 ʿAfīf ’s narrative goal is to establish the piety of the Sultan. Fred Donner’s study of the transformation of Qurʾānic piety into historiography of the early Islamic period focuses on the project of historicizing legitimacy in early historical works. He points out that establishing the piety of the figures of history was a major project of early historiographers. He writes, “In the early community of Believers piety became a crucial determinant of one’s standing in the community in this world, no less than one’s standing in the next.”36 Highlighting Fīrūz Shāh’s constant prayers and supplications, ʿAfīf participates in “theocratic legitimization,” the process by which authority is secured through evidence of the involvement of the divine in the events of mundane life.37 The signs of prophecy were a central motif of kalām literature. Sarah Stroumsa notes that the miracles of Moses were a “favored piece” of early Muslim theologians.38 In his allusion to miracles as signs of the divinely ordained right to command, ʿAfīf utilizes a major support in Muslim legitimacy. While the sultan is not a prophet, according to ʿAfīf he is like a prophet with his miraculous ability and sincere piety. For the Muslim historian, prophetic associations legitimated the Sultan’s authority, placing it in line with God’s design. The association between prophets and kings is also made explicit in Persian advice literature.39 The prophetic nature of sultans as depicted in Persian historiography in India becomes even more pronounced in historiographic representations of Muḥammad, a subject discussed in detail in the next chapter. The Polemics of History in the Figure of Abraham During the eighth/fourteenth and ninth/fifteenth century, Muslim scholars began to theorize about history as a distinct field of knowledge (ʿilm). Franz Rosenthal credits Muḥyī al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Sulaymān al-Kāfiyajī (788–879/1386–1474) with the authorship of the “oldest Muslim monograph on the theory of historiography known to us.”40 Ibn Khaldūn (723–808/1332–1406) is another historian who figures prominently in the development of historiography as a field

Auer-12.indd 34

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Pre-Islamic Prophetic Paradigms

35

of knowledge. Around the time of Ibn Khaldūn, and even earlier, Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn Baranī added his own distinct contribution to writings on historiography. In the prolegomena to his history of the sultans of Delhi, Baranī delineates seven “precious qualities” (nafāsat) indispensable to the “knowledge of history” (ʿilm-i tārīkh).41 Baranī ranks the knowledge of history high among the “fields of knowledge” (ʿulūm). For instance, Baranī claims that the knowledge of history provides scholars with an ability to distinguish between the correct and incorrect record of the early events of Islam. According to his analysis, if the “scholar of ḥadīs̱” (muḥaddis̱) is not a “historian” (muvarrikh) he will not recognize the “original narrators” (aṣl ruvāt) of the actions of the Prophet nor distinguish between the “sincere” (mukhliṣān) and “insincere” (ghayr mukhliṣān) of the “Companions” (ṣaḥābah).42 Baranī says that the seventh quality of the knowledge of history is “truth” (ṣidq).43 As proof for this statement he draws on Qurʾānic precedent and prophetic example. He elevates historical truth using the voice of Abraham (Ibrāhīm), who prayed to God (Q26:84):

َ َ ّ َ ۡ َ َ ‫ان صِ ۡدق ف ٱٓأۡلخِر‬ ٨٤ ‫ين‬ ‫وٱجعل يِل لِس‬ ِ‫ٖ ي‬ ِ Let me be honest in all I say to others.44 In both the Qurʾān and exegesis, Abraham is the paragon of truth. He is referred to as a “man of truth” (ṣiddīq) in Q19:41. This is just one of the multiple identities attached to Abraham, who is valorized as a devoted monotheist (ḥanīf), obedient servant of God, builder of the Kaaba, and patriarch.45 According to qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ traditions, his trustworthiness is attested by wild animals. Al-Kisāʾī, the legendary author of the Qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ, narrates that when Abraham was called to the court of Nimrod (Nimrūd) and compelled to worship him as a god, Abraham refused; Nimrod grew angry and questioned him about the God he worshiped. Abraham described his God as the “Lord of the Universe.” Nimrod called him a liar, but a cock approached and said, “Nimrod, Abraham is the apostle of the Lord of the Universe, and what he says is the truth.”46

Auer-12.indd 35

6/10/12 1:27 PM

36

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Baranī references Q26:84 to evoke the interpretive life of prophetic tales and establish the historical method on Abrahamic truth. Baranī was aware that the success of one’s history depended on the ability to claim access to “true” events. In this way, Baranī’s usage of prophetic examples differs from the panegyric mode of Jūzjānī and ʿAfīf. His appropriation underscores a self-conscious reflection on history emblematic of his literary production. Baranī then takes the theme of Abraham’s truth to generate a sectarian polemic. Polemics in historiography are well known. Abū ʿAlī Balʿamī (d. 363/974) utilized his Persian “translation” of al-Ṭabarī’s history to suit the court politics of Manṣūr b. Nūḥ (r. 350–65/961–76) by countering the Bāṭinī and Karrāmiyyah ideology prevalent in Khurasan and Transoxiana of the fourth/tenth century.47 Baranī enters into the polemics of history by quoting Q4:46:

َّ َ َ‫حُ َ ُ َ ۡ ل‬ ٤٦ ‫ي ّ ِرفون ٱلك َِم عن م َواضِ عِهِۦ‬ They rob words of their true meaning.48 This verse is part of an extended discussion of the “enemies” of those who “believe.” These verses have been taken as an invective against the Jews who “twist words and expressions.”49 In Baranī’s phrasing, they “make lies look like truths.”50 In this section, Baranī does not attack any specific group, but warns historians that God has punishment in store for those who lie. Baranī says that “on the Day of Judgment the lying author will receive the severest of punishments.”51 Slightly later, Baranī becomes more pointed in his polemics. He says that the “protection” (salāmatī) of “religion” (dīn va mazhab) is a “condition” (sharṭ) of writing history. Baranī criticizes the “bad religionists” (bad mazhabān) who, out of zealous partisanship regarding “hereditary succession” (ʿaṣabīyat-i mūras̱), weave “tales of lies” (qiṣṣahā-yi durūgh) about the “Companions” (ṣaḥābah).52 He makes specific mention of the “exaggerators” (ghulāt) of the “dissenters” (ravāfiz̤) and “dissidents” (khavārij), a disparaging reference to early Shīʿah

Auer-12.indd 36

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Pre-Islamic Prophetic Paradigms

37

communities and Kharijites. He emphasizes that they mix “truth and lies” (ṣidq va kazb) in their own histories. Baranī is concerned that historians from those communities easily deceive readers and he warns about the way history is used as a tool to spread ideology, a project that he himself was fully engaged in. Clearly, Sunnī-Shīʿah polemics were pronounced during the late Sultanate period under the reign of Sultan Fīrūz Shāh. He made the ravāfiz̤ a subject of attack in a stone inscription that adorned the dome of the congregational mosque in the city of Fīrūzābād. Authored by the Sultan, this inscription, now preserved in text, is known as the Futūḥāt-i Firūz Shāhī or the “Victories of Fīrūz Shāh.”53 In it Fīrūz Shāh says of the ravāfiz̤, “They furbished treatises and books about this religion and they pandered their teachings.”54 While the sobriquet ravāfiz̤ is meant to be a pejorative term (literally meaning “rejectors”) it was reappropriated by early Shīʿī communities.55 Supporting Fīrūz Shāh’s thinking, Baranī argues that one of the great advantages of a “knowledge of history” (ʿilm-i tārīkh) is that it gives one the ability to distinguish between those “who follow the path of the predecessors” (sunniyān-i salaf) and the “bad religionists” (bad mazhabān). Baranī’s Sunnī historical vision aligned ideologically with the sultans of Delhi who built their authority on associations with Sunnī traditionalism. Baranī’s invocation of Abraham’s truth served the dual function of providing credibility to the knowledge of history and issuing an indictment against historiography of which he did not approve. Joseph in the Example of the Sultan

َ َ ۡ َ َ ۡ َ َ ۡ َ َ ُّ ُ َ ُ ۡ َ‫ح‬ ٣ ‫نن نقص عليك أحسن ٱلقص ِص‬ We tell you the most beautiful of tales.56 In general, the Qurʾān is seen as the apex of literary achievement in Arabic. It serves as a source of inspiration for authors in a variety of literary genres and its repertoire of images and mythical tales has

Auer-12.indd 37

6/10/12 1:27 PM

38

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

spread far beyond the Arabic speaking world. As has been shown, historians of the Delhi Sultanate found numerous uses for the Qurʾān in historiography, through direct quotation, illustration, and allusion. However, in terms of narrative structure, historians have been at a relative loss to fulfill the dictates of the “knowledge of history” (ʿilm-i tārīkh) by drawing on the apocopated narrative strains found in the Qurʾān. “Sūrah Yūsuf ” stands in contrast to this.57 Being the most complete narrative story recorded in the Qurʾān, this locus classicus has lent itself to a complex variety of usages in historical writings. The proverbial story of Joseph (Yūsuf) was a central narrative in Jewish and Christian writings long before it spread widely in Islamicate literatures.58 It is difficult to document even one stage in the literary journey of the Joseph story, which has both oral and written dimensions. The primary narrative is found in the twelfth sūrah of the Qurʾān. It plays a major role in early Qurʾānic exegetical literature (tafsīr) and the tales of the prophets (qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ). It has also made its way into historiography. The story of Joseph was incorporated into universal histories from the writings of al-Ṭabarī in Taʾrīkh al-rusul wa ‘l-mulūk [The history of prophets and kings] to Ibn al-Athīr (555–630/1160–1233) and al-Kāmil fī al-taʾrīkh [The complete history]. The tradition of universal history writing passed into Persian with the “translation” of al-Ṭabarī’s history produced under Sāmānid patronage in 352/963. The project was carried out by Abū ʿAlī Balʿamī, vizier to Manṣūr b. Nūḥ. A. C. S. Peacock writes about the patronage of Persian literature in Sāmānid courts: “Persian prose seems to have emerged from the state’s desire to propagate conservative Islamic values amongst the pious Transoxianan public.”59 By this time pre-Islamic narratives had been recognized as standard representations of Islamic history and were employed in early Persian courts. The projection of history into a prophetic past helped bolster a court’s claims to Islamic legitimacy and the story of Joseph was a critical tool in that endeavor. The significance of the Joseph story was not lost on the historians of the Delhi Sultanate. From Jūzjānī to Baranī and ʿAfīf, all three historians utilized the story of Joseph in both stylistic and didactic

Auer-12.indd 38

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Pre-Islamic Prophetic Paradigms

39

ways. Although Joseph became a stock figure of Delhi Sultanate historiography, historians felt no need to represent him in uniform or typical ways. The first usage of the story of Joseph in this context is recorded in the Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī of Jūzjānī. Composed in the style of a universal history; Jūzjānī’s Ṭabaqāt is both history and genealogy. Genealogies were essential components of early Sultanate historiography, as exemplified by Fakhr-i Mudabbir’s Shajarah-yi ansāb, a work that contains some one hundred thirty-six genealogical tables.60 Historians utilized universal history to establish the sultans of Delhi within a traditional Islamic narrative that begins with Adam, the “father of humanity” (abū ‘l-bashar).61 While this genealogy conforms to the format of universal histories such as al-Ṭabarī’s Taʾrīkh, it can be seen in contrast to an equally strong orientation that draws from pre-Islamic Persian origins. Consider Abū Ḥanīfah al-Dīnawarī’s al-Akhbār al-ṭiwāl (third/ninth century), ʿAbd al-Ḥayy Gardīzī’s Zayn al-akhbār (fifth/eleventh century), Abū Manṣur al-Thaʿālibī’s Ghurar al-siyar (fifth/eleventh century), and of course Firdawsī’s Shāhnāmah (fourth and fifth/tenth and eleventh century). Jūzjānī’s narrative of Joseph is part of a section that begins with the life of Adam and continues with the stories of other prominent figures like Noah, Abraham, Moses, and more than thirty other prophetic figures that make up his “history” of Islam before the life of Muḥammad. In many respects he follows closely the outline of the Qurʾānic narrative.62 Jūzjānī conventionally discusses Joseph’s beauty and status as the favored son of Jacob (Yaʿqūb). He draws liberally on the qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ tradition, relating details of Joseph’s death, his initial burial in Egypt, entombment in a marble coffin, and final translatio of his body to Jerusalem (Bayt al-Maqdis) at the hands of Moses.63 The qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ had long been woven into universal history. In fact, it was not until the fifth/eleventh century that Aḥmad b. Muḥammad Thaʾlabī (d. 427/1036) produced a qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ collection distinct from history.64 Even after Thaʾlabī, the qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ continued to be an integral component of universal Islamic historiography. This was the case, for instance, of the Taʾrīkh madīnat Dimashq, composed by the sixth/twelfth-century historian

Auer-12.indd 39

6/10/12 1:27 PM

40

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

and biographer ʿAlī b. ʿAsākir (499–571/1105–76). Ibn ʿAsākir extended history back to the life of Adam and more than thirty other preIslamic prophetic figures. James Lindsay describes Ibn ʿAsākir’s understanding of history as “Heilsgeschichte or sacred history—that is, an account of God working through His agents to accomplish His will in Damascus specifically and Syria more broadly.”65 The presence of the lives of prophets in historiography is an attempt to establish a pre-Islamic prophetic continuity with Muḥammad by moving the prophetic narrative forward to substantiate the authority of contemporary Muslim rulers. Historians appropriated the qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ tradition for the project of legitimating the Delhi Sultanate. This enabled historians to conceive of the sultans of Delhi as part of a continuation of sacred history from the Qurʾān and the qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ, a challenge considering they were of Central Asian Turkish descent. The Slave Becomes King: The Joseph Story in Mamlūk Rule Beyond the universal dimensions of the Ṭabaqāt, Jūzjānī used the Joseph story in his representation of the figure of Shams al-Dīn Iltutmish, when he succeeded to the throne of Delhi.66 Quṭb al-Dīn Aybeg was the reigning sultan of Delhi when he died in a bizarre polo game accident. The resulting power vacuum led to a dynastic struggle between two primary claimants to the throne: Ārām Shāh, the son of Quṭb al-Dīn, and Shams al-Dīn Iltutmish, his former military slave (ghulām).67 While the circumstances remain unclear, Ārām Shāh was killed in his attempt to accede to the throne and Iltutmish eventually took control.68 Sunil Kumar notes that Jūzjānī glossed over the confusion and power grabbing that accompanied Iltutmish’s succession to present a “seamless continuity of the Sultanate from one lineage to another.”69 In the Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī, Jūzjānī marked the dynastic change from the Muʿizziyyah, the lineage that ended with Quṭb al-Dīn Aybeg, to the Shamsiyyah, the lineage initiated by Iltutmish, by inserting a new chapter (ṭabaqah) titled “in reference to the Shamsiyyah sultans of

Auer-12.indd 40

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Pre-Islamic Prophetic Paradigms

41

India” (fī dhikr al-salāṭīn al-Shamsiyyah bi ‘l-Hind).70 Jūzjānī frames the occasion of dynastic change in Qurʾānic terms by recalling the story of Joseph. Iltutmish’s story as the slave (ghulām) of Quṭb al-Dīn Aybeg presented a logical opportunity for an apt intertextual play. Joseph thus became the symbol of “slave” kings. Jūzjānī begins his twenty-first chapter with a passage that speaks generally about individuals who are chosen by God to rule. According to Jūzjānī, leaders may rise from any station in life; regardless of origins, God blesses whom he chooses. Jūzjānī writes: If his neck should be placed in the collar of servitude, his master becomes the possessor of affluence; and, if his footsteps traverse the paths of halting-places and inns, he will cause his companions to become people of wealth. Just as the patriarch Joseph was sold to Mālik Duʿr, at his prayer, twenty sons like royal pearls were added to the necklace of his lineage.71 If he fell into the house of ʿAzīz, in the end he was made king of Egypt. And if the child in the cradle gave witness to his purity and—there was a witness from her family [Q12:26]—in the end he became the minister of the kingdom in his service.72 The creative retelling of the Joseph story in florid prose is a prelude to Jūzjānī’s efforts to situate the ascension of Iltutmish to the throne in Delhi. First, he highlights the humble origins of greatness. Second, he provides the telltale signs of those chosen by God to rule. Like Joseph, Iltutmish was sold into slavery as a child. Jūzjānī reports, skillfully playing off the traditional accounts of the Joseph story, that Iltutmish’s father Iyal Khān had numerous followers and kindred relations. He writes that his son was blessed with “beauty” (jamāl), “ingenuity” (kayāst), and was “good natured” (ḥusn khilqat), such that his brothers became “envious” (ḥasad). So they devised a plan to take Iltutmish away from his father and mother. Then, Jūzjānī’s use of the narrative becomes the most evocative. Jūzjānī places the deception of Iltutmish’s brothers in the Qurʾānic words of the brothers of Joseph:

Auer-12.indd 41

6/10/12 1:27 PM

42

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

َ ُ ُ ٰ َ‫َ ُ ْ َ ٰٓ َ َ َ َ َ َ اَ َ ۡ َّ لَى‬ َ ُ َ َ َ‫َّ ه‬ ١١ ‫وسف ِإَونا ُلۥ لنٰ ِصحون‬ ‫قالوا يأبانا مالك ل تأَ۬منا ع ي‬ َ ُ َ َ َ‫َ ۡ ُ َ َ َ َ ٗ َ َ ۡ َ ۡ َ ۡ َّ ه‬ ١٢ ‫أ ۡرسِله معنا غدا ي ۡرتع َويلعب ِإَونا ُلۥ لحٰفِظون‬ They said, “Oh, Father! Why do you not trust us with Joseph? Indeed, we wish him well. Send him with us tomorrow to enjoy and play. Surely, we will protect him.”73 Just as with Joseph, Iltutmish was misled by his brothers. He was sold to merchants at market, and then brought by them to Bukhara.74 The Qurʾānic basis of the narrative ends and Jūzjānī continues in another miraculous vein of the life of Iltutmish. It is no coincidence that the life of Iltutmish so closely parallels that of Joseph. In his extensive study of the Joseph story, James Kugel discusses the “narrative expansions” that accompany the “interpretive life” of the text. Narrative expansions consist of “boldly asserting that, in addition to what is explicitly related in the Bible, other words or actions not specified in the text actually accompany what is specified.”75 The potential for a rich interpretive life depends on the underlying exegetical motifs. In one fashion Jūzjānī’s inclusion of Qurʾānic quotes represents a form of exegesis and narrative expansion. By inserting direct quotes from the Qurʾān, he adds its symbolic and oral presence to the narrative of mundane events. More importantly, he legitimates an uncertain dynastic change with this sacred sanction. The Shamsiyyah sultans ruled in North India for a period of nearly sixty years. With this narrative it is likely that Jūzjānī inspired the continued relevance of “the most beautiful of tales” for Delhi Sultanate history writing. Putting the Story (qiṣṣa) Back into History Baranī was perhaps the first to make full use of the richly theoretical implications of “the most beautiful of tales.” He did this by including the opening lines of “Sūrah Yūsuf ” at the beginning of his prolegomena to history. He then praises God for revealing to “humanity” (bandagān) the affairs of “those who went before”

Auer-12.indd 42

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Pre-Islamic Prophetic Paradigms

43

(maqbūlān), and for making evident the “virtues and vices” (faz̤āʾil va razāʾil) of the “ancient peoples” (dūr uftādagān) who preceded “Muḥammad’s community” (ummat-i Muḥammadī). Baranī, referring to the Qurʾān, praises God for giving the world a history in the form of “heavenly revelation” (waḥy samāvī). He solidifies this view with a direct quote from “Sūrat Yā Sīn” (36:12):

ُ َ ْ ُ َّ َ َ ُ ُ ۡ َ َ ١٢ ‫ب ما قدموا َو َءاث ٰ َره ۡ ۚم‬ ‫ونكت‬ We record what they send forward and what they leave behind.76 Through his use of the Qurʿān, Baranī makes its significance to historiography clear to the reader. He sees “the most beautiful of tales” in two dimensions. First, the Qurʾān is a consequential retelling of stories from the past. Second, the story of Joseph demonstrates the didactic function of historiography: narrating the past for the edification of the future. For Baranī, “Sūrah Yūsuf ” is important for what it reveals about human nature and the human relationship to the divine. History is not merely a chronological record of events, but a selected sample of illustrative moments and exemplary individuals. In this way Baranī imbued his writings with political and religious purpose.77 Joseph and the Just King ʿAfīf also refers to the Joseph story by employing the Qurʾānic phraseology of “the most beautiful of tales.” While Baranī refers to “the most beautiful of tales” to discuss the purpose of historiography, ʿAfīf alters its use by placing special emphasis on Joseph’s “great pain” (mashaqqat) and “misery” (miḥnat). On the whole, ʿAfīf stays close to the narrative framework of the Qurʾān. Joseph is betrayed by his brothers and separated from his father. He is thrown into a well and then sold into slavery. ʿAfīf highlights Joseph’s suffering in order to praise the exalted level of his justice. He notes that once Joseph passed his trial phase and reached the land of Egypt he was elevated to the status of a ruler. Not knowing that Joseph was still alive, his

Auer-12.indd 43

6/10/12 1:27 PM

44

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

brothers unwittingly came before him seeking aid because of the famine in Canaan. In the manner of a just king, Joseph forgave his brothers for all their evil transgressions against him. According to ʿAfīf, Joseph would have been justified, had he sought retribution against his brothers’ crimes, but he showed clemency (ḥilm), and this is why God called it the “most beautiful of tales.”78 In choosing to employ the story of Joseph in the sense of the ultimate expression of justice (ʿadl), ʿAfīf turns the tale of Joseph into a commentary on the justice of Sultan Fīrūz Shāh. Fīrūz Shāh’s clemency (ḥilm) was so great he would even forgive a “criminal” (mujrim) who had committed a hundred crimes.79 ʿAfīf builds on the theme of justice in his use of the story of Joseph in another place in his history. He was particularly concerned to provide a warning to sultans on the need to be lenient with their subjects’ failures. In their role as judges, they needed to show clemency because, according to ʿAfīf, they too would be judged in due time. ʿAfīf states that “in God’s wisdom the accounting (ḥisāb) of those who are given rule over men in this world will be great in the afterlife.”80 ʿAfīf illustrates this advice to sultans by creating a narrative expansion of the Qurʾānic story of the death of Joseph.81 The cautionary message of the Joseph story had been part of Persian advice literature as early as Niẓām al-Mulk in the Siyāsatnāmah.82 ʿAfīf reports that after Joseph’s death, his body was brought from Egypt to the temple in Jerusalem (Bayt al-Maqdis) for burial. As the funeral procession approached the temple a voice called out from inside, “Joseph’s body should be buried outside the temple and be entrusted to the earth (dar khāk) because he was the King of Egypt (bādshāh-i Miṣr). Even though he showed all manner of justice (ʿadl), nevertheless a long accounting (muḥāsabah) awaits him.”83 ʿAfīf follows up his narrative with further discussion on the way rulers will be judged differently from the rest of humanity. To illustrate this, ʿAfīf highlights Joseph’s behavior during the time of great hardship for the people of Egypt, when they experienced seven years of famine. ʿAfīf reports that during that period Joseph did not take food to satisfy his hunger. When asked why he was not

Auer-12.indd 44

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Pre-Islamic Prophetic Paradigms

45

eating, he replied, “If I ate to my fill, I would forget those who are hungry.”84 Even so, ʿAfīf reports on the authority of a saying from the Prophet Muḥammad, which he summarizes in Persian, that Joseph would enter Paradise six months after all other prophets.85 This delay was needed to scrutinize the account of his actions in this life. The implications of this telling of the story of Joseph should have been clear enough to the sultans of Delhi. The threat of punishment in the afterlife was meant to be a check against the abuse of unbridled power. ʿAfīf notes in rhetorical style that Fīrūz Shāh “shook like a leaf ” (hamchūn barg bi-yad larzīd) with fear of the “final reckoning” (ḥisāb-i ākhirat).86 When ʿAfīf reached the end of his narrative, detailed in the fourteenth section of the fifth part of the Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī, he adds a description of the charitable activities of Sultan Fīrūz Shāh, who was then in the thirty-eighth year of his reign.87 Having already established the fate of kings on the Day of Judgment, ʿAfīf notes that upon reaching the end of his life the Sultan began performing charitable activities “out of fear” (az tas̱īr-i khawf). The first of the Sultan’s charitable activities was the care of unfortunate prisoners (bandiyān-i bi-chārah). He released those who were deserving of release (rahā) and he exiled those who were deserving of exile (jalāʾ). ʿAfīf links the Sultan’s release of prisoners to the incarceration of Joseph under ʿAzīz of Egypt, drawing largely from a retelling of the Qurʾānic passages that relate to Joseph’s dream-interpreting abilities. ʿAfīf narrates that King ʿAzīz had a “nightmare” (khvāb-i sahmnāk) and called together his advisers, but none were able to interpret its meaning. The king’s cupbearer (sharābdār), who formerly shared a cell with Joseph in prison, was among the group. He informed the king of Joseph’s skill in interpreting dreams and ʿAzīz sought his advice. Joseph warns the king of an impending famine that will bring suffering upon his land, a prophecy that comes true.88 ʿAfīf reports on the authority of Muḥammad that the miraculous thing about Joseph’s behavior is that he responded immediately to the request of the king, even though he was in prison. Muḥammad says of himself that he would have waited to be released from prison

Auer-12.indd 45

6/10/12 1:27 PM

46

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

before providing his interpretation of ʿAzīz’s dream. The meaning ʿAfīf extracts from this parable is that imprisonment is a severe hardship (sakht balāʾ).89 As a result, ʿAfīf relates that Sultan Fīrūz Shāh closely supervised the condition of prisoners. In ʿAfīf ’s narrative, the life of Joseph and the example of Muḥammad come together to illustrate the piety, justice, and benevolence of Sultan Fīrūz Shāh. Retelling tales from the lives of Noah, Moses, Abraham, and Joseph was central to historiographic narratives of the lives of the sultans of Delhi. Qurʾānic themes and tales of the prophets were the measure by which the crafters of history understood their time and place and the means by which historians attempted to convey their values of leadership. This could not hold truer than for narratives of the life of the Prophet Muḥammad, the subject of the next chapter.

Auer-12.indd 46

6/10/12 1:27 PM

3 Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler

“Submitting to the sayings and following the deeds of that sultan of prophets (sulṭān-i payghambarān) became a means of salvation for all of his people.”1 —Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn Baranī The Sultan of Prophets No single figure is as central to conceptions of Muslim political authority as the Prophet Muḥammad. In fact, his model has served as the standard for all areas of life, from the legal, ethical, and mystical to his role as statesman, patriarch, and warrior.2 The Prophet is admired for the number of virtues he embodied, such as submission to God’s will, ethical and moral excellence, humility, and courage. He is referred to in the Qurʾān as the “beautiful model” (uswa ḥasana).3 Whether in success or failure, nearly all Muslim leaders, especially those who adopted the mantle of religious identity, have been judged according to a model of behavior derived from the stories of Muḥammad’s deeds. His sunnah, or example of behavior, has served as the perfect model of human action to be imitated by pious Muslims, down to the minutest detail of their lives. The preIslamic concept of sunnah as the “normative” behavior of exemplary

Auer-12.indd 47

6/10/12 1:27 PM

48

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

personages from the past was applied to Muḥammad during his own lifetime. After the early third/ninth century, the concept of sunnah was almost solely applied to the behavior of the Prophet (sunnat al-nabī).4 Muslim historians have unanimously praised the period of his life as a unique moment of harmony between religion and politics. Scholars who have studied the story of the life of Muḥammad have noted how these narratives represent a reflective and idealized portrait of historical events. Uri Rubin, in his noted study of the early textual tradition, says that “The bulk of the texts about the Prophet embody the literary product of Islamic religious devotion, and therefore they will be treated in this book not as a door opening into the ‘historical’ events which are described in them, but rather as a mirror reflecting the state of mind of the believers among whom these texts were created, preserved, and circulated through the ages.”5 Claim to the Prophet’s sunnah is a claim to orthodoxy, orthopraxy, and tradition. For the ruling elite, a properly cultivated public image, in line with the exemplary actions of the Prophet, offered the promise of legitimate rule. Muslim rulers employed court historians to craft literary images that assimilated their personae with the example of the Prophet. The degree to which sultans actually followed the dictates of the sunnah is the subject of another debate. What is beyond question is the fact that the sultans of Delhi sought to legitimate their rule by having images created that show them imitating the sunnah of the Prophet. Patronage and the Prophetic Image of Muḥammad Jūzjānī was the first to construct the legitimacy of a sultan of Delhi on the example of the Prophet. Not surprisingly, he singles out Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh for encomium in this regard. Each historian of the Delhi Sultanate attempted, above all, to represent his patron in the most favorable light and Jūzjānī succeeded in this area in terms of rhetoric, narrative structure, and symbolism. Though Jūzjānī makes no direct comparison between Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh and the Prophet, he alludes to the way the Sultan possessed character traits shared by prophets. He describes Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh as a king who possessed the “qualities of the friends of God” (awṣāf-i

Auer-12.indd 48

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler

49

awliyāʾ) and the “virtues of prophets” (akhlāq-i anbiyāʾ).6 At the top of his extensive list of desirable prophetic qualities are fear of God (taqvá), adherence to religion (diyānat), abstention from worldly things (zahādat), defense of religion (ṣiyānat), compassion (shafaqat), mercy (marḥamat), doing good (iḥsān), being just (maʿdalat), and benefaction (inʿām).7 Jūzjānī manufactures a parallel by association between the admirable qualities displayed by his Sultan and those of Muḥammad, a project that was clearly meant to flatter Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh. Perhaps, the most pleasing literary gift Jūzjānī showered on his patron was the special attention he dedicated to his reign in the scope of his universal history. His treatment of the Prophet Muḥammad is the lengthiest of all the figures detailed in his entire history, barring one, that of Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh. Jūzjānī placed his narrative of Muḥammad at the conclusion to the first ṭabaqah, the section that details the lives of pre-Islamic prophets leading from Adam to the father of Muḥammad, ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib (d. ca. 570 C.e.). Jūzjānī sketches the major events of Muḥammad’s life, devoting more attention to events beginning with the hijrī calendar, and giving each year its own section, arranged in chronological order. Preceding this he dedicates two sections to a description of the qualities (ṣifāt) and miracles (muʿjizāt) of the Prophet. Jūzjānī emphasizes the special place Muḥammad holds in relation to the previous prophets by referring to him as the “leader of prophets” (imām al-anbiyāʾ) and the “crown of the pure ones” (tāj al-aṣfiyāʾ).8 Just as Jūzjānī concludes his narrative of prophetic lives with Muḥammad, he concludes his narrative of the lives of sultans with Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh. He was the only figure Jūzjānī viewed to be significant enough to include a year-by-year account of his rule, an arrangement identical to that given to Muḥammad. Overall, Jūzjānī’s structuring of history and flattering rhetoric ensured great rewards for the historian. The power of patronage was certainly a determining factor in the favorable reception sultans received in historiography. However, the form and content of that imagery was a product of an ideology of governance whose perfect model was that of Muḥammad. Following Jūzjānī, depictions of

Auer-12.indd 49

6/10/12 1:27 PM

50

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

sultans as bearers of Muḥammad’s virtues became a standard form of praise in Sultanate historiography. Subsequent historians saw an even broader range of comparisons to be made between Muḥammad’s prophetic career and the lives of sultans. In their efforts to compliment rulers through history writing, historians of the eighth/fourteenth century went much further than Jūzjānī in their appropriation of well-established representations of Muḥammad. The Seal of Prophets and the Seal of Kings One of the central images of the exemplary ruler crafted by historians of the Delhi Sultanate derived from Muḥammad’s title, the “Seal of the Prophets” (khātam al-nabiyyīn). This title is found in Q33:40:

َ ٓ َ َ ُ‫اَ َ ح‬ َ ُ َّ‫َ ه‬ ِ‫َّما كن م َّم ٌد أبَا أ َح ٖد ّ ِمن ّرِ َجالِك ۡم َولٰكِن َّر ُسول ٱلل‬ ٗ َ ۡ َ‫َ َ َ َ َّ ّ نۧ َ َ اَ َ هَّ ُ ُ ّ ي‬ ٤٠ ‫ش ٍء عل ِيما‬ ‫وخاتم ٱنلب ِ ِي ۗ وكن ٱلل بِك ِل‬ Muḥammad is not the father of any of your men, but he is the Messenger of God and the Seal of Prophets. God has knowledge of all things. From this reference and related ḥadīth, Muslim theologians developed a theory about the nature of Muḥammad’s prophethood. Early sources indicate that the doctrine of the seal of the prophets developed gradually and was accorded multiple senses.9 The first and perhaps oldest dimension of this doctrine emphasized the “confirmation” of his prophecy. Muḥammad as the seal of prophethood brought confirmation and closure to God’s message. In this interpretation the seal of the prophets represented the authenticity of his prophecy. Around the second/eighth to third/ninth centuries the preponderance of interpretation of the doctrine crystallized around the idea of the “finality” of Muḥammad’s prophecy.10 It emphasized the notion that Muḥammad was selected to bring fulfillment to the prophetic message. According to this view of prophetic history, God has provided revelations to a number of different communities over

Auer-12.indd 50

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler

51

the expanse of time, each drawn from a great “celestial book” (umm al-kitāb). This process of divine communication was completed in the shape of the Qurʾān. Thus, in his role as messenger of God (rasūl Allāh), Muḥammad was accorded special standing among the pantheon of prophets as bearer of the last and most complete message. The theological developments surrounding the concept of the seal of the prophets had profound consequences for the understanding of history. ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Duri notes that “It set forth a universal view which conceived of history as a succession of prophetic missions—all essentially a single message preached by various prophets, the last of whom, Muḥammad, was the khātam, or ‘seal,’ of the prophets and messengers.”11 The finality of the Prophet’s message situated early Muslim communities at the onset of a new era, essentially placing them at the beginning of history. The message sent by God brought the Arabs out of their “age of ignorance” (jāhiliyyah), a time without history. The idea of the jāhiliyyah has been used in a pejorative sense to indicate the time when the Arabs followed “pagan” religious practices. It has also been used negatively in terms of the ignorance of written literature and lack of historical records, even though pre-Islamic Arab communities had a culture of oral literacy. With this background, historians saw the potential in the concept of the seal of the prophets and applied it to the lives of sultans. Certain rulers who achieved extraordinary success during their rule were said to have fulfilled the best possible results in governance and were referred to by the title the “seal of the sultans,” in essence completing the work of a ruler. The overlapping of prophetic and royal titles illustrates the impact theological understandings of the role of Muḥammad had on conceptions of Muslim rule during the Delhi Sultanate. Jūzjānī names the Seal of the Prophets as one of Muḥammad’s titles.12 Later historians utilized the doctrinal implications of the seal of the prophets to produce a correspondence between Muḥammad and sultans. ʿAfīf did this by creating a parallel title, the “seal of the sultans” (khatm-i salāṭīn), found in the fourth book, third chapter of his Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī.13 In this section, ʿAfīf compares

Auer-12.indd 51

6/10/12 1:27 PM

52

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

two significant historical events situated some six hundred years apart: first the caliphal investiture of Fīrūz Shāh and second, the origins of Muḥammad’s revelation.14 At the time when al-Muʿtaḍid (r. 753–63/1352–62), the ʿAbbāsid “shadow caliph,” was in Cairo under the Mamlūks of Egypt, Fīrūz Shāh received the symbol of caliphal investiture, the caliphal robe (jāma-yi khilāfat), without petition (bi-ghayr iltimās). The ability of the Sultan to receive caliphal investiture without request is represented by ʿAfīf as a manifestation of the “qualities of prophets and the friends of God” (khiṣāl-i anbiyāʾ va af ʿāl-i awliyāʾ). He goes on to state that when the Prophet reached the age of forty he received revelation (waḥy) but for six months did not consider himself worthy of being a prophet. Because he turned away from arrogance (khūd bīnī), God opened the “doors of kindness” (abvāb-i karam) and made him the “Seal of the Prophets” (khatm-i anbiyāʾ). ʿAfīf goes on to say that Fīrūz Shāh, by not seeking caliphal investiture, turned away from arrogance, and was made the “seal of the sultans” (khatm-i salāṭīn). Therefore, God “mysteriously” (az ghayb) sent Fīrūz Shāh the caliphal robe. ʿAfīf refers to Fīrūz Shāh throughout his work in variations on this title, such as the “Seal of the Crown Bearers” (khatm-i tājdārān) and the “Seal of the Fortunate” (khātam-i bakhtīyārān).15 ʿAfīf also inverts the comparison by applying Persian titles, customarily associated with temporal rulers, to Muḥammad. He does this by referring to him as the “King of Prophets” (shāh-i anbiyāʾ) and the “King of Kings of the Pure Ones” (shāhānshāh-i aṣfiyāʾ).16 The title of the “King of Kings” (shāhānshāh) conjures Persianate images of kingship resurrected in the third/tenth century under Būyid rule.17 Such comparisons tied imagery of Muḥammad to pre-Islamic Persian traditions of kingship. In this context it is important to understand the fundamental limitations of the legitimacy of the Delhi sultans, who were challenged in their office because they lacked traditional claims to authority. Association with Muḥammad through blood lineage served as a powerful source of legitimacy and formed a basis for rule. The ʿAbbāsids in Baghdad (132–656/750–1258) were the first Muslim empire to fully capitalize on a principle of legitimacy based on being

Auer-12.indd 52

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler

53

“chosen from the family of Muḥammad” (riḍā min āl Muḥammad).18 Only one ruler of Delhi was so bold as to declare himself caliph, Quṭb al-Dīn Mubārak Shāh. Had he survived longer, historians might have been speaking of the Indian caliphate. However, their predominantly Turkish ethnicity and “slave” origins meant that Delhi sultans could not convincingly claim the title of sayyid, which would indicate descent from the family of the Prophet. It was not until after the demise of the Tughluq dynasty that the Sayyid sultans of Delhi (r. 817–55/1414–51) made a claim to descent from the Prophet. Khiz̤r Khān made the claim to sayyid status and ruled from Delhi (817–23/1414–21); this claim served as a basis for his legitimacy in the eyes of the historian Yaḥyā b. Aḥmad Sirhindī, as expressed in the Tārīkh-i Mubārak Shāhī.19 From Quṭb al-Dīn Aybeg’s time to Fīrūz Shāh, the sultans of Delhi were not so fortunate as to possess a claim to an association with Muḥammad through blood lineage. This was especially difficult for mamlūk sultans, such as Quṭb al-Dīn, Iltutmish, and Ghiyās ̱ al-Dīn Balban, who required “non-traditional” forms of legitimization. Peter Jackson notes that historians, such as Jūzjānī, played a role in elevating the status of mamlūk sultans, “In crafting a more respectable ancestry for such patrons and in seeking, eventually, to rewrite the process by which they had attained power, the Persian literati who dedicated their works to them were perhaps registering a belief that Turkish paramountcy was there to stay.”20 The application of titles such as the “seal of the sultans” was a means of creating associations with Muḥammad and supporting a sultan’s claims to legitimacy. Clearly by the seventh/thirteenth century the “seal of sultans” had become a historiographical trope across the Persianate world. This process is evident in the work of Muḥammad b. ʿAlī Rāvandī (fl. 599/1202), who, in a retrospective view of the reign of Ṭughril Beg (447–55/1055–63), referred to the great Saljūq ruler as the “seal of kingship.”21 The “seal of the prophets” also appears outside of the theological discussions relating to Q33:40. In other contexts it referred to a physical “seal” that marked the body of Muḥammad and was a sign of his prophethood.22 Studies of writings on prophets and heroes

Auer-12.indd 53

6/10/12 1:27 PM

54

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

show that there is a recurring motif of special markings that can be found on exemplary figures. True prophets are said to have accompanying signs that serve as proof of the authenticity of their divine mission. John Renard notes that a sign was often indicated by “a birthmark that the hero does not ordinarily leave open to view.”23 This was the case with the Prophet Muḥammad. According to the Sīrah of Ibn Isḥāq (85–150/704–67) the physical seal of the Prophet was located on Muḥammad’s back, between his shoulders.24 It was identified in a dramatic scene in the Sīrah of Ibn Isḥāq, when the young Muḥammad was singled out during a chance encounter with the Christian monk Baḥīrā.25 The subject of the signs of prophethood developed into a major topic in kalām literature, as is demonstrated in one of the earliest works on this subject, Kitāb ḥujaj al-nubuwwah [The proofs of prophethood] written by the polymath al-Jāḥiẓ (ca. 160–255/776–868).26 Narratives about the birth of heroes and prophets are frequently accompanied by events that are “nearly always unusual.”27 Jūzjānī makes reference to the “signs of rule” (ās̱ār-i dawlat) that precede the birth of a child who is destined to be king. He makes a connection between the light (nūr) transmitted from Adam, down to Muḥammad, and then on to the Muslim kings of India.28 Jūzjānī writes that if God decides to mark the forehead of someone with the “signs of power and the lights of sovereignty” (ās̱ār-i dawlat va anvār-i mamlakat) that will be seen on the brow of that child’s mother.29 Specifically, Jūzjānī is referring to the auspicious events that occurred at Sultan Iltutmish’s birth. Raverty, in his translation of the Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī, takes offense at Jūzjānī’s allusion to the prophetic qualities of sultans. He writes, “Our author here follows the life of men destined for sovereignty from the conception, and applies to them, somewhat blasphemously, the theory of nūr [light, &c.] of Muḥammad.”30 It is ironic that Raverty would consider the literary output of one of the leading religious figures of his day to be “blasphemous.” Perhaps this explains why few modern scholars acknowledge the overt comparisons made between sultans and prophets in the historiography of the Delhi Sultanate. Historians saw no contradictions in making such allusions; they saw it as a natural component of the praise of a just ruler.

Auer-12.indd 54

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler

55

Finally, the doctrine of the seal of the prophets was disseminated widely throughout North Indian society as the sultans of Delhi made it a permanent fixture of their coinage. Beyond their material value, coins were powerful symbolic vehicles for the expression of imperial authority and the sultans of Delhi were adept at employing them in their favor.31 The coins of Muḥammad b. Tughluq’s reign bear the inscription “reviver of the way of the Seal of the Prophets” (muḥyī-yi sunan-i khātam al-nabiyyīn) with the obverse bearing the name Muḥammad b. Tughluq Shāh.32 Other Tughluq coins designate authority through Muḥammad to the sultans of Delhi. Many include Q4:59, “Obey God, obey the Messenger, and those with authority among you.”33 This Qurʾānic passage was an important part of the repertoire of premodern Muslim advice literature and history; al-Ghazālī referred to it in the Naṣīḥat al-mulūk.34 Fakhr-i Mudabbir and ʿAfīf both made use of this passage to similar effect.35 This is representative, in a general way, of a supporting ideology that legitimated sultanic authority by creating a direct lineage from God through Muḥammad and down to the sultans of Delhi. Two Worlds: The Piety of the Sultan on the Model of Muḥammad Representations of Delhi sultans as standard-bearers of the prophetic model were partly an expression of the didactic mode prevalent in Delhi Sultanate historiography. This is best exemplified in the writings of Baranī, who believed that knowledge of good (khayr) and evil (sharr) is found in the example of the ancestors (pishīnān) and the record (akhbār) of the predecessors (salaf) and it is a blessing (niʿmat) that God bestows on whomever He wishes. Baranī highlights the divine role that God plays in the lives of rulers, making reference to the following Qurʾānic verse found in identical formulation in Q57:21 and Q62:4:

َ ۡ ۡ َ ۡ ُ ُ َّ‫َ ٰ ِ َ َ ۡ ُ هَّ ِ ُ ۡ ِ َ َ َ ٓ ُ َ ه‬ ٢١ ‫ٱلل ذو ٱلفض ِل ٱلعظِي ِم‬ ‫ذلك فضل ٱلل يؤتِيه من يشاء ۚ و‬

That is the grace of God and He gives it to whom He wishes and God is the possessor of the greatest grace.36

Auer-12.indd 55

6/10/12 1:27 PM

56

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

For him all of the blessings from God (khudā), the prophets (anbiyāʾ), the angels of God (malāʾik-i khudā), the friends of God and the pure ones (awliyāʾ va aṣfiyāʾ) were conferred upon Muḥammad, master of all prophets (sayyid al-anbiyāʾ). Baranī notes that his praiseworthy sayings (maḥāmid aqvāl) and his illustrious acts (maʾās̱ir af ʿāl) are contained in the ḥadīth collections (mujalladāt-i aḥādīth) and histories (tavārīkh). Baranī sees Muḥammad’s prophetic example as the basis of the “rulings of sharīʿah” (aḥkām-i sharīʿah) and the “prescriptions of the Sufi path” (ʿazāʾim-i ṭarīqah). Through Muḥammad’s prophetic paradigm, Baranī builds his case for the legitimacy of kingship. He makes specific use of a descriptive vocabulary that relates Muḥammad to the sultans of Delhi. In fact, he refers to Muḥammad as a sultan himself. In a discussion of Muḥammad’s praiseworthy deeds, Baranī calls him the “sultan of the prophets” (sulṭān-i payghambarān). He writes, “The foundation of the sovereignty (jahāndārī) of the kings of Islam (bādshāhān-i Islām) and the seat of the imperial government (jahānbānī) of the sultans who protect the faith (sulṭānān-i dīn-parvar) was built on the rulings of sharīʿah (aḥkām-i sharīʿah) and the precedent of the custom (sunnah) of that king of messengers (shāh-i rusul).”37 Baranī’s historical view of a world ruled by prophet-like sultans whose highest model is Muḥammad should not only be attributed to political calculation or to the constructs of political legitimacy. Another of his literary productions illustrates his total dedication to an Islamic vision based on the example of the Prophet Muḥammad; the Ṣaḥīfah-yi naʿt-i Muḥammadī, also referred to as the S̱anāʾ-i Muḥammadī, is a work of praise and exaltation of the perfect model of Muḥammad.38 The book is divided into five chapters, the fifth of which is dedicated to an “account of the obligations which the followers (ummat) have toward the Prophet, including obedience to his positive and negative commands, ensuring and maintaining veneration of, and respectfulness toward the Prophet.”39 This is clearly the same philosophy that grounds his view of kingship as properly based on the model of the Prophet’s sunnah. The work, completed late in Baranī’s life, sometime around 750/1350,

Auer-12.indd 56

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler

57

was composed in the period following the death of Muḥammad b. Tughluq when Baranī’s allegiances fell under suspicion and he was placed in confinement under Fīrūz Shāh Tughluq. He attributes the composition of this work to his old age and the need to produce something that would aid in his salvation. In other words, it was the activity of a man in the twilight of his life, an act of piety and devotion. Most likely, in his view, it guaranteed prophetic intercession for him after his death. On another level it can be seen as an act of submission to a new political authority. Baranī envisioned the followers of Muḥammad guided by ideals that seem contradictory to kingship, particularly Muḥammad’s example of poverty. He makes frequent comparisons between the life of religious leaders and political rulers, a topic that is also the subject of a major discussion in the Fatāvá-yi Jahāndārī. Unlike sultans, Baranī speaks of Muḥammad as “ruling” (z̤abṭ kardan) the “inhabitable world” (amr-i rubʿ-i maskun) from “perfect piety” (kamāl-i taqvá), with “torn robe” (khirqah-yi pārah), and “shabby carpet” (galīm-i zhandah).40 He particularly wishes to demonstrate how the career of the Prophet was miraculous for combining world rule with religion. Speaking of Muḥammad, Baranī writes, “And he tempered (āb dādan) the affairs of world rule (jahāndārī) with the miracles of the chosen one (muʿjizāt-i Muṣṭafá) and the habit of poverty (varzish-i faqr va miskīnat).”41 For Baranī, it was through successfully combining humility, poverty, and rule that the knowledge of Islam (ʿilm-i Islām) spread throughout the world. This imagery of the world as bifurcated into two spheres, the material and the spiritual, is a dominant theme in the work of ʿAfīf. One dimension of the universe is the “kingdom of the world” (mamlakat-i dunyāvī), dazzling to the senses with all of its sounds, sights, and tastes. In ʿAfīf ’s language of metaphor the story of the world is like the story of the two sorcerers of Babylon (sāḥirān-i bābil), a reference to the figures of Hārūt and Mārūt mentioned in Q2:102. According to the qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ tradition, Hārūt and Mārūt are two fallen angels who were victims of their captivation for the world.42 God tested them when they mocked humans for

Auer-12.indd 57

6/10/12 1:27 PM

58

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

falling into sin; God’s challenge to them was to fare better and live on earth without performing the customary sinful transgressions of idolatry, fornication, murder, and wine drinking. However, after their descent to earth they quickly proved themselves to be equally fooled by the temptations of the world. The beauty of a woman referred to as al-Zuhara captivated them and for fear of being discovered they killed a man who was witness to their sexual improprieties. Thus, ʿAfīf argues that the world, with all of its enticements, is merely “fertile ground for the next world” (al-dunyā mazraʿat al-ākhirat), a point he illustrates with the ḥadīth.43 The second world is the “kingdom of the afterlife” (mamlakat-i ākhirat), which is full of innumerable blessings. It is especially set aside for those of pious nature who long for God, as was made clear in the following verse Q3:152 quoted by ʿAfīf in part:

ۡ ُّ ُ َّ ُ ١٥٢ ‫ِمنكم من يُ ِريد ٱدلن َيا‬ Among you there are those who long for the world.44 The kingdom of the world is for those enamored with material things. ʿAfīf further demonstrates this with a quote from Q3:14:

َ َ ۡ‫ُ ّ َ ِ َّ ِ ُ ُّ َّ َ َ ٰ ِ َ ّ َ ٓ ِ َ ب‬ َ ‫ِني َو ۡٱل َق َنٰ ِطري ٱل ۡ ُم َق‬ ِ ‫نط َرة‬ ِ ‫زيِن للناس حب ٱلشهو‬ ‫ت من ٱلن ِساء وٱلن‬ ِ َ ۡ‫ح‬ َ َ َ َ ۡ َ َ ٰ َ ۡ ۡ‫َ َّ َ َ ۡ َّ َ خۡ َ ۡ ۡ ُ َ َّ َ َ أ‬ ِۗ ‫ب وٱلفِضةِ وٱلي ِل ٱلمسومةِ وٱلنع ِم وٱلر‬ ‫ث ذٰلِك متٰ ُع‬ ِ ‫ِمن ٱذله‬ ۡ ُّ َ ۡ‫ح‬ ١٤ ۖ ‫ٱل َي ٰوة ِ ٱدلن َيا‬ Fair seeming to men is the love of things they desire: women and sons, accumulated riches of gold and silver, well-bred horses, cattle, and fertile land. These are the pleasures of this life.45 But the world hereafter is greater. The world now is ephemeral and the world after is eternal (Q98:8):

Auer-12.indd 58

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler

59

ٗ َ َ ٓ َ َ ٰ َ ُ ٰ َ ۡ َ ۡ‫حَ ۡ َ أ‬ ۡ َ‫ج‬ َ ُ ٰ َّ َ ِ ِ‫ت ع ۡد ٖن ت ِري ِمن تت ِها ٱلنهر خ د‬ ِ‫لين ف‬ ٨ ۖ‫يها أبدا‬ ‫جن‬ Gardens of Eden watered by flowing streams; they will dwell there forever.46 In the context of “two kingdoms” (dū mamlakat), ʿAfīf constructs a utopian vision of the ideal ruler. He says that God put the “crown of both kingdoms on the head of the king of prophets” (tāj-i bādshāhī-yi dū mamlakat bar farq-i shāh-i anbiyāʾ).47 In describing the qualities of the Prophet, ʿAfīf says that he took no interest in this world or the next, except in the search for God. This he illustrates with Q53:17, a verse linked to Muḥammad’s Night Journey:

َ َ َ ُ َ‫اغ بۡٱلَ ر‬ ٰ َ‫ص َو َما َط ى‬ ١٧ ‫غ‬ ‫ما ز‬ His sight did not wander, nor turn aside.48 ʿAfīf believed this vision was passed down to sultans whose legitimacy of rule was based on divine inspiration, a concept of Muslim authority that was in full bloom in India during the eighth/ fourteenth century. ʿAfīf grounds his concept of a ruler’s divine inspiration in revelation and prophetic speech. First he quotes Q3:7:

َ ُ َّ ُ َّ‫َ َ َ ۡ َ ُ َ ۡ َ ُ ٓ اَّ ه‬ َّ َ َ ُ ُ ۡ ۡ ‫ٱللۗ َوٱلرٰسِخون يِف ٱلعِل ِم َيقولون َءامنا بِهِۦ‬ ‫وما يعلم تأوِيلهۥ إِل‬ ٞ ّ ُ‫ل‬ َۡ َ ۡ‫َ ّ َ َ َ َ َّ َّ ُ اَّ ٓ ُ ْ ُ ْ أ‬ ۡ ‫ك ّ ِم‬ ٰ ۗ ِ ٧‫ب‬ ‫ب‬ ‫ل‬ ‫ٱل‬ ‫وا‬ ‫ل‬ ‫و‬ ‫أ‬ ‫ل‬ ‫إ‬ ‫ر‬ ‫ك‬ ‫ذ‬ ‫ي‬ ‫ا‬ ‫م‬ ‫و‬ ‫ا‬ ‫ن‬ ‫ب‬ ‫ر‬ ‫د‬ ‫ِن‬ ‫ع‬ ‫ن‬ ِ ِ ِ No one knows its meanings except God. And those who are firmly grounded in knowledge say, ‘We believe in it. It is all from our Lord.’ Yet no one understands, but those who possess intelligence.49 The Qurʾānic passage quoted above relates to the understanding and interpretation of revelation. Taken as a whole, the passage

Auer-12.indd 59

6/10/12 1:27 PM

60

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

refers to two levels of Qurʾānic meaning, verses established in meaning (muḥkam) and those that are allegorical (mutashābih).50 According to ʿAfīf these two levels of meaning are not discernable to all. He makes clear his interpretation of this verse by including the ḥadīth that states, “The hearts of kings are divinely inspired” (qulūb al-mulūk mulhamūn).51 The implication being that God makes all of the meanings of the Qurʾān accessible to kings. It was not only God who opened the sultans’ eyes and minds to divine inspiration, but also Muḥammad. ʿAfīf notes that the Prophet nourished two groups from the same cup, the “clerics and shaykhs of certainty” (ʿulamāʾ va mashāʾikh-i yaqīn) and the “religion-seeking sultans” (salāṭīn-i ṭālibān-i dīn). For the preservation of the two kingdoms he cloaked them in the “robe of the station of sovereignty” (khilʿat-i maqāmat-i salṭanat). ʿAfīf ’s dualistic understanding of the universe as divided between the worldly and the otherworldly was a theme widely utilized in Sultanate historiography. Its usage was so integral to conceptions of Muslim authority that it was simply invoked by the phrases “religion and the world” (dīn va duniyā) or “religion and governance” (dīn va dawlat). The sultans of Delhi carried these as honorific titles to show they possessed authority over both spheres, a practice that can be traced to Ghaznavid courts in the fourth/tenth century.52 ʿAfīf ’s distinctive contribution was his systematic introduction of the concept of “two kingdoms” as a foundation for historiography and basis for the ethical and political standing of a sultan of Delhi. Ḥadīth and History: Traditionalism in Delhi Sultanate Historiography As has been seen, attention to the legitimization of political authority is imbedded in the narrative structure of history and is overtly present in the comparisons of Delhi sultans to the exemplary figure of Muḥammad. The imagery of Muḥammad as the standard bearer of ethical behavior and righteous action becomes central to the representations of the activities of sultans. The veneration of Muḥammad is expressed through the preservation and usage of his sayings, which figure prominently in the historical narratives of the

Auer-12.indd 60

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler

61

Delhi Sultanate. Historians appropriated ḥadīth for their moral and ethical precepts to comment on the careers of the sultans of Delhi. The prolific usage of the sayings of the Prophet is an expression, in literary form, of Muslim traditionalism. It is the expressed need to reproduce the modes of religious and political authority on a pattern connected to early Islamic history. For historians of the Delhi Sultanate it meant the representation of sultans as preservers of the religion of Islam (dīn-i Islām). Authors primarily achieved this by representing the sultans of Delhi as following the path of Muḥammad. For example, Ḥasan Niẓāmī praised Quṭb al-Dīn Aybeg for bringing about the “revival of the signs of sharīʿah and the raising aloft of the banners of the sunnah.”53 The sunnah of Muḥammad transposed onto the lives of the Muslim leaders of Delhi becomes the sunnah of sultans at the hands of historians. William Graham discusses Islamic traditionalism as a product of the formative Islamic religious texts, “The ḥadīth genre and the concept of Sunnah, when joined to the fundamental fact of the Qurʾān, supply the functional and ideological bases of Muslim traditionalism.”54 Traditionalism was sustained by a system of transmission that linked generations of transmitters of the sayings of Muḥammad back to their original source. In a structural way, transmission took shape in a unique literary form called the isnād, the chain of transmitters of the sayings of the Prophet. The literary development of the isnād and the compilation of ḥadīth contributed to a style of transmission of knowledge that became, for a period, a characteristic feature of a variety of genres: exegesis (tafsīr), biography (sīrah), and history (taʾrīkh). Thus, ḥadīth and history were intimately linked from the third/ninth century and developed a common scholarly apparatus that accompanied the early documenting of the records of the past (alternatively referred to as khabar and ḥadīth).55 From this early stage the collection and codification of the sayings of the Prophet had a tremendous effect on the early evolution and development of historiography. In terms of history writing, al-Ṭabarī’s magnum opus, the Taʾrīkh al-rusul wa ‘l-mulūk, epitomized the standard for history constructed in the traditionist mode, each historical event copiously supplied with its own chain of transmitters.

Auer-12.indd 61

6/10/12 1:27 PM

62

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

By the sixth/twelfth and seventh/thirteenth century, authors of histories moved away from the formal and structural literary parameters of traditionalism. In Islamic Historiography Chase Robinson writes about this transition, “Historiography was becoming an altogether more assertive activity, and its practitioners now possessed the confidence to generate new forms and explore new themes. It is starting in this period that many historians began to free themselves from the traditionists’ sensitivities and taboos.”56 The same argument may be made for Sultanate historians who did not show a great concern to establish a transmission for the narration of historical events, where there is no formal isnād per se. Rather, traditionalism was reproduced in North Indian courts on a metahistorical level, through narratives that championed the sultan’s ability to reenact the model of the Prophet. The structural elements of the isnād paradigm were severed from the ḥadīth that now served the legitimating function. It also preserved an Islamic lineage that connected the past to the present. In terms of the development of historiography in the Delhi Sultanate, the incorporation of ḥadīth in historical narratives was a vestige of the earliest forms of Muslim history writing. At the same time it became a convention of Sultanate historiography. Thus historiographical traditionalism present in the Delhi Sultanate was not one of form but of content. On another level, historians of the Delhi Sultanate were concerned to connect their form of historiography to the earlier historiographical tradition. This is made explicit by a statement of Jūzjānī in the Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī, in which he concludes the major section on the sultans of India and notes that everything included in his history was read and recorded from the “stories and records of the prophets and kings” (qiṣaṣ va akhbār-i anbiyāʾ va mulūk).57 Jūzjānī places this admission in a section in which historians conventionally requested the indulgence of their readers for any errors found in their work. Here Jūzjānī utilizes the convention to emphasize his credentials as an eyewitness to historical events and situate himself as a scholar of history and a link in the chain of traditionalism. As a historian of the eighth/fourteenth century Delhi Sultanate,

Auer-12.indd 62

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler

63

Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn Baranī was significantly more systematic in establishing his own form of literary traditionalism. Like Jūzjānī, he imagined his history as an extension of the traditional Sunnī accounts. In the prolegomena to the Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī, Baranī is particularly concerned to link the knowledge of history (ʿilm-i tārīkh) to other fields of knowledge such as exegesis (tafsīr), ḥadīth, law (fiqh), and Sufism (ṭarīqat-i mashāʾikh).58 Baranī claims his own literary genealogy on the authority of the “imāms of ḥadīth” (aʾimma-yi ḥadīs̱) who say that “the knowledge of the sayings of the Prophet and the knowledge of history are twins.”59 The continued awareness of the connectedness between history and ḥadīth in the eighth/fourteenth century is a testament to the preservation of a scholastic tradition across vast geographic and cultural landscapes. Baranī argues that history binds the present to the past and has a didactic purpose. He lists seven qualities of history that contribute to traditionalism.60 According to Baranī, the principle quality of historiography is that it is a means to profit from the “possessors of insight” (ūlū ‘l-abṣār) and to have access to the “heavenly books” (kutub-i samāvī) that are filled with the records of the affairs of prophets (anbiyāʾ) and the sultans (salāṭīn) who have ruled over the sons of Adam (banī Ādam). As a court historian Baranī stresses the importance of history as a guide to rulers who should benefit from the lessons of the past. He argues that the study of history enables one to properly understand the sacred and mundane events of the past. To properly situate history (tārīkh) among other fields of knowledge, Baranī begins his description of history’s second quality by noting the scholastic relationship between the knowledge of the sayings of the Prophet Muḥammad (ʿilm-i ḥadīs̱) and the knowledge of history (ʿilm-i tārīkh).61 The knowledge of history is similar to the knowledge of ḥadīth, in the way it criticizes and praises the narrators (ruvāt) and the occasions (mā-jarā-yi vurūd) of the sayings (aḥādīth) and deeds (muʿāmalāt) of the Prophet. In his view, the scholar of ḥadīth (muḥaddith) must wear the hat of the historian (muvarrikh); otherwise he is unaware of the original (aṣl) narrators of the actions of the Prophet and the Companions. For Baranī, history is knowing the

Auer-12.indd 63

6/10/12 1:27 PM

64

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

record (ās̱ār va akhbār) of the prophets (anbiyāʾ), caliphs (khulafāʾ), sultans (salāṭīn), and the “great men of religion and rule” (buzurgān-i dīn va dawlat). One can see how this perspective on the relationship between history and ḥadīth has implications for exegesis. In this regard, for Baranī, the principle of abrogation (nāsikh va mansūkh) of the sayings of the prophet (aḥādīth) is dependent upon the knowledge of history.62 The History of Historiography in the Eyes of the Delhi Sultanate To further strengthen the assertion that the knowledge of history is essential for understanding the sayings of the Prophet, Baranī created a literary genealogy for himself, and for historians in general, by placing them in the lineage of ḥadīth scholars. Thus he traces the history of historiography through the doyens of Islamic learning. He names Ibn Isḥāq first among those who have contributed to Arab and Persian histories (tavārīkh-i ʿArabī va Pārsī). Baranī refers specifically to the Siyar al-nabī va ās̱ār-i ṣaḥābah; it is not clear if he was aware of Ibn Isḥāq’s history of the caliphs, the Taʾrīkh al-khulafāʾ.63 Baranī mentions that he was the son of a descendent of a Companion who was counted among the ḥadīth scholars (aʾimma-yi ḥadīs̱).64 He mentions Muḥammad b. ʿUmar b. Wāqid (130–207/747 or 48–822), the great specialist in maghāzī literature who served in the ʿAbbāsid courts of al-Maʾmūn and Hārūn al-Rashīd (r. 170–93/786–809). Like Ibn Isḥāq, Baranī counted him among the great ḥadīth scholars and also a child of a descendent of a Companion of the Prophet. Although not a ḥadīth specialist, Baranī mentions Abū Saʿīd ʿAbd al-Mālik b. Qurayb al-Aṣmaʿī (d. 213/828) who was, according to Baranī, the most knowledgeable of scholars in the recitation of the Qurʾān (ʿilm-i qirāʾat). The next figure in his list of luminaries is Imām Muḥammad b. Ismāʾīl al-Bukhārī (194–256/810–70), who Baranī refers to as “the greatest of ḥadīth scholars and of equal rank with exemplars of historiography, the credibility of his narration (iʿtibār-i rivāyat-i ū) is beyond doubt.”65 It is likely that Baranī was aware of al-Bukhārī’s al-Taʾrīkh al-kabīr, a history/biographical dictionary of those men who appear in his chain of transmitters, in addition to the maghāzī

Auer-12.indd 64

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler

65

and other relevant sections from the Ṣaḥīḥ. It should come as no surprise that Baranī would reference some of the most noteworthy ḥadīth scholars in Islamic history. However, it is important to see the ways in which a historian writing in Persian and living in eighth/ fourteenth-century Delhi produced an authenticity and legitimacy for himself by linking genres and authors of ḥadīth and historiography dating back more than five hundred years to the second/eighth and third/ninth centuries. Following his excursion into the history of ḥadīth scholarship, Baranī lists notable historians (muvarrikhān) from the early period of Islam who wrote in Arabic. First, he mentions Abū Manṣūr al-Thaʿālibī (350–429/961–1038), the author of Ghurar al-siyar, also known as Ghurar akhbār mulūk al-fars, a universal history. Next came al-Muṭahhar b. Ṭāhir al-Maqdisī (fl. 355/966), the author of Kitāb al-badʾ wa ‘l-taʾrīkh, a work composed under Sāmānid rule around the year 355/966. Baranī also refers to Abū Ḥanīfah al-Dīnawarī (d. ca. 282/895), author of the historical work al-Akhbār al-ṭiwāl, and finally al-Ṭabarī.66 Baranī cites al-Thaʿālibī in the Ghurar al-siyar, praising the period of the ʿAbbāsid caliphs when “caliphs, sultans, and nobles alike took great pleasure in history.”67 Hārūn al-Rashīd was said to have been extremely passionate about the knowledge of history (ʿilm-i tārīkh). From Baranī’s perspective this was demonstrated by the fact that he employed the great Ḥanafī jurist Abū Yūsuf (d. 182/798) and his disciple Muḥammad b. al-Ḥasan al-Shaybānī (d. 189/805). The fact that neither of these two figures were historians did not seem to concern Baranī when singling out the ʿAbbāsid caliph for his appreciation for the knowledge of history. Their reference can best be understood by the fact that Baranī was himself a Ḥanafī scholar. Baranī also mentions that Hārūn al-Rashīd listened to the stories about the life of the Prophet from al-Wāqidī in his court. Thus he presented the knowledge of history as a science based on the secure foundation of the understanding of the great deeds of Muḥammad. Baranī’s linking of historiography with a specific tradition of recording the sayings of the Prophet is a legitimating enterprise. Documenting the pronouncements and activities of Muḥammad was

Auer-12.indd 65

6/10/12 1:27 PM

66

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

a way to create an enduring record for the edification of Muslims and all humankind. Historians have the obligation to extend that record into the age of caliphs (khulafāʾ), the time of kings (mulūk), and the friends of God (awliyāʾ). Baranī demonstrates his understanding of the complex literary relationships that connect one genre to another in literary history. This can be seen in the rijāl literature that developed from the need to document the lives of men (and women in more limited cases) responsible for passing on the sayings of the Prophet.68 For example, the Kitāb al-ṭabaqāt al-kabīr [Great book of classes] by Ibn Saʿd (b. ca. 168–230/784–845) is a narrative of the narrators of the ḥadīth traditions as well as a biography of the Prophet.69 In the early Islamic period, in fact, the terms taʾrīkh, ṭabaqāt, and rijāl were used nearly interchangeably.70 In addition to the rijāl literature, consider the genre of maghāzī texts, the earliest transmission of events from the life of the Muḥammad. Khalīfa b. Khayyāṭ al-ʿUṣfurī (d. 240/854) authored al-Taʾrīkh, a history from the birth of the Prophet, considered to be “the oldest complete Islamic survey of events which has reached us.”71 Al-ʿUṣfurī also wrote an important early biographical work, al-Ṭabaqāt, similar to Ibn Saʿd’s Kitāb al-ṭabaqāt al-kabīr. These early works of ṭabaqāt were organized in terms of men and women described according to their relationship to the Prophet or specifically in their role as transmitters of ḥadīth, one basis for the creation of this genre.72 By the time of Jūzjānī, the ṭabaqāt genre had been transformed into a historical narrative of sultans. Thus, in terms of content and structure, it is possible to see how traditionalism took shape in the Muslim historiography produced during the Delhi Sultanate. Activity of the Sultan on the Model of the Prophet Muḥammad As history writing in Islamicate societies evolved from early historical treatments of the life of Muḥammad, later historians revisited the modes of that prophetic life to craft narratives of sultans. Take, for example, the conquest narrative of ʿAfīf on the occasion of Fīrūz Shāh Tughluq’s second battle against the Sammā rulers of Thatta. On this march to Sind there were a number of desertions from the army,

Auer-12.indd 66

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler

67

largely because the first siege of Thatta had resulted in a resounding defeat and a number of casualties. Defeat was a severe blow to the soldiers in the Sultan’s army, as their financial fortunes and physical well-being depended upon victory. Campaigns that offered little or no monetary rewards could greatly diminish the number of army enlistees. In order to keep the troops together and bring the deserters to justice, Fīrūz Shāh ordered an investigation, to be carried out from Delhi, to ascertain who had returned without authorized leave from their post. In an unusual move, at least according to ʿAfīf, the Sultan limited the severity of his punishment for desertion. In his clemency he ordered a reduced “punishment of public shaming” (tadāruk-i maʿnavī) for the guilty in lieu of the much harsher “punishment of exile or death” (tadāruk-i khusravī). ʿAfīf takes this opportunity to compare the magnanimity of the Sultan’s forgiveness to the Prophet’s sunnah following a particularly difficult military campaign of his own. ʿAfīf recounts, in a generic manner, an event in which the Prophet set out to wage a war (jangī). Rather than raising their banners and joining Muḥammad, some of his Companions abandoned him and remained behind in Medina to look after their household affairs. The Prophet heard this news on the return from his military campaign and he called the derelict stragglers to account for their inaction. They made excuses as recorded in Q48:11, the passage cited by ʿAfīf in his history:

َ ُ ۡ َ َ َ ُ‫َ َ َ ۡ َ ٓ َ ۡ َ ٰلن‬ ١١ ‫شغلتنا أمو ا وأهلونا‬ We were busy with our affairs and families.73 ʿAfīf reports that the Prophet was dissatisfied with their explanation and he decreed that they be subjected to the tadāruk-i maʿnavī that consisted of public shaming in the mosque by removing their turbans and tying them to a pillar. Out of embarrassment, the guilty offered their wealth to the Prophet with the hope of receiving forgiveness. At first the Prophet was unmoved; however, after receiving the revelation of Q9:103, he accepted their repentance and forgave them:

Auer-12.indd 67

6/10/12 1:27 PM

68

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

ّ ُ ُ ّ ُ َٗ َ َ ۡ ُ ََۡ ١٠٣ ‫خذ ِم ۡن أموٰل ِ ِه ۡم صدقة ت َط ِه ُره ۡم َوت َزكِي ِهم‬ Take of their goods a charitable gift so that you purify and sanctify them.74 In this account, ʿAfīf appears to thematically interpolate two unrelated events from the life of the Prophet: an event that occurred following the expedition to Tabūk and the affair of Abū Lubābah, who tied himself to a pillar in the mosque of Medina. In Ibn Isḥāq’s account, Kaʿb b. Mālik’s punishment for not joining the Prophet on the Tabūk campaign was public shunning for fifty days and ten days in which he was denied the company of his wife.75 However, Abū Lubābah tied himself to a pillar in the mosque as a form of penance and selfhumiliation for having doubted the Prophet and his message.76 It is perhaps of little significance that ʿAfīf ’s “historical” account from the life of Muḥammad differs from traditional accounts associated with the two Qurʾānic verses quoted above. The differences between Ibn Isḥāq and ʿAfīf ’s narrative illustrate the way ʿAfīf utilized the prophetic sunnah in comparison with the activities of the Sultan. The historical facts surrounding a particular action of the Prophet were not a central concern. Rather, the historian wished to highlight the meaning behind that action. ʿAfīf defended himself against criticism that one should be more careful with historical truth. ʿAfīf writes that one day a man accused of embezzlement (khiyānat) was brought before the court of Sultan Fīrūz Shāh to answer for his crime. He was questioned by Shams al-Dīn Abū Rajā, the auditorgeneral (mustawfī-yi mamālik) in the imperial revenue ministry (dīvān-i vizārat) of the Sultan. Khān-i Jahān, the highest minister in the Sultan’s service, appeared on the scene and objected to the handling of the accused, paraphrasing in Persian Q35:45 “Do not torment the slaves of God. If God were to judge (ʿadl kardan) his slaves, no trace of their existence would be left.” Then the Khān-i Jahān elaborated further on this principle of benevolence, incorrectly saying the Prophet himself said:

Auer-12.indd 68

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler

69

ۡ‫َ ۡ َ َ ٓ ُ إۡ ۡ َ اَّ إ‬ ٰ َ ‫ٱل ۡح‬ ٰ ‫ٱلح‬ ٦٠ ‫س ُن‬ ِ ‫س ِن إِل‬ ِ ‫هل جزاء‬ Is there any repayment for good other than good? (Q55:60) Shams al-Dīn Abū Rajā corrected the great vizier, saying he had mistaken a Qurʾānic passage for a ḥadīth. The vizier sharply retorted, “Whether this is a saying of the Prophet or a verse from the Qurʾān, in every case it is always good to do what is right.”77 ʿAfīf ’s purpose in relating this anecdote of court life was not to belittle the vizier based on Shams al-Dīn Abū Rajā’s comment, a figure he derides elsewhere. The moral of the anecdote was that understanding the spirit of the Prophet’s sayings and the Qurʾān supersedes the historical record. The Charitable Example of the Prophet in the Lives of Sultans ʿAfīf was particularly concerned to show the multiple ways Fīrūz Shāh embodied the perfect example of the Prophet. This is illustrated by the way he treats the activities of Sultan Fīrūz Shāh in the last years of his thirty-eight year reign.78 He lists three end-of-life activities, each punctuated with an injunction of the Prophet supplied to illustrate the way in which the Sultan followed this example. For example, one of the Sultan’s end-of-life activities was the restoration of mosques. ʿAfīf narrates that the Sultan ordered a survey of all the mosques located in the four cities of Delhi. He appointed imāms and muezzin in each, and provided funds for lamps and prayer mats. Those mosques that were in need of repair were restored to their original glory. Then ʿAfīf reports a ḥadīth that says that a sign of the coming of the the Day of Judgment (qiyāmat) will be that all the mosques of the world will become silvery (nuqrahgīn) and will be brought to heaven. In addition, ʿAfīf quotes the ḥadīth, “He who builds a mosque for God, God builds for him a castle in heaven” (man baná masjid lillāh baná Allāh la-hu qaṣr fī ‘l-jannah).79 In a literary move that perhaps best illustrates the historian’s project, ʿAfīf commends the Sultan for administering justice to the oppressed. He summarizes the great value of kings through the

Auer-12.indd 69

6/10/12 1:27 PM

70

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

story of a conversation between Muḥammad and the angel Gabriel. Muḥammad questions Gabriel on what he would do on earth if God sent him there. Gabriel replies that he would choose to serve kings, because it is their duty to serve the needy. In this regard, ʿAfīf says that Fīrūz Shāh possessed all the qualities of kings and many of the qualities of friends of God (awliyāʾ). In another section, ʿAfīf details the Sultan’s good deeds in creating a “public charity office” (dīvān-i khayrāt) for the purposes of supplying money to needy families who have daughters they cannot marry because of the high costs of dowries. ʿAfīf discusses the Sultan’s charitable actions in light of the saying attributed to the Prophet, “The father of daughters is blessed” (abū ‘l-banāt marzūq).80 ʿAfīf also quotes from Q18:46 to further illustrate his point:

ۡ‫ۡ َ ُ َ بۡ َ ُ َ َ ُ حۡ َ َ ٰ ِ ُّ ۡ َ ۖ َ ۡ َ ٰ َ ٰ ُ َّ ٰ َ ٰ ُ َير‬ ٤٦ ٌ ‫ت خ‬ ‫ٱلمال وٱلنون زِينة ٱليوة ٱدلنيا وٱلبقِيت ٱلصل ِح‬ Wealth and sons are the ornament of this life. But deeds of lasting merit are better rewarded.81 Following this quotation ʿAfīf goes on to give further evidence from a ḥadīth that he cites in Persian, “Do right with [your] daughters even if that be a speck/smidgen of a date.”82 ʿAfīf ’s digression into the social dynamics of the marriage of daughters and its relation to economic class provides an unusual and fascinating glance into the social life of a highly patriarchal society. It is another example of the way the model of the Prophet serves as a paradigm for the behavior of the Sultan. In another example of following the sunnah of the Prophet, ʿAfīf describes the Sultan’s activities in constructing hospitals (shifāʾ khānah, dār al-shifāʾ, or ṣiḥḥat khānah).83 ʿAfīf says that humankind is afflicted with eighteen thousand diseases (ʿillat). They are so vast and various in number that physicians (aṭibbāʾ) neither know their names nor have discovered a cure. In ʿAfīf ’s view, illness does not result from a defect of an individual or an outgrowth of sin. He illustrates this with a quote from Q24:61:

Auer-12.indd 70

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler

71

ۡ َ‫ اَ لَى‬ٞ َ ۡ َ ۡ‫ اَ لَىَ أ‬ٞ َ ٰ َ‫َّ ۡ َ لَىَ أۡ َ ۡ ى‬ ٞ َ ‫يض ح َرج‬ ‫ليس ع ٱلع‬ ِ ‫م ح َرج َول ع ٱلع َر ِج ح َرج َول ع ٱل َم ِر‬ It is no fault in the blind, nor in one born lame, nor in one afflicted with illness.84 The sick are doubly unfortunate because they are weak, cannot work and suffer both physical and financial hardships. ʿAfīf quotes the following ḥadīth, “There are two kinds of knowledge, knowledge of the body and knowledge of religions” (al-ʿilm ʿilmān ʿilm al-abdān wa ʿilm al-adyān).85 He goes on to discuss how kings have attempted to alleviate these illnesses through the establishment of hospitals. He cites Hippocrates (Buqrāt) and Socrates (Suqrāt) on this account. Thus, Fīrūz Shāh is said to have appointed doctors for the treatment of the sick, arranged for the purchase of medicine, and for the provisions of food and drink for patients. As a result, the patients repaid the Sultan with their prayers, wishing him long life which he demonstrates by quoting Q39:73:

َ َ ُ ُ ۡ َ ُ ََ َ َ ‫ل‬ ِ ِ‫َسل ٰ ٌم عل ۡيك ۡم ط ِۡب ُت ۡم فٱدخلوها خ ٰ د‬ ٧٣ ‫ين‬ Peace be upon you! You have done well. Enter here and dwell forever.86 ʿAfīf reinforces this sentiment with the following ḥadīth, “To provide happiness to the hearts of believers is charity.”87 ʿAfīf further illustrates the correspondence between prophetic and sultanic examples in a list of ten “attributes” (maqāmāt).88 He dedicates a large portion of his prolegomena to history describing the abstract qualities necessary for effective rule and emphasizes the fact that sultans are the rightful inheritors of the authority that was transmitted down through the prophets. He does this by making reference to Q7:142:

َ َ‫َ َ ۡ َ ۡ َ َ َ رۡ َ َ َّ َ ُ َ ّ َ ۡ َ َ يَ َ ٗ َ َ َ ُ ى‬ ۡ ‫وأتممنٰها بعش فتم ِميقٰت ربهِۦٓ أربعِني‬ ٰ ‫للة ۚ وقال م‬ ِ‫وس أِلخِيه‬ ِ ٖ ِ

Auer-12.indd 71

6/10/12 1:27 PM

72

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

َ ۡ ۡ َ ُۡ ۡ َ َ َّ َ َ‫ا‬ ۡ َ َ ‫سد‬ ِ ‫هٰ ُرون ٱخلف يِن يِف ق ۡو يِم َوأصل ِۡح َول تتب ِ ۡع َسبِيل ٱل ُمف‬ ١٤٢ ‫ِين‬ We completed it with ten so that the appointment with his Lord was after forty nights. Then Moses said to his brother Aaron, “Take my place among my people and do right and do not follow the path of the wrongdoers.” This passage deals with Moses’ time in seclusion with God on Mount Sinai and the transmission of revelation in the tablets and Moses’ vision of God. ʿAfīf plays off the number ten referenced in this passage of the Qurʾān and also invokes the broader implications of this verse that narrates the transfer of authority from Moses to Aaron, who is deputed to lead the community. The first character trait is compassion (shafaqat), for which he quotes Q39:53:

ً ِ َ‫اَ َ ۡ َ ُ ْ ِ َّ مۡ َ ِ هَّ ِ َّ هَّ َ َ ۡ ُ ُّ ُ َ م‬ ٥٣ ۚ ‫جيعا‬ ‫ل تقنطوا من رحة ٱللۚ إِن ٱلل يغفِر ٱذلنوب‬ Do not despair of the mercy of God, for God forgives all sins. On compassion, ʿAfīf distinguishes between the ʿulamāʾ, shaykhs, and the sultans. According to him, the only people who understand compassion are the “shaykhs of the people of certainty” (mashāʾikh-i ahl-i yaqīn) and the “religion-seeking sultans” (salāṭīn-i ṭālibān-i dīn). The ḥadīth quoted by ʿAfīf on compassion is “The glory is to God’s command and the compassion is on what God created.”89 The second quality is forgiveness (ʿafv), for which he quotes Q23:115:

َ ُ َ ُ َ‫َ َ َ ۡ ُ ۡ َ َّ َ َ َ ۡ َ ٰ ُ ۡ َ َ ٗ َ َ َّ ُ ۡ يَ ۡ َ ا‬ ١١٥ ‫لنا ل ت ۡرجعون‬ ِ ‫أفحسِبتم أنما خلقنكم عبثا وأنكم إ‬ Did you think We created you in jest and would not bring you back to Us? First ʿAfīf provides a description of what this means for the ʿulamāʾ and mashāʾikh. Their adherence to forgiveness is brought to

Auer-12.indd 72

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler

73

focus through supplication to God (duʿāʾ) and he uses this ḥadīth, “Supplication to God is the best part of worship.”90 Likewise, sultans make forgiveness both their upper and lower garment, for which ʿAfīf supplies an anecdote from the reign of the caliph Hārūn al-Rashīd. All kings who have achieved success have done so by adopting a policy of forgiveness and clemency (ḥilm). This is further substantiated by a second ḥadīth, “If you listen [to others], you will be heard.”91 The third trait is justice (ʿadl) and bounty (faz̤l); he quotes the Q17:35:

َ ۡ ۡ ِ َ ۡ ۡ ْ ُ َ ٣٥ ‫اس ٱل ُمستقِي ِ ۚم‬ ‫وزِنوا بِٱلقِسط‬ Measure with a balance that is level! As in the previous section, he presents an anecdote from the life of another ruler, Shāh ʿIzz al-Dawlah, to illustrate his concept of justice and grace. It is said that during the life of ʿIzz al-Dawlah some of his servants killed the she-cow of one of his subjects. As recompense he replaced the one cow with eleven, one for justice (ʿadl) and ten out of his bounty (faz̤l).92 He highlights this act of the just ruler first with a quote (Q25:70):

َ َ َ ۡ َّ َ ُ َّ‫ُ َ ّ ُ ه‬ ٧٠ ‫ت‬ ۗ ٖ ٰ‫يبدِل ٱلل سي ِٔات ِ ِهم حسن‬ God will turn their evil deeds into good.93 Then he concludes this section by utilizing a widely quoted ḥadīth used by historians in discussions of justice (ʿadl):

ً َ َ َ ّ َ َ ْ ٌ ْ‫َ ْ ُ َ َ َ ر‬ ‫ي مِن عِباد ِة ِستني سنة‬ ‫عدل ساع ٍة خ‬ The justice of one hour is better than sixty years of worship.94

Auer-12.indd 73

6/10/12 1:27 PM

74

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

In actions, as well as in the very physical stature of the sultan, he should mirror the Prophet. Even in terms of physical appearance, ʿAfīf did not hesitate to describe Fīrūz Shāh in a manner that bears a striking resemblance to descriptions of Muḥammad found in literature dedicated to the veneration of the Prophet known as shamāʾil and dalāʾil. For instance, consider the framework of the Prophet’s description epitomized in the Kitāb shamāʾil al-Muṣṭafá by Abū ʿĪsā Tirmidhī (d. 279/892). He says, “Muḥammad was middle-sized, did not have lank or crisp hair, was not fat, had a white circular face, wide black eyes, and long eye-lashes . . . he was taller than middling stature but shorter than conspicuous tallness . . . the upper part of his nose hooked; he was thick bearded.”95 ʿAfīf describes Fīrūz Shāh in strikingly similar fashion as being “white skinned, high-nosed and having a long beard. He was not too tall, nor too short and neither too corpulent, nor too thin.”96 The Footprint of the Prophet and the Location of Muslim Authority in South Asia What sultans attempted to realize through the patronage of history writing, in terms of constructing their legitimacy on imagery of Muḥammad, they immortalized architecturally. Prior to the seventh/ thirteenth century, possession of the relics of the Prophet Muḥammad (hair, fingernails, clothing, and footprints) had long served as sources for legitimating the rule of Muslim leaders. Housed in tombs, mosques, and madrasahs across the Muslim world, Muḥammad’s relics produced a powerful symbolic environment that “served to mark and signify the territorial boundaries of civilization and the law of revelation.”97 These relics provided important connections with paradigmatic moments at the origins of Muslim communities. Footprints of the Prophet were enshrined across the Muslim world in major city centers such as Damascus, Istanbul, and Cairo. Perween Hasan discusses the broader tradition of the enshrinement of the footprint of the Prophet as well as comparable traditions of the veneration of the footprint of Christ and the Buddha.98 The ultimate example of the enshrinement of the footprint of the Prophet Muḥammad is in the Dome of the Rock complex in Jerusalem. This

Auer-12.indd 74

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler

75

architectural monument, built under the patronage of the Umayyad ruler ʿAbd al-Malik (65–86/685–705), represents both the sacralization of space and the mythologizing of history, linking this world to the next through the association with the Night Journey (isrāʾ) and Ascension (miʿrāj) of the Prophet Muḥammad. Nasser Rabbat traces the origin of the belief of the association of the Dome of the Rock complex with Muḥammad’s Night Journey and Ascension to the second/eighth century, citing the Sīrah of Ibn Isḥāq, but notes that ʿAbd al-Malik must have had some purpose in constructing the mosque “other than just to celebrate the Prophet’s Ascension to Heaven, since such an association appears not to have been fully formulated by his time.”99 In the Futūḥāt-i Fīrūz Shāhī, the sultan Fīrūz Shāh makes a special reference to the footprint (mawṭī) as one of the insignia that accompanied his caliphal investiture and brought by emissaries of the “commander of the faithful” (amīr al-muʾminīn).100 The “noble footprint,” known as qadam sharīf, was housed in a citadel complex that contained a mosque and a madrasah. The relic was found and placed over the tomb of Sultan Fīrūz Shāh’s son, Prince Fatḥ Khān, who died at a young age. The significance of this site can be observed by the fact that high Mughal officials built their tombs within the same vicinity during the eleventh/seventeenth century.101 Sultan Fīrūz Shāh’s patronage of the shrine of the footprint can be seen as part of the broader effort to establish Delhi as a center of Muslim authority. As a practical matter Delhi was selected as a capital for Muslim rule because of its promising location for access to resources and suitable terrain that was ideal for trade and defense.102 Along with the establishment of Delhi, court historians invented a language of territorial centrality based on a cosmological view of the world. Jūzjānī describes Delhi in religious and universal terms as “The center of the circle of Islam, the cradle of the commandments and prohibitions of sharīʿah, the territory of the religion of Muḥammad (dīn-i Muḥammadī), the dais (manaṣṣah) of the Muslim community (millat-i Aḥmadī), and the dome of Islam (qubbat-i Islām) of the eastern part of the world.”103 Jūzjānī was fond of referring to Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh as the Sultan of Islam (sulṭān-i Islām), striking

Auer-12.indd 75

6/10/12 1:27 PM

76

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

a claim to his legitimacy and casting the orbit of his rule into a global sphere of politics.104 While Delhi strove to take its places as a major center of political, military, economic, and cultural power during the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/fourteenth centuries it was one of a number of competing centers of authority across the Indian subcontinent. Evidence suggests there was a great deal of provincialization during the eighth/fourteenth century that allowed for the autonomy of individual kingdoms that remained in a tributary relationship with the sultans of Delhi.105 The relationship between regional powers and the center formed a kind of “galactic polity” of courts. Each was situated within shifting gravitational fields of power emanating from multiple centers; in the words of Stanley Tambiah, “a complex of satellites arranged around a center.”106 Through the construction of a pilgrimage center located at the footprint of the Prophet, Sultan Fīrūz Shāh attempted to draw the periphery closer into Delhi’s orbit and confer upon it a status comparable to other sacred centers in the larger Muslim world. As it did for cities like Mecca, Cairo, and Jerusalem, the establishment of reliquaries produced a lasting status, elevating the local to a regional and even transregional stage of importance. Locating relics was a means of laying greater claim to authority—the universality of sacred space is reoriented and localized in the site of Delhi. The sultans of Delhi immortalized this status through coinage that referred to Delhi as the “abode of Islam” (dār al-Islām).107 Intentionally or unintentionally, the qadam sharīf also fit into a broader South Asian complex of religious symbols, footprints being revered in the context of Buddhist, Hindu, and Jain communities. This was all part of a larger symbolic system of power embedded in urban Sultanate architecture. In addition to heightening the centrality of Delhi to Muslim rule in the Indian subcontinent, history and architecture were mobilized to confer upon the rulers of Delhi a symbolic genealogical connection to the Prophet, a lineage that substantiated their claims to be in the ranks of the caretakers of the Islamic heritage.

Auer-12.indd 76

6/10/12 1:27 PM

4 Images of the Friends of God in the Lives of Sultans

Historiography and Sacred Biography Some time following the uncertainty of the regnal transfer from Muḥammad b. Tughluq to Fīrūz Shāh, Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn Baranī lost favor with the royal court and was imprisoned, likely in relation to the machinations of the former chief minister Khvājah-i Jahān. Ostracized from the court but still intellectually engaged in the imperial project, Baranī took up his pen and began to compose what would become the most noted historiographical piece of the Delhi Sultanate era, the Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī. At the same time, another courtier with better fortunes, Amīr Khvurd (fl. 752–90/1351–82)1 was engaged in a different sort of project—writing the Siyar al-awliyāʾ, a history of the Chishtiyyah, the most influential Sufi order of the subcontinent. The Chishtiyyah were “founded” in India by Muʿīn al-Dīn Chishtī. The lack of writings from Muʿīn al-Dīn Chishtī or any prior Chishtī textual record obscures the origins of this development.2 If the court at Delhi and their satellite territories scattered across al-Hind represented the apogee of political and military power, then the friends of God (awliyāʾ), as shaykhs identified with the mystical path were known, were the epitome of religious power.3 Sufism spread through urban and rural areas and across South Asia through the influence

Auer-12.indd 77

6/10/12 1:27 PM

78

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

of leading shaykhs, their successors, and followers. Along with the Chishtiyyah, the Suhravardiyyah, established in South Asia under the direction of Bahāʾ al-Dīn Zakariyāʾ (578–661/1182 or 83–1262), developed a vast institutional network of shaykhs and followers that had a definitive impact on social and cultural life.4 As prominent authors who lived through this critical time, Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn Baranī and Amīr Khvurd were at the epicenter of the two most pervasive and influential social and cultural forces of the eighth/fourteenth century, the sultans and the friends of God. The development of Sufism (taṣavvuf) in the sixth/twelfth century from metaphysics and individual asceticism, to organized orders with transmittable systems of authority, had a profound impact on the establishment and use of political authority in the Delhi Sultanate.5 As early as the sixth/twelfth century, Muslim courts in South Asia were developing in tandem with the emerging social power of Sufi shaykhs. The early evidence of the influence of the Sufi shaykh on the religious, cultural, and political geography of South Asia dates from the Ghūrid period. Finbarr Flood, writing of Ghūrid patronage of monumental tomb architecture dedicated to the shaykhs, says, “The provision of acceptable foci for pilgrimage in the form of shrines of saints and mystics would be one means of encouraging visible expressions of Sunnī orthodoxy.”6 By the late seventh/thirteenth century a massive trans-regional network of organized Sufi groups had spread across the subcontinent. Situated historically with the emergence of this new religious polity, the sultans of Delhi often collaborated and at times competed with the power and influence of this growing number of Sufi shaykhs and their followers.7 The new religious polity of Sufi shaykhs and devoted followers fostered a burgeoning literary culture defined, in part, by authors composing biographical works that detailed the lives of Sufi shaykhs. This literary tradition is exemplified by earlier works such as the Ṭabaqāt al-Ṣūfiyyah of Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī (d. 412/1021), the Ḥilyat al-awliyāʾ of Abū Nuʿaym al-Iṣfahānī (d. 430/1038), and later in South Asia, the Siyar al-awliyāʾ of Amīr Khvurd.8 A second dimension of the literary production of the followers of Sufi shaykhs

Auer-12.indd 78

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Images of the Friends of God

79

was the recorded conversations of the shaykhs, what came to be known as the malfūẓāt/majālis textual traditions.9 In these two literary genres, authors developed a stock imagery of the Sufi shaykh that emphasized his divine inspiration (ilhām), renunciation (darvīshī), and the protection (walāyah) he offered through God, his closeness to God, and his marvelous powers (karāmāt). One consequence of the coevolution of Sufi polities and the Delhi Sultanate can be seen in the images of shaykhs that were crafted with literary techniques found in the historiography of sultans and vice versa. Shaykhs were themselves recipients of the same types of panegyric treatment sultans received in the works they patronized. This is evident in writings that address the most influential shaykh of Delhi in the eighth/fourteenth century, Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ (ca. 640 or 41–725/1243 or 44–1325). The most notable authors of the Shaykh’s lifetime, Amīr Ḥasan, Amīr Khvurd, and Baranī, all wrote about him in a favorable manner, adding to his prestige. Amīr Khusraw offered the most effervescent depiction of Niẓām al-Dīn, dedicating a prefatory section of praise to the Shaykh in a number of his major works.10 The confluence of the imagery of sultans and shaykhs had grown to such an extent that Niẓām al-Dīn was referred to as the “sultan of shaykhs” (sulṭān al-mashāʾikh).11 Carl Ernst notes, in relation to this feature of historical and Sufi biographical literatures, that “The polarity between mystical and royal historiographies should not be taken as absolute and exclusive, but as a symbiotic relationship.”12 The idea that hagiography was different from historiography was born in the modern context of the “nineteenth-century transformation in historiographic conceptions.”13 A reciprocal literary development was in progress as well during the Delhi Sultanate. As the success of Sufi shaykhs grew in South Asia, historians increasingly modeled the imagery of sultans on that developed for the friends of God. Of the sultans who patronized history writing, all were referred to as having the traits of the awliyāʾ. It is clear that historians were greatly influenced by the images of piety that surrounded the sanctified figure of the Sufi shaykh. They had also absorbed the theological underpinnings that extended

Auer-12.indd 79

6/10/12 1:27 PM

80

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

religious authority from pre-Islamic prophets to Muḥammad and then onto the friends of God.14 From the time of the composition of the Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī of Jūzjānī until the Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī of ʿAfīf, there is a discernable historiographical trend in which the figure of the sultan was increasingly crafted with religious imagery, such that he came to resemble the Sufi shaykh. Theology and Historiography: The Qurʾān and the Protection of the Friends of God The developmental convergence of historiography and sacred biography during the Delhi Sultanate is evident in the theological principles that relate to the character, role, and function of the friends of God in Muslim societies. These principles were integrated into historiographic narratives that related the pious character of the sultan. Walāyah was one of the key concepts produced in theological arguments relating to the friends of God that entered the vocabulary of historians of the Delhi Sultanate.15 There are some difficulties in the interpretation and translation of walāyah in modern scholarship due to the breadth of connotations and usages of the term. In translation, walāyah has frequently been rendered as “sainthood”; the related term awliyāʾ has widely been rendered as “saints.”16 However, these are far from literal translations. More restricted usage yields the sense of protection (walāyah) and friends of God (awliyāʾ).17 Walāyah appears only twice in the Qurʾān and is used primarily in the sense of protection. This is conveyed in the Medinan “Sūrat al-Anfāl,” Q8:72:

ُ َ َ ۡ ٰ َ ۡ َ ْ ُ َ ٰ َ َ ْ ُ َ َ َ ْ ُ َ َ َ َّ‫َّ لذ‬ َّ‫ه‬ َ‫سه ۡم ف سب‬ ِ‫يل ٱلل‬ ِ ِ ِ ِ‫إِن ٱ ِين ءامنوا وهاجروا وجهدوا بِأمول ِ ِهم وأنف ِ ي‬ ْ ُ َ َ َ َّ‫َ لذ‬ ۡ َ ُ ٓ َ ِ‫َ لذَّ ِ َ َ َ ْ َّ َ رَ ُ ٓ ْ ُ ْ َ ٰٓ َ َ ۡ ُ ُ ۡ َ ۡ ي‬ ِ ‫ض وٱ ين ءامنوا‬ ۚ ٖ ‫وٱ ين ءاووا ونصوا أولئِك بعضهم أولاء بع‬ ْ ُ َ ُ َّ‫ّ يَ ۡ َ ى‬ َ ُ َ َ ْ ُ َُ ََۡ ٰ ‫كم ّ ِمن َول ٰ َيت ِ ِهم ِمن ش ٍء ح‬ ٧٢ۚ ‫جر ۚوا‬ ‫جروا ما ل‬ ِ ‫ت يها‬ ِ ‫ولم يها‬

Those who believed and emigrated, and struggled with their property and their persons for God’s cause, as well as those who gave them asylum and aid, they are protectors (awliyāʾ) of

Auer-12.indd 80

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Images of the Friends of God

81

one another. As to those who believe but did not emigrate, you do not owe them any protection (walāyah) until they emigrate. This is a specific reference to the hijra, the emigration of the nascent Muslim community from Mecca. The protection was necessary for those who chose to adopt Islam and leave their homes to join the Muslims gathered in Medina. In this passage, the use of the term awliyāʾ refers to the protectors, an indirect reference to the anṣār, the people of Medina who welcomed the persecuted Muslim community. Since the anṣār are also referred to as awliyāʾ, it inspired the later usage that referred to Sufis. This was particularly the case when Sufi shaykhs were positioned at the frontiers of Muslim communities and served as protectors of the faith in lands where Muslims were a minority. A similar usage of walāyah is found in “Sūrat al-Kahf,” (Q18:44). The subtext of this passage is the ephemeral and uncertain nature of the world, a point illustrated through a number of parables. In times of uncertainty and insecurity, humanity should seek God’s protection:

ۡ ُ ۡ‫ُ َ َ ۡ َ َ ٰ َ ُ للِهَّ حۡ َ ّ ُ َيرۡ َ ٗ َير‬ ۚ ِ ‫هنالِك ٱلولية ِ ٱل‬ ٤٤ ‫ ث َوابا َوخ ٌ عق ٗبا‬ٞ ‫ق ه َو خ‬ In such ordeals protection (al-walāyah) comes only from God, the true God. He is the best reward and the best outcome. Here, walāyah indicates the ultimate nature of God’s protection on the Day of Judgment (yawm al-qiyāmah). Although the final protection can only be given by God, in later exegesis walāyah was thought to have been conferred upon the walī, or protector, to act as intercessor on the Day of Judgment. In the Sīrat al-awliyāʾ, Muḥammad b. ʿAlī Ḥakīm al-Tirmidhī (d. ca. 318/936) developed the concept of the “seal of protection” (khātam al-walāyah), based on his understanding of Muḥammad as possessing the “seal of prophethood” (khātam al-nubuwwah). In al-Tirmidhī’s soteriology, the possessor of the seal of protection will serve as intercessor (shafīʿ) on the Day

Auer-12.indd 81

6/10/12 1:27 PM

82

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

of Judgment.18 Al-Tirmidhī, a resident of Khurasan, influenced later mystics such as Ibn al-ʿArabī (560–638/1165–1240).19 It should also be mentioned that “Sūrat al-Kahf ” contains the account of the inscrutable actions of a mysterious figure, Khiz̤r, identified in exegesis as the mystic and spiritual guide who reveals to Moses the esoteric meaning of his actions during their travels to the “junction of the two seas” (majmaʿ al-baḥrayn). This parable was frequently used by Sufis to justify esoteric interpretations of Qurʾānic passages and to demonstrate the need for a spiritual guide. Together these Qurʾānic passages illustrate the dual nature of walāyah, the protection of God and of those appointed by God. On its own, the Qurʾānic concept of walāyah did not produce immediate theological consequences. It has been suggested that the concept of walāyah was developed in early Shīʿah writings, perhaps as early as time of the Shīʿah Imām Muḥammad al-Bāqir (d. 113/732).20 If this is the case, then it took around three centuries for the concept to develop within Sufism—largely by al-Tirmidhī. Al-Tirmidhī’s most systematic arguments on the concept of walāyah are expressed in Khatm al-walāyah [The sealing of the friendship with God].21 In this work, al-Tirmidhī established his concept of walāyah on the basis of an interpretation of the concept of prophethood (nubuwwah). He hypothesized that even though Muḥammad was the seal of the prophets (khātam al-nabiyyīn), as in Q33:40, there still remained a need for humanity to receive communications from God. In the absence of nubuwwah, al-Tirmidhī saw walāyah as fulfilling that role. He concluded from this assessment that just as there was a “seal of prophethood” (khātam al-nubuwwah), so too there is a “seal of friendship with God” (khātam al-walāyah).22 To support this theological stance he differentiated between two kinds of speech from God, one received by prophets, referred to as kalām, and the other reserved for the friends of God, referred to as ḥadīth. This is best summed up in al-Tirmidhī’s response to the inquiry of one of his students who asked about the difference between friendship with God and prophethood. Al-Tirmidhī is reported to have said:

Auer-12.indd 82

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Images of the Friends of God

83

The difference between prophethood and Friendship with God is that prophethood consists of speech (kalām), which detaches itself from God as revelation (waḥy), and it is accompanied by a spirit (rūḥ) from God. Revelation comes to an end and God seals it with the spirit and the spirit causes [a prophet] to accept it . . . As for the one possessed of Friendship with God—God is in charge of the speech (ḥadīth) [he hears] from the celestial treasure chambers, and God causes it to reach him. Thus he receives supernatural speech.23 This position earned him the denunciation of the authorities of Balkh where he was in residence at the time.24 Al-Tirmidhī’s conception of walāyah was transmitted and transformed in the context of South Asia at the hands of ʿAlī b. ʿUs̱mān Hujvīrī (d. ca. 465/1072), known by the epithet Dātā Ganj Bakhsh. His treatment of the concept of walāyah is the earliest known in South Asia and is recorded in his Kashf al-maḥjūb.25 Significantly, Hujvīrī lived during the territorial expansion of Muslim empires in the Punjab region initiated by the military campaigns of Maḥmūd of Ghazna (r. 388–421/998–1030). Under pressure from the Saljūqs, Ghaznavid rulers, who once controlled provinces to Khurasan in the west, were forced to redirect their military activities east into the Indian subcontinent. It was in this context of conflict and conquest that Hujvīrī set out from Ghazna to the regional capital of Lahore. Hujvīrī credits al-Tirmidhī with placing the foundations of Sufism on his theory of walāyah. Hujvīrī notes that God conferred upon the walī a special protection (walāyah) that enabled him to carry out his religious practices and find protection from Satan.26 He placed this concept at the very center of his understanding of Sufism: The foundation of the Sufi path and mystic knowledge (ṭarīqat-i taṣavvuf va maʿārifat), all of it, rests on walāyah. The proof of this is that all shaykhs are in agreement on it, though each expresses it in his own way. Muḥammad b. ʿAlī Ḥakīm al-Tirmidhī is unique for ascribing to it the expression “the reality of the way” (ḥaqīqat-i ṭarīqat).27

Auer-12.indd 83

6/10/12 1:27 PM

84

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Reiterating these points, Hujvīrī writes, “God has friends (awliyāʾ) whom he has especially gifted with ‘friendship and protection’ (dūstī va walāyah) and whom he has chosen to be the ‘protectors of the kingdom’ (vāliyān-i mulk).”28 From Theology to Historiography: The Concept of Walāyah The Qurʾānic concept of walāyah as developed in the exegesis of al-Tirmidhī and Hujvīrī had a profound intellectual impact on history writing during the Delhi Sultanate. The idea that Sufi shaykhs had a special protection for their communities was critical in the exposition of history. For instance, consider the narrative of Sultan Fīrūz Shāh’s trip to Hānsī to meet Shaykh Nūr al-Dīn, the son and successor of Quṭb al-Dīn Munavvar. ʿAfīf describes their encounter as a discussion between two kings (dū bādshāh). During their conversation the Sultan asked the Shaykh to move to Ḥiṣār Fīrūzah (a citadel in the Punjab, west of Hānsī) where he promised to build a new Sufi hospice (khāngāh) and provide for its expenditures.29 Throughout this period, patronage of the Sufi hospices was producing a lasting impact on Muslim polities of South Asia, particularly in terms of social organization and culture.30 This was also a time when Delhi was challenged by the political and military designs of the Central Asian Chaghatay Khānate, whose threat loomed greatest during the reign of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh and then resurfaced during the time of Muḥammad b. Tughluq.31 According to ʿAfīf, the Sultan hoped that Ḥiṣār Fīrūzah would be saved from the incursions of Mongol armies threatening the stability of the Sultan’s rule through the Shaykh’s blessing (az barakat-i qadam-i khidmat-i shaykh). The Shaykh declined the offer on the grounds that Bābā Farīd and Niẓām al-Dīn traditionally conferred the area of Hānsī on him and his ancestors, implying that he had an obligation to remain there. In light of Nūr al-Dīn’s rejection, the Sultan requested that the Shaykh extend his blessing (barakah) to Ḥiṣār Fīrūzah. ʿAfīf claims that the wish of the Sultan came true, saying that when the “cursed-ones” (malāʿīn) sacked Delhi (referring to Tīmūr’s invasion in 801/1398), the areas of Hānsī and Ḥiṣār Fīrūzah were saved “through the blessings

Auer-12.indd 84

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Images of the Friends of God

85

of the protection of the shaykh” (az barakat-i walāyat-i ḥaz̤rat).32 In addition to the protection offered by Sufi shaykhs, it was believed that they could perform supernatural acts: ward off drought, defend their community against invaders, teleport themselves, and act as clairvoyants. Prophets had long been recognized to possess the power to perform miracles, referred to as muʿjizāt; Sufi shaykhs were believed to possess an analogous power, referred to as karāmāt.33 This was recognized by Hujvīrī, who said that the awliyāʾ have been especially gifted with various kinds of marvels (karāmāt).34 Marvels are a consistent theme in the biographies of the friends of God and were considered a necessary trait of the charismatic spiritual guide.35 The marvels of Sufi shaykhs also appear in historiography. Baranī is another historian who was deeply influenced by the social current of Sufism; he was an acquaintance of the famous Sufi shaykh Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ, and that relationship influenced his writing. For example, Baranī wrote of the military entanglement of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh in regions far south of the capital at Delhi. In the year 709/1309, Sultan ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn sent Malik Nāʾib on an expedition to capture the mud fort of Warangal, the capital of the Kākatīya kingdom under the reign of King Pratāparudra (r. 1289–1323 C.e.).36 During such expeditions, as a precautionary measure, the Sultan established outposts (thāna) along the army’s route to maintain communications between Delhi and his forces. However, along the journey south the Sultan’s army was forced to traverse rivers likely swollen from torrential rains. Several of the outposts were washed out due to the harsh conditions and all connections with the capital were severed. Since there were no reports from the battlefront, the Sultan assumed the worst but sought reassurance from Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ. He dispatched Malik Qīrā Beg and Qāz̤ī Mughīs̱ al-Dīn Bayāna to seek a prediction (bishāratī) from the Shaykh concerning the fate of his army. He instructed them to observe every gesture and response of the Shaykh. They were not disappointed. They received the good news of victory from Niẓām al-Dīn and returned to make their report, which was happily received by ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn. Afterwards the Sultan made a public statement. He pulled out his handkerchief (dastārchah), a symbol of royalty, and tied a knot in it, saying,

Auer-12.indd 85

6/10/12 1:27 PM

86

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

“I have taken a good omen in the words of the Shaykh which do not come in vain. Warangal has been conquered.”37 This narrative was clearly meant to elevate the status of Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ in relation to Sultan ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn. Elsewhere in the Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī, Baranī attributed the spread of the knowledge of Islam (ʿilm-i Islām), the care for the subjects of the kingdom, and all of the order that was created during the reign of Sultan ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn to the good wishes and blessings (mayāmin va barakāt) of Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ.38 In this case the motif reiterates the perspicacity of a friend of God. Niẓām al-Dīn not only predicted events unseen but also, by implication, caused the success of the Sultan’s army and, by extension, the victory of Islam. It is another example of the influence theological views on the concept of walāyah had on historiography. Another special trait of Sufi shaykhs was their ability to understand the world in a manner inaccessible to ordinary human beings. In Hujvīrī’s mind the friends of God (awliyāʾ) were appointed by God and given various ranks (darajāt); God “opened a door for them to understand mystical meanings (maʿānī).”39 Furthering the parallel between prophethood and friendship with God, Hujvīrī, following al-Tirmidhī, postulated that the walī was given access to divine inspiration (ilhām) in a manner comparable to the way that prophets received revelation (waḥy).40 Like the ability to perform marvels, divine inspiration and the understanding of mystical meanings was central to the special characteristics of the friends of God. ʿAfīf appropriated this idea and transposed it onto Fīrūz Shāh, who was said to have possessed divine inspiration (ilhām-i ilāhī).41 Finally, Hujvīrī traced the development of Sufism back to the Prophet, the “successors of the Prophet” (khalīfat-i payghambar), Abū Bakr, ʿUmar, ʿUthmān, ʿAlī, and the descendents from the family of Muḥammad (ahl al-bayt).42 Hujvīrī notes the way that these figures inspired later Sufis and that each produced a number of sayings that indicated their own proclivity toward Sufism. One of the primary traits said to elevate the early Muslim leadership was their ability to live a life of poverty (faqr) and humility.43 In Baranī’s vision, the first four caliphs were unmatched in their ability to combine proper religious practices with just governance. He writes, “They succeeded, among

Auer-12.indd 86

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Images of the Friends of God

87

the early and later generations, in combining renunciation (darvīshī) with kingship (jamshīdī).”44 Baranī utilizes this characterization of the early caliphs to decry the state of Islamic leadership during his age; leadership that he perceived as enslaved to wealth and luxury. Encounters with the Friends of God and the Origins of Rule Historiographic narratives of the encounters between the friends of God and sultans demonstrate that historians felt a need to establish the legitimacy of a sultan’s rule through the blessings of shaykhs. The acknowledgment of Sufi shaykhs was an explicit sanction of the divine. Sunil Kumar notes that modern historians have largely ignored the rhetorical dimensions of the historiographic encounters between sultans and the friends of God saying, “They have frequently assumed that these reports described the ‘actual’ nature of the relationship between the two groups, ignoring the discursive, rhetorical content of the narratives.”45 At the origin of the pious ruler there was frequently a narrative in which the stature of the youth was recognized by a Sufi shaykh. The Sufi shaykh who identified an adolescent as a future ruler not only displayed his prescience but conferred the ability of rule on sultans. Omid Safi recognizes this as a pattern in sacred biography: “The first pattern is that of the firāsat-designating narratives in which the saint uses his divinely bestowed insight and clairvoyance (firāsat) to forecast great success for figures well before they have achieved notoriety.”46 Safi provides insightful analysis on Rāvandī’s much commented-upon narrative of the encounter between the Saljūq sultan, Ṭughril Beg and Bābā Ṭāhir.47 Jūzjānī relates one such narrative from the early life of Iltutmish, the future sultan of India and founder of the Delhi Sultanate. This marvel-filled and legitimating narrative was said to have come from the mouth of the Sultan. The incident reportedly happened while Iltutmish was an adolescent in Bukhara, where he had been sold as a slave to relatives of the ṣadr-i jahān of that city, likely members of the influential family known as Āl-i Burhān.48 One day the young Iltutmish was sent to the market with a bit of gold to buy some grapes. Unfortunately, because of his

Auer-12.indd 87

6/10/12 1:27 PM

88

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

age and innocence, he lost the gold before he completed his task. Frightened by the situation he began to cry. While he was sitting, dejected, with tears streaming down his face, a dervish approached him and took him by the hand. He bought him some grapes and made him promise (ʿahd) that, “When you achieve power (dawlat va mulk) show respect to those who have accepted voluntary poverty (fuqarāʾ) and the people of goodness (ahl al-khayr), give them their right (ḥaqq).”49 The young Iltutmish gave his promise to the dervish. Jūzjānī completed this tale, saying that Iltutmish claimed that whatever power (dawlat va salṭanat) he achieved in life was through the favor/gaze (naẓar) of that dervish.50 From beginning to end this anecdote bears the hallmarks of a mystical initiatory narrative. The conditions of the encounter between the future sultan and the mysterious dervish are those of loss, confusion, and innocence. The dervish appears as the archetypal guide who leads the one who has gone astray to his desired goal. In fact, the very language of the master-disciple relationship indicates this function. The shaykh, as murshid, is literally a “guide to the right way” and the disciple, as murīd, is “one who desires or seeks.”51 When looked at metaphorically, the object of loss is evocative of the theme of divine union, central to mystical literature. Grapes and their byproduct, wine, are symbols of the “intoxicated” state achieved through direct encounters with God.52 Here the grapes in their raw and natural state also indicate the unrefined and uninitiated state of the young Iltutmish. Another level in the mystical dimension of Jūzjānī’s historical narrative is the clairvoyance of the dervish. The Sufi practitioner’s ability to predict the future was a common theme of sacred biography. John Renard identifies this ability as one category of the “marvels of knowledge.”53 The dervish’s prediction also functions as a blessing that confers legitimacy upon Iltutmish and transmits authority from the dervish to the future sultan. When the dervish resolves the child’s dilemma by providing him with fruit from the market, Iltutmish says that he gave him a “promise” (ʿahd). An etymological study of the term ʿahd shows that in addition to the connotation of

Auer-12.indd 88

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Images of the Friends of God

89

promise, “In later usage, the latter term is commonly used of civil engagements and contracts, whereas ʿahd is generally restricted to political enactments and treaties, in particular to the appointment of a successor, a walī al-ʿahd [q.v.], by a ruler.”54 The term ʿahd points to the idea of a succession of rule, transmitting authority from the shaykh to the sultan. The story of the loss of wealth and power symbolized by the piece of gold and regained through the intercession of the dervish highlights the important connection between Sufi circles and the courts of sultans. In that vein, Iltutmish attributes his success in attaining wealth and power to the favor of that dervish. Even the term used here, naẓar, has Sufi connotations. Annemarie Schimmel notes, “Naẓar, ‘looking,’ becomes, then, one of the central topics of mystical love experience. The mystic who is completely absorbed in his love contemplates in the human beloved only the perfect manifestation of divine beauty, which is as distant from him as God Himself.”55 The implication is that the dervish recognized the divinely-inspired child. It is from this anecdote that Jūzjānī describes Iltutmish as being first among kings in respect and reverence for the ʿulamāʾ and shaykhs. K. A. Nizami uncritically read this historical tale of the encounter between Iltutmish and the itinerant dervish and combined it with narratives from a much later period. His study of Iltutmish’s purported relationships with shaykhs led him to write a short biographical sketch of Iltutmish that attempted to produce an image of the Sultan as a mystic.56 The recurrence of this kind of legitimating narrative is further demonstrated by Jūzjānī, who described an encounter between two dervishes and Malik Ḥusām al-Dīn, later known as Ghiyās ̱ al-Dīn ʿIvaz̤ (r. 610–24/1213–27), the sultan of Bengal. Jūzjānī says that while walking in the foothills on the edge of Ghūr, Malik Ḥusām al-Dīn crossed paths with two wandering dervishes. They were hungry and asked if he had any food to eat. Without hesitating, Malik Ḥusām al-Dīn spread out food and drink to satisfy their hunger. Jūzjānī reports, as if verbatim, the following conversation between the dervishes. They said to each other, “‘This good man has served us.

Auer-12.indd 89

6/10/12 1:27 PM

90

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

His right should not be denied him.’ Then facing Ḥusām al-Dīn they said, ‘Prince, go to India as far as there is the Muslim religion (musulmānī). That we have given to you.’”57 Following this encounter, Jūzjānī reports that Ḥusām al-Dīn took his family and established the capital of Lakhnawtī. This story clearly implies that the power of the Sultan was acquired though the blessings of dervishes. The early Sufi narratives on the legitimization of the authority of the sultan, typified by Jūzjānī, reach a crescendo in the writings of ʿAfīf on the reign of Sultan Fīrūz Shāh. ʿAfīf reports that before ascending the throne of Delhi, Fīrūz Shāh heard the “prediction of kingship” (bishārat-i mulk va salṭanat) from four celebrated shaykhs. First he heard the news from ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn (grandson of Bābā Farīd).58 ʿAfīf narrates a story of the visit of the governor (muqṭaʿ) of Dīpālpūr, Ghiyās ̱ al-Dīn Tughluq Shāh, to ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn. Muḥammad b. Tughluq and Fīrūz Shāh, still in their youth, were both present. During this meeting the Shaykh performed a ritual of initiation, in which he distributed various lengths of untailored fine linen so that turbans could be made for each individual. Ghiyās ̱ al-Dīn was given four and one-half meters (gaz) of cloth, Muḥammad b. Tughluq twentyseven, and Fīrūz Shāh forty. After ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn distributed the cloth he proclaimed that each of these three men would become king (sāḥab-i tāj va takht). ʿAfīf concludes his visionary tale by saying that it was because of the blessing of the Shaykh that these three men did indeed become king. As Fīrūz Shāh received the last portion of the cloth, ʿAfīf says that he was the “seal of kingship” (khatam-i bādshāhī), noting that after him Delhi was destroyed. The second prediction (bishārat) came from Sharaf al-Dīn Pānīpatī, also known as Bū ʿAlī Qalandar (d. 724/1324). As in the previous tale, the three future rulers went to visit the revered Shaykh. The Shaykh ordered that food be brought. Just as the three men sat down to eat the Shaykh called out, “Three kings are eating from one plate!”59 This narrative, when paired with the previous one, legitimated (in retrospect) the transmission of the throne through this specific dynastic lineage, as against rivals with equal if not stronger genealogical claims to rule.

Auer-12.indd 90

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Images of the Friends of God

91

A third prediction (bishārat) came from Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ. ʿAfīf reports that when Fīrūz Shāh was young he went to Ghiyās ̱pūr to pay respects to Niẓām al-Dīn. During their encounter Niẓām al-Dīn was impressed with Fīrūz Shāh’s humility (tavāz̤u ʿ). Niẓām al-Dīn enquired of Fīrūz Shāh’s name. He responded by saying that his name was Kamāl al-Dīn (kamāl meaning perfect), one of his nicknames. The Shaykh replied, “He is perfect in age (ʿumr), perfect in fortune (dawlat), and perfect in blessing (niʿmat).”60 The fourth and final prediction (bishārat) was said to come from Naṣīr al-Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i Dihlī (d. 757/1356), who was traveling with Muḥammad b. Tughluq to Thatta when he died. Naṣīr al-Dīn sent a message to Fīrūz Shāh asking him to assume the throne on the condition that he would be just (ʿadl va inṣāf) to his subjects, otherwise another protector (vālī) would be sought from God. Fīrūz Shāh replied that he would show clemency (ḥilm) to his subjects. Satisfied with this answer, the Shaykh responded that he would pray to God that he become king for forty years.61 ʿAfīf records numerous instances of Sufi shaykhs blessing Fīrūz Shāh, including a conversation between the Sultan and Shaykh Naṣīr al-Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i Dihlī who advises him to pay homage to Quṭb al-Dīn Munavvar (another important disciple of Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ), through whose walāyah he was to pass on the way to Delhi. In an exchange of letters the Sultan then requested to be put in the Shaykh’s charge (havāla). Quṭb al-Dīn replied, “As my brother Naṣīr al-Dīn has charged me with your care I hope in the generosity of God the Almighty that Delhi would come to you as well.”62 All these passages were meant to demonstrate how Fīrūz Shāh’s ascension firmly rested upon the blessing of the shaykhs. ʿAfīf links these events over ten pages in the history, concluding with Fīrūz Shāh’s triumphal entrance in Delhi and recalling the blessings of Quṭb al-Dīn Munavvar and his prediction of Fīrūz Shāh’s ascendancy to the throne.63 This story was influential to such an extent that according to Mughal historiographical tradition it was Naṣīr al-Dīn himself who arranged for Fīrūz Shāh’s installation on the throne.64

Auer-12.indd 91

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Auer-12.indd 92

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Figure 3. Delhi, the tomb of Ghiyās̱ al-Dīn Tughluq, likely constructed during the end of his life (ca. 720–25/1320–25).

Images of the Friends of God

93

Tales of the blessings of shaykhs went beyond the figure of the sultan and were extended to close members of the court. ʿAfīf reports that Malik Sayyid al-Ḥujjāb Maʿrūf (nadīm to Fīrūz Shāh) and his father Vaḥīd Qurayshī were disciples (murīdān) of Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ. After birth, Vaḥīd Qurayshī brought his son to be seen and receive the favor (naẓar) of Niẓām al-Dīn. At the time, the Shaykh was performing his ablutions. As soon as he saw the young child he said, “Khvājah Vaḥīd! Bring forward that notable (maʿrūf) of both worlds and famous one of the universe.”65 Niẓām al-Dīn took a drop of ablution water and placed it into the mouth of the infant Malik Sayyid al-Ḥujjāb. ʿAfīf says that because Niẓām al-Dīn referred to him as maʿrūf he became known by that name. My House has Two Doors While there are a number of narratives in which Sufi shaykhs legitimate the rule of the sultan, there are others that detail tensions between them and the sultans. Many narratives emphasize the desire of the friends of God to remain free of the worldly baggage that accompanied close association with the sultan’s court. This conflict was an outgrowth of theological principles of faqr, or voluntary poverty, the basis of a Sufi shaykh’s moral authority. This was particularly true of narratives depicting the Chishtī shaykhs. There are numerous examples in history writing, sacred biography, and malfūẓāt / majālis texts of pious Chishtī shaykhs refusing service to the sultan or making remarks about the need to keep a healthy distance from the corrupting influences of political power. The literary trope of the pious shaykh had a tremendous influence on twentieth-century scholarly depictions of the relations between sultans and shaykhs. This contributed to the problematic generalization that Sufi shaykhs, particularly those of the Chishtī order, shunned contact with the rulers of their day. The point is particularly evident in Aziz Ahmad’s work, which relies on the statements of Chishtī shaykhs recorded by devotees in later Persian taz̤kirah literature. This literature praises the Chishtī shaykhs of the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/fourteenth centuries. For instance, speaking of Muʿīn al-Dīn Chishtī’s dedication to faqr Ahmad writes, “He inaugurated

Auer-12.indd 93

6/10/12 1:27 PM

94

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

the Chishtī tradition of devotion to a life of poverty, with an attitude of dissociation from the ruler and the state.”66 The piety of the Sufi shaykh and his disdain for worldly affairs is certainly alluded to in the rhetoric of taz̤kirah and malfūẓāt / majālis texts and is also referenced in historiography. However, it is far from clear what that piety meant in actual practice, particularly as there are a number of examples that show the ways Chishtī shaykhs were deeply entangled in the affairs of the royal court. The most memorable statement that has come to epitomize the disdain for worldly affairs is attributed to Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ and is recorded in the Siyar al-awliyāʾ of Amīr Khvurd. On the occasion of a visit by Sultan ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn to Niẓām al-Dīn,67 Amīr Khvurd records Niẓām al-Dīn’s thoughts on the Sultan’s visit, “The house of this fragile old man has two doors. If he [the Sultan] enters through one door, I exit through the other.”68 The Shaykh’s remark has been taken as a definitive proclamation on the Sufi distaste for the affairs of Islamic courts. There is also an implicit warning in this statement against the enticements of the affairs of the world. To ignore the principles of voluntary poverty and involve oneself in politics was to endanger the special relationship with the divine. This was the very lesson Baranī attempts to demonstrate in his narrative of the death of Sīdī Muwallih. Sīdī Muwallih was a prominent shaykh living in Delhi who had attracted a number of followers from the court of Jalāl al-Dīn Fīrūz Shāh.69 Among them was Qāz̤ī Jalāl Kāshānī, a scholar and judge of some repute. Baranī says that he held nightly private meetings with Sīdī Muwallih along with members of the Balban family who had been displaced during the transition of power to the Khiljī dynasty that took place under Jalāl al-Dīn. Baranī unveils an elaborate plot concocted by this rebellious group. Their plan was to assassinate Jalāl al-Dīn and install Sīdī Muwallih as caliph (khalīfah); he would then marry the daughter of Sultan Nāṣir al-Dīn and reestablish the lineage of the former dynasty. Unfortunately for them, but fortunately for Sultan Jalāl al-Dīn, one of the members of the scheming group deserted and brought the plans of their conspiracy to the attention of the

Auer-12.indd 94

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Images of the Friends of God

95

Sultan. Most of the conspirators were executed, but a special death was reserved for Sīdī Muwallih—he was trampled to death under the feet of an elephant.70 Earlier in the history, we find Baranī’s reason for retelling the dramatic events of the execution of Sīdī Muwallih; indeed it had more than a purely historical function. Baranī preceded this story with a foreshadowing narrative of an encounter between Bābā Farīd and Sīdī Muwallih. In this meeting Bābā Farīd doled out some prescient advice to Sīdī Muwallih. He is reported to have said, “Do not mix (ikhtilāṭ) with kings and emirs (mulūk va umarāʾ). Imagine their coming and going to your house as a deadly place to inhabit. Every dervish who has mixed with kings and emirs has had a disastrous end.”71 Sīdī Muwallih clearly did not follow this advice. Baranī reports that after the brutal execution of Sīdī Muwallih the sky turned black and drought and famine spread throughout the land.72 The shaykh’s death is depicted as bringing divine retribution down upon Delhi, retribution that took the shape, in the literary topos, of a natural disaster. This is a view that was widely reported in the Persian historiographical tradition.73 Finally, the didactic nature of narratives of encounters between sultans and shaykhs is further highlighted in passages in which the shaykh asserts his superior moral authority and reprimands the sultan for behavior unbefitting his high status. This was the case in the meeting between Shaykh Quṭb al-Dīn Munavvar and Fīrūz Shāh, just following his ascension to the throne. In the Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī, ʿAfīf reported that the Sultan was admonished by Quṭb al-Dīn for excessive drinking and hunting and in a final slight he refused to accept an improper gift from the Sultan.74 The Sultan’s initial faux pas was to arrive for his meeting with the Shaykh before the Friday prayer, surprising him as he was leaving his house to attend the mosque. As a consequence, Quṭb al-Dīn proceeded to scold the Sultan for his improper drinking and hunting habits. The awkwardness of the situation was exacerbated in a scene that took place inside the mosque, where the Shaykh rejected the gift of an ostentatious robe from the Sultan because it was prohibited according to the sharīʿah.

Auer-12.indd 95

6/10/12 1:27 PM

96

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

In declining the king’s robe and admonishing him for his behavior, the shaykh was shown to establish his superior piety and ethical command over the figure of the sultan. Pilgrimage and Sacred Geography in the Imperial Realm In addition to narratives detailing the face-to-face encounters between sultans and shaykhs, there are numerous accounts of sultans visiting the tombs of the friends of God. These narratives tend to emphasize the intercessory role of deceased shaykhs, the persistence of barakah following death, and the piety of pilgrims. The Muslim world of the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/fourteenth centuries was defined by the tremendous popularity of the pilgrimage (ziyārat) to the tombs of shaykhs.75 This is reflected in the extensive archeological record that demonstrates a growth in monumental tomb architecture, as well as an extensive body of literature documenting visitation to these sacred sites. From Morocco to Egypt, Iran, Central Asia, and India, mausoleum complexes populated the architectural landscape and supported, with food and lodging, the predominant culture of religious visitation. The vast travels of Ibn Baṭṭūṭa demonstrate the ubiquity and function of these shrines in the Muslim world, as his voyage was largely subsidized through the large financial endowments that supported these institutions.76 The earliest Muslim funerary architecture dedicated to shaykhs in South Asia likely dates from the late sixth/twelfth century and was an expression of Ghūrid rule in the Punjab.77 Over the course of the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/fourteenth centuries the establishment of tomb complexes, through the patronage of successive Muslim courts across South Asia, sprouted a vast network of interconnected pilgrimage routes. These routes can be roughly traced in pilgrimage paths described by Jūzjānī, Baranī, and ʿAfīf. Information about the routes of pilgrimage and the rituals that accompany them was detailed in a genre of literature known as the “books of pilgrimage” (kutūb al-ziyārah) that functioned as manuals or travel guides for pilgrims.78 The sultans of Delhi were great patrons in the building of mausolea that in turn grew to support pilgrimage as a pervasive ritualist

Auer-12.indd 96

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Images of the Friends of God

97

practice of South Asian Muslim communities. It is likely that the most intense phase of this construction was accomplished under the reign of the Tughluq sultans. Anthony Welch and Howard Crane argue that, “While earlier Muʿizzī and Khaljī architecture of the late twelfth through early fourteenth centuries can be discussed only in terms of a small number of buildings, the extant corpus of Tughluq architecture is very large.”79 The Tughluq dynasty was situated at the cusp of a new phase in the evolution and growth of the major Sufi orders of India. Indeed, it played a significant role in bringing about their transformation from the practice of individual shaykhs and their followers to the veneration of the friends of God following their death. The first historical narratives relating to this development come from Baranī, who documents Muḥammad b. Tughluq’s pilgrimage to the tomb of the legendary figure Sayyid Sipah Sālār Masʿūd Ghāzī of Bahraich.80 This pilgrimage followed the Sultan’s victory over ʿAyn al-Mulk who rebelled from Delhi’s central authority while he was governor of Avadh. His visit to the shrine suggests that the Sultan was seeking to honor Masʿūd Ghāzī in return for his good fortune. Baranī notes that upon his arrival Muḥammad b. Tughluq generously distributed alms (ṣadaqāt) to the “residents of the tomb” (mujāvirān-i rawz̤ah).81 By ʿAfīf ’s time narrative compositions of imperial pilgrimages had become an elaborate affair. Not only did ʿAfīf document the numerous instances of pilgrimage and patronage in the actions of Sultan Fīrūz Shāh, but he also created a narrative style that spoke to the inner dimensions and personal relationships created between deceased shaykhs and living sultans.82 ʿAfīf describes how Fīrūz Shāh went to Bahraich to visit the tomb of Sipah Sālār Masʿūd Ghāzī in the year 776/1374.83 One night the deceased Shaykh appeared to Fīrūz Shāh and in the dream (dar khvāb) Masʿūd Ghāzī stroked his beard, indicating the Sultan’s advanced age, a gesture meant to encourage him to think about how he should spend his autumn years and suggest that he make preparations for the afterlife (ākhirat). On one level, ʿAfīf ’s dream narrative can be read as an account of the Sultan’s reverence for the piety of Sufi shaykhs. In a more critical

Auer-12.indd 97

6/10/12 1:27 PM

98

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

way it can be seen as a legitimating ploy of the Sultan, who, by doing so, makes a public statement of his own piety. Dream interpretation, or oneiromancy, was popular in the fifth/ eleventh century when important literary works appeared on the subject. This development is exemplified by the early work of Naṣir b. Yaʿqūb al-Dīnawarī (fl. 397/1006), al-Qādirī fī al-taʿbīr, which is considered to be “The most important treatise on ArabMuslim oneirocritics.”84 While oneiromancy is a significant cultural dimension of Muslim societies, ʿAfīf ’s description of the Sultan’s encounter with the dead Shaykh was a major departure in the historiography of the Delhi Sultanate. Until this time, narratives about the relations between shaykhs and sultans were largely restricted to the patronage and devotion of sultans to shaykhs. The motif of Masʿūd Ghāzī’s dream visitations subsequently spread widely and was the purported inspiration for the eleventh/seventeenth century biographical account Mirʾāt-i Masʿūdī, composed by ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Chishtī (d. 1094/1683).85 In addition to the dream narrative, ʿAfīf gives more detail about the Sultan’s visits to the tombs of Sufi shaykhs. He says that it was Fīrūz Shāh’s practice to perform pilgrimage (ziyārat) to the shrines of “devout shaykhs” (mashāʾikh-i dīndār) and “notable sultans” (salāṭīn-i nāmdār) located in the area of Delhi before any excursion outside of the capital.86 He used the subject of pilgrimage to describe ritual elements and to highlight the piety of the Sultan in seeking blessings from the respected shaykhs of the past. The reason for this particular round of visits to the tombs in and around Delhi was the launch of his military expedition against the Sammā rulers of Thatta. To ensure a favorable outcome, ʿAfīf says Fīrūz Shāh visited the burial place of Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ. ʿAfīf provides a detailed description of the Sultan’s pilgrimage. He narrates the humble manner the Sultan approached the tomb of Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ, bowing his head and touching it to the ground, actions which the historian witnessed with his own eyes. ʿAfīf also notes that he prayed at the tomb, and recited the Qurʾān (khvāndanī) as prescribed by the sharīʿah.87 He claims that it was a Sunnī custom (sunnat-i sunniyah) and it was a character trait of the friends of God

Auer-12.indd 98

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Images of the Friends of God

99

(ṣifat-i awliyāʾ), for which he supplied the following ḥadīth, “If you are troubled with a problem ask help from those in the grave.”88 ʿAfīf ’s emphasis on the Sultan’s activities as conforming to sharīʿah and in line with Sunnī custom, as demonstrated by the inclusion of a ḥadīth, was a conscious rebuttal to accusations concerning the illicit nature of tomb visitation; accusations that arose in theological debates of the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/fourteenth centuries.89 ʿAfīf goes on to narrate how the Sultan patronized the tombs of the friends of God and the royal treasurers distributed a fixed amount for the care of the poor and unfortunate. Following his pilgrimage to the shrine of Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ, he made another stop in Ajūdhan to pay his respects at the tomb of Bābā Farīd. One reason ʿAfīf documents numerous instances of pilgrimage is that his father and his father’s brother held appointments responsible for the administration of tombs.90 The Historiographic Transformation of the Sultan into the Shaykh With ʿAfīf ’s composition of the Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī, the transformation of the sultan’s image from a seeker and recipient of the blessings of shaykhs, to a producer of his own charismatic religious authority was complete. There were inklings of this protracted development in earlier historiography. Jūzjānī referred to his patron Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh by employing the literary imagery of the Sufi shaykh. He says that God had planted in the Sultan the “attributes of the friends of God” (awṣāf-i awliyāʾ).91 ʿAfīf, however, went beyond mere comparison and simile. More than any other historian he created a portrait of his patron that effectively merged the image of the sultan into the shaykh, a literary feat he accomplished in both subtle and overt ways. First, he constructed an image of the perfect king based on the ethical and moral attributes of Sufi shaykhs. In the introduction to the Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī he describes ten attributes of the ideal ruler.92 Each attribute is referred to by the term maqāmāt or stages, a term common in Sufi literature for the stages an individual traverses on the Sufi path. ʿAfīf elaborates on the ten stages: (1) compassion

Auer-12.indd 99

6/10/12 1:27 PM

100

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

(shafaqat), (2) forgiveness (ʿafv), (3) justice and grace (ʿadl va faz̤l), (4) fighting and combat (muqātalah va muḥārabah), (5) generosity in bestowing gifts (īs ̱ār va iftikhār), (6) majesty and awe (ʿaẓmat va rʿub), (7) intelligence and insight (hūshiyārī va bīdārī), (8) wakefulness and vigilance (intbāh va ʿibrat), (9) conquest and victory (fatḥ va nuṣrat), and (10) wisdom and discernment (kiyāsat va firāsat). Each stage is understood symbolically as a stage in the spiritual journey to nearness with God. These stages form a major topic of Sufi literature, as is demonstrated by the lengthy discussion Abū ‘l-Qāsim al-Qushayrī (376–465/986–1072) dedicated to the maqāmāt in his famous treatise on Sufism, the Risālah.93 The first stage in ʿAfīf ’s understanding of the ideal attributes of the perfect ruler is compassion (shafaqat). He imbued this stage with Sufi meaning, saying that only the “shaykhs of the people of certainty” (mashāʾikh-i ahl-i yaqīn) and the “religion-seeking sultans” (salāṭīn-i ṭālibān-i dīn) understand the value of compassion.94 He accompanies each of the following nine stages of kingship with an interpretation of their meaning in a sense applicable to Sufism. By employing maqāmāt in his description of the attributes of ideal kingship, ʿAfīf shifts the image of the Sufi shaykh onto the image of the sultan. In a number of cases ʿAfīf does not simply refer to sultans as having the characteristics of shaykhs, but to actually being a shaykh or a friend of God. This was the case with his treatment of Fīrūz Shāh. ʿAfīf legitimated his characterization of the Sultan as a shaykh, saying it was recognized by the reputable shaykh Quṭb al-Dīn Munavvar, who is reported to have said that Fīrūz Shāh was one of the “shaykhs of the path” (mashāʾikh-i ṭarīqah). This representation was predicated on his ability to rule “without the use of the sword” (bi-ghayr-i tīgh).95 ʿAfīf attempts to show that Fīrūz Shāh displayed the characteristics of the friends of God early in his career. He narrates events following the death of Muḥammad b. Tughluq, events that coincided with some effective military raids of the Mongols that greatly threatened the stability of the Sultanate. During that time Fīrūz Shāh was called upon by the notables of his day to assume the throne and wield power. Showing humility and fear of God,

Auer-12.indd 100

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Images of the Friends of God

101

the young Fīrūz Shāh replied that he had the intention of going on pilgrimage to Mecca, a common destination for individuals who wished to avoid the political complications of their day.96 ʿAfīf compared the refusal of power to a custom associated with the Sufi “robe of succession” (khirqah-yi taḥkīm). Customarily successorship is refused until after the death of the shaykh.97 As noted earlier, one of the Sufi shaykh’s special abilities was his protection (walāyah) of the communities surrounding the area where he lived. ʿAfīf applied this motif to the figure of the Sultan in light of the military incursions of the Mongols. He said that Fīrūz Shāh had a positive impact on the kingdom over the forty-year duration of his reign because God had conferred upon him the “protection of the peoples of the world” (walāyat-i ādmiyān-i jahān). Thus he had received the divine right to rule. This, he claims, was because the Sultan was “one of the friends of God” (yakī az awliyāʾ-i Allāh).98 ʿAfīf found proof for this, with the benefit of hindsight, in the manner the kingdom fell into chaos following the Sultan’s death. This view is opposed in later Sufi biographical literature, such as the Mirʾat al-asrār by ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Chishtī and the Manāqib al-aṣfiyāʾ by Shuʿayb Firdawsī, in which Fīrūz Shāh is accused of inviting divine punishment in the form of Tīmūr’s invasion of Delhi because of his execution of two Sufi figures.99 In a further transformation of the sultan into a shaykh, ʿAfīf discusses Fīrūz Shāh’s end-of-life activities. Toward the end of his life, the Sultan made a pilgrimage to the tomb of Masʿūd Ghāzī in Bahraich and was visited by the deceased Shaykh in a dream. Following his night-time encounter, the Sultan shaved his head (maḥlūq) in a public ceremony attended by the khāns and maliks of the kingdom.100 In this narrative, ʿAfīf utilizes a trope of Sufi literature in which novices receive initiation through a dream. This tradition of dream initiation was exemplified by the legendary figure of Uways al-Qaranī (d. 37/657), who was said to have communicated with Muḥammad by telepathy, a tale passed down in a number of stories of the Prophet and made widely known in Sufi literature by Farīd al-Dīn ʿAṭṭār in the Tazkirat al-awliyāʾ.101

Auer-12.indd 101

6/10/12 1:27 PM

102

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

ʿAfīf makes multiple uses of this narrative. He goes on to compare the Sultan’s actions with those of the Prophet at the end of his life, particularly by quoting from Q48:27, the verse revealed to Muḥammad about entering Mecca following the treaty of Ḥudaybiyyah:

َ ُ َ َ‫حُ َ ّ َ ُ ُ َ ُ ۡ َ ُ َ ّ َ اَ خ‬ ٢٧ ۖ‫ين ل تافون‬ ‫ص‬ ِ ِ‫ملِقِني رءوسكم ومق ر‬ With their heads shaved and hair cut short, they will not fear.102 Here ʿAfīf makes an analogy between the life of Muḥammad and the life of Fīrūz Shāh. The Sultan’s dream is said to parallel Muḥammad’s dream of entering Mecca.103 ʿAfīf reiterates the point that the Sultan shaved his head like the “shaykhs of the people of discernment” (mashāʾikh-i ahl-i tamyīz). He describes how God blessed the Sultan with the “light of the protection of the friends of God” (anvār-i walāyat-i awliyāʾ) and says that he looked like a shaykh with a prayer mat. To which he adds the ḥadīth, “Those who sit in assembly are not troubled” (lā yashqá jalīsuhum).104 ʿAfīf also says that the Sultan abolished everything that contradicted the sharīʿah. Clearly the purpose of this narrative was to show that the sultans followed the dominant Islamic ethics and morals of their day, making them a model of behavior. Finally, ʿAfīf conferred upon Fīrūz Shāh the ability to perform marvels (karāmāt).105 As noted, Fīrūz Shāh performed a marvel during his wanderings in the Rann of Kutch, following the defeat at Thatta. Starved and without water, ʿAfīf says that the Sultan went into meditative seclusion (khalvat), and immediately following his silent prayers, clouds covered the sky and the “rain of mercy” (bārān-i raḥmat) fell to provide water to the desperate army. All of this, ʿAfīf says, was born out of the “blessing of the prayer of the Sultan” (barakat-i duʿā-yi Sulṭān).106 Completing his portrait of the Sultan in the image of the Sufi shaykh, ʿAfīf notes a story from Farīd al-Dīn ʿAṭṭār’s Taz ̱kirat al-awliyāʾ in which the noted Egyptian Sufi shaykh Dhū ‘l-Nūn Miṣrī (180–246/796–861) prayed for rain during a period of drought and his prayer was granted.107 Amīr Khusraw also

Auer-12.indd 102

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Images of the Friends of God

103

records the marvelous powers of sultans. In the Khazāʾin al-futūḥ, he attributes the victorious march of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh’s army from Delhi and their ability to overcome the dangers that lay before them, not to the blessings of Niẓām al-Dīn, as did Baranī, but rather to the “marvels of the Sultan” (karāmat-i sulṭān).108 The force of the flooding of the Narmada River is compared to the universal deluge caused by the flood of Noah. That divine power was only contravened by the marvel of the Sultan that dried up the swirling deep waters just as the army arrived. Nimrod Hurvitz shows how the genre of biography acts as a “cultural code” that can be deciphered to trace the moral and ethical constructs that predominate in a given society in a given situation. On biographies and their emphasis on piety, he writes, “It is no novelty to argue that they were constructed for the sake of conveying behavioral patterns.”109 All in all, the recorded instances of Fīrūz Shāh’s respect and veneration for the living shaykhs of his day, his pilgrimages and patronage of the friends of God, his own temperament of humility and benevolence, the shaving of his head as he reached an autumn age, and finally his marvelous ability to bring rain through seclusion and prayer, reflect the moral imagination of the historian during a period when images of pious Sufi shaykhs populated the cultural milieu.

Auer-12.indd 103

6/10/12 1:27 PM

5 Caliphal Authority and Representation in the Delhi Sultanate

As with representations of pre-Islamic prophets, Muḥammad, and the friends of God, historians of the Delhi Sultanate incorporated imagery, narratives, and motifs of caliphs into their history writing. When historians raised the subject of the caliphate, it was often to reflect on the power and ideals of Muslim authority, to note the legitimacy of the sultan, and on occasion to lament the coming of the end of the world. Biographies of caliphs (sīrat al-khulafāʾ) were an early form of historical writing in Arabic.1 The appearance of caliphal narratives in Sultanate historiography was a sign of the profound impact that Sunnī political and religious ideologies had on Muslim rulers in India and their historians. A brief discussion of caliphal and sultanic relations along with reference to legal texts and advice literature brings to light the way caliphal legitimating ideologies are reflected in historiography of the Delhi Sultanate.2 The parameters of caliphal authority were detailed in the long‑standing prescriptive Sunnī legal tradition. The theoretical foundations of caliphal authority were discussed and debated by a number of major authors in writings that spanned the second/eighth to eighth/fourteenth centuries.3 In principle, caliphal authority was

Auer-12.indd 104

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Caliphal Authority and Representation

105

based on a universal model of Muslim authority and a universal conception of the Muslim community (ummah). In reality, caliphal authority was never universal but a product of an evolving historical relationship between the center and periphery, between the existence of authority and the exercise of power. Actual sovereignty exercised by ʿAbbāsid caliphs was curtailed as early as the third/ninth century under the influence of the Turkish ghilmān and further significantly reduced in the fourth/tenth and fifth/eleventh centuries with the rise of Būyid and then Saljūq regimes. Developments that led to the decentralization of the caliphate emerged from the area just south of the Caspian Sea. Under the leadership of ʿAlī b. Būya (r. 320–38/932–49) and his two brothers, Būyid rule effectively marginalized the caliphate of al-Mustakfī (r. 333–34/944–46) and al-Muṭīʿ (r. 334–63/946–74). As early as 322/934 the shift of actual authority from Baghdad to the province of Fars and its major city Shiraz was complete. While the caliph remained in “power” in Baghdad and the Būyid family ruled nominally as governors, in actuality the caliph’s functions had been diminished to a mere ceremonial role. Eric Hanne, in his study of ʿAbbāsid political power struggles, stresses the fact that the emergence of Būyid rule was not an endpoint of the ʿAbbāsid caliphate but rather a moment in the constantly shifting balance of control in the central Islamic lands.4 Sunnī ideologies of caliphal authority had to be modified in the context of changing historical circumstances. This is particularly evident in the writings of authors who faced a substantial diminution of caliphal power. Al-Māwardī is most frequently cited in this area because of the way his life and writings capture the evolving history and ideology of caliphal authority. As a man who lived and died in Baghdad under ʿAbbāsid caliphs during the de facto rule of Būyid emirs, al-Māwardī was inspired to produce some of the most salient arguments on the extent and limit of caliphal authority. In his famous work, Aḥkām al-sulṭāniyyah, al-Māwardī attempts to reassert caliphal authority, modifying it to the political circumstances of his day. He queries the conditions for the forfeiture of the leadership

Auer-12.indd 105

6/10/12 1:27 PM

106

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

(imāmah) of the Muslim community under the circumstances of the curtailment of caliphal liberties. Al-Māwardī concludes that the caliph can maintain his position as long as those in actual power adhere to the requirements of religion and justice.5 A central dilemma arising from the loss of caliphal authority can be seen in cases in which a Muslim ruler takes control of a province without a formal caliphal appointment, a situation referred to as the “emirate of seizure” (imārat al-istīlāʿ).6 Under such circumstances, al-Māwardī concludes that the legitimacy of the rule of a province taken by force is dependent upon the ex post facto investiture of the caliph.7 It was a pragmatic approach to conditions in which Muslim courts spread far beyond the control of a centralized caliphal authority. In effect, al-Māwardī’s views allowed for a split in the functions of a globalized Muslim authority between the caliph, who retained a titular and symbolic role, and the sultan, who controlled the exercise of power. This type of thinking clearly had relevance to the sultans ruling from Delhi. Al-Māwardī’s ideas came under scrutiny from writers who, clearly seeing the shape of things to come, went beyond the question of the emirate of seizure to directly confront the actual disappearance of the office of the caliph. In the Ghiyāth al-umam, al-Juwaynī systematically lays out the rational arguments that deal with such an eventuality.8 His writings, when compared with those of al-Māwardī, exemplify the shifting ideological bases of authority in Muslim societies in the fifth/eleventh century. Al-Juwaynī’s political attitudes were formulated under the circumstances of Saljūq rule, under whose patronage he received an appointment to the Niẓāmiyyah madrasah in Nishapur. Analyzing the diminished stature of the caliph, he argues that although there are a number of requirements for the appointment and support of the leader of the Muslim community, they each have a relative value. Al-Juwaynī concludes that it is ultimately the requirement of power that holds precedence over all other requirements to rule.9 The ability of the imām to control, defend, and unify the Muslim community is paramount to his legitimacy. Failure to carry out that duty should result in the deposition of the imām.

Auer-12.indd 106

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Caliphal Authority and Representation

107

While this sketch of the ideologies of authority constructed during Būyid and Saljūq rule forms a basis of comparison with the ideologies at work in Northern India during the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/ fourteenth centuries, it is important to keep in mind that the Delhi Sultanate existed under very different historical circumstances. First, the Būyid and the Saljūq dynasties spanned the living context of the ʿAbbāsid caliph in Baghdad. They also controlled, shared, and competed for authority over a common geographical region. In contrast, the Delhi Sultanate was being established during the time of the destruction of the ʿAbbāsid caliphate and the sultans of Delhi controlled regions far from any boundaries held by the ʿAbbāsids or their vassals. However, bound to a Sunnī vision of rule, the Delhi sultans’ fortunes depended upon caliphal legitimization. Confronted with an interregnum and transitional period in Sunnī Muslim authority more dramatic than at perhaps any other period of history, historians preserved an integrated narrative of caliphal authority and sultanic legitimacy. This is particularly evident in the narratives that document the caliphal investiture of sultanic authority. Caliphal Investiture The most important historical narratives for understanding the legitimization of sultanic authority were the occasions of the reception of the deed of caliphal investiture (manshūr) and the caliphal robe (khilʿat).10 Caliphal legitimization of sultanic authority was symbolically transmitted in formal documents of attestation and the paraphernalia of rule and Sultanate historians were keen to document the events surrounding their arrival. Historical narratives show that the sultans of Delhi considered these significant occasions in which their authority was acknowledged in public ceremonial displays. Jūzjānī, Baranī, and ʿAfīf all took the opportunity to describe this legitimating event. Their narratives resemble each other in striking ways, albeit with significant points that distinguish them. Each narrative reveals the explicit ways the sultans of Delhi aligned themselves with the Sunnī caliphal legitimacy represented by the ʿAbbāsids.

Auer-12.indd 107

6/10/12 1:27 PM

108

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Jūzjānī laid the groundwork by producing the first historical narrative of the caliphal investiture of a sultan from Delhi, that of Iltutmish.11 The ʿAbbāsid caliph at the time was al-Mustanṣir (r. 623–40/1226–42), the penultimate caliph of Baghdad.12 Jūzjānī says that emissaries from the house of the caliphate (dār al-khilāfat), bearing luxurious presents (tashrīfāt-i vāfirah), arrived in Delhi on the twenty-second of Rabīʿ al-awwal in 626 (18 February 1229). Jūzjānī is brief in his description of the elaborate ceremonies arranged for the occasion, only noting that the city of Delhi was decorated and there was much rejoicing and celebration.13 The pomp and circumstance of the reception of the formal documents and symbols of caliphal investiture reveals something of the theatrical nature of the event. Following Jūzjānī, caliphal narratives of investiture did not appear for more than one hundred years, that is, until Baranī and the reign of Muḥammad b. Tughluq. The ongoing Mongol invasions from Central Asia and the destruction of the ʿAbbāsid caliphate in Baghdad, discussed later in this chapter, profoundly disrupted relations between the ʿAbbāsid caliphs and the Delhi sultans. In the time between the investiture of Iltutmish and the sack of Baghdad in 656/1258 there is no record of a sultan of Delhi receiving the investiture. Even after the death of al-Mustaʿṣim, the last ʿAbbāsid caliph of Baghdad, Jūzjānī notes that Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh continued to read the khuṭbah and mint coins in the name of the fallen caliph.14 Ishtiaq Husain Qureshi has determined that the name of the caliph al-Mustaʿṣim remained on the coinage of the sultans of Delhi until the reign of the Khiljī ruler Jalāl al-Dīn Fīrūz Shāh, a period of nearly forty years.15 The persistence of the idea of ʿAbbāsid authority is a statement about the strength of conceptions of Sunnī legitimacy. Carl Ernst, however, argues that although there was an element of seeking “religious respectability,” particularly in the later cases of Muḥammad b. Tughluq and Fīrūz Shāh’s caliphal investitures, the primary motive of the early sultans of Delhi in maintaining the pretense of caliphal authority was as “a challenge to the Mongol claims to world domination.”16 After the fall of Baghdad, ʿAbbāsid claimants who sought to reestablish their authority found their fortunes under the

Auer-12.indd 108

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Caliphal Authority and Representation

109

Figure 4. Delhi Sultanate coin (ca. 607–33/1210–35) bearing the inscription “The Mighty Sultan, Sun of the World and Faith, Father of Victory, Iltutmish al-Quṭbī, Helper of the Commander of the Faithful.” (Courtesy David Collection, Copenhagen, Denmark)

supervision of the Mamlūk sultans of Egypt. As early as 648/1250, Turkish Mamlūk sultans began to assert their authority over the provinces of Egypt and Syria, subsuming the Ayyūbid dynasty (r. 564–648/1169–1250). Out of a “desire for legitimacy,” the ʿAbbāsid caliphate was reinstated in 659/1261 through the leadership of al-Ẓāhir Baybars (r. 658–76/1260–77).17 It has been argued that the

Auer-12.indd 109

6/10/12 1:27 PM

110

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

relationship between the Mamlūk sultans of Egypt and the revived ʿAbbāsid caliph was one of accommodation, mutual benefit, and shifting power relations. P. M. Holt’s observations on this marriage of convenience deserve a lengthier comment: The caliph’s principal functions were ceremonial, and in one respect at least his role grew in importance some decades after the restoration of the caliphate, namely in legitimating by his presence, and sometimes by his word and act, the accession of a new sultan. The necessity for such symbolic and public legitimation seems to have been a consequence of the installation of sultans by rival factions of magnates from the late seventh/ thirteenth century onwards.18 It was in the global context of shifting spheres of Muslim political authority that Muḥammad b. Tughluq, the sultan of a land much further east, contemplated his own source of legitimacy. During his reign, Muḥammad b. Tughluq declared allegiance to the caliph, he dispatched emissaries to Egypt, he stopped the Friday and ʿĪd prayers, and he replaced his own name and titles on his coins in favor of the caliph al-Ḥākim II (r. 741–53/1341–52).19 In the year of 744/1343 Ḥājjī Saʿīd Ṣarṣarī brought the deed of investiture (manshūr), banner (livāʾ), and robe (khilʿat) to the Sultan. To enhance the lavish celebrations arranged for the formal investiture, the court poet Badr-i Chāch composed lyric poems (qaṣīdah, pl. qaṣāʾid) in praise of the caliph and the sultan to honor the occasion.20 One wonders why Muḥammad b. Tughluq made any effort to secure formal caliphal investiture after what amounted to a one-hundredyear hiatus. K. A. Nizami speculates that the Sultan made a public display of his allegiance to the caliph because he was influenced by the ideas of Ibn Taymiyyah.21 Nizami claims that “direct evidence” for this can be found in a single visit of ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Ardabīlī to the court of the Sultan, recorded in the Riḥlah of Ibn Baṭṭūṭa. Ibn Baṭṭūṭa mentions that Ardabīlī was a ḥadīth expert (muḥaddith) and studied under Ibn Taymiyyah along with three other Damascene scholars he specifically names: Burhān al-Dīn b. al-Barqaḥ (or

Auer-12.indd 110

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Caliphal Authority and Representation

111

Barkaḥ), Jamāl al-Dīn al-Mizzī (654–742/1256–1341), and Shams al-Dīn Dhahabī (673–748/1274–1347 or 48). In their encounter the Sultan was particularly impressed with Ardabīlī’s knowledge of ḥadīth regarding the positive attributes of the family of ʿAbbās and therefore conferred upon him corresponding honors.22 The influence of Ibn Taymiyyah is, however, likely overstated. Ibn Baṭṭūṭa gives no indication of the length of the Sultan’s relationship to Ardabīlī and there is no discussion of Ibn Taymiyyah’s ideas. The anecdote is in a section of the Riḥlah that details a number of court visits in which the Sultan showed his generosity, indicating it was a shortlived encounter. The fact that Baranī does not mention Ardabīlī further supports this view.23 There was clearly a powerful resurgence in the eighth/fourteenth century in ideas regarding the legitimacy of Muslim authority. It is more likely that Muḥammad b. Tughluq was swayed by the general intellectual climate rather than by any specific intellectual response to the challenge of Islamic legitimacy. Baranī notes that Muḥammad b. Tughluq had to make numerous inquiries just to learn that the ʿAbbāsid caliph was now ruling from Egypt. In Baranī’s recollection it would appear the Sultan was struck by the idea that The Sultanate (salṭanat) and the government of sultans (imārat-i salāṭīn) is not valid (durust) without the order of the caliph of the family of ʿAbbās (āl-i ʿAbbās). Any king (bādshāh) who has ruled or rules without the investiture (bī-manshūr) of the ʿAbbāsid caliphs (khulafāʾ-i ʿAbbāsī) was a usurper (mutaghallib) or is a usurper.24 In all likelihood Muḥammad b. Tughluq’s efforts to reconnect the Delhi Sultanate with the ʿAbbāsid caliphate were part of a sustained project of establishing the legitimacy of his rule. Even before he received official caliphal investiture, he minted coins in the name of the caliph in Cairo, al-Mustakfī (r. 701–40/1302–40).25 Following Muḥammad b. Tughluq’s “admission,” Baranī notes that the Sultan made an oath of allegiance (bayʿa) to the Caliph. The bayʿa was a public ritual that reinforced hierarchy and subservience, social

Auer-12.indd 111

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Auer-12.indd 112

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Figure 5. Qurʾān manuscript produced in India during the eighth/fourteenth century and gifted to the Mamlūk sultan of Egypt, Nāṣir al-Dīn Muḥammad, who ruled two times: 693–708/1293–1309 and 709–41/1310–41. (Courtesy David Collection, Copenhagen, Denmark)

Caliphal Authority and Representation

113

order and cohesion. Roy Rappaport notes the symbolic power and transformative function of enactments of meaning in performative utterances. He particularly applies this line of thought to the English performative act of dubbing, words that transform an ordinary individual into a knight.26 This thinking can also be applied to the Delhi sultans and the bayʿa ritual. Relationships of authority and dominance were sustained through a complex set of personal contracts and obligations meant to establish loyalty. Loyalties were symbolically acquired by men through “deliberate acts and not through the ascription of those men to a category.”27 The bayʿa was the primary mode by which a sultan obtained from the caliph his symbols of authority and simultaneously procured the submission and assent of members of his own echelon. This was equally the case of Mamlūk sultans in Egypt. Peter Holt notes of the bayʿa ceremony, “When al-Mustanṣir was installed in 659/1261, Baybars performed the bayʿa to him as the head of the Muslim community. In 922/1516 by contrast, as on some (perhaps all) previous occasions since at least the accession of al-Nāṣir Aḥmad in 742/1342, the roles were reversed, and the caliph performed the bayʿa to the sultan.”28 Fīrūz Shāh was the last sultan of Delhi to receive the caliphal investiture. According to Baranī this happened on two occasions.29 Baranī states that Fīrūz Shāh received the “robe of the masters of the command” (khilʿat-i ūlū ‘l-amrī), the “deed of authorization” (manshūr-i izn), and the “banner of kingship” (livāʾ-i bādshāhī). Baranī’s narrative is distinguished from Jūzjānī’s by the miraculous tinge he gives it. He says that the symbols of authority descended from heaven (āsmān) and were delivered from the court of the chosen one, referring to the Prophet and not the caliph of the time.30 In Baranī’s view the reception of the caliphal symbols of authority was an event permeated with celestial blessings and good tidings. In his words, “the heavenly bounty (fayz̤-i āsmānī) was spread over the land and the exalted heavenly doors (abvāb-i balā-hā-yī āsmānī) were closed to drought (qaḥṭ) and pestilence (vabā).”31 ʿAfīf also documents the circumstances of Fīrūz Shāh’s caliphal investiture. Prior to that Fīrūz Shāh had his own name read in the

Auer-12.indd 113

6/10/12 1:27 PM

114

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

khuṭbah along with previous sultans beginning with Muʿizz al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Sām.32 ʿAfīf makes no mention of any of the caliphs’ names being read at the Friday sermon or during the ʿĪd prayers, suggesting that he saw no need for such a basis of legitimization. However, ʿAfīf states that Fīrūz Shāh received the caliphal robe (jāmah-yi khilāfat) from Abū ‘l-Fatḥ Abū Bakr al-Muʿtaḍid b. Abū Rabī Sulaymān (r. 753–63/1352–62). ʿAfīf ’s narrative was primarily constructed to highlight the piety of Fīrūz Shāh, who ʿAfīf believed was the epitome of the ideal ruler. The excellence and even miraculous nature of his rule, according to ʿAfīf, is further attested to by the fact that he received the caliphal investiture without petition (bi-ghayr iltimās). Both Muḥammad b. Tughluq and Iltutmish had made formal requests for recognition. Jūzjānī notes that Iltutmish sent the emissary Rashīd al-Dīn Abū Bakr Ḥabash bearing gifts to the court in Baghdad, thus actively seeking caliphal investiture.33 In the Javāmiʿ al-ḥikāyāt va lavāmiʿ al-rivāyāt, Sadīd al-Dīn Muḥammad ʿAwfī (fl. 625/1228) credited the vizier Niẓām al-Mulk Junaydī with the initiative to send gifts to the caliph in Baghdad in order to secure investiture during the reign of Iltutmish.34 Thus, for ʿAfīf, caliphal recognition of Fīrūz Shāh was a sign of divine acknowledgment. Like Baranī and Jūzjānī, ʿAfīf describes the reception of caliphal robes as an immense public and formal display. The Sultan went out of the city to greet the delegation on the road, thereby showing the greatest respect before donning the robe. The manshūr from the caliph conferred upon Fīrūz Shāh the title of Chief of Sultans (sayyid al-salāṭīn).35 As with the robes, the manshūr was handled with the utmost deference. ʿAfīf describes the Sultan holding it carefully with both hands, kissing it, and raising it to both of his eyes. According to ʿAfīf, once this ceremony was over the Sultan bowed down to the ground in the direction of the house of the caliphate (dār al-khilāfat) and the court chamberlains (ḥujjāb-i bārgāh) called out happy tidings. ʿAfīf indicates that the reception of caliphal robes happened on multiple occasions and that each time three sets of robes were sent: one for the Sultan, a second for his son Fatḥ Khān,

Auer-12.indd 114

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Caliphal Authority and Representation

115

and a third for his vizier Khān Jahān. The Sultan distributed robes to the emissaries from the caliph and the nobles of the court. The caliphal robes were then stored in the royal wardrobe and the other symbols of rank were deposited in the royal standard storehouse. On the same day a feast was held for the general populace of the city. Further details of these events are compiled in the anonymous work Sīrat-i Fīrūz Shāhī, completed in 772/1370 or 71. According to this work the first caliphal investiture was brought by Shaykh Shihāb al-Dīn Aḥmad Ṣāmit in 754/1353.36 In a portion of the Sīrat-i Fīrūz Shāhī that is likely a reproduction of the actual document of investiture, the Sultan was conferred the titles the Sword of the Caliphate (sayf al-khilāfat) and the Partner of the Commander of the Faithful (qasīm amīr al-muʾminīn). Subsequently, robes and other symbols of authority were received from Abū ʿAbd Allāh al-Mutawakkil (r. 763–79/1362–77) in 764/1363. The author notes the expanse of territory conferred upon Fīrūz Shāh that he calls the “kingdom of the regions of India” (mamlakat-i aqālim-i Hind). He said this domain spanned the island of Sri Lanka and the coastal lands of Maʿbar and Kollam in the south, Bengal in the east and Sind in the west, the Himalayan Mountains, and all the way to the borders of Turkistan and Transoxiana.37 He received envoys bearing the investiture again in 766/1365 and 771/1370. In addition to symbolically demonstrating the authority and legitimacy of the sultans of Delhi, caliphal investiture had a secondary purpose. It could be shared and transmitted to subordinates or potential rivals in the form of a symbolic designation of authority. Acting as the reigning sultan of Delhi, Iltutmish designated his own authority, acknowledging Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh’s victory over Sultan Ghiyās ̱ al-Dīn ʿIvaz̤ in Bengal. Jūzjānī notes that he selected a precious robe (tashrīf-i girān māya) he had received from Baghdad and sent it as a gift to his son, the future ruler of Delhi, along with a ruby-studded parasol (chatr-i laʿl), another symbol of sultanic authority.38 In a reverse action, various sultans of Bengal alluded to their recognition of the central authority of Delhi by directly recognizing the authority of the caliph.39 This was also the case with

Auer-12.indd 115

6/10/12 1:27 PM

116

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

the independent ruler of Maʿbar, Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Damghān Shāh (r. 745–57/1344–56) and the Bahmanī sultan Muḥammad (r. 759–76/1358–75).40 Caliphal investiture was also a means of building and sustaining pan-Islamic networks, as delegations were exchanged between courts. Emissaries in these delegations provided a physical link across the vast distances that separated Muslim polities. For instance, al-Ḥasan b. Muḥammad al-Ṣaghānī (577–650/1181–1252), the famous lexicographer and compiler of ḥadīth, was sent to India as an emissary of the caliph al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh (r. 575–622/1180–1225) in 617/1220. He remained there till 624/1226 or 27, when he returned to Baghdad. He made a second journey to India in the same year at the behest of al-Mustanṣir and stayed until 630/1232 or 33.41 It is said that when Muḥammad b. Tughluq took the oath of allegiance (bayʿa) after receiving caliphal investiture he had the Qurʾān and the Mashāriq al-anwār of al-Ṣaghānī with him.42 Jūzjānī also evidences the effective transregional networks produced through the exchange of emissaries. He notes several occasions in which Ghiyās ̱ al-Dīn Muḥammad of Ghūr (r. 558–99/1163–1203) was honored with precious investiary robes of honor (khilʿat-i fākhirah) from both al-Mustaz̤ī (r. 566–75/1170–80) and al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh. On one occasion an emissary named Ibn al-Khaṭīb came in the entourage bearing the caliphal documents and symbols of investiture. On his return Jūzjānī’s father Sirāj al-Dīn was appointed to accompany him back to the court of the caliph.43 Ultimately, perhaps the credit for the sustained relevance of the ʿAbbāsid caliphate in the Delhi Sultanate can be traced to Iltutmish, who petitioned for caliphal investiture and established Sultanate authority on that basis. It might be said that Iltutmish was merely following precedent, crafting his authority on the model of Sunnī rulers before him, just as Saljūq rulers had propagated an image of themselves as “obedient to (Sunnī) Islamic principles” and “loyal to the ʿAbbāsid caliphs.” Saljūq historians adopted imagery of the loyal, upright, Sunnī ruler, imagery Omid Safi has called the “Great Saljūq Myth.”44 In actuality, relations between ʿAbbāsid caliphs and Saljūq sultans were quite different than the ideal depicted in history

Auer-12.indd 116

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Caliphal Authority and Representation

117

writing and are better characterized as strained by a struggle over power and authority.45 Finally, it could be said that Iltutmish was responding to the historical currents of his day. ʿAbbāsid caliphs had regained some of their temporal authority in the period following the decline of the Saljūqs in the late sixth/twelfth and early seventh/thirteenth centuries. Al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh was particularly effective in restoring ʿAbbāsid authority and reorienting attention back to the caliphate, and Iltutmish acknowledged this by placing his name on the coinage of Delhi.46 A degree of credit should go to Jūzjānī who wrote the investiture narrative into Sultanate historiography. His simple narrative clearly became a model for subsequent historians, and Baranī and ʿAfīf took up, modified, and retold that narrative in their own histories, enhancing it with a miraculous aura. Baranī divinized the investiture narrative not just to elevate the status of Fīrūz Shāh but rather to sanctify the genealogy of Muslim authority, linking it back to the Prophet Muḥammad. ʿAfīf takes the opportunity of the events of Fīrūz Shāh’s investiture to eulogize the Sultan and to establish his rule not so much on caliphal authority as on divine consent. In the broadest view, their investiture narratives reveal the explicit ways sultans of Delhi aligned themselves with Sunnī caliphal legitimacy. Styles of Legitimacy and Sultanic Titles in the Delhi Sultanate Titles indicating sovereignty appear in an array of formulations in Sultanate historiography and they form a basic ingredient in the hierarchical structures of the imperial apparatus.47 This is evident in the pages upon pages dedicated to the titles of rulers. Some titles were coined by the Delhi sultans, others were adopted from previous examples: pre-Islamic Persian notions of kingship were represented by the titles shāhānshāh and khusraw, Arabic titles such as malik and amīr, and Turkish honorifics like atabeg and khān also appeared. Titles were more than a prefix or suffix indicating status and rank, but were concepts of rule that served a number of functions. They were used to signify association to a group, emphasize a political philosophy of rule, establish a connection with the past, produce

Auer-12.indd 117

6/10/12 1:27 PM

118

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

an aura of power, or mark a change in authority. For instance, the Sāmānid ruler Nūḥ b. Naṣr (r. 331–43/943–54) adopted the title of malik, one of the earliest usages by a Muslim ruler, to elevate his status in contradistinction to the authority of the caliph al-Muṭīʿ.48 Hārūn al-Rashīd utilized the title al-khalīfa al-marḍī signifying a unifying figure following a succession crisis.49 C. E. Bosworth notes in his study of titulature that “the wide dissemination of honorific titles in the Islamic world began at the top, with the adoption of regnal titles by the caliphs.”50 Historians utilized titles to convey a grand and all-encompassing concept of Sultanate authority. For instance, Jūzjānī refers to Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh, Iltutmish, and Balban as the “shadow of God in the worlds” (ẓill Allāh fī ‘l-ʿālamīn), a title which suggested that God provides refuge to humankind through the protection of sultans.51 This title was in wide usage across the Muslim world during the sixth/thirteenth century. It has been attributed to a saying of the prophet, “The sultan is God’s shadow on earth” (al-sulṭān ẓill Allāh fi ‘l-ʿarḍ).52 A number of titles, conferred or co-opted, indicated the role of someone who assists the caliph. These titles were transferred to the Delhi Sultanate via the earlier practices of the Ghaznavid and Ghūrid rulers. This is clearly displayed in the title of yamīn-i khalīfat Allāh or “the right hand of God’s caliph.”53 The title yamīn al-dawlah or “the right hand of power” was one of the first and favored titles that Sultan Maḥmūd received from Baghdad. It represented the role of the sultan as executor of the will of the caliph and Jūzjānī used it in relation to the reign of Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh as well as Iltutmish.54 With similar connotations, sultans of Delhi are referred to as the “helper of the commander of the faithful” (nāṣir amīr al-muʾminīn).55 Of course tradition has long ascribed the title “commander of the faithful” as dating back to ʿUmar’s caliphate. In another variation, Jūzjānī refers to Balban as the “assistant to the lord of the faithful” (ẓahīr amīr al-muʾminīn).56 One of the titles frequently used in the Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī is qasīm amīr al-muʾminīn. Part of its historical interest lies in Jūzjānī’s anecdote of how the title was first conferred upon the Shansabāniyyah

Auer-12.indd 118

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Caliphal Authority and Representation

119

during the reign of the ʿAbbāsid caliph Hārūn al-Rashīd.57 The caliphate of Hārūn al-Rashīd has long ignited the imagination of historians as a “golden age” in the history of Islamic societies.58 Jūzjānī credits this title to the good qualities of the early Ghūrid ruler, Amīr Banjī b. Nahārān Shansabānī. According to Jūzjānī, Amīr Banjī was particularly handsome (khūb-rūy) and of the highest moral character (guzīdah-yi akhlāq). In order to settle a dispute between his own tribe and that of the rival Shīshāniyān, it is said that Amīr Banjī approached Hārūn al-Rashīd. Jūzjānī says he was the first among that tribe (dūdmān) of Ghūr to visit the capital (dār al-khilāfah) and acquire the mandate (ʿahd) and banner (livāʾ) of the caliph. Jūzjānī notes that upon meeting and hearing his speech, the caliph was greatly impressed by Amīr Banjī and said that he was qasīm, meaning, in Jūzjānī’s version, that he was good-looking. In recognition of his good qualities, he was given shared authority over the territories of Ghūr. Earlier, Jūzjānī speculates that the founder of the Shansabānī, Shansab, was converted by the fourth caliph ʿAlī and that he received the investiture from him.59 Bosworth discusses these stories of conversion and legitimacy as fitting into a pattern of familiar myths.60 This anecdote establishes the idea that Muslim authority is only transmitted through the formal investiture of the caliph, in this case legitimating the authority of Ghūrid dynasties. Jūzjānī also suggests that titles were not merely symbolic, but were meant to embody the real qualities of rulers. As was mentioned previously, Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh’s early reign predated the destruction of the ʿAbbāsid caliphate in Baghdad and he never received any official delegation from the caliph. Nevertheless, Jūzjānī provided his patron with the title of qasīm amīr al-muʾminīn, a title previously acquired through the formal caliphal investiture of sultanic authority.61 Some sultans of Delhi took their claims of authority a step further and in subtle and overt ways appropriated caliphal symbolism for themselves. Ishtiaq Qureshi argues that ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh flirted with adopting the title of caliph for himself, or at least was not averse to being praised as such.62 His court historian and

Auer-12.indd 119

6/10/12 1:27 PM

120

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

panegyrist Amīr Khusraw describes his rule as raising the banners of his own caliphate (ʿalāmāt-i khilāfat-i khvīsh) following the demise of the ʿAbbāsid caliphs.63 Similarly he refers to ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh as carrying the banner of the Prophet’s caliphate (ʿalam-i khilāfat-i Muḥammadī) and refers to Delhi as the city of Islam (madīnat al-Islām), an epithet Jūzjānī used to refer to Baghdad, which was still the seat of the ʿAbbāsid caliphate.64 Amīr Khusraw goes further to refer to ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh as caliph, a fact he believes should be acknowledged by Sunnī Muslims (sunniyān) for his victories over the infidels (kuffār) and suppression of the dissenters (s. rāfiz̤, pl. ravāfiz̤). The maintenance of religious order was one of the most important functions of any ruler who held the title of imām.65 Some modern scholars question the language applied to ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh, arguing against a literal reading of the texts. Aziz Ahmad suggests that there was a “loosening of meaning” in the Persian usage of khalīfah and sulṭān.66 Khaliq Ahmad Nizami similarly dismisses any suggestion that Amīr Khusraw, as well as Amīr Ḥasan Sijzī (655–737/1275–1336), could have meant anything other than sultan in applying the title of caliph to ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh.67 However, it is unlikely that literary figures of the stature of Amīr Khusraw and Amīr Ḥasan Sijzī simply substituted the term khalīfah for sulṭān in their panegyrics of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh. The most irrefutable case of a sultan of Delhi appropriating caliphal authority was ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh’s son, Quṭb al-Dīn Mubārak Shāh. He was not as demure as his father and proclaimed himself caliph outright. By 717/1317 he had immortalized his status as caliph in the inscriptions of his coins and adopted the traditional titles, the exalted leader (al-imām al-aʿāẓam), the caliph of God (khalīfat Allāh), and the commander of the faithful (amīr al-muʾminīn).68 Amīr Khusraw played the role of court panegyrist and assigned Quṭb al-Dīn Mubārak Shāh the title of caliph.69 Baranī makes no mention of Quṭb al-Dīn’s pretensions in his history; perhaps he was not eager to acknowledge this controversial act of a sultan of Delhi.

Auer-12.indd 120

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Caliphal Authority and Representation

121

Quṭb al-Dīn’s proclamation of caliphal authority against the ʿAbbāsid family was not unusual in Islamic history. Umayyad rulers of Spain (r. 316–422/929–1031) and Fāṭimid rulers of North Africa and Egypt (r. 297–567/909–1171) were two of the more successful dynasties to establish claims of authority over the office of caliphate. ʿAbd al-Raḥmān III (r. 300–50/912–61) established his authority by linking his genealogy back to the Umayyad caliphs of Damascus. To this end, historiography played a role in “staking the claim” to caliphal legitimacy during the fourth/tenth century in Andalusia. Spanish Umayyad rulers patronized historians such as ʿUmar b. al-Qūṭiyyah (d. 367/977), author of Taʾrīkh iftitāḥ al-Andalus, in an attempt to universalize their local history and establish the authority of Andalusian kings through the conquest narrative and the fulfillment of divine will.70 Fāṭimid rulers offered a narrative of succession, tracing their genealogy through the concept of the imamate that stemmed from the line of ʿAlī and Fāṭimah, ʿAlī’s wife and the daughter of Muḥammad.71 Fāṭimid caliphs patronized history writing that crafted a powerful historical narrative closely allying political ideology with their claims to authority. This is perfectly exemplified in the Iftitāḥ al-daʿwa of al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān (d. 363/974), a figure intimately linked to the reign of the first four Fāṭimid caliphs and a major contributor to the ideology of the Fāṭimid empire.72 While no sultan of Delhi had sustained success in laying claim to the caliphate, it is tantalizing to imagine that possibility. Their dynasties spanned a period in which the relevance of the office of the caliph was quite uncertain. On the whole they chose to support, or at least nominally accept, the authority of the ʿAbbāsid caliphs, regardless of their real power. The historiographical record appears to show that in aligning themselves with the ʿAbbāsid concept of Muslim authority, the sultans of Delhi benefited in unexpected ways, even following the sack of Baghdad and the destruction of the caliphate in 656/1258. This is evident in one of the single most important historical narratives of the dramatic events of the fall of the house of ʿAbbās.

Auer-12.indd 121

6/10/12 1:27 PM

122

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

The Advent of the Mongols, Apocalyptic Vision, and the Refuge in India Jūzjānī’s record of the demise of the ʿAbbāsid caliphate is one of the most important historical narratives for its length and detail. While he was not an eyewitness to the event, he was a contemporary. Various Muslim historians documented the story, for instance Nāṣir al-Dīn Ṭūsī, who was in the company of Hūlāgū at the fall of Baghdad.73 However, Jūzjānī’s tale of war (jihād), the infidelity (kufr) of the Mongols, the treachery and deception perpetrated by al-Mustaʿṣim’s Shīʿah (rāfiz̤ī) vizier, and his dramatic execution— trampled to death under the feet of the men of Hūlāgū, the grandson of Chingiz Khān and conqueror of the throne at Baghdad—is one of the greatest historiographical achievements of his age.74 One of the key features of Jūzjānī’s narrative of the advance of the Mongol armies west into territories controlled by Muslim rulers is the way he speaks of the portents of the end of the world. For Jūzjānī, it was from fateful beginnings that the seeds of the ultimate destruction of Islam were sown, a tragedy he identified with the execution of the ʿAbbāsid caliph. In historical writings, traditions concerning the apocalyptic destruction of the world were often attributed to the sayings of the Prophet. Jūzjānī reports a tradition about a group of Muḥammad’s Companions, who questioned him about “the Hour” (al-sāʿat).75 Jūzjānī says, in Persian, that the Prophet predicted that the world would come to a close, “After six hundred and some years.”76 The ambiguity of “some” leads Jūzjānī into an understandable burst of etymological investigation, from which he concludes that indeed the signs of the end were at hand. He finds evidence for this in the death of Muʿizz al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Sām, who, coincidentally, died in 602/1206, the same year the great Mongol leader Chingiz Khān initiated his military campaigns.77 He refers to this as the “eruption of the infidels” (khurūj al-kuffār).78 Aside from the tragedies that befell Muslim rulers during this period, the early Mongol conquests led to large scale Muslim migrations to South Asia and Anatolia. These individuals brought with them stories of death and destruction that

Auer-12.indd 122

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Caliphal Authority and Representation

123

were then extensively and sorrowfully commented on by Sultanate historians. Jūzjānī likely heard tales from refugees and described them as apocalyptic visions. For example, he notes ominously, “The first sign of the resurrection (qiyāmat) is the coming of the Turks (turk).”79 Jūzjānī’s writings reflect a broader trend in apocalypticism that pervaded the Muslim world during this period.80 Apocalyptic visions produced in the context of invading nomadic tribes from the Central Asian steppe can be traced back to the early ʿAbbāsid period and were often interwoven with the ancient myth of Gog and Magog (Yājūj wa Mājūj). The understanding of the peoples of Gog and Magog comes from a pre-Islamic eschatological tradition and was later adopted in Muslim apocalyptic writings.81 Qurʾānic reference to Gog and Magog is found in Q18:93–98 and Q21:96. Jūzjānī wished to evoke the Qurʾānic imagery in his apocalyptic tale without stating it explicitly. To accomplish this he makes subtle allusion to a Qurʾānic narrative by referring to Muʿizz al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Sām as a barrier (saddī) against the rebellions of the final time (fitna-hā-yi ākhir al-zamān) and the appearance of the signs of the resurrection (ẓahūr-i ʿalāmāt-i qiyāmat).82 The reference to the barrier evokes accounts of Gog and Magog that involve the heroic feats of Alexander, referred to in the Qurʾān as Dhū ‘l-Qarnayn, “the two-horned,” who enclosed them “between two mountains and shut them behind the Caspian Gates.”83 This is discussed in “Sūrat al-Kahf,” verses 93 and 94, where we read:

َ ُ َ َ َّ‫َ ٗ ا‬ ُ ۡ َّ َّ َ ۡ‫َ ىَّ ٰٓ َ َ َ َ ن‬ َ َ ‫ت إِذا بلغ َبي ٱلسدي ِن َوجد ِمن دون ِ ِه َما ق ۡوما ل يكادون‬ ‫ح‬ ٗ‫َ ۡ َ ُ َ َ ۡ ا‬ ٩٣ ‫يفقهون قول‬ Till, when he reached [a place] between the two barriers (saddayn), he found beneath them a people who could scarcely understand a word.

َ ۡ‫أ‬ ََۡ َ ُ ۡ ُ َ ُ ۡ َ َ َ ُ ۡ َ َّ ۡ‫َ ُ ْ َ ٰ َ ۡ َ ۡ َ ن‬ ِ ‫ي إِن يأجوج ومأجوج مفسِدون يِف ٱل‬ ‫ۡرض فهل‬ ِ ‫قالوا يذا ٱلقرن‬

Auer-12.indd 123

6/10/12 1:27 PM

124

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

ّٗ َ ۡ َ َ َ ۡ َ َ َ ۡ َ‫جَ ۡ َ ُ َ َ َ ۡ ً لَىَ ٰٓ َ ج‬ ٩٤ ‫ع أن تعل بيننا َوبين ُه ۡم َسدا‬ ‫نعل لك خرجا‬ They said: “Oh Dhū ‘l-Qarnayn! Behold, Gog and Magog are spoiling the earth. May we, then, pay you a tribute on the understanding that you will erect a barrier (sadd) between us and them?” By giving this Qurʾānic reference, Jūzjānī succeeds in comparing the heroic military exploits of Muʿizz al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Sām to those of Alexander. He reorients the imaginative geography of the barrier, traditionally associated with the Caucasus region, to that of the world of Central Asia and the impact of the armies of Chingiz Khān. He shifts the Qurʾānic vision of the conquests of Gog and Magog onto the border regions controlled by the sultans of Delhi. Jūzjānī’s narrative leading up to the fall of the ʿAbbāsid caliphate displays theological elements of predestination. He assigns a degree of responsibility for setting in motion the fateful events to the greed of a Muslim ruler and retells the tale of the early encounter between Muslims and Mongols. When Sultan Muḥammad Khwārazm Shāh (r. 596–617/1200–20) learned of the early conquests of Chingiz Khān, he wanted to acquire intelligence on his forces and their movements. He commissioned the emissary Bahāʾ al-Dīn Rāzī to lead a mission to Chingiz Khān. Jūzjānī makes special mention of the fact that he received the details of these events directly from the Sultan’s emissary.84 On his journey east, at the edge of the region of Ṭamghāj, Bahāʾ al-Dīn Rāzī and his group saw a peculiar sight across a vast distance. At first, to those who beheld the vision, it looked like a snowy mountain. Horrified, they learned from their guides that it was a mountain of human bones. As they progressed they traveled for three days where the ground was soaked with human fat. At the end of this frightening journey they encountered Chingiz Khān. The Great Khan offered the emissaries of Sultan Muḥammad Khwārazm a pact of trade and peace. To cement the deal he distributed precious gifts to their party and dispatched a caravan loaded with valuable goods

Auer-12.indd 124

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Caliphal Authority and Representation

125

for trade. However, the caravan was sacked by Qadr Khān, apparently with the permission of Khwārazm Shāh. Everyone in the trading company was killed with the exception of one camel driver, who happened to be taking a bath at the time of the attack. He escaped through the stove of the bathhouse and by way of the desert returned to Chingiz Khān to report the terrible news. Jūzjānī reports that it was this treachery (ghadr) that sealed the fate of Islam, a fate that was predestined in the divine will of God. Jūzjānī emphatically drives home this point by inserting the following verse from Q33:38:

َّ‫َ اَ َ َ ۡ ُ ه‬ ً ‫ٱللِ قَ َد ٗرا َّم ۡق ُد‬ ٣٨ ‫ورا‬ ‫وكن أمر‬ God’s decrees are preordained.85 From this point forward, Jūzjānī narrates the steady advances and ruthless successes of Chingiz Khān. He says that for every piece of gold and coin that belonged to the traders that fell in Chingiz Khān’s caravan, each and every bit was recovered by his armies and wherever they were found, each treasury, kingdom, and country was conquered by him, a “fact” that Jūzjānī attempts to authenticate by saying his informants swore to its veracity.86 Out of this eschatological imagination Jūzjānī constructs the historical role and salvific function of the Delhi Sultanate in relation to the broader Muslim world following the destruction of the ʿAbbāsid caliphate. Since during Jūzjānī’s lifetime a vast swath of the territories previously held under Muslim control were usurped by Mongol armies, the Delhi sultans became a source of deliverance. Jūzjānī writes: The kingdom of Hindustan (mamālik-i Hindūstān), by the grace of the divine bounty and the favor of heavenly benevolence, became the center of the people of Islam (ḥawzah-yi ahl-i Islām) and the circle of the companions of the faith (dāʾirah-yi aṣḥāb-i īmān) under the protection of the shade of the Shamsī family and the care of the illustrious house of Iltutmish.

Auer-12.indd 125

6/10/12 1:27 PM

126

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

He completes this thought with a quote from Q62:4:

َ ۡ ۡ َ ۡ ُ ُ َّ‫َ ٰ ِ َ َ ۡ ُ هَّ ِ ُ ۡ ِ َ َ َ ٓ ُ َ ه‬ ٤ ‫ٱلل ذو ٱلفض ِل ٱلعظِي ِم‬ ‫ذلك فضل ٱلل يؤتِيه من يشاء ۚ و‬ Such is the grace of the God, He bestows it on whom He wills and God is the possessor of the greatest grace.87 Jūzjānī further solidifies Delhi’s predestined role as defender of Islam in his account of the death of Ögedei, the son of Chingiz Khān, in 639/1241. Jūzjānī details a separate prophetic tradition that told that when the Turks erupt (khurūj-i Turk) and the narrow-eyed (tang chashmān) seize the world and destroy the Persian lands, the power of their armies would diminish when they reached Lahore.88 For Jūzjānī this prediction came true in the case of Ögedei who made it as far as Lahore but unexpectedly died two days after its conquest, thus he left the Mongol armies disunited and in disarray. Overall, Jūzjānī saw the land of India and the Muslim kings who inhabited it as a bulwark against the forces of chaos, a standard holding firm against the winds of the destruction of the world. For him, as well as for the many Muslim refugees who made their way to India following the Mongol invasions, the destruction of the caliphate was simultaneously the formation of the Delhi Sultanate as a refuge for the Muslim world. This is made all the more ironic for the fact that the early rulers of Delhi came from that same stock of ethnic Turks and Mongols that were “cursed.” Thus, while historians strove to disguise contradictions in their narratives and to “communicate the sense of stability and order, on the other hand, frontier commanders like Ghiyas al-Din Tughluq had to be creatively reinvented as paradigms of virtue, a veritable ‘saviour of Islam.’”89 Religion served as a unifying force that obviated against ethnically based alliances and conflicts. The Four Friends of the Chosen One Aside from the contemporary political relations that inspired historical narratives relating the Delhi Sultanate to the ʿAbbāsid caliphate,

Auer-12.indd 126

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Caliphal Authority and Representation

127

historians drew from the past to craft narratives around the earliest caliphs, the “rightly-guided caliphs” (khulafāʾ-i rāshidūn). The first four caliphs were recognized as the paragons of Islamic rule and the sultans of Delhi acknowledged this in their coinage and inscriptions.90 Historians of the Delhi Sultanate acknowledged the elevated status of the Rāshidūn in their narratives of the early caliphs. Jūzjānī’s own treatment of the Rāshidūn fits clearly within the frame of universal history, in fact he dedicates the second chapter (ṭabaqah) of his history to discussions of the early caliphs: Abū Bakr, ʿUmar, ʿUthmān, and ʿAlī. He gives a brief description of each of their physical attributes, genealogy and progeny, their precedence in accepting Islam (sābiqah), their ascension to the caliphate, and conquests. Jūzjānī devotes the lengthiest description to the caliphate of ʿAlī and credits al-Wāqidī and Ibn Isḥāq for many of the details. Arrangements of history according to caliphates developed in the late second/early ninth century. According the Albrecht Noth this was part of a gradual trend in “the establishment of an official historiography under a strong, central, caliphal government.”91 As early as the second/ninth century, authors dedicated large portions of the early styles of the manāqib literature to the praiseworthy actions and noble qualities of the Rāshidūn. The virtues most notably on display in works dedicated to the Rāshidūn were “courage, truthfulness, abstemiousness, and generosity.”92 The lives of the early caliphs were also presented with theological and political implications and display polemics on a large number of issues: from precedence in accepting Islam (sābiqah), to disputes over the designation of authority, to the struggle for control over the definition of the family of the Prophet (ahl al-bayt).93 Baranī goes further than Jūzjānī in his treatment of the Rāshidūn, giving them a central place in the introduction (dībāchah) to the Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī. Baranī foraged through the genre of manāqib literature, picking bits and pieces to highlight the “virtues of the four friends of the Chosen One” (manāqib-i chahār yār-i Muṣṭafá).94 Baranī participates in disputes generated in the second/ninth century, utilizing narrative strategies, selections of facts, and panegyric

Auer-12.indd 127

6/10/12 1:27 PM

128

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

language to both subtly and overtly advance his ideological agenda. Above all, he argues that it is the qualities of the “four friends of the Chosen One” (chahār yār-i Muṣṭafá) (the epithet Baranī assigns the Rāshidūn), that require our attention. To illustrate the encomium reserved for them he quotes from Q9:100:

ُ ُ َّ َ َّ‫َ َ أۡ َ َ َ لذ‬ َ ُ ۡ َ َ ُ َّ َ ۡ‫َ َّ ٰ ُ َ أ‬ ِ ‫ج ِرين وٱلنصارِ وٱ‬ ‫ين ٱت َبعوهم‬ ‫و‬ ِ ٰ ‫ٱلسبِقون ٱلولون ِمن ٱلمه‬ ْ ۡ َ ُ َّ‫ۡ َ ٰ َّ يِ َ ه‬ َُۡ ُ ‫بِإِحس ٖن رض‬ ١٠٠ ‫ٱلل عن ُه ۡم َو َرضوا عنه‬ Those with precedence are the first of the muhājirīn and the anṣār, and those who followed them in doing good, God is pleased with them and they are pleased with him.95 Baranī says that ultimate praise goes to them in “Sūrat al-Anfāl” 8:64:

َ َ َّ َ ُ َّ‫َ ٰٓ َ ُّ َ َّ ُّ َ ۡ ُ َ ه‬ َ ۡ ۡ ٦٤ ‫ٱلل َوم ِن ٱت َبعك ِم َن ٱل ُمؤ ِمن ِني‬ ‫يأيها ٱنل يِب حسبك‬ Oh Prophet, God suffices you, and those who follow you among the believers.96 Aligning his praise with that given in the Qurʾān, Baranī elevates the literary status of his narrative of the early caliphs. Baranī begins his narrative with the caliphate of Abū Bakr (r. 11–13/632–34), saying, “From the time of Abū Bakr the affairs of world rule were put in order and the pretenders to prophethood (mutanabbiyān-i nubuvvah) and the opponents of religion (muʾānidān-i dīn) were destroyed.”97 Here Baranī makes reference to groups engaged in conflict with the early Muslim community, groups that historians writing in Arabic collectively call the riddah, literally “turning away” or apostasy.98 He recalls the conquest of Syria and Iraq, when the armies of Islam (ʿasākir-i Islām) confronted the kings without religion (bādshāhān-i bī-dīn). Baranī champions the age of Abū Bakr as a time when those who sowed strife (fitna) and those who rejected Islam (murtaddān-i

Auer-12.indd 128

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Caliphal Authority and Representation

129

Islām) were destroyed and their wealth, children, and women were made the booty of those who struggled for religion (mujāhidān-i dīn). It was also a period when the traditions of the chosen one (sunnat-i Muṣṭafá) gained ascendancy. Baranī’s grand narrative of the caliphate of Abū Bakr is one of the conquest and victory of the forces of Islam over those of irreligion. In the same manner, the historiographical framework for the expansion of Islam in India is structured according to conflict narratives broadly conceived as battles between religion and irreligion. Following Abū Bakr, Baranī discusses the succession, as it passed to ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭāb (r. 13–23/634–44), who took his place on the “seat of the caliphate” (masnad-i khilāfat). According to Baranī, it was during his reign that all of the inhabitable realms of the world were conquered, a fact that he says was among the “signs of the eternal miracles” (āsār-i muʿjizāt-i abad) of Muḥammad.99 He describes it as a time when the rulings of sharīʿah (aḥkām-i sharīʿah) and the knowledge of Islam (ʿilm-i Islām) was spread to the world’s inhabitants (ʿālamiyān). Baranī lists these as all the tribes (qabāʾil) of Arabia, Hijaz, Yemen, Bahrain, the kingdoms (mamālik) of Iraq and Syria, and Egypt, most of Khurasan and Transoxiana (mā warāʾ al-nahr), and some of the regions of Byzantium (rūm). These regions were opened by the “sword of struggle” (tīgh-i jihād) during the “ʿUmarian caliphate” (khilāfat-i ʿUmarī). Under ʿUmar, Baranī sees the old world order overturned for a new world order dominated by Islam. The new order was distinguished by its humility, which he juxtaposes with the pomp and circumstance of royal courts. In his own view the poor of the Companions (fuqarāʾ-i ṣahābah), who were close to the doorstep (dargāh) of Muḥammad, became commander (amīr) and governor (wālī), replacing the throne of Khusraw (Kasrā), Caesar (Qayṣar), and the sultans (salāṭīn).100 It was also a religious revolution in which “infidelity (kufr), polytheism (shirk), and fire worship (ātish parastī) were removed from the realms of Iraq and other places, along with the religion of the Zoroastrians and the cult of the Magi (dīn-i Majūs va mazhab-i Mūghān).”101 It was a time of construction, when the cities of Islam (shahr-hā-yi Islām) were built. According to Baranī, it was a wonder of wonders

Auer-12.indd 129

6/10/12 1:27 PM

130

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

(ʿajab al-ʿajāʾib) in the seven thousand years since the life of Adam that ʿUmar b. Khaṭṭāb ruled (sulaymānī va sikandarī kardan) by combining the way of Muḥammad with the fourteen robes (khirqahyi chahārdah). It was a time when the rebellious submitted out of fear of the scourge of ʿUmar (az rubʾ-i dirra-yi ʿUmarī).102 Also, the wealth of the kings of Persia, the Khosroes (akāsira) and the Caesars (qayāṣira), fell to the leaders of Islam and was distributed to the noble and the common in the mosque of the chosen one (masjid-i Muṣṭafá) and on the plain of Medina (ṣaḥrāʾ-i Madīnah). Baranī narrates the humility and lack of greed of ʿUmar, who only took two handfuls of wealth from the conquest to his house. For his wages he made a living for himself and his family from brick-making (khisht zanī); this greatly enhanced his respect among the Companions. Baranī goes on to praise ʿUmar by comparing him with pre-Islamic Persian kings. According to Baranī, even Jamshīd, Kayqubād, and Kaykhusraw were not capable of handling rebellions and upheaval. Except for the prophets and messengers, in seven thousand years no king (bādshāh) or caliph (khalīfah) of such capacity had appeared. With heightened rhetoric Baranī claims that the world saw justice (ʿadl) and magnanimity (ʿaṭā) in ʿUmar that had not been seen in one hundred Anūshīrvāns the Just, or Ḥātim al-Ṭāʾī.103 ʿUmar’s justice is a recurrent motif in Delhi Sultanate historiography and his model was utilized as a simile for certain sultans of Delhi. In praise of Balban, Jūzjānī says that no one had ever heard a more beautiful story of imperial strength, whose justice resembles that of the legacy of ʿUmar.104 ʿUmar’s justice and style of rule becomes, in Baranī’s model, an example that attempts to strike a balance between sharīʿah and siyāsah.105 To this end Baranī says that he successfully combined kingship (jamshīdī) with renunciation (darvīshī), one of the central challenges of Muslim authority according to Baranī. Baranī goes on to list a series of ʿUmar’s first accomplishments. This section comes from the awāʾil tradition, a literature dedicated to “firsts.” He was the first caliph to be called the commander of the faithful (amīr al-muʾminīn); he was the first caliph to set aside financial assistance (rizq) for the warriors (mujāhidān) and people

Auer-12.indd 130

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Caliphal Authority and Representation

131

who have just claims (ahl-i ḥuqūq); he was the first caliph to construct cities; he was the first caliph to put up dwellings for the Companions (ṣaḥābah) and followers (tābaʿīn); he was the first caliph to establish the tax (kharāj) on the people of Islam (ahl-i Islām); he was the first caliph to appoint judges (quz̤āt) in the cities of Islam; he was the first caliph to chastise (adab kardan) the people with the scourge (dirra); and he was the first caliph of Islam to be martyred (shahīd shudan). Baranī gives a shorter and quite a different depiction of ʿUthmān, in contrast to the strength and battle readiness of Abū Bakr and ʿUmar.106 He says that ʿUthmān was known for his clemency and modesty (ḥilm va ḥayāʾ). He collected the Qurʾān in one book (ṣaḥīfa) and there was a consensus of the Companions (ijmāʾ-i ṣaḥābah) on his compilation (jamʿ). He was a scribe of prophecy (kātib-i waḥy) and preserver of the Qurʾān (ḥāfiẓ-i Qurʾān). He married two of the Prophet’s daughters and thus he was called the “Possessor of Two Lights” (zu ‘l-nūrayn); this emphasized how much he was favored by the Prophet. Without discussing this period as one of conquest, Baranī is content to say that under ʿUthmān the provinces of ʿUmar remained obedient to him and all of Khurasan and Transoxiana were brought under control. Conspicuously, Baranī makes no mention of the assassination of ʿUthmān, a transformative historical moment that produced vast quantities of historiographical activity for the questions it raised on the succession to the caliphate. His excision of this narrative helped preserve a unified concept of the period of the Rāshidūn. Baranī quickly moves from his brief narrative of the caliphate of ʿUthmān to discuss the life and character of ʿAlī. He says that after the prophets and messengers from the time of Adam till the end of the world, he is extraordinary in knowledge (ʿilm). In courage (shajāʿat) he was second only to Ḥamza b. ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib, the paternal uncle of the Prophet. Ḥamza has been valorized in both poetry and prose for his bravery at the battle of Badr and his display of fighting prowess in single challenge combat.107 The theme of ʿAlī’s courage was incorporated into the imagery of the sultan in earlier Sultanate historiography. In courage (shajāʿat), Jūzjānī describes

Auer-12.indd 131

6/10/12 1:27 PM

132

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Iltutmish as a second ʿAlī.108 Similarly, he refers to Sultan Tāj al-Dīn Yildiz al-Muʿizzī (d. ca. 611/1215), Ghūrid commander and ultimately rival to Iltutmish, as being a second ʿAlī in bravery (dilāvarī).109 Baranī offers ample reasons for the reverence paid to ʿAlī, listing point by point the characteristics that legitimated his succession to the caliphate. He says the honor of the one who is pleasing (murtaẓá), an epithet traditionally applied to ʿAlī, was proven in every respect among the Companions. First, he was the son of the uncle of the chosen one (Muṣṭafá) and was among the exiled of the Banī Hāshim. The claim to a shared familial genealogy with Muḥammad was one of the most important bases of authority available for descendents of ʿAlī. In the broader context of Islamic legitimacy, this was subsumed under the concept of people of the house (ahl al-bayt). The boundaries of descent were particularly contested in the competing Umayyad, ʿAbbāsid, and ʿAlid claims to the leadership of the Muslim community.110 Second, Muḥammad found protection in the care of ʿAlī’s father, Abū Ṭālib. Third, he was father to Ḥasan and Ḥusayn. Fourth, the Prophet called him the most abstemious (azhad) and he was the most abstemious of the Companions. Fifth, none of the Companions resembled him in his abundance of learning (vufūr-i ʿilm). Sixth, he never flinched in the face of infidelity (kufr) and polytheism (shirk), even before taking the oath (bayʿa).111 Seventh, in reference to him, several verses from the Qurʾān were revealed. Baranī reports that during ʿAlī’s caliphate, the brothers of ʿUthmān who had become the governors of the provinces of Islam (mamālikat-i Islām), gave birth to a number of innovations (bidʿat-hā).112 ʿAlī wanted to change those innovations back to the custom of the Prophet (sunnah). He placed truth first, in central place, and adorned it with the customs of the Prophet (sunan-i Muḥammadī) and the rule of ʿUmar (z̤abṭ-i ʿUmarī). Muʿāwiyah (r. ca. 41–60/661–80), the first Umayyad caliph, and the brothers of ʿUthmān confronted ʿAlī with rebellion (baghī) and tyranny (shaṭāṭ) and did not offer their allegiance to him. Abdelkader Tayoub discusses the manner in which al-Ṭabarī framed the “first fitna” and how it reveals his ideological and theological attitudes toward the succession of ʿAlī

Auer-12.indd 132

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Caliphal Authority and Representation

133

and Muʿāwiyah.113 For Baranī this signified the end of the power and strength that existed during the age of the shaykhs (ʿahd-i shaykhīn). Baranī then narrates the death of ʿAlī. ʿAlī set out for Iraq from Medina, stopping in Kūfa with two hundred, among whom fifty were Companions. For four years and four months he was under siege, from a group not made up of Companions according to Baranī, during which time the rebellious army killed many of the Companions. Finally, the Khārijī leader Ibn Muljam, “the Cursed” (malʾūn) as Baranī refers to him, assassinated ʿAlī in 40/661. He stabbed ʿAlī with a dagger, killing the caliphate of prophethood (khilāfat-i nubuvvah). The idea of the caliphate of prophethood reveals Baranī’s ultimate understanding of his succession to Muḥammad. In his view the continuation of Muslim rule that achieved the example set by Muḥammad, one that ended with the caliphate of ʿAlī, was short-lived. The conclusion of the caliphate of prophethood signified, for Baranī, the fact that the period of shared religious and political authority in the figure of the caliph had ended. He emphasized this view by quoting the following oracular ḥadīth:

ْ ُ ُ َ َُ َْ َ ًَ َ َ ُ َ ْ َ ُ َ ْ‫خ‬ ‫ري ملك‬ ‫الِالفة بعدِ ي ثالثون سنة و بعده ي ِص‬ The caliphate after me will be thirty years and after that the age of kings.114 Muhammad Qasim Zaman shows that the usage of this ḥadīth in the early ʿAbbāsid period served to legitimate the caliphate of ʿAlī as belonging to the “golden age” of the rightly-guided caliphs (rāshidūn).115 Such an early termination of the caliphal ideal certainly goes against the Umayyad and ʿAbbāsid perpetuation of the caliphal function in Muslim societies. Barani’s inclusion of the thirty-year ḥadīth as a concluding flourish has a dual purpose. It serves to legitimate the reign of sultans by linking them back in a chain of transmitted authority that passed from the Prophet, down through the caliphs and to the Delhi Sultanate. The legitimating ḥadīth lends

Auer-12.indd 133

6/10/12 1:27 PM

134

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

a degree an authenticity to the rule of Delhi sultans. Read in another way, narrating the early transmission of authority from Muḥammad to the early caliphs might be viewed as an implied criticism of sultans. The concept of kingship (mulk), in some contexts, carried with it a negative connotation of the abuse of power and the extravagance of wealth. The sultan, acting as a king, evokes narratives of Umayyad dynasties that were vilified in historiography produced under patronage of ʿAbbāsid courts. Clearly caliphal narratives transcribed onto the pages of Sultanate historiography were a double-edged sword. Acquiring caliphal investiture and adopting titles indicating submission to a normative Sunnī ideology of Muslim authority sanctioned by ʿAbbāsid caliphs proved to be a reliable source of legitimacy for the sultans of Delhi. This legitimated their authority within the larger scheme of the global Muslim community. From another perspective, caliphal narratives were a challenge to sultanic power. They constrained sultans to behave according to a certain set of rules that restricted their power and required them to elevate their sense of humility and justice.

Auer-12.indd 134

6/10/12 1:27 PM

6 Sharīʿah and Justice

“Delhi is the . . . cradle of the rulings and prohibitions of sharīʿah.”1 —Minhāj Sirāj Jūzjānī “Religion and justice are twins.”2 —Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn Baranī Justifications for new forms of absolute Muslim authority ran particularly high in the fifth/eleventh through seventh/thirteenth centuries in periods when caliphal power was greatly challenged. In the quest for political legitimacy the sultans of Delhi turned toward, and at times away from, the sharīʿah to establish their authority. The sharīʿah was codified in a restricted body of legal rules monitored by the ʿulamāʾ.3 At the same time, sultans had access to a second set of rules (z̤avābiṭ) derived from ideas of pre-Islamic Persian kingship. The dual legal foundations of the Delhi Sultanate represented a challenge to the ultimate justice (ʿadl) of the sultan. Justice was one of the primary legitimating motifs of early Sultanate historiography.4 Historians of the period utilized the occasions of the sultan’s justice to reflect on the relationship between religion and pre-Islamic Persian kingship as sources of political legitimacy. Even earlier than the period in question, issues of the religious legitimacy of kings, sultans, and caliphs had been addressed in numerous prominent writings. Al-Māwardī, in his Aḥkām

Auer-12.indd 135

6/10/12 1:27 PM

136

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

al-sulṭāniyyah, attempted to resolve questions about the relationship between the sharīʿah and sultanic authority, many of which arose with the dilution of caliphal authority under Būyid ascendancy. Marshall Hodgson acutely sums up the efforts of al-Māwardī, saying that “He was especially concerned to formulate, in terms of the Sharīʿah, conditions under which caliphal authority could be delegated to subordinates—and tried to bring order and legal legitimacy into such delegation—which seemed likely to prove continuingly necessary.”5 Around the same time, Niẓām al-Mulk was laying out the principles of Muslim governance in his famed Siyāsatnāmah, combining preIslamic Persian kingship with the sharīʿah.6 The issue was certainly not resolved there. Ann Lambton claims that Niẓām al-Mulk failed to synthesize pre-Islamic Persian governance with sharīʿah, saying, “By restating the old Persian tradition of monarchy, with its independent ethical standards based on force and opportunism, he reaffirmed the duality between the ruling and the religious institutions.”7 In historiography, Roy Mottahedeh points to the way Abū ‘l-Faz̤l Bayhaqī (385–470/995–1077) attempted to legitimate a model of Muslim kingship by intimating at the divine providence of Muslim authority.8 Utilizing Qurʾānic precedent, Bayhaqī supported Ghaznavid claims to authority “as part of God’s decree”:

َ ۡ ۡ ُ َ َ ُ ٓ َ َ َ َ ۡ ُ ۡ ۡ ُ ۡ ُ ۡ َ ٰ َ َّ ُ َّ ُ ِ ‫ق ِل ٱللهم مل ِك ٱلمل‬ ‫زنع ٱل ُملك‬ ِ ‫ك تؤ يِت ٱلملك من تشاء وت‬ ۡ‫خ‬ ُّ ٓ ٓ َ َ َ َ ُ َ َ ُ ٓ ََ ۡ‫َ َير‬ ۖ ُ ‫ِم َّمن تشا ُء َوتع ُِّز من تشا ُء َوتذِل من تشا ُء ۖ ب ِ َيدِك ٱل‬ ّ ُ‫َّ َ لَىَ ٰ ل‬ ٞ ‫شءٖ قَد‬ ۡ َ‫ك ي‬ ‫إِنك‬ ٢٦ ‫ِير‬ ِ ‫ع‬ Say, oh God, possessor of sovereignty, you give sovereignty to whomever you choose and take it from whomever you choose, and exalt whom you chose and abase whom you choose. In your hand is the good; surely, you have power over all things.9 By the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/fourteenth centuries the sources for legitimacy in relation to the sharīʿah had become a primary concern of historians of the Delhi Sultanate who attempted

Auer-12.indd 136

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Sharīʿah and Justice

137

to judge, in light of history, the sultan’s ability to reconcile diverging systems of Muslim kingship, caliphal authority, and sharīʿah. They were primarily preoccupied with the dilemma presented by political power not covered by, or used as an alternative to, the sharīʿah. Political power, referred to in the sources as siyāsah, represented one of the greatest challenges to the religious claims of the legitimacy of sultans ruling from Delhi. It was this global predicament that led to the efforts of individuals like Ibn Taymiyyah and Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyyah (691–751/1292–1350) who, under the Mamlūk sultans of Egypt, attempted to formulate a theory that became known as siyāsah sharʿiyyah.10 This phenomenon was so momentous that some believe it represents a seismic shift in history writing, beginning roughly in the fifth/eleventh century. This brought about an era of “siyāsah-oriented historiography,” epitomized by the Mamlūk chronicles of the seventh/thirteenth century.11 It is through questions of the respective roles of the authority of kings and the ʿulamāʾ in relation to the parameters of the sharīʿah that the inherent tensions and ambiguities in the structures of power reveal themselves. Religious Authority and Kingly Power Narratives on the relationship between the sharīʿah and siyāsah in the Delhi Sultanate uncover the extent and limits of sultanic authority. They show a system of governance that allowed for the delegation of authority, particularly in the area of the judiciary, from the sultan down to viziers and judges (quz̤āt). Some scholars depict the relationship between the ʿulamāʾ and the sultan as a kind of stand off in which, “they could not influence a sultan, they could not easily be influenced by him.”12 The actual dynamics of influence were likely much more complex. While the sultan controlled the greatest power through his effective role as the chief military officer, an ambiguity remained concerning his role and function in relation to the judiciary. In one sense, the implementation of the sharīʿah during the Delhi Sultanate period was seen as quite expansive in relation to the sultan’s authority. In the Tārīkh-i Fakhr al-Dīn Mubārak Shāh, Fakhr-i Mudabbir lists the specific and broad-ranging duties and

Auer-12.indd 137

6/10/12 1:27 PM

138

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

rulings of sharīʿah (aḥkām-i sharʿ) that relate to the person and command of kings (bi-z ̱āt va farmān-i bādshāhān): addressing the Friday prayer and the two holidays (khuṭbah-yi jumʿah va ʿīdayn), upholding the ḥadd punishments (iqāmat-i ḥudūd), collecting the taxes and alms (jihāt-i kharāj va ṣadaqāt), making war (ghazv kardan), judging between litigants (ḥukm kardan miyān-i khuṣmān), hearing petitions (daʿvá shanīdan), protecting the domain against foreign armies (ḥifẓ-i vilāyat az lashkar-hā-yi bīgānah), forming the armies (murattab dāshtan-i lashkar-hā), providing remuneration for those who wage war (dādan-i arzāq-i muqātilah), carrying out punishment for the welfare of the populace (siyāsat farmūdan barā-yi maṣāliḥ-i raʿāyā), judging between people (ʿadl kardan miyān-i khalq), and exacting justice for victims (inṣāf sitādan-i maẓlūmān).13 In Fakhr-i Mudabbir’s estimation, the king’s overall duties as judge, preserver of justice, and protector of the kingdom were wholly dictated by the sharīʿah. At the level of rhetoric, the oft-repeated mantra that “religion and rule are twins” or “religion and kingship are twins” illustrates the attempt to reconcile the authority embodied in the sharīʿah and exercised by the ʿulamāʾ with the power wielded by the sultan.14 This apothegm was copiously reported in multiple variations in Muslim historiography and was traditionally attributed to the Sasanid ruler of Persia Ardashīr-i Bābakān (r. 226–241 C.e.).15 Of the numerous references found scattered in historiography of the Delhi Sultanate, Ḥasan Niẓāmī uses a variation of the dictum, “The continuation of the customs of religion and the establishment of the regulations of the kingdom are twins (istimrār-i marāsim-i dīn va istiqrār-i qavāʿid-i mulk tawʾamān and).” He illustrates this further with the purported ḥadīth, “Religion is the foundation and kingship is its guardian. That which has no foundation is destroyed and that which has no guardian is lost (al-dīn uss wa ‘l-mulk ḥāris wa mā lā uss la-hu fa-huwa mahdūm wa mā lā ḥāris la-hu fa-huwa ḍāʾiʿ).”16 The most explicit effort from the Delhi Sultanate to confront issues of kingly power and religious authority is provocatively displayed in the title of Baranī’s mirror-for-princes, the Fatāvá-yi

Auer-12.indd 138

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Sharīʿah and Justice

139

Jahāndārī [Edicts of world rule], a work that attempts to reconcile religion and rule, executive and judicial authority. Commenting on the tensions underlying narratives that deal with relations between the ʿulamaʾ and kings in advice literature, Louise Marlow says, “It is rare, however, for an author to admit the existence of any theoretical tension between kings and scholars.”17 In this regard, Baranī also utilizes a related phrase “religion and justice are twins” (al-dīn wa ‘l-ʿadl tawʾamān) in his Fatāvá-yi Jahāndārī.18 Muzaffar Alam describes Baranī’s Fatāvá-yi Jahāndārī as an intervention in the standing debate on the relationship between religion and politics in Muslim societies. He says of Baranī, “He intervenes instead to try to resolve the dilemma posed by the conflict between the concrete realities of Muslim politics and the theory of the shariʿa.”19 In relation to the sharīʿah came the concept of siyāsah, a term that was used in a variety of senses in writings produced during the Delhi Sultanate. The range of meanings employed in the use of the term spanned from political power to statecraft and punishment. In the Fatāvá-yi Jahāndārī, Baranī defines siyāsah in a general sense, saying, “Kings should know that the meaning of siyāsah is making right the affairs of the world (rāst kardan-i umūr-i jahān).”20 On an abstract level the concept of siyāsah refers to the role of sultans in society as preservers of order. This was often supported by the purported ḥadīth:

ً

ْ َ ْ ُ ُ ْ َ ُ َّ َ َ َ ُ َ ْ ُّ َ ْ َ ‫انلاس بعضهم بعضا‬ ‫لوال السلطان ألكل‬

If there were no Sultan, mankind would eat each other. Fakhr-i Mudabbir made use of this ḥadīth in the introduction to his Shajarah-yi ansāb, even though its authencity is doubtful.21 The appeal to this prophetic saying was ubiquitous across the Delhi Sultanate period. Muḥammad b. Tughluq chose to have it stamped onto his coinage in 730/1330, the sixth year of his reign.22 ʿAfīf utilized it as well in the prolegomena to the Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī.23 Some scholars call into question its authenticity; Iqtidar Hussain

Auer-12.indd 139

6/10/12 1:27 PM

140

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Siddiqui takes offense at this ḥadīth and others, arguing that they were “concoctions” of “scholars associated with the royal courts,” and adding, “Monarchy was, indeed, repugnant to Islam.”24 This does not change the fact that statements such as these remained some of the most powerful arguments for the legitimacy of kingship. For Baranī, siyāsah had two dimensions. The first dimension of siyāsah is the establishment of justice (ʿadl va inṣāf). This justice is said to be comprised of various elements that include gentility (luṭf), compassion (shafaqat), courtesy (navāzish), magnanimity (iʿṭāʾ), respect (ikrām), benefaction (inʿām), and doing good (iḥsān). The second dimension of siyāsah is punishment, and Baranī lists these punishments in concrete form.25 The first kind (qism) of punishment is ridicule (tawhīn), humiliation (taẕlīl), removal from office (ʿazl), ostracism (ʿadam-i iltifāt), and the confiscation of property (salb-i mal). A second kind of punishment is to be put in chains (band va zanjīr) and imprisoned (habs va bāz dāsht). A third kind is exile (jalāʾ), for which there are various types. According to Baranī they are all forms of imperial punishments (siyāsāt-i mulkī).26 He does not address the question of capital punishment directly in this section, rather he prefers to constrain the unnecessary “shedding of the blood of a believer” (rīkhtan-i khūn-i muʾmin) that he argues was “not sanctioned according to sharīʿah” (rukhṣat-i sharʿī nabūd). According to Baranī, these rules are such that it is the duty of the sultan to appoint those “upright in religion” (mutadayyinān) to carry out the dictates of the sharīʿah. They would handle all the cases covered by the sharīʿah and bring those they cannot dispatch to the king. In the area of judicial matters Baranī faced the more difficult challenge of defining the categories under which the sultan has authority to execute punishment. According to Baranī no clear legal precept (rivāyatī) had come down from the four legal schools (maz ̱hab-i arbaʿah) concerning the rules governing punishment (siyāsāt va taʿzīrāt), only that imperial punishments (siyāsāt-i mulkī) are reserved (makhṣūṣ) for the king (bādshāh).27 He displays his concern over the fact that the boundaries of siyāsah are not formally prescribed for by the sharīʿah, placing the sultans in the difficult position of potentially “turning their backs” (pusht dihand) on the

Auer-12.indd 140

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Sharīʿah and Justice

141

rule (ḥukm) of God and the Prophet. Baber Johansen argues that this ambiguity in law derived from the “private and individualistic character of Hanafite law. Hanafite law is based on the rights of the individual and gets into difficulties whenever it tries to reconcile these rights with the public interest.”28 Confronting this danger, Baranī urges kings to restrain their punishments; he makes a subtle appeal to the Qurʾān, saying that the “great men (of former times) of the religion and government of Muṣṭafá (i.e., the Prophet)” (buzurgān-i dīn va dawlat-i Muṣṭafá) have truly comprehended Q40:3:

َ‫ا‬ ََ َّ َ ۡ َ ۡ َّ ٣ ‫اب‬ ِ ‫ب شدِي ِد ٱلعِق‬ ِ ‫ۢنب وقاب ِ ِل ٱتلو‬ ِ ‫غفِرِ ٱذل‬ The Forgiver of sin and Accepter of repentance is severe in punishment.29 Taken literally, this verse seems to legitimate a kind of absolute power to administer punishment. However, Baranī uses it to substantiate his claim that the just sultan understands the “proper place for forgiveness and punishment” (maḥall-i ʿafv va mawz̤iʿ-i siyāsah). He reiterates the importance of the forgiveness of the sultan by further quoting from the Qurʾān:

َ ۡ َ ٰ َ‫َ َ ۡ ُ َ ُ هَّ ُ َّ َ َ َ َ ُ ْ َ َ َ َ لَى‬ َّ َ ٤٥ ٖ‫ع ظهرِها ِمن دٓابة‬ ‫ولو يؤاخِذ ٱلل ٱنلاس بِما كسبوا ما ترك‬ If God were to punish men according to what they deserve, He would not leave on the back of the [earth] a single living creature.30 By framing his commentary in Qurʾānic terms, Baranī’s discourse on the sharīʿah and siyāsah is actually a check on sultanic authority. The boundaries of the sultan’s authority are literally defined by his justice and the execution of his punishment. Historical narratives of the sultan’s punishments underscored a structural ambiguity in the legal system of the Delhi Sultanate. Understanding Baranī’s

Auer-12.indd 141

6/10/12 1:27 PM

142

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

theory of kingship, stated explicitly in the Fatāvá-yi Jahāndārī, throws light on the tangible fashion in which ideology and history are woven together. Keeping this legal background in mind, it is understandable that historical narratives on the occasions of the sultan’s execution of siyāsah display a noticeable tension in the structures of authority. On an essential level, narratives about punishment were not about punishment, rather they were intended to confront, and in some cases cover up, fundamental imbalances in the relationship between power and justice. A dissonance clearly remained between the rules of pre-Islamic Persian kingship and the sharīʿah. Baranī singles out Muḥammad b. Tughluq in particular as a figure who contributed to that dissonance. He is depicted as a sultan who was ignorant and even belligerent toward the sharīʿah. Other scholars, however, note that Muḥammad b. Tughluq exhibited a greater concern for Islamic law than acknowledged by Baranī, whose view was adopted by later historians. Zafarul Islam argues that the Sultan was well-versed in the sharīʿah and reports that, according to Shihāb al-Dīn al-ʿUmarī (697–749/1297–1348), another historian of the same period, he had memorized the Hidāyah of Marghīnānī, encouraged the discussion of the sharīʿah, and procured fiqh texts for his court.31 The form of Baranī’s historical representation of Muḥammad b. Tughluq as a sultan who brashly ignored the principles of the sharīʿah, makes an assessment of their historicity complex. It is certainly clear, however, that Baranī saw the legitimacy of the Delhi sultans as established on at least two foundations simultaneously, and while a sultan may choose to emphasize different aspects of his legitimacy, on an abstract level no sultan should willfully ignore either the heritage of Persian kingship or the principles of the sharīʿah. Images of the Ignorant King As in the case of Muḥammad b. Tughluq, Baranī portrays the reign of Sultan ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh as failing to follow the principles of the sharīʿah, in large part because of his excessive punishments. In Baranī’s estimation, ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh was “not a man of learning” (khabar az ʿilm nadāsht) primarily because he held the

Auer-12.indd 142

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Sharīʿah and Justice

143

(uninformed) opinion that imperial power (mulkdārī va jahānbānī) was separate from the traditions and rulings of the sharīʿah (rivāyah va aḥkām-i sharīʿah) and that the rulings of kingship (aḥkām-i bādshāhī) were related to the king (bādshāh) and the rulings of the sharīʿah (aḥkām-i sharīʿah) were consigned to judges (qāz ̤iyān) and legal experts (muftiyān). Therefore, when it came to affairs of the kingdom, ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh looked toward the wellbeing of the empire (ṣalāḥ-i mulk) and did not consider whether his actions were in accordance with the sharīʿah.32 Baranī gives an anecdote meant to illustrate the Sultan’s ignorance in matters of the sharīʿah. There were a number of legal experts in the circle of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh and Baranī names a few: Qāzī̤ Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn Bayāna, Mawlāna Ẓahīr Lang, and Mawlāna Mashayad Kuhrāmī.33 Baranī highlights one particular interaction between the Ḥanafī Qāz̤ī Mughīs ̱ al-Dīn Bayāna and the Sultan. The Sultan had consulted the qāz̤ī on legal questions concerning the jizya, corruption, whether or not wealth acquired by bloody warfare belongs to the sultan or the “public treasury” (bayt al-māl), and what are the rights of the sultan and his children to the public treasury. Baranī reports that Qāz ̤ī Mughīs ̱ al-Dīn Bayāna’s opinions on these matters contradicted the Sultan’s actions; the Sultan voiced his great displeasure and sent the qāz̤ī away. But on the following day he called the qāz ̤ī back, rewarded him for his honesty, and explained to him that his actions, whether in accordance with the sharīʿah or not, were for the well-being of the empire (ṣalāḥ-i mulk).34 Curiously, Baranī puts a nearly identical phrasing into the mouth of Balban.35 It is interesting to note the narrative affiliations between these historical events and those Baranī describes in relation to other sultans. The common thread in these narratives of justice and punishment is that above and beyond the sharīʿah, the sultan considered the well-being of the empire (ṣalāḥ-i mulk) the top priority. In his discussion of this same passage, Iqtidar Siddiqui notes the way in which modern scholars have uncritically taken Baranī’s subtle critique of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh and reproduced it in full in their own histories, thus giving a distorted view of his reign.36 Sunil Kumar discusses the way in which ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh

Auer-12.indd 143

6/10/12 1:27 PM

144

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

attempted to construct an image of himself as a reviver of the sharīʿah, particularly in inscriptions he commissioned for the congregational mosque in Delhi, an image that was expressed through the great panegyrist and court littérateur Amīr Khusraw. Kumar notes that Baranī subverted this image in his history.37 Baranī’s representation of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh as a sultan who was beyond the pale when it came to Islamic law may be a result of his displeasure at the punishments the Sultan commanded. In particular, he reacts strongly to ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn’s punishment of the “new Muslims” (nau Musulmānān). These were Mongol immigrants to North India who converted to Islam, whose women and children were imprisoned—Baranī insists that this was an unprecedented practice. The Sultan ordered that they all be killed—a horrific act that Baranī compares to the ruling of Pharaoh and Nimrod (ḥukm-i ū Farʿūnī va Namrūdī būd).38 He also describes the “most horrible punishments” (bad-tarīn siyāsah) administered to the “the licentious” (ibāḥatiyān) whose heads were cut off with the “saw of punishment” (arrah-yi siyāsah). In contrast to Baranī’s scorn for ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh’s repugnant tactics, his contemporary and acquaintance Amīr Khusraw describes with poetic relish the punishments meted out to the ibāḥatiyān. Amīr Khusraw refers to the punishment delivered by ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh, saying: Over the heads of all of them, men as well as women, the saw of punishment was drawn . . . the saw with its heart of iron loudly laughed over their heads with tears of blood. Those, who by a secret stroke (zarb-i pinhān) had become one, were now openly sawed into two, and the soul that had sought union with another soul was now compelled to leave its own body.39 Images of the Sharīʿah King To counterbalance the image of the sultan who abused the authority derived from siyāsah, Baranī crafts an idealistic vision of a regime capable of integrating both religion and kingship into a single

Auer-12.indd 144

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Sharīʿah and Justice

145

system of governance. However, in Baranī’s estimation this did not occur; it was an ideal achieved only during the early caliphate. It was exemplified by rulers who put truth in a central position and adroitly balanced the “customs of the Prophet” (sunan-i Muḥammadī) and the “rule of ʿUmar” (z̤abṭ-i ʿUmarī), a reference to the second caliph ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭāb.40 In this historian’s mind, as irretrievable as the golden age of Islamic rule now was, one sultan in particular was successful for his ability to follow a course of action that balanced religion and rule. This was Sultan Fīrūz Shāh. Unlike the imagery he employs in his depiction of Muḥammad b. Tughluq and ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh, in the case of Fīrūz Shāh, Baranī paints the picture of a sharīʿah-minded ruler. When discussing the transition between the reign of Sultan Muḥammad b. Tughluq and Sultan Fīrūz Shāh, Baranī lists three rules (z̤avābiṭ) Fīrūz Shāh established that were meant to achieve a greater reliance on the sharīʿah. The first rule (z̤ābiṭah) he notes is Fīrūz Shāh’s abandonment of capital punishment (tark-i siyāsah), which had increased in previous days.41 The second rule was the management of the economic affairs of the empire; he did this by developing lands for cultivation to draw revenue from them.42 The third rule was the establishment of justice and beneficence (ʿadl va iḥsān) throughout the kingdom.43 The “fact” of Fīrūz Shāh’s clemency in punishment first appears in Baranī and then is picked up fully in ʿAfīf. In the case of Fīrūz Shāh, the claim to abolish siyāsah contributed to the image of his rule as one firmly based on the sharīʿah. As in the case of Muḥammad b. Tughluq, certain sultans were depicted as ignoring the precepts of the sharīʿah. To his credit, Fīrūz Shāh was the most successful in producing an image of himself as a sultan who ruled according to the sharīʿah. The theme of Fīrūz Shāh’s adherence to it is maintained in Baranī and ʿAfīf ’s writings. In chapter sixteen of the first book of the Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī, ʿAfīf dedicates his discussion to the rule of Fīrūz Shāh in relation to the sharīʿah. Under the virtues of Fīrūz Shāh he refers to him as the “beacon of the sharīʿah” (rawshan kunandah-yi sharīʿah).44 He says that in the age of past sultans the “laws were not measured” (qānūnāt ghayr-i qiyās būd); however,

Auer-12.indd 145

6/10/12 1:27 PM

146

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam In the time of his reign, Sultan Fīrūz Shāh made the sharīʿah of Muḥammad the messenger of God (sharīʿat-i Muḥammad rasūl Allāh) foremost. He planted trees of compassion (ashjār-i marāḥim) in the rose garden (ṣaḥn-i gulzār) of the fettered and the free (banda va aḥrār). He removed all that was unlawful (nā-mashrūʿāt) and he tightened all that was lawful (mashrūʿ).45

It is clear from the historiographical record that Fīrūz Shāh made the elevation of the sharīʿah, at least in rhetoric, a priority during his reign. It was a central topic in the Futūḥāt-i Fīrūz Shāhī. In this work, Fīrūz Shāh Tughluq, successor to Muḥammad b. Tughluq, “inscribed” his own history.46 In it he lists the principles of his reign and numbers his accomplishments. Following invocatory praises for God and the Prophet, Fīrūz Shāh discusses past ages when there was a prevalence of cruel punishments that contradicted just rule. He prefaces this discussion by situating his reign as emerging from a period when all kinds of innovations (bidʿat-hā) and unlawful acts (munkarāt) had spread (shāʾiʿ shuda) throughout the land of India (Hindustan). Specifically, he says that people had turned away from the “the ways of the Sunnī” (sunan-i sunniyah) and he saw it as an obligation (wājib) to completely eradicate the false customs that were contrary to the sharīʿah (khilāf-i sharʿ). In the Futūḥāt-i Fīrūz Shāhī, Fīrūz Shāh singles out Shīʿah communities for specific punishment; he refers to them as the ravāfiz̤ of the shīʿī mazhabān, along with heretics (mulḥidān) and “the licentious” (ibāḥatiyān), thus using a literary strategy to underscore the sectarian nature of the Sultanate.47 The first innovation eliminated from the Sultan’s list was the death penalty in cases of Muslim subjects. He writes, “In the past much Muslim blood (khūn-i Musulmānān) used to be spilt and many kinds of torture (taʿẕīb) were carried out.”48 To great effect he provides a lengthy and gruesome list: Hands, feet, ears, and noses were cut off; eyes were gouged out; molten lead was poured down people’s throats; the bones of the hands, feet, and chest were smashed with mallets; skin

Auer-12.indd 146

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Sharīʿah and Justice

147

was burnt with fire; nails were driven into the hands, feet, and chest; flesh was torn away; beatings with a scourge spiked with iron nails; chopping off of feet and men were sawn in half.49 Sultan Fīrūz Shāh goes on to say that he will endeavor to halt the spilling of Muslim blood unjustly and end all forms of torture. He says that the justification for spreading terror (ruʿb) and fear (khawf) in the hearts of people was to keep the affairs of the Sultanate in order, a principle that he says was commonly illustrated by the following verse:

‫تيغ را بي قرارخواهي داشت‬

‫ملك را برقرار مي خواهي‬

If you wish the kingdom to be at peace, Then keep the sword at war.50 Fīrūz Shāh claims to have rejected this principle and with the “grace of God” (faz̤l-i Ilāhī) changed “severities” (tashaddudāt) and “threats” (takhwīfāt) into “benevolence” (rifq), “kindness” (karam), and “doing good” (iḥsān). For Fīrūz Shāh this meant that those who deviate from the “path of the sharīʿah” (rāh-i sharʿ) will receive their due according to “rule of the Book” (ḥukm-i kitāb) and the “judgment of the qāz̤ī” (qaz̤āʾ-i qāz̤ī). This was a significant claim for a sultan of Delhi. It represented an attempt to delegate the broadest range of legal matters to the court of judges. At the same time, it did not explicitly impinge on his ability to handle a whole variety of crimes that could be considered matters of the state. ʿAfīf reproduces the Sultan’s attitude wholeheartedly and uncritically in his history of Fīrūz Shāh’s reign. He quotes the same verse in the opening to his section on Fīrūz Shāh to illustrate the Sultan’s great benevolence and justice.51 The concern about the killing of Muslims by Muslim kings held a prominent place in the Sultan’s inscription and was also a recurrent theme in historiography of the period. In a number of places in his history, ʿAfīf discusses his awareness of the disapproval of the

Auer-12.indd 147

6/10/12 1:27 PM

148

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

violence of Muslim against Muslim. This issue is raised prominently after Fīrūz Shāh considered invading Dawlatābād, the independent Muslim kingdom in south India. The advice he received on this military adventure is cast in the voice of his vizier Khān-i Jahān who lists no fewer than ten disadvantages of attacking the “people of Islam” (ahl-i Islām).52 This discourse is punctuated with a ḥadīth that quotes the Prophet saying that shame comes to Muslims who attack other Muslims because “the believers are brothers” (innamā al-mūʾminūn akhūhu).53 Historians were challenged to represent the justice of Muslim kings as striking the proper balance between distinct legal categories, those embodied in the z̤avābiṭ of sultans and the sharīʿah under the purview of the ʿulamāʾ. The occasions of intra-communal punishment made that challenge all the more difficult. It has been noted that the Tughluq sultans greatly increased their patronage for the development of legal writings.54 Zafarul Islam comments that “it may be said with certainty that the reign of the Tughluq sultans (fourteenth century C.e.) is a formative period of the fiqh literature in India.”55 The two most significant legal texts were produced under the patronage of Fīrūz Shāh, the Fiqh-i Fīrūz Shāhī and the Fatāvá al-tātārkhānīyah.56 The increased concern and awareness of legal matters can also be seen in the monumental architecture constructed during the reign of the Tughluq sultans. Of prominent note was the Ḥawz̤ Khāṣṣ Madrasah patronized by Fīrūz Shāh.57 The concern for the patronage of institutions where legal matters were studied was emphasized in the historiography of the period, particularly that depicting Fīrūz Shāh’s efforts to build new and restore existing madrasahs.58 Justice, Impartiality, and Clemency One framework for reconciling the sharīʿah and siyāsah involved emphasizing the impartiality of the sultan’s administration of justice. Baranī takes up this theme in two sequential chapters in the Fatāvá-yi Jahāndārī. He begins his section on justice through the oratio recta of Sultan Maḥmūd of Ghazna, saying, “Justice is a balance on which the affairs of truth and faleshood are weighed. In justice, rightful

Auer-12.indd 148

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Sharīʿah and Justice

149

and wrongful claims are born out. It exposes cruelty and oppression, wrath and destruction, so that there is no stability in the affairs of men without justice.”59 Thus justice provides the ultimate order of society, without which it would devolve into chaos. For Baranī, a king must have a “natural disposition to justice” (ʿadl-i jibillī), for which Baranī lists twenty identifying traits. He highlights one, saying, “No one can influence him (the king) where the administration of justice is concerned.”60 To illustrate this natural disposition toward justice, he offers an anecdote in the form of a ḥikāyat. As was seen earlier, Baranī’s views of justice were particularly tested by the question of capital punishment and the shedding of the blood of Muslims (khūn-i Musulmānān). He attempts to resolve this with an example from the caliphate of ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭāb; he uses it to illustrate his vision of the relationship between justice, punishment, and the impartiality of the ruler. ʿUmar, as represented by Baranī, is the paradigmatic example of the just ruler, a position he says he occupies along with the pre-Islamic Sasanid ruler Anūshīrvān, further emphasizing the dichotomous nature of the sources of legitimacy for sultanic authority. The particular anecdote Baranī chose from the life of ʿUmar was the sentencing of his son Abū Shahma to be flogged for drinking alcohol, a punishment that led to his son’s death. He says of ʿUmar: He did not give special treatment to his son in giving a right judgment, and his paternal affection did not prevent him from enforcing the punishment according to ḥadd sharʿī. Wise men know that such a perfect and innately just man who let his own son die according to ḥadd sharʿī would not allow any relationship to catch hold of his hand or to restrain him in enforcing the orders of the sharʿ.61 Here ʿUmar’s execution of this punishment on his own son serves as the ultimate example of the impartial justice of a ruler. Baranī stresses necessity of strict adherence to the letter of the law, an attitude that has significant implications for the overall implementation of capital punishment and the activity of the ruler in maintaining

Auer-12.indd 149

6/10/12 1:27 PM

150

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

self‑discipline in the Muslim community. Even though Baranī argues that this specific case was covered by the sharīʿah, he goes on to address cases for punishment not covered under the sharīʿah and makes an argument for an independent body of legal justifications. The theme of the impartiality of the king in administering justice and punishment can be seen in a number of other places in Sultanate historiography. Baranī discusses the impartiality of the justice delivered by Ghiyās ̱ al-Dīn Balban. He says that he did not give special treatment to his family, associates, or nobles when they committed offenses (maẓlumat kardī). This is illustrated by the punishment meted out to Malik Baq-baq for the killing of a servant while drunk during Balban’s reign.62 Malik Baq-baq was the father of Malik Qīrā Beg, a servant (banda) of the Sultan; he killed an attendant (farrāshī) with his own hands by means of the scourge (dirra). Malik Baq-baq held a high court appointment and at the time possessed the iqtāʿ of Badāʾūn, one of the most prized possessions of the Delhi Sultanate. When Sultan Balban found out about this brutal and senseless act of violence, he ordered that Malik Baq-baq be scourged before the wife of the murdered servant. The intelligence officer (barīd) of Badāʾūn who was negligent in reporting the incident was hung from the gates of city. Baranī also narrates a related incident that involved Haybat Khān, a courtier in the service of the Sultan. He likewise killed a man while drunk and the Sultan ordered that he be given five hundred blows with the scourge before the Sultan. He then ordered that Haybat Khān be turned over to the wife of the murdered man so that she could execute him herself. However, through negotiations Haybat Khān was able to purchase his release for twenty thousand coins (tankah).63 Both of these anecdotes are positioned within Baranī’s narrative to illustrate the Sultan’s impartial administration of justice. From a general perspective, narratives of punishment in Sultanate historiography depict the swiftness and retributive aspect of the sultan’s authority. This was less the case with representations during the reign of Fīrūz Shāh, who was more frequently described as possessing clemency and forgiveness. This is largely due to the efforts

Auer-12.indd 150

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Sharīʿah and Justice

151

of ʿAfīf, who saw these two characteristics as ranking highest among the qualities and traits of sultans. As noted earlier, ʿAfīf describes in great detail the ten attributes of kingship, adopting terminology common to the circles of Sufi mystics.64 The first three of these attributes figure prominently in historiographic representations of Fīrūz Shāh, particularly in regard to punishment: compassion (shafaqat); forgiveness (ʿafv); and justice and grace (ʿadl va faẓl). ʿAfīf says that the sultans of old (salāṭīn-i pīshīn) did not show clemency (ḥilm) in the affairs of world rule (jahāndārī) because it was believed that excessive clemency (ḥilm) caused much harm (ziyān). But Sultan Fīrūz Shāh had a sincere heart (ikhlāṣ-i dil), ʿAfīf argued, and was honest in intent (niyat-i ṣādiq). He says that, with God’s help, the Sultan displayed clemency during his forty-year reign. ʿAfīf does, however, list two crimes for which Sultan Fīrūz Shāh was strict in issuing punishment. One was theft (duzd-i birūnī) and the other murder (ashkhāṣ-i khūnī). ʿAfīf reasons that this is because those two crimes infringe on the rights of others (ḥuqūq-i dīgarān). The Sultan implemented capital punishment (siyāsat kardan for both of those groups of criminals.65 In one special case meant to exhibit the strictness of Fīrūz Shāh in punishing a murderer (khūnī), ʿAfīf highlights Fīrūz Shāh’s ability to be swift in punishment, a trait which he legitimates by saying that it is in accordance with the rules of kings (āʾīn-i jahāndārān va qavānīn-i tājdārān). This case involved the sons of Malik Yūsuf Bughrā a high official in the court of Sultan Muḥammad b. Tughluq. The two sons were born of different mothers; the elder brother killed the younger brother, presumably to ensure his full inheritance. ʿAfīf reports that the Sultan was “shocked” (mutaḥayyir manad) to hear of the murder. After much deliberation and careful consideration, he ordered the execution (qaṣāṣ farmūd) of the elder son, despite the fact that, according to ʿAfīf, the Sultan had compassion (shafaqat) for him.66 Another important example of the benevolence and impartiality of the Sultan is illustrated by the events just following his ascension to the throne in Delhi following the death of Muḥammad b. Tughluq. ʿAfīf ’s narrative of the inauguration culminates with the surreptitious

Auer-12.indd 151

6/10/12 1:27 PM

152

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

execution of Aḥmad b. Ayāz, the vizier to Muḥammad b. Tughluq and bearer of the title of Khvājah-i Jahān. The full details of the transition of authority from Muḥammad b. Tughluq to Fīrūz Shāh are difficult to discern because of the variety and discrepancy of historiographic accounts.67 However, ʿAfīf ’s account of the rise of the new Sultan and execution of the head representative of the former regime shows the precarious nature of sultanic authority in the Delhi Sultanate and the contradictory nature of the Sultan’s justice and punishment. At the time of Muḥammad b. Tughluq’s death in 752/1351, Fīrūz Shāh was in Sind, far from the struggles over the future of the Sultanate that ensued in Delhi. Aḥmad b. Ayāz was at the center of this conflict because he held the highest office in the empire. In the confusion following the death of Sultan Muḥammad b. Tughluq, the Khvājah-i Jahān had evidently received poor intelligence about the fate of Fīrūz Shāh, who was presumed killed or captured in a battle with Mongol (mughalān) armies.68 In an effort to provide stability at the capital, and sensing the urgency of the situation, the Khvājah-i Jahān installed the infant son of Muḥammad b. Tughluq on the throne. This proved a mistake and when he learned that Fīrūz Shāh was approaching Delhi, he set out to surrender himself to Fīrūz Shāh. The subsequent trial and execution of the Khvājah-i Jahān followed an interesting course of events. According to ʿAfīf, a heated debate ensued among the courtiers about the crime of treason (khiyānat-i aʿdāʾ) committed by the Khvājah-i Jahān; the bulk of advisers favored his execution. Fīrūz Shāh adopted the minority position of clemency in light of the Khvājah-i Jahān’s actions, but was unable to sway the members of his court who were unanimous in their position on the execution of the Khvājah-i Jahān. A compromise was made and the Sultan washed his hands of the affair by turning the fate of the Khvājah-i Jahān over to the members of his court. According to ʿAfīf, the Khvājah-i Jahān was told to leave Delhi and manage the iqṭāʿ of Sāmāna but was overtaken on the road and assassinated.69 Whether or not Fīrūz Shāh was complicit in the assassination of the former vizier remains the subject of debate. ʿAfīf, however, utilized

Auer-12.indd 152

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Sharīʿah and Justice

153

this narrative to highlight the compassion of the newly appointed Sultan in light of his role as the executor of punishment. “An Hour of Justice” There is a special death penalty case from the Delhi Sultanate that illustrates not only the ways in which justice and punishment are interwoven in medieval Muslim histories, but also the tensions between the categories of punishment justified by the sharīʿah and those determined by the king’s rule. ʿAfīf narrates a case of capital punishment meted out to a Muslim accused of murder with intent. It is the story of one Khvājah Aḥmad, a scribe (navīsandah) working in the royal treasury (khazānah). He had employed a tutor in his home to teach the children at his residence. In the course of their acquaintance, their relationship developed into a love affair (qaz̤iyahyi muḥabbat). Khvājah Ahmad felt betrayal when he discovered that the tutor had fallen in love with a woman. The Khvājah, in his jealousy, conspired to have the tutor killed with the help of two sons of his slaves. He invited the tutor to go drinking and with the help of the others, he overpowered him, slit his throat (ḥalq-ash burīdand), and disposed of the corpse by throwing it over the Malik Bridge. Unfortunately for the Khvājah, the next day the Sultan happened to be out for a walk on that bridge and he discovered the corpse. The Sultan ordered a full investigation of the incident. The body was identified and witnesses were called. Khvājah Aḥmad was summoned to appear before the magistrate, and he flatly denied the allegation. After testimony that included eyewitness accounts to the murder, the Khvājah was sentenced to death. ʿAfīf provides copious details about the witnesses, their testimonies, and other evidence produced during the trial that displays a concern for procedural detail. It indicates that the trial of high officials was something of a public spectacle and that the details were widely known, at least to people of the court. In an effort to escape his punishment, Khvājah Aḥmad appealed to the Khān-i Jahān to commute his sentence to eighty-thousand coins (tanka) to be paid in blood-money (bahā-yi khūn). The Khān-i Jahān brought this

Auer-12.indd 153

6/10/12 1:27 PM

154

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

plea of Khvājah Aḥmad to the notice of the Sultan. ʿAfīf reports the Sultan’s response, as if verbatim, saying: Oh foolish Vizier! Anyone with wealth would shed blood with the power of wealth. If money were taken and heads were turned away from the spilling of Muslim blood then the state of the opinion of humanity would fall into difficulty. And one would be ashamed before the chair of judgment (kursī-yi qaz̤ā) on the day of resurrection (fardā-yi qiyāmat).70 The Khān-i Jahān attempted another tactic to dissuade the Sultan by explaining that there was a problem of thousands of tankas to be accounted for by the Khvājah and some postponement of the execution was necessary to get the accounts cleared so that the royal treasury would not suffer the loss. The Sultan was undeterred and ordered the execution (siyāsat). Ultimately, Khvājah Aḥmad was put to death in public view along with his two accomplices. ʿAfīf completes this narrative with the words of the Prophet Muḥammad:

ً َ َ َ ّ َ َ ْ ٌ ْ‫َ ْ ُ َ َ َ ر‬ ‫ي مِن عِباد ِة ِستني سنة‬ ‫عدل ساع ٍة خ‬ The justice of one hour is better than sixty years of worship.71 Here prophetic example served in the projection of the concept of justice during the Delhi Sultanate. The above apothegm of Arabic and Persian literature can be found in a variety of forms in historical and mirror-for-princes writings, though without a traceable isnād.72 Al-Ghazālī utilized it in a letter written to Muʿizz al-Dīn Aḥmad Sanjar in 503/1109–10, future Sultan of the Great Saljūqs. He wrote, “The justice of one hour was better than the worship of sixty years.” Though obviously dissatisfied with the political situation of the day, he was quick to add, “Today affairs have reached such lengths that the justice of one hour is equal to the worship of one hundred years.”73 The purpose of tracing the peregrinations of this ḥadīth attributed to the Prophet is to show how prophetic sayings were used in

Auer-12.indd 154

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Sharīʿah and Justice

155

various contexts in an attempt to propagate a concept of justice that legitimated a variety of sultanic actions. ʿAfīf employs this ḥadīth to legitimate the execution of a prominent Muslim subject functioning in the service of the Sultan’s court in Delhi. He carefully deflects the attention of his readers from the fact of the execution to highlight the impartiality and justice of the Sultan. It was also seen in the preceding discussion on the boundaries between religious and political legitimacy, which were in flux throughout the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/fourteenth century in North India. In an age that saw the Delhi Sultanate expand its rule to nearly the entire Indian subcontinent, the sources for legitimacy were deeply contested in historical writings; this was particularly true in narratives highlighting the justice and punishment of kings. It is clear that the Delhi Sultanate cannot be described as possessing either a theocratic or secular form of governance. While the sharīʿah was integral to the judicial systems and necessary to the proper functioning of the Sultanate, it was balanced—to a greater or lesser degree—with the executive authority of the sultan who, within certain limits, was capable of exceeding those legal boundaries. The question of a strictly “theocratic” or “secular” concept of authority in the Delhi Sultanate does not arise in the historical sources from the period. In particular, the term secular, when used in relation to the Delhi Sultanate, is clearly a distorting anachronism, as it is, perhaps, for all premodern societies.74 The sultans of Delhi appropriated both the sharīʿah and siyāsah judicial systems for their own political purposes. While the influence of the ʿulamāʾ on the sultan and his decision making varied, there was no purging of the ʿulamāʾ from the court and their presence remained more or less constant from one regime to the next. However, the representation of that relationship varied dramatically in the historiography of the Delhi Sultanate and represented the ideological propensities of the historians and sultans who wished to project an image of themselves as being in some cases more, and in other cases less dependent upon the sharīʿah.

Auer-12.indd 155

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Conclusion

In the month of Safar of the year 801/1398 Amīr Tīmūr was on a bold march across the Punjab, steadily advancing on Delhi. This world conqueror was already in the thirtieth year of his reign. Ruling from Samarqand, Tīmūr had extended his influence to regions spanning from the Black Sea to the Persian Gulf and the plateaus of Central Asia. The purpose of Amīr Tīmūr’s incursion into South Asia was not to establish any lasting legacy in the region. As was his war policy elsewhere, “In many of the territories he conquered, such as northern India, Syria, Anatolia, Mughulistan, and the Qipchaq steppe, Temür contented himself with the collection of ransom money and the destruction or chastisement of unfriendly leaders, leaving no permanent administration behind him.”1 Although the reigning sultan of Delhi, Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh II (r. 796–801/1394–98), put up resistance, his forces were quickly overrun by the superior power and numbers of Tīmūr’s armies. The Sultan managed to escape, but Delhi was not spared. As the historian Muḥammad Bihāmad Khānī (fl. 842/1438) noted with deep regret, “All the people, high and low, young and old, were imprisoned and put to martyrdom.”2 By 801/1398 when Tīmūr invaded Delhi, Fīrūz Shāh, the last great ruler in the Tughluq dynasty, had been dead for ten years. In those ten years, no fewer than five sultans sat on the throne in Delhi. The fractured continuity of rule in that decade stood in stark contrast

Auer-12.indd 156

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Conclusion

157

to his lengthy thirty-eight-year reign. While the political stability of the Delhi Sultanate in the seventh/thirteenth and eighth/fourteenth centuries was not a record of seamless transition of rule, nevertheless, the disruptive circumstances at the cusp of the ninth/fifteenth century were unprecedented for the urbane populace of Delhi. As a result, historians of Muslim political life in South Asia generally regard the period following Fīrūz Shāh’s death as a margin in time. As the period of political instability gradually eroded Delhi’s centrality it elevated the status of regional kingdoms. Gujarat, Bengal, and the Deccan, areas that had stood in subservient or contentious relations with Delhi, now exercised a freer hand in consolidating territory. It also allowed for the greater cultivation of regional cultural identity. Areas closer to Delhi that had been under direct control established independent kingdoms. Succinctly put, “The centralizing authority of the Delhi sultan that had been asserted with varying success since the time of Muḥammad Ghuri (d. 1206) ceased to be a paramount factor in Indian political life, and its place was taken by kingdoms, many of which were centers of great artistic achievement, and some of which were better organized and more powerful than Delhi.”3 The rulers of these new centers of authority helped patronize the production of original Persian histories.4 Southeast of Delhi, the town of Kalpi became a refuge for the scholars, artisans, merchants, soldiers, and workers who sought security far from the effects of Tīmūr’s invasion.5 Muḥammad Bihāmad Khānī completed his Tārīkh-i Muḥammadī in the year 842/1438, documenting the growth of this emerging center of Islamic social and cultural life.6 It is a universal history divided into four parts: the first part details the life of the Prophet Muḥammad; the second addresses the lives of the caliphs through the ʿAbbāsids as well a history of Sufi shaykhs, the third part is dedicated to the rule of Central Asian kings; and the fourth to the sultans of India and the evolving provincial kingdoms in Kalpi, Jawnpūr, and Malwa. As a universal history, Khānī reorients Muslim rule in India back to its origins, along the lines established by Jūzjānī more than two hundred years earlier. Khānī acknowledges his reliance on the work of Jūzjānī, Niẓāmī, and Baranī. Delhi’s continuing influence on the

Auer-12.indd 157

6/10/12 1:27 PM

158

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

manufacture of the symbols of authority is suggested by the fact that the ruler of Kalpi took on the title of Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh, the same as that of Jūzjānī’s great patron of the early Delhi Sultanate. In the period immediately following Tīmūr’s invasion, there was no centralized authority figure in Delhi. Khiz̤r Khān, who had served as muqtāʿ of Multān, emerged as a leader in Delhi, but effectively served as a proxy for Tīmūrid rule. He acknowledged his subservient status by minting coins in the name of Tīmūr and his son and successor, Shāh Rukh (r. 811–50/1409–47) and established a lineage of rulers of Dehli known as the Sayyid dynasty. His successor and son was Mubārak Shāh (r. 824–37/1421–34). He is valorized by Yaḥyā b. Aḥmad Sirhindī who sought the patronage of Mubārak Shāh by writing a history in his honor, the Tārīkh-i Mubārak Shāhī, completed some time around 831/1428.7 The Tārīkh-i Mubārak Shāhī is a history that conceptualizes the rule of Muslim dynasties in India as a whole. Sirhindī begins his narrative with the Ghūrid ruler Muʿizz al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Sām and links that genealogy of rule to Mubārak Shāh. The Sayyid dynasty was succeeded by the Lodī dynasty (r. 855–932/1451–1526), but neither of these dynasties was able to revive the centrality of Delhi achieved under Tughluq rulers. The relative obscurity of Delhi and the provincialized nature of Muslim rule in India began to change with Bābur’s victory at the Battle of Pānīpat in 932/1526 over the Lodī sultan Ibrāhīm b. Sikandar II (r. 923–32/1517–26). On Tuesday 12 Rajab 932/24 April 1526, Bābur entered the Delhi fort and by Friday his name was being read at the congregational mosque.8 This event signified the early development of the Mughal dynasty, perhaps the greatest Muslim dynasty to rule India. It is quite an ironic twist of fate that Bābur, the inheritor of the Tīmūrid legacy, helped bring about the revitalization of Delhi. Writing in his memoir, Bābur acknowledges Delhi’s central status, saying, “The capital of all Hindustan is Delhi.”9 This turn of events would have been a profound shock to ʿAfīf, whose only associations with the word “Mughal” were fearsome expressions like “plunder” (nahb), “calamity” (ḥādisah), and the “cursed” (malāʿīn). The histories produced during the Delhi Sultnanate had a profound influence on the view of history during subsequent eras, as Mughal

Auer-12.indd 158

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Conclusion

159

historians reconstructed their views of Islamic engagement in India from these earlier histories.10 This was the case of ʿAbd al-Qādir b. Mulūk Shāh Badāʾūnī (947–1024/1540–1615) and his major historical work the Muntakhab al-tavārīkh. Muḥammad Qāsim Hindū Shāh Astarābādī (ca. 980–1033/1572–1623 or 1624), known by the pen name Firishta, relied on the Delhi Sultanate histories to compose his Gulshan-i Ibrahīmī, Finally, the imperial historical project Tārīkh-i alfī, a history written to honor the Islamic millennium, was commissioned under Akbar (r. 963–1014/1556–1605), perhaps the greatest of Mughal emperors.11 The compilation of these works relied heavily on Jūzjānī, Baranī, and ʿAfīf and contributed to the conceptualization of the history of Mughal rule in India. As these new histories were written, historiography retained its role in the manufacture of the symbols of authority and much derived from the Delhi Sultanate. Histories of the Delhi Sultanate and the symbols of authority they described became the major frame of reference for British imperialists who saw in them the record of an “Asiatic despotism” that legitimated their colonial endeavor. Under British rule the study of this literary heritage virtually exploded as colonial administrators, soldiers, engineers, scientists, linguists, and politicians sought to better understand the Indian subcontinent to better rule it. Within the span of an eighty-year period, the British encounter brought about major transformations in the Persian historiographical tradition in India. First, British administrators adopted the Persian language and engaged in a comprehensive scholarly project to catalogue and study Persian historical sources. The establishment of the Asiatic Society of Calcutta in 1784 represented a watershed in the history of British attempts to categorize and quantify the “Orient” and it was there that much of the early Orientalist scholarship was produced. A second stage was initiated as the British gained ascendency and supplanted the established court patronage systems of India. In changing economic circumstances, members of the diminished Persian literary establishment were caught between two cultural worlds as they were asked to step into the roles of interpreter, translator, and informant. They sought to communicate to their new British

Auer-12.indd 159

6/10/12 1:27 PM

160

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

patrons the values of Persian language courts while transforming those values to accommodate the cultural differences and political power represented by the British. The 1867 posthumous publication of Henry Elliot’s massive compendium history, The History of India as Told by it own Historians: The Muhammadan Period, marked a certain culmination of the Orientalist project. Having taken care to compile the work of the “Native Chroniclers,” Elliot denigrated their work, noting that they were “dull, prejudiced, ignorant, and superficial.”12 Nevertheless, he saw the purpose of shedding “the full beams of European truth and discernment . . . on the obscurity of the past.”13 It was during this period that the British made the decision to replace Persian as an official language, thereby leading to the production of English language histories of India. These works were premised on a historical vision that presented Muslim rule as an age of despotism; they were intended to bisect the history of India into the antagonistic periods of “Hindus” and “Mahometans,” thus helping to fuel the rise of nationalist historiography in India. In many cases factions evolved in which Hindu nationalists sided with India and Muslim nationalists sided with Pakistan. Each found, in histories from the Delhi Sultanate, arguments to support their version of history and arguments that fanned and continue to fan the flames of communalism. The command of history is as much the power over the present and future as it is over the past. In it historians make claims to both the “real” and the “ideal.” From investigating the relationship between religion, politics, and history in premodern South Asia we learn that early Persian historiography is as much an enterprise in representation and identity construction as it is a record of dynastic action. Ultimately, we will never know if the Delhi Sultanate was ninety percent image or action. Whatever the answer, there is no doubt that historians played a major role in producing and sustaining ideas about power, justice, and Islamic rule of the premodern empire. It is also certain that the interpretation of history writing produced in the Delhi Sultanate will continue to play a major role in the formation of social and political identity of the present.

Auer-12.indd 160

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

Acknowledgments 1 “Making ‘Medieval’ Islam Meaningful,” Medieval Encounters 13 (2007), 386. Preface 1 For actual sources on the figure of Ḥakīm, the “veiled prophet,” see “al-Muqannaʿ,” EI2. Also see Julie Scott Meisami, Persian Historiography to the End of the Twelfth Century, Islamic Surveys (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), 32–3, 75, 197. 2 For the suspicions perked by Borges’ Ḥakīm and his literary confession, see Norman Thomas Di Giovanni, The Lesson of the Master: On Borges and his Work (New York: Continuum, 2003), 128–30. 3 Al-Ghūṭah is the fertile oasis region fed by the Barada river where Damascus was built. 4 Amīr Khusraw, Mas ̱navī-yi nuh sipihr, ed. Mohammad Wahid Mirza (Calcutta: Baptist Mission Press, 1948), 154. 5 See Hayden White, “The Fictions of Factual Representation,” in The Literature of Fact: Selected Papers from the English Institute, ed. Angus Fletcher (New York: Columbia University Press, 1976), 21–44. Chapter 1: Delhi at the Center 1 For a useful cadastral reference to the period of the Delhi Sultanate along with the Central Asian dynasties, see Joseph Schwartzberg, A Historical Atlas of South Asia, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992), 37–9. 2 See A. Levanoni, “The Mamluk Conception of the Sultanate,” International Journal of Middle East Studies 26, no. 3 (1994): 373–92.

Auer-12.indd 161

6/10/12 1:27 PM

162

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

3 P. Crone, and M. Hinds, God’s Caliph: Religious Authority in the First Centuries of Islam, vol. 37, University of Cambridge Oriental Publications (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), 1. 4 P. Crone, God’s Rule: Government and Islam (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004), 133. 5 I. M. Lapidus, “State and Religion in Islamic Societies,” Past and Present 151 (1996), 4. 6 Ibid., 9. 7 M. Q. Zaman, “The Caliphs, the ʿUlamāʾ, and the Law: Defining the Role and Function of the Caliph in the Early ʿAbbāsid Period,” Islamic Law and Society 4, no. 1 (1997), 4. Zaman deals with this subject in much more detail in M. Q. Zaman, Religion and Politics under the Early ʿAbbāsids: The Emergence of the Proto-Sunnī Elite, vol. 16, Islamic History and Civilization: Studies and Texts (Leiden: Brill, 1997). 8 K. A. Nizami, Some Aspects of Religion and Politics in India during the Thirteenth Century (Bombay: Asia Publishing House, 1961), 89. 9 Ibid. 10 Writing thirty-six years later, he says the same, “The sultanate was born out of expediency: it had no sanction in Islamic law (shariʿat); nay, it was a nonlegal institution.” See K. A. Nizami, Royalty in Medieval India (New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers, 1997), 21. 11 See Mohammad Habib’s introduction to Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn Baranī, The Political Theory of the Delhi Sultanate (including a translation of Ziauddin Barani’s Fatawa-i Jahandari, circa, 1358–9 A.D.), trans. A. U. S. Khan (Allahabad: Kitab Mahal, 1961), vi. 12 “The process of secularization of the Indian state, continuing since the inception of the Delhi Sultanate, had become still more pronounced during the 16th century.” See I. A. Khan, “Medieval Indian Notions of Secular Statecraft in Retrospect,” Social Scientist 14, no. 1 (1986), 6. 13 P. M. Holt, “The Structure of Government in the Mamluk Sultanate,” in The Eastern Mediterranean Lands in the Period of the Crusades, ed. P. M. Holt (Warminister: Aris and Phillips Ltd., 1977), 44. 14 For specific arguments made by al-Māwardī along with useful commentary by Gibb, see H. A. R. Gibb, “Al-Mawardi’s Theory of the Caliphate,” in Studies on the Civilization of Islam, ed. S. Shaw and W. Polk (Boston: Beacon Press, 1962), 151–65. On al-Juwaynī see W. B. Hallaq, “Caliphs, Jurists and the Saljūqs in the Political Thought of Juwaynī,” Muslim World 74, no. 1 (1984), 26–41. 15 For an overview of the term sultan and the growth of the office across the Muslim world, see J. H. Kramers, C. E. Bosworth, O. Schumann, Ousmane Kane, “Sulṭān,” EI2. 16 A. L. Srivastava, The Sultanate of Delhi: Including the Arab Invasion of Sindh 711–1526 A.D., 1st ed. (Agra: Shiva Lal Agarwala, 1950), 422. 17 A. Ahmad, “The Role of the Ulema in Indo-Muslim History,” Studia Islamica

Auer-12.indd 162

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

163

31 (1970), 5. 18 Ibid. 19 R. M. Eaton, “The Articulation of Islamic Space in Medieval Deccan,” in Essays on Islam and Indian History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 159. 20 White, “The Fictions of Factual Representation,” 25. 21 See G. M. Spiegel, The Past as Text: The Theory and Practice of Medieval Historiography (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997), 99–100. 22 M. Q. Zaman, “Maghāzī and the Muḥaddithūn: Reconsidering the Treatment of ‘Historical’ Materials in Early Collections of Hadith,” International Journal of Middle East Studies 28, no. 1 (1996), 2. 23 White, “The Fictions of Factual Representation,” 25. 24 See Minhāj Sirāj Jūzjānī, T̤abaḳāt-i Nāṣirī: A General History of the Muhammadan Dynasties of Asia, including Hindustan; from A. H. 194 (810 A.D.) to A.H. 658 (1260 A.D.) and the Irruption of the Infidel Mughals into Islam, trans. H. G. Raverty, 2 vols. (New Delhi: Oriental Books Reprint Corporation, 1970), 1:xiv. 25 H. M. Elliot, and J. Dowson, The History of India as Told by its Own Historians: The Muhammadan Period, 8 vols. (London: Trübner and Co., 1867), 1:xxii. 26 See C. W. Ernst, Eternal Garden: Mysticism, History, and Politics at a South Asian Sufi Center, SUNY Series in Muslim Spirituality in South Asia (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1992), 18. 27 See F. Rosenthal, A History of Muslim Historiography, 2nd rev. ed. (Leiden: Brill, 1968), vi. 28 Ibid., 197. 29 See P. Hardy, “Force and Violence in Indo-Persian Writing on History and Government in Medieval South Asia,” in Islamic Society and Culture: Essays in Honour of Professor Aziz Ahmad, ed. M. Israel and N. K. Wagle (New Delhi: Manohar, 1983), 168. 30 For a critique of commonly held views concerning the causes of historic violence in South Asia, see R. M. Eaton, “Temple Desecration and IndoMuslim States,” in Essays on Islam and Indian History (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2000), 94–132. Also see I. H. Siddiqui, “The Sultan and the Hindus: A Re-appraisal of Hindu Muslim Relations in the Sultanate of Delhi during the 13th Century,” Journal of Objective Studies 6, no. 2 (1994), 39–49. 31 See Ernst’s discussion of the “problem of nationalist historiography.” Ernst, Eternal Garden, 18–22. 32 It is curious that this statement is applied specifically to history writing in Persian. B. van Dalen and others, “Taʾrīkh,” EI2. 33 See S. Kumar, The Emergence of the Delhi Sultanate 1192–1286 (New Delhi: Permanent Black, 2007), 362–77. 34 H. A. R. Gibb, “Tarikh,” in Studies on the Civilization of Islam, ed. S. Shaw and W. Polk (Boston: Beacon Press, 1962), 111. 35 C. F. Robinson, Islamic Historiography, Themes in Islamic History (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 13.

Auer-12.indd 163

6/10/12 1:27 PM

164

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

36 For an overview of the relationship between history and the Qurʾān and the Qurʾānic influence on historiography, see F. Rozenthal, “History and the Qurʾān,” EQ. For a discussion of some of the problems in understanding the relationship between the Qurʾān and historiography see A. Neuwirth, “Qur’an and History—A Disputed Relationship: Some Reflections on Qur’anic History and History in the Qur’an,” Journal of Qur’anic Studies 5, no. 1 (2003), 1–18. For the theological and philosophical dimensions of the Qurʾānic vision of time see G. Böwering, “The Concept of Time in Islam,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 141, no. 1 (1997), 55–66. 37 See T. Khalidi, Arabic Historical Thought in the Classical Period, Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 8. 38 ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Duri, The Rise of Historical Writing among the Arabs, Modern Classics in Near Eastern Studies (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1983), 20. 39 R. S. Humphreys, “Qurʾānic Myth and Narrative Structure in Early Islamic Historiography,” in Tradition and Innovation in Late Antiquity, ed. F. M. Clover and R. S. Humphreys, Wisconsin Studies in Classics (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1989), 270–90. 40 Hawting demonstrates this with examples of the use of the Qurʾān in early Muslim historiography. See G. R. Hawting, “Two Citations of the Qurʾān in ‘Historical’ Sources for Early Islam,” in Approaches to the Qurʾān, ed. G. R. Hawting, and Abdul-Kader A. Shareef, Routledge/SOAS Series on Contemporary Politics and Culture in the Middle East (London: Routledge, 1993), 260–8. 41 See J. Pedersen, “Ādam,” EI2 and R. Tottoli, “Adam,” EI3. 42 For the manner in which al-Ṭabarī combines theology and history, see B. Shoshan, Poetics of Islamic Historiography: Deconstructing Tabari’s History, vol. 53, Islamic History and Civilization: Studies and Texts (Leiden: Brill, 2004), 85–97. 43 U. Rubin, “Prophets and Caliphs: The Biblical Foundations of the Ummayad Authority,” in Method and Theory in the Study of Islamic Origins, ed. H. Berg (Leiden: Brill, 2003), 80. 44 See J. Mazzeo, “Allegorical Interpretation and History,” Comparative Literature 30, no. 1 (1978), 3. 45 For an overview of the history and impact of these orders in India, see S. A. A. Rizvi, A History of Sufism in India, 2 vols. (New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal, 1978), 1:114–300. 46 See M. G. S. Hodgson, The Venture of Islam, 3 vols. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1977), 1:57–60. 47 For some details on the Khvadāy-nāmag, see E. G. Browne, A Literary History of Persia: From the Earliest Times until Firdawsi (to 1000 A.D.), vol. 1, Classics of Persian Literature (Bethesda: Iranbooks, 1997), 123. See also C. E. Bosworth, “The Persian Contribution to Islamic Historiography in the Pre-Mongol Period,”

Auer-12.indd 164

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

165

in The Persian Presence in the Islamic World (The Thirteenth Levi Della Vida Conference, in Honour of Professor Ehsan Yarshater), ed. R. G. Havhanisian, and G. Sabagh (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 221. 48 See L. Marlow, Hierarchy and Egalitarianism in Islamic Thought, Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 72–7. 49 See M. Simidchieva, “Kingship and Legitimacy in Niẓām al-Mulk’s Siyāsatnāma, Fifth/Eleventh Century,” in Writers and Rulers: Perspectives on their Relationship from Abbasid to Safavid Times, ed. B. Gruendler, and L. Marlow, Literaturen im Kontext (Wiesbaden: Reichert, 2004), 97–131. 50 For a survey of advice literature, see A. K. S. Lambton, “Islamic Mirrors for Princes,” Convegno internazionale sul tema la Persia nel Medioevo (1970), 419–42. 51 See M. Alam, The Languages of Political Islam: India 1200–1800 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004), 46–54. 52 Julie Meisami surveys the historical works of Abū Isḥāq al-Ṣābiʾ and his Kitāb al-tājī, Abū Naṣr ʿUtbī’s Taʾrīkh al-Yamīnī, ʿAbd al-Ḥayy Gardīzī and his Zayn al-akhbār, Abū ‘l-Faz̤l Bayhaqī’s Tārīkh-i Bayhaqī, Ẓahīr al-Dīn Nīshāpūrī’s Saljūqnāmah, and others. See J. S. Meisami, “Rulers and the Writing of History,” in Writers and Rulers: Perspectives on their Relationship from Abbasid to Safavid Times, ed. B. Gruendler, and L. Marlow, Literaturen im Kontext (Wiesbaden: Reichert, 2004), 73–95. 53 Richard Eaton has ably discussed the “articulation of authority” on the Bengal frontier during the formation of the Delhi Sultanate. See R. M. Eaton, The Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier 1204–1760, vol. 17, Comparative Studies on Muslim Societies (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), 22–70. For the shapings of Islamic authority in South India see R. M. Eaton, “The Articulation of Islamic Space in Medieval Deccan,” 159–75. 54 For a fascinating description of the influence of Delhi’s courtly articulations of authority on royal titles and styles of dress at Vijayānagara, see P. B. Wagoner, “‘Sultan Among Hindu Kings’: Dress, Titles, and the Islamicization of Hindu Culture at Vijayanagara,” Journal of Asian Studies 55, no. 4 (1996), 862. 55 Subaltern is the expression that came out of the post-colonial critique of the manner “subordinate” social groups were effectively written out of history in South Asia. For a strident example of this critique from one of the founders of subaltern studies see R. Guha, “On Some Aspects of the Historiography of Colonial India,” Subaltern Studies 1 (1982), 1–8. See S. Mayaram, Against History, Against State: Counter Perspectives from the Margins (New York: Columbia University Press, 2003), 74–96. 56 See R. W. Bulliet, The Patricians of Nishapur: A Study in Medieval Islamic Social History, vol. 16, Harvard Middle Eastern Studies (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1972), x. 57 Ibid. 58 For introductory biographical material on Minhāj Sirāj Jūzjānī, see A. S.

Auer-12.indd 165

6/10/12 1:27 PM

166

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Bazmee Ansari, “al-Djūzjānī,” EI2. Also see section from K. A. Nizami, On History and Historians of Medieval India (New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal, 1983), 76–80. Also see M. Moin, “Qadi Minhaj al-Din Siraj al-Juzjani,” Journal of the Pakistan Historical Society 15 (1967), 163–74. 59 For an overview of the ṭabaqāt genre in South Asia, see I. H. Siddiqui, “Intellectual Dimension of the Tabaqat Form of Persian Historiography, Produced in Pre-Mughal India,” in Islamic Heritage in South Asian Subcontinent, ed. A. Nazir and I. H. Siddiqui (Jaipur: Publication Scheme, 1998), 130–9. 60 Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn Baranī, Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī, vol. 33, Bibliotheca Indica (Calcutta: Asiatic Society, 1862), 23. Gar bigūyam kih nīst dar ʿālam misl-i tārīkh-i man kitāb-i dīgar – Chūn darīn ʿilm ʿālimī nabūd kih kunad guftah-yi marā bāvar. 61 See P. Hardy, Historians of Medieval India: Studies in Indo-Muslim Historical Writing (London: Luzac, 1960), 20. See Baranī, TFS1, 23, where he dates his history. 62 See 20–2. 63 I list just a few studies of note on Baranī and his writing. For Baranī’s treatment of history, see Hardy, Historians of Medieval India, 20–39. Also see K. A. Nizami, “Ziya-ud-din Barani,” in Historians of Medieval India, ed. M. Hasan (Meerut: Meenakshi Prakashan, 1968), 37–52; I. Habib, “Baranī’s Theory of the History of the Delhi Sultanate,” Indian Historical Review 7 (1981), 99–115; I. Habib, “Ziya Barani’s Vision of the State,” Medieval History Journal 2, no. 1 (1999), 19–36; I. H. Siddiqui, “Fresh Light on Ḍiyā’ al-Dīn Baranī: The Doyen of Indo-Persian Historians,” Islamic Culture 63, nos. 1–2 (1989), 69–94. For references to the manuscript tradition of Baranī’s works, see C. A. Storey, Persian Literature: A Bio-Biographical Survey (London: Luzac & Co., 1927), 1:505–08. 64 For an overview of Persian advice literature, see L. Marlow, “Advice and Advice Literature,” EI3. 65 Afsar Salīm Khān provides the most comprehensive overview of the Fatāváyi Jahāndārī in his critical edition of the same work. See Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn Baranī, Fatāvá-yi Jahāndārī, 1st ed., vol. 25, Intishārāt-i Idārah-yi Taḥqīqāt-i Pākistān (Lahore: Research Society of Pakistan, 1972), 1–133. Earlier Mohammad Habib wrote the introduction to the translation of the Fatāvá-yi Jahāndārī. See Baranī, The Political Theory of the Delhi Sultanate, i-xii. These authors’ comments on this work and Khān’s translation now require significant revision. More recently Muzaffar Alam has provided some interesting comments on the Fatāvá-yi Jahāndārī. See M. Alam, The Languages of Political Islam, 31–43. 66 Neither of these works have been properly studied and are only available in manuscript. For bibliographical references to the Akhbār-i barmakiyān, see I. Habib, “Ziya Barani’s Vision of the State,” 23n21. For a brief description of the Ṣaḥīfah-yi naʿt-i Muḥammadī along with an excerpt, see N. Hasan, “Sahifa-i Na’t-i Muhammadi of Zia-ud-Din Barani,” Medieval India Quarterly 1, nos. 3 & 4 (1950), 100–5. For a summary of Baranī’s works along with a list of the titles of those lost, see K. A. Nizami, Supplement to Elliot & Dowson’s History

Auer-12.indd 166

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

67 68 69 70

71 72 73 74 75

1 2

3 4

5 6

Auer-12.indd 167

167

of India: Vol. III The Khaljis and the Tughluqs, vol. 16, IAD Oriental (Original) Series (Delhi: Idarah-i Adabiyat-i Delli, 1981), 43–5. Shams Sirāj ʿAfīf, Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī, vol. 119, Bibliotheca Indica (Calcutta: Asiatic Society, 1888), 339. For further details in ʿAfīf ’s biography, see Shams Sirāj ʿAfīf, Medieval India in Transition—Tarikh-i Firoz Shahi: A First Hand Account, trans. R. C. Jauhri (New Delhi: Sundeep Prakashan, 2001), 279–81. See ʿAfīf, TFS2, 29–30. There are a few short studies of ʿAfīf ’s history. See Hardy, Historians of Medieval India, 40–55. Also see the section following R. C. Jauhri’s translation of ʿAfīf, Medieval India in Transition, 281–90. This brief study on the history improves on his earlier article, R. C. Jauhri, “Shams Siraj ʿAfif and his Tarikh-i-Firuzshah: A Study in Persian Tradition of Writing History,” in Indo-Persian Cultural Perspectives: Prof. Bhagwat Saroop Memorial Volume, ed. M. A. Khan, and R. G. C. Shekhar (Delhi: Saud Ahmad Dehlavi, 1998), 65–79. See Hardy, Historians of Medieval India, 41n5. For instance, it is said of ʿAfīf that he “manages to be factual (though somewhat weak in dates) despite much rhetoric.” For this tepid literary criticism, see M. Athar Ali, “Taʾrīkh,” EI2. For dating the work, see N. Hasan, “Abū ʿAlī Qalandar,” EI2. R. C. Jauhri gives the titles of these works culled from the Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī, footnoting the relevant passages. ʿAfīf, Medieval India in Transition, 281. See S. Sharma, “Amir Khusraw and the Genre of Historical Narratives in Verse,” Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East 22, nos. 1 & 2 (2002), 112–8. Chapter 2: Pre-Islamic Prophetic Paradigms in Delhi Sultanate Historiography For a fuller discussion of the Qarā Khiṭāi, “The Black Cathay,” see, C. E. Bosworth, “Ḳarā Khiṭāy,” EI2. Also see D. Morgan, The Mongols, The Peoples of Europe (Oxford: Blackwell, 1990), 48–50. For the appearance of the Khokar in Indo-Persian historical writing, see A. Subhan, “Khokars,” EI2. Jūzjānī refers to the qabāʾil-i kūkarān. See Minhāj Sirāj Jūzjānī, Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī, 2nd ed., 2 vols. (Kabul: Anjuman-i Tārīkh-i Afghānistān, 1342), 1:443. See Ibid. Peter Jackson discusses the ambiguous status of Quṭb al-Dīn Aybeg’s authority during the rule of Muʿizz al-Dīn. See P. Jackson, The Delhi Sultanate: A Political and Military History, Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 26–9. Makhāz ̱īl is used widely and pejoratively in Persian historiography to describe any enemy of the state. See Jūzjānī, TN, 1:443. The Persian reads kuffār-rā az awj-i mawj bi ḥaz̤īz̤-i dūzakh mīfiristād.

6/10/12 1:27 PM

168

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

7 Q71:25, quoted directly by Jūzjānī. 8 See J. Renard, Islam and the Heroic Image: Themes in Literature and the Visual Arts, Studies in Comparative Religion (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1993), 11. 9 For a discussion of the debates about the meaning of ghāzī see C. Imber, “What Does Ghazi Actually Mean?,” in The Balance of Truth: Essays in Honour of Professor Geoffrey Lewis (Istanbul: Isis Press, 2000), 165–78. 10 Humphreys, “Qurʾānic Myth,” 274. 11 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:444. 12 Jackson, The Delhi Sultanate, 13. 13 For the passage from Niẓāmī, see Ḥasan Niẓāmī, Tāj al-maʾāsir (MS B. L. Add. 7623), fols. 67–68. 14 Prior to this time Sultan Maḥmūd Ghaznavī (r. 388–421/998–1030) was seen as the paragon of the ghāzī warrior and his figure is taken up in a number of places in Sultanate historiography. For representations of Maḥmūd in the broader Persianate historiographical tradition, see C. E. Bosworth, “Maḥmūd of Ghazna in Contemporary Eyes and Later Persian Literature,” Iran 4 (1966), 85–92. For representations of Maḥmūd in Persian advice literature in India, see N. Sarkar, “‘The Voice of Maḥmūd’: The Hero in Ziyā Baranī’s Fatāwā-i Jahāndārī,” Medieval History Journal 9, no. 2 (2006), 327–56. 15 C. Kafadar, Between Two Worlds: The Construction of the Ottoman State (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995), 79. 16 L. T. Darling, “Contested Territory: Ottoman Holy War in Comparative Context,” Studia Islamica 91 (2000), 148. 17 The centrality of ghazā imagery in the writings of Bābur is demonstrated in A. Anooshahr, The Ghazi Sultans and the Frontiers of Islam: A Comparative Study of the Late Medieval and Early Modern Periods (London: Routledge, 2009), 15–37. 18 ʿAfīf applies the title of “Supreme Sultan” (Sulṭān al-Aʿz̤am) to Fīrūz Shāh. ʿAfīf, TFS2, 19. 19 For a discussion of the early Bengal Sultanate and the relations with Delhi, see Eaton, The Rise of Islam, 40–50. 20 For details on the tablet see W. Kwiatkowski, “The David Collection Steele: A New Source for Firuz Shah Tughluq’s Jajnagar Campaign,” Journal of the David Collection 3 (2010), 114–29. 21 For a full account of the Sūmra and Sammā as discussed in contemporary Arabic and Persian sources, see R. Islam, “The Rise of the Sammas in Sind,” Islamic Culture 22 (1948), 359–82. For a more recent study, see N. Ahmad, “Diplomatic Relations Between the Sultans of Delhi and the Il-Khans of Iran,” in Islamic Heritage in South Asian Subcontinent, ed. N. Ahmad and I. H. Siddiqui (Jaipur: Publication Scheme, 1998), 69–78. Also see A. K. Majumdar, “Sind,” in The Delhi Sultanate, ed. R. C. Majumdar, The History and Culture of the Indian People (Bombay: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, 1967), 221–7.

Auer-12.indd 168

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

169

22 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 199. 23 For further descriptions of these events see P. Jackson, The Delhi Sultanate, 300–01. Also see J. M. Banerjee, History of Firuz Shah Tughluq (Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal, 1967), 36–40. 24 Gazetteer of Sind quoted in ibid., 56–57n125. 25 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 211. 26 For the imagery of the tears of the Sultan, see ibid., 215. 27 For a discussion of Qurʾānic representations of Moses, see M. Causse, “The Theology of Separation and the Theology of Community: A Study of the Prophetic Career of Moses According to the Qurʾān,” in The Qurʾan: Style and Contents, ed. A. Rippin, The Formation of the Classical Islamic World (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2001), 323–44. For a detailed discussion of interpretations of the Qurʾānic story of Moses, see B. M. Wheeler, Moses in the Quran and Islamic Exegesis, RoutledgeCurzon Studies in the Quran (London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2002). 28 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 217. Ārī bū ‘l-ʿajab asrārī chunānchih mihtar mūsà ʿalà nabīnā wa ʿalayhi al-salām-rā ‘ālam-i tīh pīsh āmad kih ān qiṣṣa-hā dar tafāsir-i mashhūr mazḵ ūr ast. ʿAfīf often begins or ends a narrative that includes miraculous events with the telltale marker “what a wondrous secret.” 29 Ibid., 217–18. 30 Both translations of the Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī neglect the passage provided in translation above. See Elliot and Dowson, The History of India, 3:326. Also ʿAfīf, Medieval India in Transition, 133. 31 For an exploration of the “desert motif ” in Biblical literature, see S. Talmon, “The ‘Desert Motif ’ in the Bible and in Qumran Literature,” in Biblical Motifs: Origins and Transformations, ed. A. Altmann, Philip W. Lown Institute of Advanced Judaic Studies Brandeis University Studies and Texts (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1966), 31–63. 32 Cornelia Shöck, “Moses,” EQ. 33 These events are also narrated in Q2:57–60. 34 Q5:26. 35 A. Khusraw, Khazāʾin al-futūḥ, 2nd ed., Bibliotheca Indica (Lahore: Ripon Printing Press Ltd., 1976), 13. 36 F. M. Donner, Narratives of Islamic Origins: The Beginnings of Islamic Historical Writing, vol. 14, Studies in Late Antiquity and Early Islam (Princeton, NJ: Darwin Press, 1998), 98. 37 For his important discussion of “styles of legitimation,” see ibid., 98–122. 38 See S. Stroumsa, “The Signs of Prophecy: The Emergence and Early Development of a Theme in Arabic Theological Literature,” Harvard Theological Review 78, nos. 1/2 (1985), 103. 39 See L. Marlow, “Kings, Prophets, and the ʿUlamāʾ in Mediaeval Islamic Advice Literature,” Studia Islamica 81 (1995), 106–10. 40 Rosenthal, A History of Muslim Historiography, 245. For the original text

Auer-12.indd 169

6/10/12 1:27 PM

170

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

see Muḥyī al-Dīn al-Kāfiyajī, Al-Mukhtasar fi ʿilm al-taʾrīkh (Beirut: ʿĀlam al-Kutub, 1990). 41 For Baranī’s seven precious qualities (nafāsat) of the knowledge of history (ʿilm-i tārīkh), see Baranī, TFS1, 10–13. 42 Ibid., 11–12. 43 Ibid., 12. 44 This verse has caused a difference of opinion in interpretation by modern day translators. The translation closest to the meaning taken by Baranī is found in K. Cragg, Readings in the Qurʾān (Brighton: Sussex Academic Press, 2004), 118. Arberry’s translation is along the same lines: “Appoint me a tongue of truthfulness among the others.” However, Dawood and Yusuf Ali produce different meanings in their translations of this āya. Q26:84 has a related verse Q19:50. 45 For insight into some of the multiple representations of the figure of Abraham in the Qurʾān and exegetical literature, see N. Calder, “Tafsīr from Ṭabarī to Ibn Kathīr: Problems in the Description of a Genre, Illustrated with Reference to the Story of Abraham,” in Approaches to the Qurʾān, ed. G. R. Hawting and Abdul-Kader A. Shareef, Routledge/SOAS Series on Contemporary Politics and Culture in the Middle East (London: Routledge, 1993), 101–40. Also see S. L. Lowin, The Making of a Forefather: Abraham in Islamic and Jewish Exegetical Narratives, vol. 65, Islamic History and Civilization: Studies and Texts (Leiden: Brill, 2006). 46 Muḥammad b. ʿAbd Allāh Kisāʾī, The Tales of the Prophets of al-Kisāʾi, trans. W. Thackston, vol. 2, Library of Classical Arabic Literature (Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1978), 142. 47 See J. S. Meisami, Persian Historiography to the End of the Twelfth Century, Islamic Surveys (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999), 24–37. 48 Baranī, TFS1, 12. See also identical wording in Q5:13. 49 Yusuf Ali is conspicuously vociferous on this point in his translation of this verse. Y. Ali, The Holy Qurʾan: Text, Translation and Commentary (Elmhurst: Tahrike Tarsile Qurʾan, 1987), 194n565. 50 Durūgh-hā bi-rāstī mānand kunad. Baranī, TFS1, 13. 51 Fardā-yi qiyāmat muʾallif-i kaẕāb bisakht-tarīn ʿaẕāb va ʿiqāb dar mānad. Ibid., 16. 52 Ibid., 14–15. 53 For an introduction to the Futūḥāt-i Fīrūz Shāhī that includes a Persian edition and translation, see Fīrūz Shāh Tughluq, The Futuhat-i Firuz Shahi, trans. A. Alavi (Delhi: Idarah-i Adabiyat-i Delli, 1996). The first printed edition of the Futūḥāt-i Fīrūz Shāhī is Fīrūz Shāh Tughluq, Futūḥāt-i Firūz Shāhī (Delhi: Rizvi Press, 1885). The next edition with translation was Fīrūz Shāh Tughluq, “Futūḥāt-i Fīrūzshāhī,” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal 7, no. 1 (1941), 61–89. For the translation of N. B. Roy, see Fīrūz Shāh Tughluq, “The Victories of Sulṭān Fīrūz Shāh of Tughluq Dynasty: English Translation of Futūḥāt-i Fīrūz Shāhī by N.B. Roy,” Islamic Culture 15, no. 1 (1941), 449–64. I

Auer-12.indd 170

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

171

have relied on the Aligarh edition, Fīrūz Shāh Tughluq, Futūḥāt-i Fīrūz Shāhī (Aligarh: Department of History Aligarh Muslim University, 1954). 54 See ibid., 6. 55 For this discussion and further description, see E. Kohlberg, “al-Rāfiḍa or al-Rawāfiḍ,” EI2. For an overview of the term “exaggerators” (ghulāt), see M. G. S. Hodgson, “Ghulāt,” EI2. Also see Wadād al-Qāḍī, “The Development of the Term Ghulāt in Muslim Literature with Special Reference to the Kaysāniyya,” in Akten des VII. Kongresses für Arabistik und Islamwissenschaft, Göttingen, 15. bis 22. August 1974, ed. A. Dietrich (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1976), 295–319. 56 “Sūrat Yūsuf ” 12:3, quoted in the prolegomena of Baranī, TFS1, 1. 57 For literary analysis of “Sūrat Yūsuf,” see A. H. Johns, “Joseph in the Qur’ān: Dramatic Dialogue, Human Emotion and Prophetic Wisdom,” Islamochristiana / Dirāsāt Islāmīya Masīḥīya 7 (1981), 29–55. 58 For a cross reading of the Joseph narrative in Biblical and Qurʾānic sources, see J. Kaltner, Inquiring of Joseph: Getting to Know a Biblical Character through the Qurʾan, Interfaces (Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 2003). In Persian, the most celebrated example is Nūr al-Dīn ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Jāmī’s ninth/fifteenth century poem, Yūsuf va Zulaykhā. For a retelling of the story in Swahili, see J. Knappert, Islamic Legends: Histories of the Heroes, Saints, and Prophets of Islam, vol. 15:1, Religious Texts in Translation Series Nisaba (Leiden: Brill, 1985), 85–104. For an early Urdu version, see A. S. Gujarātī, Yūsuf Zulaikhā, 1580–1585: Dabistān-i Golkunḍah kī Pahlī Masnavī (Hyderabad: Milne kā patah Sayyidah Jaʿfar, 1983). 59 See A. C. S. Peacock, Mediaeval Islamic Historiography and Political Legitimacy: Balʿamī’s Tārīkhnāma, Routledge Studies in the History of Iran and Turkey (London: Routledge, 2007), 48. 60 For an overview of Shajarah-yi Ansāb, see M. S. Khan, “The Life and Works of Fakhr-i Mudabbir,” Islamic Culture 51, no. 2 (1977), 127–40. 61 For a discussion of Adam as the progenitor of humankind in tafsīr and ḥadīth literature, see M. J. Kister, “Legends in tafsīr and ḥadīth Literature: The Creation of Ādam and Related Stories,” in Approaches to the History of the Interpretation of the Qurʾān, ed. A. Rippin (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1988), 82–114. 62 Cf. Q12:1–101 and Jūzjānī, TN, 1:29–30. 63 The burial and translatio are not present in al-Ṭabarī or al-Kisāʾī but similar details are given in Aḥmad b. Muḥammad Thaʿlabī, ʿArāʾis al-majālis fī qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ, or, Lives of the Prophets, trans. W. M. Brinner, vol. 23, Studies in Arabic Literature (Leiden: Brill, 2002), 234–5. Translatio is a major subject of medieval Christian hagiographical writings. See P. J. Geary, Furta Sacra: Thefts of Relics in the Central Middle Ages, rev. ed. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990), 9–15. 64 T. Nagel, “Ḳiṣaṣ al-Anbiyāʾ,” EI2. 65 J. Lindsay, “ʿAlī Ibn ʿAsākir as a Preserver of Qiṣaṣ al-Anbiyāʾ: The Case

Auer-12.indd 171

6/10/12 1:27 PM

172

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

of David b. Jesse,” Studia Islamica 82 (1995), 53. For a full treatment of Ibn ʿAsākir’s Taʾrīkh madīnat dimashq, see J. Lindsay, “Professors, Prophets and Politicians: ʿAlī ibn ʿAsākir’s Taʾrīkh madīnat dimashq” (PhD diss., University of Wisconsin–Madison, 1994). 66 For a description of Iltutmish’s succession and subsequent events of his reign, see Jackson, The Delhi Sultanate, 29–43 and Kumar, The Emergence of the Delhi Sultanate 1192–1286, 130–46. Also see A. Wink, Al-Hind: The Making of the Indo-Islamic World, vol. II, The Slave Kings and the Islamic Conquests 11th–13th Centuries (Leiden: Brill, 1997), 152–8, 184–92. 67 Peter Jackson prefers to refer to his dynasty as the “Shamsid dynasty” rather than “Mamlūk or Slave dynasty.” Jackson, The Delhi Sultanate, 44. For a preliminary study of the mamlūk institution that compares India and Egypt, see P. Jackson, “The Mamlūk Institution in Early Muslim India,” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 2 (1990), 340–58. For a comparison with similar developments in Egypt, see A. Levanoni, “The Mamluk Conception of the Sultanate,” 373–92. 68 Peter Jackson discusses the ambivalent historical record related to the occasion of Ārām Shāh’s death. See Jackson, The Delhi Sultanate, 29. 69 See S. Kumar, The Emergence of the Delhi Sultanate 1192–1286, 135. 70 M. S. Jūzjānī, TN, 1:439. 71 Mālik Duʿr, not mentioned by name in the Qurʾān, rescues Joseph from the well after his brothers abandoned him. Francis Steingass notes that Duʿr is the “name of the father of Mālik the Khuzāʿite, who drew Joseph from the well.” See A Comprehensive Persian-English Dictionary, 8th ed., s.v. “Duʿr.” Wheeler Thackston transcribes his name as Malik ibn Dhuʿr in his translation of Kisāʾī, The Tales of the Prophets of al-Kisāʾi, 171–2. William Brinner lists his name as Mālik ibn Daʿar in al-Ṭabarī, The History of al-Ṭabarī (Taʾrīkh al-rusul wa ‘l-mulūk), 40 vols., Bibliotheca Persica (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1986), 2:153. The discrepancy is also noted by ʿAbd al-Ḥayy Ḥabībī in Jūzjānī, TN, 1:30n2. 72 Ibid., 1:439. Al-Kisāʾī gives the reference to a six-month-old child who witnessed the seduction and spoke out on behalf of Joseph. See Kisāʾī, The Tales of the Prophets of al-Kisāʾi, 175. Al-Ṭabarī lists some traditions about the seduction of Joseph, stating that it was a young child who proposed the solution to the conflicting testimony of Rāʿīl the wife of Potiphar, and Joseph. See al-Ṭabarī, The History of al-Ṭabarī (Taʾrīkh al-rusul wa ‘l-mulūk), 2:156–58. 73 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:441. “Sūrat Yūsuf,” 12:12–13. 74 For the full text of Iltutmish’s journey into slavery, see ibid., 1:439–442 (tr. 1:597–602). 75 J. Kugel, In Potiphar’s House: The Interpretive Life of Biblical Texts, 1st pbk. ed. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1994), 6–7. 76 Baranī, TFS1, 1. 77 The degree of Baranī’s “theological” and alternatively “secular” outlook on

Auer-12.indd 172

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

173

history has been the subject of controversy. Peter Hardy tends to stress the theological tenor of Baranī’s history writing, a position that elicits strong reaction among scholars. See I. Habib, “Baranī’s Theory of the History of the Delhi Sultanate,” 99, 111n5. Also see K. A. Nizami, On History and Historians of Medieval India, 136. 78 Unlike Baranī who initiates his discussion with “the most beautiful of tales,” ʿAfīf concludes his retelling of the story of Joseph with the Qurʾānic quote. See ʿAfīf, TFS2, 24. 79 Ibid., 25. 80 Ibid., 342. 81 ʿAfīf ’s narration of the story of Joseph builds off fragments of the Qurʾānic narrative and the qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ. Ibid., 342–43 (tr. 194–95). 82 See Niẓām al-Mulk, Siyāsatnāmah (Tehran: Bungāh-i Tarjamah va Nashr-i Kitāb, 1962), 17. Niẓām al-Mulk identifies the angel Gabriel (Jibraʾīl) with the voice from above. 83 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 342. 84 Ibid., 343. 85 Ibid. 86 Ibid. 87 Ibid., 509–11. 88 Cf. Q12:43–54 with ibid., 510–11. 89 Ibid., 511. Chapter 3: Muḥammad’s Example as the Perfect Ruler 1 Baranī, TFS1, 2. 2 For the comprehensive survey of the myriad ways the example of the Prophet has been revered in Muslim societies, see A. Schimmel, And Muhammad is His Messenger: The Veneration of the Prophet in Islamic Piety (Lahore: Vanguard Books Ltd., 1987). 3 Q33:21. 4 See G. H. A. Juynboll, “Some New Ideas on the Development of Sunna as a Technical Term in Early Islam,” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 10 (1987), 97–118. 5 U. Rubin, The Eye of the Beholder: The Life of Muḥammad as Viewed by the Early Muslims (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995), 3. 6 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:477. 7 Ibid., 1:477 (tr. 674). 8 Ibid., 1:56. 9 For a survey of the development of the idea of the seal of the prophets, see Y. Friedmann, “Finality of Prophethood in Sunnī Islām,” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 7 (1986), 177–215. 10 S. Evstatiev, “On the Perception of the Khātam al-Nabiyyīn Doctrine in Arabic Historical Thought: Confirmation or Finality,” in Studies in Arabic and

Auer-12.indd 173

6/10/12 1:27 PM

174

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Islam: Proceedings of the 19th Congress, Union Européenne des Arabisants et Islamisants, Halle 1998, ed. S. Leder, et al., Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta (Leuven: Peeters, 2002), 455–67. 11 M. A. Ali, “Capital of the Sultans: Delhi during the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries,” in Delhi through the Ages: Essays in Urban History, Culture and Society, ed. R. E. Frykenberg (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1986), 20–1. 12 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:62. 13 Arabic and Persian usage of the term “seal” has a number of possible variations from khātam, to khātim, and khatm. There is no distinction made between these variant readings in historiographical usage from the Delhi Sultanate. 14 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 273 (tr. 161). 15 Ibid., 19. This includes a long list of Fīrūz Shāh’s titles. 16 Ibid., 3. 17 See Wilferd Madelung, “The Assumption of the Title Shāhānshāh by the Būyids and ‘The Reign of the Daylam (Dawlat al-Daylam),’” Journal of Near Eastern Studies 28, no. 2 (1969): 84–108; 68–83. 18 Hugh Kennedy describes the establishment of ʿAbbāsid authority as a restructuring of the legitimacy of Muslim rule, saying, “The Abbasid revolution was not a coup d’état led by one faction in the ruling élite against another; it was rather an attempt to reconstruct the Islamic polity, to reintegrate rulers and the ruled in the umma under the leadership of the Family of the Prophet.” See Hugh Kennedy, The Prophet and the Age of the Caliphates: The Islamic Near East from the Sixth to the Eleventh Century, ed. P. M. Holt, A History of the Near East (London: Longman, 1986), 127. 19 See Yaḥyā b. Aḥmad Sirhindī, Tārīkh-i Mubārak Shāhī, ed. Hidayat Husain, vol. 254, Bibliotheca Indica (Calcutta: Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1931), 182. 20 P. Jackson, “Turkish Slaves on Islam’s Indian Frontier,” in Slavery & South Asian History, ed. Indrani Chatterjee and Richard Maxwell Eaton (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006), 75. 21 Quoted from the Rāḥat al-ṣudūr in O. Safi, The Politics of Knowledge in Premodern Islam: Negotiating Ideology and Religious Inquiry, ed. Carl W. Ernst and Bruce B. Lawrence, Islamic Civilization and Muslim Networks (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2006), 136. 22 Evstatiev, “On the Perception of the Khātam an-nabiyyīn Doctrine,” 463–64. 23 Renard, Islam and the Heroic Image, 144. 24 Generally known as al-Sīrah, this seminal work on the life of Muḥammad was likely originally titled Kitāb al-maghāzī wa’l-siyar. M. Hinds, “‘Maghāzī’ and ‘Sīra’ in Early Islamic Scholarship,” in The Life of Muhammad, ed. U. Rubin (Brookfield: Ashgate, 1998), 1–10. 25 Muḥammad b. Isḥāq, The Life of Muḥammad: A Translation of Ibn Isḥāq’s Sīrat Rasūl Allāh, trans. Alfred Guillaume (Karachi: Oxford University Press, 2004), 80. 26 For a discussion of the origins of theological discussions on the signs of

Auer-12.indd 174

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

175

prophethood, see Stroumsa, “The Signs of Prophecy,” 101–14. 27 Renard, Islam and the Heroic Image, 135–6. 28 On the light of Muḥammad, see Uri Rubin, “Pre-existence and Light: Aspects of the Concept of Nūr Muḥammad,” Israel Oriental Studies 5 (1975): 62–119. 29 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:439 (tr. 596). The “signs of rule” (ās ̱ār-i dawlat) may be seen to parallel the “signs of the noble one” (āthār al-sharīf) which refer to the relics of the Prophet Muḥammad. 30 See Jūzjānī, T̤abaḳāt-i Nāṣirī, 1:596n1. 31 S. Jabir Raza, “Nomenclature and Titulature of the Early Turkish Sultans of Delhi Found in Numismatic Legends,” in Medieval Indian Coinages: A Historical and Economic Perspective, ed. Amiteshwar Jha (Nasik: Indian Institute of Research in Numismatic Studies, 2001), 85–96. 32 H. Nelson Wright, Catalogue of the Coins in the Indian Museum Calcutta: Including the Cabinet of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, vol. 2 (Oxford: Published for the Trustees of the Indian Museum at the Clarendon Press, 1907), 52. 33 Ibid., 60. 34 See A. K. S. Lambton, “The Theory of Kingship in the Naṣīḥat ul-Mulūk of Ghazālī,” Islamic Quarterly 1 (1954): 51–2. 35 See Muḥammad b. Manṣūr (Fakhr-i Mudabbir) Mubārak Shāh, Ta’ríkh-i Fakhru’d-Dín Mubáraksháh being The Historical Introduction to the Book of Genealogies of Fakhru’d-Dín Mubáraksháh Marvar-rúdí [sic] completed in A.D. 1206, ed. E. Denison Ross, vol. 4, James G. Forlong Fund (London: Royal Asiatic Society, 1927), 12. Also see ʿAfīf, TFS2, 23. 36 Baranī, TFS1, 2. 37 Ibid., 2–3. 38 As far as we know, the only surviving manuscript of the Ṣaḥīfah-yi naʿt-i Muḥammadī is located in the Rampur Library in India. The manuscript dates from 1002/1593–4. Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn Baranī, “Ṣaḥīfah-yi naʿt-i Muḥammadī,” in Raza Library (Rampur). 39 Hasan, “Sahifa-i Na’t-i Muhammadi of Zia-ud-Din Barani,” 101. 40 Baranī, TFS1, 3. 41 Ibid. 42 G. Vajda, “Hārūt wa Mārūt,” EI2. See also W. Brinner, “Hārūt and Mārūt,” EQ. 43 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 2. 44 Ibid. 45 Ibid. 46 Ibid. 47 Ibid., 3. 48 Ibid. 49 Ibid., 1. 50 For a discussion of this subject in Qurʾānic exegesis, see Leah Kinberg, “Muḥkamāt and Mutashābihāt (Koran 3/7): Implications of a Koranic Pair of Terms in Medieval Exegesis,” Arabica 35, no. 3 (1988): 143–72.

Auer-12.indd 175

6/10/12 1:27 PM

176

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

51 52 53 54

Ibid. C. E. Bosworth, “The Titulature of the Early Ghaznavids,” Oriens 15 (1962): 210. Niẓāmī, Tāj al-maʾāsir, fol. 10a. W. Graham, “Traditionalism in Islam: An Essay in Interpretation,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 23, no. 3 (1993): 506. 55 A number of scholars have commented on the overlapping literary development of ḥadīth and history, beginning with Franz Rosenthal who discussed khabar as an early historical literary form. See Rosenthal, A History of Muslim Historiography, 66–71. For further discussion of khabar, see Stefan Leder, “The Literary Use of the Khabar: A Basic Form of Historical Writing,” in The Byzantine and Early Islamic Near East, ed. A. Cameron and L. Conrad, Studies in Late Antiquity and Early Islam (Princeton, NJ: Darwin Press, 1992), 277–315. For a discussion of the relationship between ḥadīth and history, see Khalidi, Arabic Historical Thought in the Classical Period, 17–30. 56 See Robinson, Islamic Historiography, 98. 57 Jūzjānī, TN, 497 (tr. 716). 58 Baranī, TFS1, 9. 59 Ibid., 10. Baranī uses the Arabic phrase here, ʿilm al-ḥadīth wa ʿilm al-taʾrīkh tawʾamān, making a clever turn on an ubiquitous saying found in history writing across the Muslim world. For further discussion on the related apothegm “religion and rule are twins,” see chapter 6. 60 For Baranī’s seven qualities of history, see Ibid., 10–13. 61 For a comprehensive treatment of the concept of knowledge (ʿilm) in the history of Islam, see Franz Rosenthal, Knowledge Triumphant: The Concept of Knowledge in Medieval Islam (Leiden: Brill, 1970). 62 For a discussion of the principle of abrogation, see J. Burton, “Nask ̱h (a.), or al-Nāsiḵh wa ‘l-Mansūḵh,” EI2. Also see D. Powers, “The Exegetical Genre nāsikh al-Qurʾān wa mansūkhuhu,” in Approaches to the History of the Interpretation of the Qurʾān, ed. Andrew Rippin (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1988), 117–38. 63 The one extant record of the Taʾrīkh al-khulafāʾ of Ibn Isḥāq is found in a fragment of papyrus. N. Abbott, Studies in Arabic Literary Papyri, vol. 1, The University of Chicago Oriental Institute Publications (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1957), 80–99. 64 General consensus has it that he was a child in a family of manumitted slaves (mawālī) under Qays b. Makhrama b. al-Muṭṭalib b. ʿAbd Manāf b. Quṣayy. See J. M. B. Jones, “Ibn Isḥāḳ, Muḥammad b. Isḥāḳ b. Yasār b. Ḵhi̱ yār,” EI2. Baranī elevates and sanctifies the stature of the authors he cites by discussing their descent from companions of the Prophet (in the case of Muḥammad b. ʿUmar b. Wāqid as well). 65 Baranī, TFS1, 14. 66 Ibid. The text makes reference to one ‫ امام هضم‬leaving speculation as to which historian Baranī intended. Perhaps it is a reference to the great Andalusian historian Abū Muḥammad ʿAlī b. Aḥmad b. Saʿīd Ibn Ḥazm (384–465/

Auer-12.indd 176

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

177

994–1064). 67 Ibid., 17. 68 For an overview of the relationship between the development of ḥadīth collections and the genre of ʿilm al-rijāl, see Graham, “Traditionalism in Islam,” 507–9. 69 J. W. Fück, “Ibn Saʿd,” EI2. 70 G. H. A. Juynboll, “Riḏjāl,” EI2. 71 S. Zakkar, “Ibn Khayyāṭ al-ʿUṣfurī, Khalīfa,” EI2. For a more detailed treatment and partial translation of Ibn Khayyāt’s al-Taʾrīkh, see the dissertation of C. Wurtzel, “The Umayyads in the History of Khalīfa b. Khayyāṭ” (PhD diss., Yale University, 1977). 72 For an overview of the genre of ṭabaqāt, see I. Hafsi, “Recherches sur le Genre « Ṭabaqāt » dans la Littérature Arabe,” Arabica 23, no. 3 (1976): 227–65; 24, no. 1 (1977): 1–41; 24, no. 2 (1977): 150–86. For the introduction of the ṭabaqāt form of historiography in the subcontinent, see Ahmad, “Diplomatic Relations Between the Sultans of Delhi and the Il-Khans of Iran,” 125–50. For the development of ṭabaqāt literature as it relates to Sufism and the evolution of hagiographical literature in Islam, see J. Mojaddedi, The Biographical Tradition in Sufism: The ṭabaqāt Genre from al-Sulamī to Jāmī, ed. Sue Hamilton, Curzon Studies in Asian Religion (Richmond: Curzon Press, 2001). 73 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 227–28 (tr. 138). Classical commentaries of this verse relate it to the events of the attempted pilgrimage from Medina to Mecca that resulted in the treaty of al-Ḥudaybiyyah. Al-Ṭabarī, Jāmiʿ al-bayān ʿan taʾwīl āy al-Qurʾān, 2nd ed., 30 vols. (Egypt: Muṣṭafá al-Bābī al-Ḥalabī, 1954–68), 26:76–7. 74 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 229. 75 Ibn Isḥāq, The Life of Muḥammad, 610–14. 76 Ibid., 462. 77 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 476 (tr. 258). 78 Ibid., 509–11. 79 Ibid., 512. 80 Ibid., 351 (tr. 198). 81 Ibid., 351. 82 Ibid. 83 For a brief discussion of medicine during the Delhi Sultanate, see A. Azmi, “Islamic Medicine in India during the Sultanate Period (1206–1413),” Studies in History of Medicine and Science 18, no. 1 (2002): 1–15. 84 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 353. 85 Ibid., 354. 86 Ibid., 357. 87 Ibid., 359, idkhāl al-surūr fī qulūb al-mūʾminīn ṣadaqah. This ḥadīth is also utilized in ʿAfīf ’s ten traits of kingship. ʿAfīf, TFS2, 12. 88 ʿAfīf appropriates the language of maqāmāt from the discourse of Sufism. Here I have translated it as “attributes” to best fit the sense utilized by ʿAfīf in his

Auer-12.indd 177

6/10/12 1:27 PM

178

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

prolegomena. However, in the context of Sufism the term is more commonly translated as “stages” or “stations,” referring to the progression a religious practitioner makes on a spiritual path while being guided by a shaykh. For a further discussion of these issues, see chapter 4. 89 The Arabic reads al-taʿẓīm li-amr Allāh wa ‘l-shafaqah ʿalá khalq Allāh. ʿAfīf, TFS2, 6. The above quote is found in Fatḥ al-bārī bi-sharḥ Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī from the great ḥadīth scholar Ibn Ḥajar al-ʿAsqalānī (773–852/1372–1449), though not directly attributed to Muḥammad. See Ibn Ḥajar al-ʿAsqalānī, Fatḥ al-bārī: Sharḥ Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī, 1st ed., 15 vols. (Riyadh: Dār al-Islām, 2000), 11:552. 90 The Arabic reads al-duʿāʾ mukhkh al-ʿibādah. ʿAfīf, TFS2, 7. 91 The Arabic is idha tasmaʾ tusmaʾ. Ibid., 8. 92 Ibid., 8–9. 93 Ibid., 9. 94 Ibid. 95 The passage from al-Tirmidhī is quoted in Schimmel, And Muhammad is His Messenger, 34. 96 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 20. 97 B. Wheeler, Mecca and Eden: Ritual, Relics, and Territory in Islam (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006), 81. 98 See P. Hasan, “The Footprint of the Prophet,” Muqarnas 10 (1993): 335–43. 99 See N. Rabbat, “The Meaning of the Umayyad Dome of the Rock,” Muqarnas 6 (1989): 12. For a discussion of the Night Journey and Ascension in literary sources and the relationship to Jerusalem, see H. Busse, “Jerusalem in the Story of Muhammad’s Night Journey and Ascension,” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 14 (1991): 1–40. 100 The symbols of rule conferred upon Fīrūz Shāh were robes (khilʿat-hā), the standard (ʿalam), signet ring (khātam), sword (sayf), and the footprint of the Prophet (mawṭī). Tughluq, Futūḥāt-i Fīrūz Shāhī, 18–9. There is some discrepancy between the early accounts that indicates that the footprint was brought as part of the caliphal investiture, while a later tradition, documented by Sir Thomas Metcalfe who was British Resident in the court of the last Mughal emperor Bahādur Shāh, says that Fīrūz Shāh sent his own emissary to Mecca to procure caliphal investiture where the relic was also obtained. See A. Welch, “The Shrine of the Holy Footprint in Delhi,” Muqarnas 14 (1997): 166. 101 For an overview of the architectural history of the qadam sharīf complex, see Welch, “The Shrine of the Holy Footprint in Delhi,” 166–78. 102 See Ali, “Capital of the Sultans: Delhi during the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries,” 34–44. 103 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:440 (tr. 599). 104 Ibid., 1:698 (tr. 76). 105 S. Digby, “Before Timur Came: Provincialization of the Delhi Sultanate through the Fourteenth Century,” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the

Auer-12.indd 178

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

179

Orient 47, no. 3 (2004): 298–356. 106 Stanley Tambiah utilizes the metaphor of the “galactic polity” to characterize traditional Southeast Asian kingdoms. Stanley Jeyaraja Tambiah, Culture, Thought, and Social Action: An Anthropological Perspective (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1985), 252–86. 107 Wright, Catalogue of the Coins in the Indian Museum Calcutta, 61. Chapter 4: Images of the Friends of God in the Lives of Sultans 1 His full name is Muḥammad Mubārak al-ʿAlavī al-Kirmānī. For an overview of his famous work, the Siyar al-awliyāʾ, see M. Siddiqui, The Memoirs of Sufis Written in India: Reference to Kashaf-ul-mahjub, Siyar-ul-Auliya, and Siyar-ul-Arifin, 1st ed. (Baroda: Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda Press, 1979), 56–81. Also see Ernst, Eternal Garden, 85–7. 2 K. A. Nizami writes, “The pre-Indian history of the Čishtī order cannot be reconstructed on the basis of any authentic historical data.” See K. A. Nizami, “Čishtiyya,” EI2. For a comprehensive study of the Chishtiyyah and their historical impact, see C. Ernst and B. Lawrence, Sufi Martyrs of Love: The Chishti Order in South Asia and Beyond, 1st ed. (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002). 3 For an overview of the term awliyāʾ, see F. Denny, “‘God’s Friends’: The Sanctity of Persons in Islam,” in Sainthood: Its Manifestations in World Religions, ed. Richard Kieckhefer and George Doherty Bond (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988), 69–97. 4 For an outline of the growth of the influence of Sufi shaykhs in South Asia, see Simon Digby, “The Sufi Shaikh as a Source of Authority in Mediaeval India,” in Islam et Société en Asie du Sud (Collection Puruṣārtha, 9), ed. Marc Gaborieau (Paris: Editions de l’Ecole des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, 1986), 57–77. 5 While scholars have identified various phases in the development of Sufism, there appears to be no consensus on the origin and development of the Sufi orders. The standard work is that of J. Spencer Trimingham, The Sufi Orders in Islam (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971); however, early on this study came under criticism for its lack of theoretical sophistication. For its critics, see S. Digby, “Review Article: The Sufi Order in Islam,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 36, no. 1 (1973): 136–9. Also see comments by Bruce Lawrence, “Review Article,” Religious Studies Review 4, no. 3 (1978): 171–9. More recently, Erik Ohlander has provided a nice summary of the major positions on the question of origins. See E. Ohlander, Sufism in an Age of Transition: ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī and the Rise of the Islamic Mystical Brotherhoods, vol. 71, Islamic History and Civilization (Leiden: Brill, 2008), 1–6. 6 See F. Flood, “Ghūrid Architecture in the Indus Valley: The Tomb of Shaykh Sādan Shahīd,” Ars Orientalis 31 (2001): 156. 7 For a look at the sometimes conflictual relations between the sultans of Delhi and Sufi shaykhs that resulted from their overlapping spheres of influence, see

Auer-12.indd 179

6/10/12 1:27 PM

180

8

9

10

11

12 13 14

Auer-12.indd 180

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam S. Digby, “The Sufi Shaykh and the Sultan: A Conflict of Claims to Authority in Medieval India,” Iran 28 (1990): 71–81. Also see B. Auer, “Intersections between Sufism and Power: Narrating the Shaykhs and Sultans of Northern India, 1200–1400,” in Sufism and Society: Arrangements of the Mystical in the Muslim World, 1200–1800, ed. J. Curry, and E. Ohlander, 17–33 (New York: Routledge, 2011). Javid Mojaddedi provides a useful study of six major works in the Sufi biographical tradition. See Mojaddedi, The Biographical Tradition in Sufism. Even earlier than these works is the Kitāb al-awliyāʾ of Ibn Abī ‘l-Dunyā (208–81/823–94). This compilation of the sayings and anecdotes of the awliyāʾ is among the earliest of its kind and represents the beginning stages in their literary construction. See Muḥammad b. ʿAlī Ḥakīm al-Tirmidhī, The Concept of Sainthood in Early Islamic Mysticism: Two Works by Al-Ḥakīm Al-Tirmidhī, ed. Ian Richard Netton, trans. Bernd Radtke and John O’Kane, Curzon Sufi Series (Richmond Surrey: Curzon Press, 1996), 8. For an overview of the malfūẓāt textual tradition, see Nizami, On History and Historians of Medieval India, 163–97. For its development in the context of the Chishtiyyah, see C. Ernst, “The Textual Formation of Oral Teachings in Early Chishtī Sufism,” in Texts in Context: Traditional Hermeneutics, ed. Jeffrey R. Timm (Albany: State University of New York, 1992), 271–97. Simon Digby gives the references for the sections of Khusraw’s works dedicated to eulogizing the Shaykh. See Digby, “The Sufi Shaikh as a Source of Authority in Mediaeval India,” 70n77. For a study of the relationship between Amīr Khusraw and Niẓām al-Dīn, see N. Faruqi, “Amīr Khusraw in the Presence of his Mentor Ḥaḍrat Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyā,” Hamdard Islamicus 16, no. 2 (1993): 5–24. For the various references to the Shaykh as a sultan, see K. A. Nizami, The Life and Times of Shaikh Nizam-u’d-din Auliya, ed. Khaliq Ahmad Nizami, Muslim Religious Thinkers of South Asia (Delhi: Idarah-i Adabyat-i Delli, 1991), 182–84. The title of sultan as applied to mystics was in vogue earlier than its use by Amīr Khvurd. Farīd al-Dīn ʿAṭṭār (d. ca. 617/1220) supplies a biographical tale of the life of the early and noted mystic Bāyazīd al-Bisṭāmī (d. ca. 261/874), in which he is conferred, by a celestial voice, the title of sulṭān al-ʿārifīn. See Farīd al-Dīn ʿAṭṭār, Tazḵ irat al-Awliyāʾ, ed. Reynold A. Nicholson, 2 vols., Persian Historical Texts (London: Luzac & Co., 1905–1907), 1:156. Ernst, Eternal Garden, 88. See F. Lifshitz, “Beyond Positivism and Genre: ‘Hagiographical’ Texts as Historical Narrative,” Viator 25 (1994): 111. Baranī, TFS1, 346. Baranī conveniently provides us with a list of what he considered the most popular books circulating in this vein: Qut al-qulūb of Muḥammad b. ʿAlī Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī (d. 386/998); Iḥyāʾ ʿulūm al-dīn of al-Ghazālī; Tarjamah-yi iḥyāʾ al-ʿulūm (likely the Kīmiyā-yi saʿādat, al-Ghazālī’s own Persian translation/abridgement of the Iḥyāʾ); ʿAwārif al-maʿārif of Shihāb

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

15

16 17 18 19

20 21

22

Auer-12.indd 181

181

al-Dīn Abū Ḥafṣ ʿUmar Suhravardī (539–632/1145–1234); Kashf al-maḥjūb; Sharḥ-i taʿarruf (also known as Nūr al-murīdīn wa faḍīḥat al-muddaʿīn), the commentary in Persian by Ismāʿīl b. Muḥammad Mustamlī Bukhārī (d. 434/1042) on the Kitāb al-taʿarruf li-madhhab ahl al-taṣawwuf of Muḥammad b. Ibrāhīm Kalābādhī (d. ca. 384/994); Risālah Qushayrī of ʿAbd al-Karīm b. Hawāzin Qushayrī (376–465/986–1072); Mirṣād al-ʿibād of Najm al-Dīn Rāzī (573–654/1177–1256); Maktūbāt-i ʿAyn al-Quz̤āt of Hamadhānī (492–526/1098– 1131); Lavāʾiḥ va Lavāmiʿ of Ḥamīd al-Dīn Nāgawrī (d. 641/1244); and Favāʾid al-fuʾād of Amīr Ḥasan Sijzī (655–737/1257–1336). For the sake of consistency, I utilize the Arabic transliteration walāyah. Wilāyah is also common, but as noted by Hermann Landolt, “The vocalization is not normally indicated in the texts, and the classical Arab lexicographers are not unamimous on this point.” See H. Landolt, “Walāyah,” ER. For examples of the distinction made in Sufism between walāyah and wilāyah, see V. Cornell, Realm of the Saint: Power and Authority in Moroccan Sufism, 1st ed. (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1998), xvii–xix. Vincent Cornell provides arguments for the usage of the terms sainthood and saints in the translation of walāyah and awliyāʾ. See Cornell, Realm of the Saint, xx–xxi. John Renard demonstrates this in J. Renard, Friends of God: Islamic Images of Piety, Commitment, and Servanthood (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008). See al-Tirmidhī, The Concept of Sainthood in Early Islamic Mysticism, 109. For a comprehensive discussion of the concept as it was picked up by Ibn al-ʿArabī, see M. Chodkiewicz, Seal of the Saints: Prophethood and Sainthood in the Doctrine of Ibn ʿArabī, trans. Liadain Sherrard, Golden Palm Series (Cambridge: Islamic Texts Society, 1993). See A. Sachedina, The Just Ruler in Shi’ite Islam: The Comprehensive Authority of the Jurist in Imamite Jurisprudence (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 33. Muḥammad b. ʿAlī Ḥakīm al-Tirmidhī, Kitāb khatm al-awliyāʾ, ed. ʿUthmān Yaḥyá, vol. 19, Buḥūth wa-dirāsāt (Beirut: al-Maṭbaʿah al-kāthūlīkiyah, 1965). Bernd Radtke notes that the titles Khatm al-awliyāʾ and Khatm al-walāyah are of later origin and argues that the original title was Sīrat al-awliyāʾ. See Bernd Radtke, “The Concept of Wilāya in Early Sufism,” in The Heritage of Sufism: Classical Persian Sufism from its Origins to Rumi (700–1300), ed. Leonard Lewisohn (Oxford: Oneworld, 1999), 484. Hujvīrī refers to the text as Khatm al-walāyah and ranks it as one of al-Tirmidhī’s major contributions. See ʿAlī b. ʿUs̱mān Hujvīrī, Kashf al-maḥjūb, ed. V. A. Zhukovskii, vol. 89, Zabān va farhang-i Īrān, 8th ed. (Tehran: Ṭahūrī, 1381Sh), 188. See al-Tirmidhī, The Concept of Sainthood in Early Islamic Mysticism, 96–7. For an overview of the idea of the seal of friendship with God, see Gerald T. Elmore, Islamic Sainthood in the Fullness of Time: Ibn al-ʿArabī’s Book of the

6/10/12 1:27 PM

182

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Fabulous Gryphon, ed. H. Daiber and D. Pingree, vol. 32, Islamic Philosophy, Theology, and Science: Texts and Studies (Leiden: Brill, 1999), 131–62. 23 See al-Tirmidhī, The Concept of Sainthood in Early Islamic Mysticism, 111. 24 Elmore, Islamic Sainthood in the Fullness of Time, 138n46. 25 For an overview of the Kashf al-maḥjūb, see Mojaddedi, The Biographical Tradition in Sufism, 125–47. 26 Hujvīrī, KM, 268. These ideas are largely a reflection of al-Tirmidhī’s. See Radtke, “The Concept of Wilāya in Early Sufism,” 488–89. 27 Hujvīrī, KM, 265–66. 28 Ibid., 268. Hujvīrī supported this idea by reference to the following Qurʾānic proof texts: 10:62, 41:31, and 2:257. 29 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 131 (tr. 94–96). For a study in comparison, see the useful work of Leonor Fernandes, which focuses on concurrent developments in Egypt. It is particularly useful for his analysis on the contribution of endowments (s. waqf) and patronage that were central to the institutionalization of Sufism in Egypt during the seventh/thirteenth through tenth/sixteenth centuries. See L. Fernandes, The Evolution of a Sufi Institution in Mamluk Egypt: The Khanqah, ed. Klaus Schwarz, vol. 134, Islamkundliche Untersuchungen (Berlin: Klaus Schwarz Verlag, 1988). 30 For a look at the social life and organization of the khāngāh during the Sultanate period, see K. A. Nizami, “Some Aspects of Khānqah Life in Medieval India,” Studia Islamica 8 (1957): 51–69. 31 See P. Jackson, “The Mongols and the Delhi Sultanate in the Reign of Muḥammad Tughluq (1325–1351),” Central Asiatic Journal 19, nos. 1–2 (1975): 118–57. 32 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 133. ʿAfīf traces the safety of Hānsī, achieved through the presence of the Chishtī shaykhs in the region, as beginning with Quṭb al-Dīn Munavvar. See ʿAfīf, TFS2, 82. 33 Again al-Tirmidhī was at the forefront of theological exposition on the subject of prophetic miracles and the wonders of shaykhs. For his contribution, see B. Radtke, “Al-Hakīm al-Tirmidhī on Miracles,” in Miracle et Karāma: Hagiographies Médiévales Comparées, ed. Denise Aigle (Turnhout: Brepols, 2000), 287–99. This theological principle was never accepted in all quarters and debates surrounding its validity persisted over time. For the vigorous expression of this debate in al-Andalus, see Maribel Fierro, “The Polemic about the Karāmāt al-awliyāʾ and the Development of Ṣūfism in al-Andalus (Fourth/Tenth-Fifth/Eleventh Centuries),” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 55, no. 2 (1992): 236–49. 34 Hujvīrī, KM, 268. John Renard makes the useful distinction between prophetic “miracles” (muʿjizāt) and the “marvels” (karāmāt) of Sufi shaykhs, acknowledging the important distinction made in Muslim theological writings. See Renard, Friends of God, 95, 267–75. 35 For a discussion of the stories of marvels (karāmāt) in the sacred biographies during the Delhi Sultanate, see R. Aquil, “Miracles, Authority, and Benevolence:

Auer-12.indd 182

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

183

Stories of Karamat in Sufi Literature of the Delhi Sultanate,” in Sufi Cults and the Evolution of Medieval Indian Culture, ed. Anup Taneja (Delhi: Indian Council of Historical Research, 2003), 109–38. 36 For a discussion of the history of relations between Kākatīya and Delhi and the architectural heritage that emerged from that encounter, see P. Wagoner and J. Rice, “From Delhi to the Deccan: Newly Discovered Tughluq monuments at Warangal-Sult̤ānpūr and the Beginnings of Indo-Islamic Architecture in Southern India,” Artibus Asiae 61, no. 1 (2001): 77–117. 37 Baranī, TFS1, 332. 38 Ibid., 325. 39 Hujvīrī, KM, 265. 40 In al-Tirmidhī’s conception, the Sufi parallel to prophetic revelation (waḥy) is inspiration (ilhām). See Radtke, “The Concept of Wilāya in Early Sufism,” 492. 41 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 73 also 217, among other instances. 42 For a complete discussion of Hujvīrī’s genealogy from the successors of the Prophet to the Sufis (rijāl al-ṣūfiyah), see Hujvīrī, KM, 78–218. 43 Hujvīrī devotes an entire chapter (bāb) to highlighting the virtues of selfimposed poverty (faqr). See Ibid., 21–34. 44 Baranī, FJ, 140. 45 See S. Kumar, “Assertions of Authority: A Study of the Discursive Statements of Two Sultans of Delhi,” in The Making of Indo-Persian Culture: Indian and French Studies, ed. Muzaffar Alam, Françoise ‘Nalini’ Delvoye, and Marc Gaborieau (New Delhi: Manohar, 2000), 39. 46 Safi, The Politics of Knowledge in Premodern Islam, 129. 47 Ibid., 132–36. For an overview of narratives relating to sultans and shaykhs of the Saljūq period, see H. Dabashi, “Historical Conditions of Persian Sufism during the Seljuk Period,” in The Heritage of Sufism: Classical Persian Sufism from its Origins to Rumi (700–1300), ed. Leonard Lewisohn (Oxford: Oneworld, 1999), 137–74. 48 For the influence of this family in Bukhara during the sixth/twelfth century, see Omeljan Pritsak, “Āl-i Burhān,” Der Islam 30 (1952): 81–96. 49 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:442 (tr. 600). 50 A similar narrative of later origin is found in the Favāʾid al-fuʾād of Amīr Ḥasan Sijzī. In this narrative Iltutmish is said to have been foretold by either Shihāb al-Dīn Suhravardī or Awḥad Kirmānī (d. ca. 635/1238), “You will be king!” Amīr Ḥasan Sijzī, Favāʾid al-fuʾād, 1st ed. (Lahore: Malik Sirāj al-Dīn 1966), 358. 51 For a description of the etiquette of this relationship, see M. Ajmal, “A Note on Adab in the Murshid-Murīd Relationship,” in Moral Conduct and Authority: The Place of Adab in South Asian Islam, ed. Barbara Daly Metcalf (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984), 241–51. 52 For a discussion of the usage of the imagery of wine in early Persian poetry, see E. Yarshater, “The Theme of Wine-Drinking and the Concept of the Beloved in Early Persian Poetry,” Studia Islamica, no. 13 (1960): 43–53.

Auer-12.indd 183

6/10/12 1:27 PM

184

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

53 For acts of clairvoyance, see Renard, Friends of God, 112–15. 54 J. Schacht, “ʿAhd,” EI2. 55 A. Schimmel, Mystical Dimensions of Islam (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1975), 290. 56 See K. A. Nizami, “Iltutmish the Mystic,” Islamic Culture 20, no. 2 (1946): 165–80. 57 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:435 (tr. 581). This exemplary narrative has been noted by Richard Eaton in his treatment of the role of Sufis in the expansion of Islam into Bengal. Eaton, The Rise of Islam, 83–84. 58 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 27–28 (tr. 39). 59 Ibid., 28 (tr. 39). 60 Ibid. 61 Ibid., 28–29 (tr. 39–40). 62 Ibid., 61–62. 63 Ibid., 71. 64 ʿAbd al-Qādir b. Mulūk Shāh Badāʾūnī, Muntakhab al-tavārīkh, ed. Mawlavī Aḥmad ʿAlī, 3 vols., Bibliotheca Indica (Calcutta: College Press, 1865–1869), 1:241–42. 65 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 446 (tr. 243–44). 66 See Aziz Ahmad, “The Sufi and the Sultan in Pre-Mughal Muslim India,” Der Islam 38, nos. 1–2 (1963): 142–53. 67 There is some dispute on the question of which sultan came to visit Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ. Bruce Lawrence disagrees with the text edited by Nizami and says that it was Jalāl al-Dīn Fīrūz Shāh (r. 689–95/1290–96). See the introduction to Amīr Ḥasan Sijzī, Nizam ad-din Awliya: Morals for the Heart, ed. Bernard McGinn, trans. Bruce B. Lawrence, Classics of Western Spirituality (New York: Paulist Press, 1992), 35n138. Riazul Islam disagrees with this change. See Riazul Islam, Sufism in South Asia: Impact on Fourteenth Century Muslim Society (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), 245n31. 68 Muḥammad b. Mubārak Kirmānī, Siyar al-awliyāʾ (Lahore: Muʾassasah-yi Intishārāt-i Islāmī, 1978), 145. Riazul Islam notes an important account that contradicts the need for Niẓām al-Dīn to make such a statement. Baranī laments the fact that while living in Delhi, Sultan ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn never made the effort or expressed a desire to visit the Shaykh. See Islam, Sufism in South Asia, 11. 69 For further details on the muwallihān dervishes, see S. Digby, “Qalandars and Related Groups: Elements of Social Deviance in the Religious Life of the Delhi Sultanate of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries,” in Islam in Asia, ed. Y. Friedmann (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1984), 66–67. 70 The entirety of this narrative is in Baranī, TFS1, 210–12. 71 Ibid., 209. 72 Ibid., 212. 73 For a useful reading of the Sīdī Muwallih tale across different historical accounts see Islam, Sufism in South Asia, 298–307. 74 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 78–82 (tr. 65–67).

Auer-12.indd 184

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

185

75 An excellent study on the development and evolution of ziyārat exists for the specific geographical context of Egypt during this period. See, for instance, C. Taylor, In the Vicinity of the Righteous: Ziyāra and the Veneration of Muslim Saints in Late Medieval Egypt, ed. Ulrich Haarman and Wadad Kadi, vol. 22, Islamic History and Civilization: Studies and Texts (Leiden: Brill, 1999). 76 For a comparative analysis and description of the architectural elements of three shrine complexes of the eighth/fourteenth century, located across the Muslim world from Morocco to Egypt and Iran, where Ibn Baṭṭūṭa might have stayed, see S. Blair, “Sufi Saints and Shrine Architecture in the Early Fourteenth Century,” Muqarnas 7 (1990): 35–49. 77 For specific reference to the difficulty of properly dating early Muslim funerary architecture in the Indian subcontinent, see Flood, “Ghūrid Architecture in the Indus Valley,” 131n3. 78 To my knowledge there are no books of visitation extant from the early Delhi Sultanate period. For a discussion and partial translation of the twelfth/ eighteenth-century pilgrim’s guide, Makhzan-i a‘rās see C. Ernst, “An IndoPersian Guide to Sufi Shrine Pilgrimage,” in Manifestations of Sainthood in Islam, ed. Grace Martin Smith and Carl W. Ernst (Istanbul: Isis Press, 1993), 43–67. For a description of pilgrim’s guides of Egypt produced between the 1200 and 1500 C.e., see Taylor, In the Vicinity of the Righteous, 229–34. 79 See A. Welch and H. Crane, “The Tughluqs: Master Builders of the Delhi Sultanate,” Muqarnas 1 (1983), 123. For architectural studies of monumental funerary architecture dedicated to shaykhs, see J. Burton-Page, “The Tomb of Rukn-i Alam in Multan,” in Splendors of the East, ed. Mortimer Wheeler (London: Putnam, 1965), 72–81. Also see A. Khan, “The Mausoleum of Šaiḫ ‘Alā’ al-Dīn at Pākpattan (Punjāb): A Significant Example of the Tuġluq Style of Architecture,” East and West 24, nos. 3–4 (1974): 311–26. 80 For a description of this shrine as well as its ritual life and history, see T. Mahmood, “The Dargah of Sayyid Salar Masʿud Ghazi in Bahraich: Legend, Tradition and Reality,” in Muslim Shrines in India: Their Character, History and Significance, ed. Christian W. Troll (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2003), 24–43. Also see I. H. Siddiqui, “A Note on the Dargah of Salar Masʿud in Bahraich in Light of the Standard Historical Sources,” in Muslim Shrines in India: Their Character, History and Significance, ed. Christian W. Troll (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2003), 44–7. 81 Baranī, TFS1, 491. 82 On the Sultan’s ascension to the throne of Delhi, he stops in Multan to honor the shaykhs there and in Ajūdhan at the shrine of Bābā Farīd. See ʿAfīf, TFS2, 60–1 (tr. 57). For the importance of pilgrimage to the shrine of Bahāʾ al-Dīn Ẕakariyāʾ at the suggestion of Shaykh al-Islām Ṣadr al-Dīn (grandson of Bahāʾ al-Dīn Ẕakariyāʾ), see ʿAfīf, TFS2, 230 (tr. 139). 83 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 372–73 (tr. 209–10). 84 See T. Fahd, “The Dream in Medieval Islamic Society,” in The Dream and

Auer-12.indd 185

6/10/12 1:27 PM

186

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Human Societies, ed. Roger Caillois and Gustave E. von Grunebaum (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1966), 359. 85 For a description of this work, see Rizvi, A History of Sufism in India, 1:312–4. Also see N. R. Farooqi, “The Legend of Sayyid Sâlâr Mas‘ûd Ghâzî,” Islamic Culture 75, no. 3 (1993): 73–84. 86 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 194. 87 Ibid., 196. Khvāndanī is a portion of the Qurʾān (1/30th) appointed for daily reading. 88 Ibid., 195. Wa idhā taḥīrtum fī al-umūr fa astaʿīnū min ahl al-qubūr. 89 For a review of arguments on the topic of the licit nature of the veneration of the dead and shrine visitation, see J. Meri, “The Etiquette of Devotion in the Islamic Cult of Saints,” in The Cult of Saints in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages: Essays on the Contribution of Peter Brown, ed. James Howard-Johnston and Paul Antony Hayward (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 273–86. 90 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 196 (tr. 24). 91 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:477. 92 See ʿAfīf, TFS2, 4–19. 93 See the section following the biographies of the Sufi shaykhs in ʿAbd al-Karīm b. Hawāzin Qushayrī, al-Risālah al-Qushayriyah fī ʿilm al-taṣawwuf, ed. Muḥammad ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Marʿashlī (Beirut: Dār Iḥyāʾ al-Turāth al-ʿArabī, 1998). 94 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 6. 95 Ibid., 23. 96 The literary trope of the refusal of great power is traceable to biblical literature. See A. J. Wensinck, “The Refused Dignity,” in ʿAjab-Nāma: A Volume of Oriental Studies Presented to Edward G. Browne (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1922), 491–99. 97 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 43–44. For the symbolism of the Sufi robe (khirqah) and its role in the transmission of authority, see Jamal Elias, “The Sufi Robe (Khirqa) as a Vehicle of Spiritual Authority,” in Robes and Honor: The Medieval World of Investiture, ed. Stewart Gordon, The New Middle Ages (New York: Palgrave, 2001), 275–89. 98 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 22. ʿAfīf repeats the formula “one of the friends of God” in relation to Fīrūz Shāh. See ʿAfīf, TFS2, 95. 99 See C. Ernst, “From Hagiography to Martyrology: Conflicting Testimonies to a Sufi Martyr of the Delhi Sultanate,” History of Religions 24, no. 4 (1985): 325–26. 100 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 372–3 (tr. 209–10). 101 ʿAṭṭār, Taẕkirat al-Awliyāʾ, 1:15–24. 102 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 372. 103 For a reference to the Prophet’s “vision” and the shaving of his head, see Ibn Isḥāq, The Life of Muḥammad, 505 and 507. 104 Found in various formulations in ḥadīth collections. In the Ṣaḥīḥ of Muslim, in the section on the merits of the assemblies from the remembrance of God,

Auer-12.indd 186

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

187

God receives a report from the angels who observe the doings of those who sit in the assemblies for the remembrance of God. God is pleased with their devotion and offers them His forgiveness and protection. The angels note that one individual was present by mistake and God extended his forgiveness to him as well, saying that “He is pardoned as well because those who sit in the assemblies are without trouble” (wa lahu ghafrat hum al-qawm lā yashqá bi-him jalīsuhum). See Abū l-Ḥusayn b. al-Ḥajjāj al-Qushayrī al-Nīsābūrī Muslim (d. 261/875), Ṣaḥīḥ, ed. Muḥammad Fuʾād ʿAbd al-Bāqī, 5 vols. (Cairo: Dār Iḥyā al-Kutub al-ʿArabīyah, 1955–56), 4:2070. 105 In another instance ʿAfīf makes the manifestation of the marvel of Sultan Fīrūz Shāh (iẓhār-i karāmat-i Sulṭān Fīrūz Shāh) the heading of the twelfth chapter of the fifth book. See ʿAfīf, TFS2, 492 (tr. 266). However, the chapter does not appear to make any clear reference to the marvel of the Sultan, leaving open the possibility of a lacuna in the manuscript record. 106 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 218. 107 Ibid. This marvel-filled tale of Dhū ‘l-Nūn Miṣrī did not make it into Reynold Nicholson’s critical edition of the Taẕkirat al-Awliyāʾ. However, tales of rainmaking are ubiquitous in the stories of the lives of Sufi shaykhs. See examples from the life of Abū Yaʿzā Yallanūr (d. 572/1177) in the account of al-Tamīmī (c. 603/1207) in Tales of God’s Friends, 38. The pouring forth of water is listed as one of ten types of marvels by ʿAfīf al-Dīn ʿAbd Allāh b. Asʿad al-Yāfiʿī in his apologetic work, Nashr al-mahāsin. See Tales of God’s Friends, 58. 108 Khusraw, Khazāʾin al-futūḥ, 77. 109 Nimrod Hurvitz, “Biographies and Mild Asceticism: A Study of Islamic Moral Imagination,” Studia Islamica, no. 85 (1997), 43. Chapter 5: Caliphal Authority and Representation in the Delhi Sultanate 1 Albrecht Noth has identified early caliphal narratives as sīrat al-khulafāʾ. See A. Noth and L. Conrad, The Early Arabic Historical Tradition: A Source-Critical Study, trans. Michael Bonner, vol. 3, Studies in Late Antiquity and Early Islam, 2nd ed. (Princeton, NJ: Darwin Press, 1994), 37. For a discussion of the legitimating function of early sīrat al-khulafāʾ, see Donner, Narratives of Islamic Origins, 190–5. 2 Early studies dealing with the relationship between caliphs and sultans are significantly aided by newer scholarship that offers a more critical approach to historical and theological texts. For some earlier studies, see V. V. Bartold, “Khalif i Sultan,” Mir Islama 1 (1912): 202–26, 345–400. This article was later translated into English from the Russian by N. S. Doniach and reprinted incomplete as V. V. Bartold, “Caliph and Sultan,” Islamic Quarterly 7, nos. 3 and 4 (1963): 117–35. Also see A. H. Siddiqi, Caliphate and Kingship in Medieval Persia, vol. 14, Studies in Islamic History (Philadelphia: Porcupine Press, 1977). This is a reprinted edition of his serialized article in one volume,

Auer-12.indd 187

6/10/12 1:27 PM

188

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

A. H. Siddiqi, “Caliphate and Kingship in Mediæval Persia,” Islamic Culture 9–11 (1935–37). Siddiqi initiated this study in his doctoral thesis at London University in 1934 and revisited the subject over the course of a number of years, culminating in this work, Caliphate and Sultanate, 2nd ed. (Karachi: Jamiyat ul-Falah Publication, 1963). 3 Ann Lambton provides comprehensive summaries of a number of the major authors. She discusses the writing of luminaries from Abū Yūsuf (d. 182/798), Ibn al-Muqaffaʿ (d. 139/757), al-Jāḥiz (160–255/776–868 or? 869), Ibn al-Qutaybah (213–76/828–89), al-Bāqillānī (d. 403/1013), al-Baghdādī (d. 429/1037), al-Māwardī (364–450/974–1058), al-Juwaynī (419–78/1028–85), al-Ghazālī (450–505/1058–1111), Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī (543–606/1149–1209), Ibn Jamāʿa (639–733/1241–1333), and Ibn Taymiyyah (661–728/1263–1328). See A. K. S. Lambton, State and Government in Medieval Islam: An Introduction to the Study of Islamic Political Theory: The Jurists, vol. 36, London Oriental Series (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981), 43–151. 4 E. Hanne, Putting the Caliph in his Place: Power, Authority, and the Late Abbasid Caliphate (Madison: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2007), 43. 5 See H. A. R. Gibb, “Al-Mawardi’s Theory of the Caliphate,” in Studies on the Civilization of Islam, ed. Stanford Shaw and William Polk (Boston: Beacon Press, 1962), 159–60. 6 Ibid., 162–4. 7 H. Mikhail, Politics and Revelation: Māwardī and After (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1995), 28. 8 W. Hallaq, “Caliphs, Jurists and the Saljūqs in the Political Thought of Juwaynī,” Muslim World 74, no. 1 (1984): 26–41. 9 Hallaq credits al-Juwaynī for being original in his ideology of power in relation to the imām and acknowledges Tilman Nagel for making this observation in his Staat und Glaubensgemeinschaft im Islam. Ibid., 39n38. 10 For a descriptive historical survey of the usage of robes in conferring authority from the early ʿAbbāsid period through the Delhi Sultanate, see G. Hambly, “From Baghdad to Bukhara, from Ghazna to Delhi: The khilʿa Ceremony in the Transmission of Kingly Pomp and Circumstance,” in Robes and Honor: The Medieval World of Investiture, ed. Stewart Gordon, The New Middle Ages (New York: Palgrave, 2001), 193–222. 11 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:447 (tr. 616). There appears to be an unresolved dispute over whether or not the events of Iltutmish’s caliphal investiture were also recorded by Ḥasan Niẓāmī in the Tāj al-maʾāsi̱ r. Elliot was the first to recognize a significant discrepancy in the manuscript tradition of the Tāj al-maʾās ̱ir. He notes that some copies conclude with events of the year 614/1217, while others continue until 626/1228 or 29. See Elliot and Dowson, The History of India, 2:210. However, he did not investigate the authenticity of the versions that contain the additional twelve years. Shahpurshah Hormasji Hodivala was the first scholar to dismiss the additional years as “fake.” See S. Hodivala,

Auer-12.indd 188

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

12 13

14

15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24

Auer-12.indd 189

189

Studies in Indo-Muslim History: A Critical Commentary on Elliot and Dowson’s History of India as Told by its own Historians, 2 vols. (Bombay: N.p., 1939–57), 2:46–7. This was corroborated by S. A. H. Abidi. See the introduction to Ḥasan Niẓāmī, Taj ul ma’athir: The Crown of Glorious Deeds, ed. M. Aslam Khan and Chander Shekar, trans. Bhagwat Saroop (Delhi: Saud Ahmad Dehlavi, 1998), xxx–xxxi. However, some scholars of note have uncritically included those portions as authentic, leaving the debate open for clarification. See Nizami, On History and Historians of Medieval India, 60. Also see Jackson, The Delhi Sultanate, 38n67. For coinage that indicates the relationship between al-Mustanṣir and Iltutmish, see Wright, Catalogue of the Coins in the Indian Museum Calcutta, 20–1. The manuscript tradition here has led to some confusion, as there is a discrepancy between a version that reads robe (khilʿat) in place of service (khidmat). One translation would read, “The king (bādshāh), governors (mulūk), and his sons, may God bless them, as well as other governors (mulūk), servants (khadam), and slaves (bandagān), all were honored with robes (khilʿat) from the house of the caliph.” The other version reading “. . . all were honored in service (khidmat) of the house of the caliph.” Raverty notes this and favors the reading of khidmat. Jūzjānī, T̤abaḳāt-i Nāṣirī, 616–17n4. However, Ḥabībī opts for the reading of khilʿat. Jūzjānī, TN, 1:447. Ibid., 2:199 (tr. 1259). For a discussion of the khuṭbah, as well as other symbols of rule produced in relation to the caliphate, see A. H. Siddiqi, “Insignia of Sovereignty during the Caliphate,” Proceedings of the Pakistan History Conference 3 (1953): 67–75. Qureshi, The Administration of the Sultanate of Delhi, 29. Ernst, Eternal Garden, 56. P. M. Holt, “Some Observations on the ʿAbbāsid Caliphate of Cairo,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 47, no. 3 (1984), 502. Ibid., 504. For further comment on the Mamlūk Sultanate of Egypt, see P. M. Holt, “The Position and Power of the Mamlūk Sultan,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 38, no. 2 (1975): 237–49. Baranī, TFS1, 492. Wright, Catalogue of the Coins in the Indian Museum Calcutta, 53. Badr-i Chāch, Qaṣāʾid-i Badr-i Chāch, ed. Muḥammad Hādī ʿAlī Ashk (Kānpūr: Naval Kishūr, 1877), 13–18. K. A. Nizami, “The Impact of Ibn Taimiyya on South Asia,” Journal of Islamic Studies 1, no. 1 (1990), 129. See Ibn Baṭṭūṭa, Riḥlat Ibn Baṭṭūṭa, 2 vols. in 1 (Cairo: al-Maṭbaʿah al-Azharīyah, 1928), 2:44. Nizāmī’s hypothesis is questioned. Peter Jackson appears to have accepted his view. See Jackson, The Delhi Sultanate, 163. Baranī, TFS1, 491. Mutaghallib is a legal term applied to rulers who have taken power without authorization, rendering their rule illegal and illegitimate. This

6/10/12 1:27 PM

190

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

idea was clearly a concern during the Tughluq era, as a similar mention of this problem of power and legitimacy is made in the Sīrat-i Fīrūz Shāhī. See Anon., Sīrat-i Fīrūz Shāhī: nuskhah-yi Khudā Bakhsh, ed. S. H. Askari (Patna: Khuda Bakhsh Oriental Public Library, 1999), 269. 25 The sultans minted coins in the name of the ʿAbbāsid caliph as early as 741/1340. See S. Lane-Poole, The Coins of the Sultáns of Dehlí in the British Museum, ed. Reginald Stuart Poole, Catalogue of Indian Coins in the British Museum (London: Gilbert & Rivington, 1884), 69. 26 R. Rappaport, “Enactments of Meaning,” in Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity, Cambridge Studies in Social and Cultural Anthropology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 104–38. 27 Mottahedeh, Loyalty and Leadership in an Early Islamic Society, 6. 28 See Holt, “Some Observations on the ʿAbbāsid Caliphate of Cairo,” 504. 29 Baranī, TFS1, 598. 30 Ibid. 31 Ibid., 598–9. 32 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 105–7 (tr. 78–80). 33 I. H. Siddiqui, Authority and Kingship under the Sultans of Delhi (ThirteenthFourteenth Centuries) (Delhi: Manohar, 2006), 58. Jūzjānī, TN, 2:45. 34 Siddiqui, Authority and Kingship, 58. 35 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 275 (tr. 160). 36 Anon., Sīrat-i Fīrūzshāhī: nuskhah-yi Khudā Bakhsh, 275. 37 Ibid., 276. 38 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:454 (tr. 629–30). For the symbolism and emblematic use of the royal parasol (chatr) in the Delhi Sultanate, see K. A. Nizami, Royalty in Medieval India (New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers, 1997), 50–3. 39 A. Karim, “The Khalīfa as Recognized in the Coins of Bengal Sulṭāns,” Journal of the Numismatic Society of India 17, no. 2 (1955): 86–91. 40 Ernst, Eternal Garden, 59. 41 R. Baalbaki, “al-Ṣaghānī,” EI2. 42 Baranī, TFS1, 495. The Mashāriq al-anwār combines the ḥadīth collections of Bukhārī and Muslim. For further discussion of Saghānī’s contribution to ḥadīth studies, see M. Ishaq, India’s Contribution to the Study of Hadith Literature, 2nd ed. (Dacca: University of Dacca, 1976), 218–21 and 226–31. 43 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:361 (tr. 82–3). The text reads al-Muqtafī bi-Amr Allāh (r. 555– 66/1160–70) but his dates do not match the reign of Ghiyāth al-Dīn Muḥammad. Both Raverty and Ḥabībī note this discrepancy and favor the reading of al-Mustaz̤ī. 44 See Safi, The Politics of Knowledge in Premodern Islam, 1–9. This style of legitimization was espoused in works such as the Saljūqnāmah of Ẓāhir al-Dīn Nīshāpūrī (d. ca. 580/1184–5), and later picked up in the Rāḥat al-ṣudūr of Muḥammad b. ʿAlī Rāvandī, and the Jāmiʿ al-tawārīkh of Rashīd al-Dīn Faz̤l Allāh Ṭabīb (ca. 645–718/1247–1318). For a succinct overview of historiography

Auer-12.indd 190

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

191

of the reign of the Saljūqs, see C. Cahen, “The Historiography of the Seljuqid Period,” in Historians of the Middle East, ed. Bernard Lewis and P. M. Holt, Historical Writings of the Peoples of Asia (London: Oxford University Press, 1962), 59–78. 45 Safi, The Politics of Knowledge in Premodern Islam, 35–42. For a thoughtful and critical review of Safi’s work, see D. DeWeese, “Untitled,” review of The Politics of Knowledge in Premodern Islam: Negotiating Ideology and Religious Inquiry, by Omid Safi, Journal of the American Academy of Religion 76, no. 1 (2008): 177–83. 46 A. Hartmann, “al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh, Abu ‘l-ʿAbbās Aḥmad,” EI2. For her laudable study of the reign of al-Nāṣir, see A. Hartmann, an-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh (1180–1225): Politik, Religion, Kultur in der späten ʿAbbāsidenzeit, vol. 8, Studien zur Sprache, Geschichte und Kultur des Islamischen Orients (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1975). For coinage of Iltutmish’s recognition of al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh, see Wright, Catalogue of the Coins in the Indian Museum Calcutta, 20. 47 For a general discussion of titulature of the Delhi Sultanate, see Raza, “Nomenclature and Titulature,” 85–96. 48 See L. Treadwell, “Shāhānshāh and al-Malik al-Muʾayyad: The Legitimization of Power in Sāmānid and Būyid Iran,” in Culture and Memory in Medieval Islam: Essays in Honour of Wilfred Madelung, ed. F. Daftary and J. W. Meri (London: I.B.Tauris, 2003), 324–25. 49 See M. Bonner, “Al-Khalīfa al-Marḍī: The Accession of Hārūn al-Rashīd,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 108, no. 1 (1988): 79–91. 50 C. E. Bosworth, “laḳab,” EI2. 51 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:353 and 440 (tr. 597) and 2:2 respectively. 52 See R. Kassis, The Book of Proverbs and Arabic Proverbial Works, vol. 74, Supplements to Vetus Testamentum (1999), 65–8. Fakhr-i Mudabbir utilizes it in the Tārīkh-i Fakhr al-Dīn Mubārak Shāh. See Mubārak Shāh, Ta’ríkh-i Fakhru’d-Dín Mubáraksháh, 13. For usage in Anatolia of the same period see J. M. Rogers, “Waqf and Patronage in Seljuk Anatolia: The Epigraphic Evidence,” Anatolian Studies 26 (1976): 72 and 79. 53 See Bosworth, “The Titulature of the Early Ghaznavids,” 217. 54 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:475 (tr. 671) and 2:440 (tr. 597) respectively. Ḥasan Niẓāmī refers to Quṭb al-Din Aybeg as the “arm of the caliphate” (ʿaz̤ud al-khilāfah), which also has the connotations of companion, aid, and assistant. See Niẓāmī, Tāj al-maʾāsir, fol. 10a. 55 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:450 (tr. 624). Fakhr-i Mudabbir says that the caliph al-Mustanṣir granted Iltutmish the title of nāṣir-i amīr al-muʾminīn in 626/1229. Muḥammad b. Manṣūr (Fakhr-i Mudabbir) Mubārak Shāh, Ādāb al-ḥarb wa ‘l shujāʿah, ed. Aḥmad Suhaylī Khvānsārī (Tehran: Intishārāt-i Iqbāl, 1346Sh/1967), 10–1. 56 Jūzjānī, TN, 2:2. 57 Ibid., 1:324–7 (tr. 11–6). 58 For the projection and creation of the literary images of Hārūn al-Rashīd, see

Auer-12.indd 191

6/10/12 1:27 PM

192

59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72

73

74 75 76 77 78 79

Auer-12.indd 192

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam chapter 2 of Tayeb El-Hibri, Reinterpreting Islamic Historiography: Hārūn al-Rashīd and the Narrative of the ʿAbbāsid Caliphate, ed. David Morgan, Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 17–58. Jūzjānī, TN, 1:319–20 (tr. 302). Clifford Edmund Bosworth, “The Early Islamic History of Ghūr,” Central Asiatic Journal 6, no. 2 (1961): 125–7. Jūzjānī, TN, 1: 323 (tr. 10), 66 (tr. 88), 471 and 475. For a discussion of the “caliphate” of ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh, see Qureshi, The Administration of the Sultanate of Delhi, 29–32. Khusraw, Khazāʾin al-futūḥ, 6. Ibid., 64 (tr. 49–50). And Jūzjānī, TN, 2:193 (tr. 1234). This was the view of al-Juwaynī, along with Amīr Khusraw. Hallaq, “Caliphs, Jurists and the Saljūqs,” 36. See A. Ahmad, Studies in Islamic Culture in the Indian Environment, 1966 ed. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1964), 7. See Nizami, Royalty in Medieval India, 22–3. Wright, Catalogue of the Coins in the Indian Museum Calcutta, 43–4. Qureshi gives a number of references scattered in Khusraw’s various works. See Qureshi, The Administration of the Sultanate of Delhi, 32n4. J. Safran, The Second Umayyad Caliphate: The Articulation of Caliphal Legitimacy in al-Andalus, vol. 33, Harvard Middle Eastern Monographs (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2000), 111–83. M. Brett, The Rise of the Fatimids: The World of the Mediterranean and the Middle East in the Fourth Century of the Hijra, Tenth Century CE, ed. Hugh Kennedy, et al., vol. 30, The Medieval Mediterranean (Leiden: Brill, 2001), 31–3. H. Haji, Founding the Fatimid State: The Rise of an Early Islamic Empire— An Annotated English translation of al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s Iftitāḥ al-Daʿwa, ed. Farhad Daftary, vol. 6, Ismaili Texts and Translations Series (London: I.B.Tauris, 2006), 1–15. See J. Boyle, “The Death of the Last ʿAbbasid Caliph: A Contemporary Muslim Account,” Journal of Semitic Studies 6, no. 2 (1961): 145–61. Also see G. M. Wickens, “Nasir ad-din Tusi on the Fall of Baghdad: A Further Study,” Journal of Semitic Studies 7, no. 1 (1962): 23–35. Jūzjānī, TN, 2:189–200 (tr. 1225–61). For a discussion of “the Hour” (al-sāʿat) in the Qurʾān and ḥadīth, see S. Bashear, “Muslim Apocalypses and the Hour: A Case Study in Traditional Interpretation,” Israel Oriental Studies 13 (1993): 75–99. Jūzjānī, TN, 2:97. Ibid., 2:97–98 (tr. 935). He dedicates his twenty-third and final ṭabaqah to this discussion. Ibid., 2:90–221. Ibid., 2:98 (tr. 935). For a treatment of some of the apocalyptic views of “Turks” produced during this time, see D. Cook, Studies in Muslim Apocalyptic, vol.

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

193

21, Studies in Late Antiquity and Early Islam (Princeton, NJ: Darwin Press, 2002), 84–91. 80 In addition to providing interesting commentary on histories produced during the period of the Mongol invasions, David Morgan points out that Najm al-Dīn Rāzī (573–654/1177–1256) had a similar vision of the end times, as detailed in his Marmūzāt-i asadī dar mazmūrāt-i dāvūdī. See D. Morgan, “Persian Historians and the Mongols,” in Medieval Historical Writing in the Christian and Islamic Worlds, ed. David Morgan (London: School of Oriental and African Studies University of London, 1982), 112n13. 81 See EI2, s.v. “Yādjūdj wa-Mādjūdj” (E. Van Donzel and Claudia Ott) and EQ, s.v. “Gog and Magog” (Keith Lewinstein). For a more recent and fascinating study of Gog and Magog, see chapters 4–6 of T. Zadeh, Mapping Frontiers Across Medieval Islam: Geography, Translation, and the ʿAbbāsid Empire (London: I.B.Tauris, 2011). 82 Jūzjānī, TN, 2:98 (tr. 935). 83 C. S. F. Burnett, “An Apocryphal Letter from the Arabic Philosopher Al-Kindi to Theodore, Frederick II’s Astrologer, Concerning Gog and Magog, the Enclosed Nations, and the Scourge of the Mongols,” Viator, no. 15 (1984): 151–2. For further treatment of the origins and permutations of this myth, see R. Meserve, “The Inhospitable Land of the Barbarian. (1. Chinese views; 2. Indian views; 3. Persian and Arabic views; 4. The Land of Gog and Magog: Islamic, Christian, and Talmudic views; 5. Greek, Roman and Byzantine views.),” Journal of Asian History 1, no. 16 (1982): 75–82. Also see C. E. Wilson, “The Wall of Alexander against Gog and Magog; and the Expedition Sent Out to Find It by the Khalif Wāthiq in 842 A.D.,” Hirth Anniversary Volume (1923): 575–612. 84 Jūzjānī, TN, 2:102 (tr. 963). 85 Ibid., 2:104. 86 Ibid., 2:104 (tr. 967–8). 87 Ibid., 2:90. 88 Ibid., 2:166 (tr. 1136–9). 89 S. Kumar, “The Ignored Elites: Turks, Mongols and a Persian Secretarial Class in the Early Delhi Sultanate,” Modern Asian Studies 43, no. 1 (2009), 49. 90 In coins struck in 725/1325, the second year of his reign, Muḥammad b. Tughluq surrounded his own name with the names of the first four caliphs: Abū Bakr, ʿUmar, ʿUthmān, and ʿAlī, with the reverse reading the shahādah. Wright, Catalogue of the Coins in the Indian Museum Calcutta, 50. 91 Noth and Conrad, The Early Arabic Historical Tradition, 47. 92 A. Afsaruddin, “In Praise of the Caliphs: Re-Creating History from the Manāqib Literature,” International Journal of Middle East Studies 31, no. 3 (1999), 330. 93 Ibid., 329–50. 94 Baranī, TFS1, 8–9. 95 Baranī, TFS1, 3. 96 Ibid. Baranī skirts any notice of the disputes around the succession to

Auer-12.indd 193

6/10/12 1:27 PM

194

97 98

99

100 101 102

103

104 105 106

Auer-12.indd 194

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam Muḥammad at the time of his death, and the questions they raise about the transmission of authority over the Muslim community. For a discussion of how the early historiographical tradition of these events reflects a political philosophy on legitimacy and authority, see Abdelkader Tayob, “Political Theory in Ṭabarī and his Contemporaries: Deliberations on the First Caliph in Islam,” Journal for Islamic Studies 18–19 (1998–99): 24–50. Baranī, TFS1, 3–4. For background on this early period of Islamic history, see the essential F. Donner, The Early Islamic Conquests (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1981), 82–90. Donner identifies early riddah historiography dating from the late second century. See Donner, Narratives of Islamic Origins, 200–2. For the classic Arabic work praising the exploits of ʿUmar by the famous Ḥanbalī jurist Ibn al-Jawzī (510–97/1126–1200), see Abū al-Faraj Ibn al-Jawzī, al-Khalīfah al-ʿādil ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭāb: Amīr al-muʾminīn, 1st ed. (Amman: Dār al-Isrāʾ, 2004). Kasrā is the Arabized form of the Persian khusraw, title of the kings of the Sasanid dynasty, especially of Anūshīrvān. Baranī, TFS1, 5. The scourge (dirra) of ʿUmar is a symbol of his retributive justice and appears to be a broader theme of Persian literature. For a discussion of the dirra as a form of punishment, see C. Lange, Justice, Punishment and the Medieval Muslim Imagination, Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008), 77–79. Here Lange also provides a reference to the dirra and ʿUmar in the writings of the great Persian poet Sanāʾī (fl. 467–525/1075–1131). The figure of Anūshīrvān as the paradigm of the just ruler, the Sasanid king who ruled from 531–578 C.e., originated in Pahlavi advice literature. For the appearance of the mythologized figure of Anūshīrvān and its transmission over time into Arabic and Persian literatures, see R. Marcotte, “Anūshīrvān and Buzurgmihr—The Just Ruler and the Wise Counselor: Two Figures of Persian Traditional Moral Literature,” Rocznik Orientalistyczny 51, no. 2 (1998): 69–90. For a brief description of Ḥātim al-Ṭāʾī, see A. Schaade, “ʿAdī b. Ḥātim b. ʿAbd Allāh b. Saʿd al-Ṭāʾī, Abū Ṭarīf ” EI2. Jūzjānī, TN, 2:2–3 (tr. 721). For further treatment of this subject, see chapter 6. Fred Donner analyzes the narrative strategies found in Ibn ʿAsākir’s treatment of ʿUthmān in the Taʾrīkh madīnat Dimashq. He shows how, using the strategies of placement, repetition, and manipulation, Ibn ʿAsākir countered Shīʿī claims to produce a pro-Umayyad view of the caliphate. F. Donner, “ʿUthmān and the Rāshidūn Caliphs in Ibn ʿAsākir’s Taʾrīkh madīnat Dimashq: A Study of Strategies of Compilation,” in Ibn ʿAsākir and Early Islamic History, ed. James E. Lindsay, Studies in Late Antiquity and Early Islam (Princeton, NJ: Darwin Press, 2001), 44–61.

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

195

107 The stories of Ḥamza as an adventurer and battle hero spread widely throughout the Persianate world and achieved epic proportions in the Dāstān-i Amīr Ḥamza produced under the patronage of the Mughal emperor Akbar and fully illuminated with his legendary exploits. For an overview of the literary life and summary of the story of Ḥamza, see the introduction to F. Pritchett, The Romance Tradition in Urdu: Adventures from the Dāstān of Amīr Ḥamzah (New York: Columbia University Press, 1991), 1–58. 108 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:440 (tr. 598). 109 Ibid., 1:410 (tr. 96). 110 See M. Sharon, “The Umayyads as Ahl al-Bayt,” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 14 (1992): 115–52. 111 Baranī uses kufr and shirk in the broadest sense of idolatry. 112 For the early development and evolution of historical imagery surrounding the conflict between ʿAli and Muʿāwiyah, see E. Petersen, ʿAlī and Muʿāwiya in Early Arabic Tradition: Studies on the Genesis and Growth of Islamic Historical Writing until the End of the Ninth Century, trans. P. Lampe Christensen (Copenhagen: Munksgaard, 1964). 113 A. Tayob, “Tabari on the Companions of the Prophet: Moral and Political Contours in Islamic Historical Writing,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 119, no. 2 (1999): 203–10. 114 Baranī, TFS1, 8. 115 For a full discussion of the relevance of the thirty-year ḥadīth in the early ʿAbbāsid period, see M. Zaman, Religion and Politics under the Early ʿAbbāsids: The Emergence of the Proto-Sunnī Elite, ed. Ulrich Haarmann and Wadad Kadi, vol. 16, Islamic History and Civilization: Studies and Texts (Leiden: Brill, 1997), 170–8. Chapter 6: Sharīʿah and Justice 1 Jūzjānī, TN, 1:440. 2 Baranī, FJ, 66. 3 For an overview of the various functions of the ʿulamāʾ and their relations with the sultans of the Delhi Sultanate, see M. Sharif, “The Sultan and the ʿUlamāʾ in the Turkish Sultanate of Delhi (1206–1413),” Iqbal 13, no. 3 (1965): 31–58. 4 For an overview of justice in the broader Muslim world, see A. K. S. Lambton, “Justice in the Medieval Theory of Persian Kingship,” Studia Islamica 17 (1962): 91–119. 5 Hodgson, The Venture of Islam, 2:55. 6 For a discussion of the legitimacy of Muslim kingship in the Siyāsatnāmah, see Simidchieva, “Kingship and Legitimacy,” 97–131. 7 See A. K. S. Lambton, “The Dilemma of Government in Islamic Persia: The Siyāsat-Nāma of Niẓām al-Mulk,” Iran 22 (1984): 64. 8 Roy P. Mottahedeh, “Some Attitudes Towards Monarchy and Absolutism in the Eastern Islamic World of the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries A.D.,” Israel

Auer-12.indd 195

6/10/12 1:27 PM

196

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Oriental Studies 10 (1980): 88–9. 9 Q3:26. 10 For an introduction and translation of the work see H. Laoust, Le Traité de Droit Public d’Ibn Taimiya. Traduction annotée de la Siyâsa shar’iyya (Beirut: Institut Français de Damas, 1948). For the original Arabic see Ibn Taymiyyah, al-Siyāsah al-sharʿiyyah (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyyah, 1988). 11 See Khalidi, Arabic Historical Thought in the Classical Period, 182–4 and 193–200. 12 See A. Ahmad, “The Role of the Ulema in Indo-Muslim History,” 4. For a discussion of the relationship of sultans and the ʿulamāʾ as depicted in the mirrors-for-princes tradition, see Marlow, “Kings, Prophets, and the ʿUlamāʾ,” 101–20. 13 Mubārak Shāh, Ta’ríkh-i Fakhru’d-Dín Mubáraksháh, 13. 14 Peter Hardy gives further examples from Persian historiography. Hardy, Historians of Medieval India, 25n3. 15 Al-Masʿūdī (fl. 332/943), in the Murūj al-dhahab attributes this saying to the founder of the Sasanid dynasty, thereby linking its didactic implications to the ḥadīth of Muḥammad. See Lambton, “Justice in the Medieval Theory of Persian Kingship,” 96. Julie Meisami gives a later example that also contains the ḥadīth reference in the Taʾrīkh al-Yamīnī of Abū Naṣr ʿUtbī (b. ca. 350/961), historian to Ghaznavid courts. See Meisami, Persian Historiography to the End of the Twelfth Century, 55. 16 See Niẓāmī, Tāj al-maʾāsir, fol. 9b. 17 See Marlow, “Kings, Prophets, and the ʿUlamāʾ,” 112. 18 Baranī, FJ, 66. 19 See M. Alam, “Shariʿa and Governance in the Indo-Islamic Context,” in Beyond Turk and Hindu: Rethinking Religious Identities in Islamicate South Asia, ed. David Gilmartin and Bruce Lawrence (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2000), 223. 20 Baranī, FJ, 194. 21 See Mubārak Shāh, Ta’ríkh-i Fakhru’d-Dín Mubáraksháh, 13. 22 See Wright, Catalogue of the Coins in the Indian Museum Calcutta, 60. Tughluq also employed in his coinage the ḥadīth “He who obeys the sultan obeys God” (man aṭāʿ al-sultān fa qad aṭāʿ al-raḥmān). Ibid., 59. 23 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 4. 24 See I. H. Siddiqui, “The Origin and Growth of Islamicate Historiography in India: Analysis of the Thirteenth Century Indo-Persian Historians’ Approach to the History of the Foundation of Muslim Rule in South Asian Sub-Continent,” Journal of Objective Studies 1, nos. 1 and 2 (1989), 68. 25 For an overview of justice and punishment in the Delhi Sultanate, see B. Auer, “Concepts of Justice and the Catalogue of Punishments under the Sultans of Delhi (7th–8th/13th–14th Centuries),” in Public Violence in Islamic Societies: Power, Discipline, and the Construction of the Public Sphere, 7th–19th Centuries CE, ed. Maribel Fierro and Christian Lange (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University

Auer-12.indd 196

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

197

Press, 2009), 238–55. 26 Baranī, FJ, 194. Here Baranī lays out the details on punishment. It is not a complete list, as there is a lacuna in the manuscript at this point. For the most comprehensive treatment of the types of punishments carried out in the fifth/ eleventh and sixth/twelfth centuries of the medieval Islamic period, see C. Lange, Justice, Punishment and the Medieval Muslim Imagination. 27 Baranī, FJ, 202. 28 B. Johansen, “Sacred and Religious Elements in Hanafite Law: Functions and Limits of the Absolute Character of Government Authority,” in Islam et Politique au Maghreb, ed. Ernest Gellner and Jean-Claude Vatin (Paris: Éditions de Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1981), 302. 29 Baranī, FJ, 196. 30 Q35:45. Ibid., 199. 31 Z. Islam, “Development of Fiqh Literature in the Sultanate Period,” in Islamic Heritage in South Asian Subcontinent, ed. Nazir Ahmad and I. H. Siddiqui (Jaipur: Publication Scheme, 2000), 87. 32 Baranī, TFS1, 289. 33 Ibid., 289. 34 Ibid., 289–96. 35 Ibid., 47. 36 Siddiqui, Authority and Kingship, 103n54. 37 See Kumar, “Assertions of Authority,” 43–52. 38 Baranī, TFS1, 336. For a discussion of representations of Pharaoh in the writings of al-Ṭabarī, see Shoshan, Poetics of Islamic Historiography, 92–4. 39 See Amīr Khusraw, The Campaigns of ‘Alā‘u’d-Dīn Khiljī: Being the Khaẓā’inul futūḥ (Treasures of Victory), trans. Mohammad Habib (Madras: D. B. Taraporewala Sons & Co., 1931), 12. 40 Baranī, TFS1, 8. 41 Ibid., 572–4. 42 Ibid., 574–5. 43 Ibid., 575. 44 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 19. 45 Ibid., 98–9. 46 Khaliq Ahmad Nizami has argued for the importance of reading the Futūḥāt-i Fīrūz Shāhī as an inscription rather than as “text,” paying particular attention to the place of that inscription that determines, to a large extent, its content. See K. A. Nizami, “The Futuhat-i-Firuz Shahi as a Medieval Inscription” (paper presented at the Seminar on Medieval Inscriptions, Aligarh, India, February 6–8, 1970), 28–35. 47 Tughluq, Futūḥāt-i Fīrūz Shāhī, 6–7. For discussion of the ibāḥatiyān see Baranī, FJ, 66. 48 Tughluq, Futūḥāt-i Fīrūz Shāhī, 2. 49 Ibid.

Auer-12.indd 197

6/10/12 1:27 PM

198

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

50 Ibid., 3. 51 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 20. 52 Ibid., 265. 53 Ibid., 266. 54 See Z. Islam, “The Contribution of the Tughluq Sultans to Islamic Jurisprudence,” Majallat al-Taʾrīkh al-Islāmī 2, nos. 3–4 (1997): 516–28. 55 Islam, “Development of Fiqh Literature in the Sultanate Period,” 87. 56 The Fatāvá al-Tātārkhānīyah is available in a Beirut edition. See ʿĀlim b. ʿAlāʾ, al-Fatāwá al-tātārkhānīyah fī al-fiqh al-ḥanafī, ed. ʿAbd al-Laṭīf Ḥasan ʿAbd al-Raḥmān, 4 vols., 1st ed. (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyyah, 2005). The Fiqh-i Fīrūz Shāhī is still only available in manuscript. See Ṣadr al-Dīn Yaʿqūb Muẓaffar Kuhrāmī, Fiqh-i Fīrūz Shāhī (MS B. L. 2564). 57 See A. Welch, “A Medieval Center of Learning in India: The Hauz Khas Madrasa in Delhi,” Muqarnas 13 (1996): 165–90. 58 This was the case with ʿAfīf, who documented the Sultan’s efforts. See ʿAfīf, TFS2, 511–2. 59 Baranī, FJ, 66. 60 Ibid., 182 (tr. 52). 61 Ibid., 188 (tr. 55). 62 Baranī, TFS1, 40. 63 Ibid., 40–1. 64 Again the ten are (1) compassion (shafaqat), (2) forgiveness (ʿafv), (3) justice and grace (ʿadl va faẓl), (4) fighting and combat (muqātala va muḥāraba), (5) generosity in bestowing gifts (īs ̱ār va iftikhār), (6) grandeur and awe (ʿaẓmat va rʿub), (7) intelligence and insight (hūshiyārī va bīdārī), (8) wakefulness and vigilance (intbāh va ‘ibrat), (9) conquest and victory (fatḥ va nuṣrat), and (10) wisdom and discernment (kiyāsat va firāsat). ʿAfīf, TFS2, 4–19. 65 Ibid., 25. 66 Ibid., 503–4. 67 Both Peter Jackson and Iqtidar Siddiqui have closely studied the various narratives of the ascension of Fīrūz Shāh, and highlight the difficulty of reconstructing this event. See Siddiqui, Authority and Kingship, 163–9. Cf. Jackson, The Delhi Sultanate, 166–7. 68 ʿAfīf, TFS2, 51. 69 Ibid., 76–8. 70 Ibid., 508. 71 Ibid. He also quotes this same ḥadīth in the prolegomena to his history. Ibid., 9. 72 Ismāʿīl b. Muḥammad al-ʿAjlūnī (d. 1162/1749), the influential late medieval ḥadīth compiler, only traced this saying back to Abū Nuʿaym al-Iṣfahānī (336–430/948–1038). See Ismāʿīl b. Muḥammad al-ʿAjlūnī, Kashf al-khafāʾ wa-muzīl al-ilbās ʿammā ishtaharah min al-aḥādīth ʿalá alsinat al-nās, 2 vols. (Beirut: Dār Iḥyāʾ al-Turāth al-ʿArabī, 1351), 2:57. 73 Quoted in A. K. S. Lambton, “Changing Concepts of Justice and Injustice from

Auer-12.indd 198

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Notes

199

the 5th/11th Century to the 8th/14th Century in Persia: The Saljuq Empire and the Ilkhanate,” Studia Islamica 68 (1988): 39–40. The phrase “justice of one hour” was also used by the author of the anonymous work Baḥr al-fawāʾid, a mirror-for-princes dedicated to the son of the Saljūq ruler of Aleppo, Āq Sunqur. See Lambton, “Islamic Mirrors for Princes,” 421. A further reference to this ḥadīth in relation to Fīrūz Shāh is found in a letter from Shaykh Sharaf al-Dīn Yaḥyá Manīrī (d. ca. 782/1381) advising the Sultan to “be impartial in dispensing justice.” Cited in Rizvi, A History of Sufism in India, 1:231. 74 For a discussion of some of the problems in the usage of the term secular, see R. Vernon, “The Secular Political Culture: Three Views,” Review of Politics 37, no. 4 (1975): 490–512. Conclusion 1 B. Manz, The Rise and Rule of Tamerlane, Canto ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 90. 2 Muḥammad Bihāmad Khānī, Tarikh-i Muḥammadi: Portion Dealing with the Account of Sultan Firoz Shah, His Successors, and the Minor Kingdoms, from AH 752/AD 1351 to AH 842/AD 1438, trans. Muhammad Zaki (Aligarh: Aligarh Muslim University Press, 1972), 93. 3 S. M. Ikram, Muslim Civilization in India (New York: Columbia University Press, 1964), 76. 4 For an overview of Persian historiography in India see B. Auer, “Persian Historiography in India,” in Persian Prose from outside Iran: The Indian Subcontinent, Anatolia, Central Asia after Timur, ed. John Perry and Sunil Sharma (London: I.B.Tauris, forthcoming). 5 For background on Kalpi, see I. H. Siddiqui, “Kalpi in the 15th Century,” Islamic Culture 61, no. 3 (1987): 90–120. 6 Muḥammad Bihāmad Khānī, Tārīkh-i Muḥammadī (MS B.L. Or. 137). For an overview of the Tārīkh-i Muḥammadī, see P. Hardy, “The Tarikh-i Muhammadi by Muhammad Bihamad Khani,” in Essays Presented to Sir Jadunath Sarkar (Hoshiarpur: Panjab University, 1958), 181–90. 7 See Hardy, Historians of Medieval India, 56–67. 8 Bābur, Baburnama: Memoirs of Babur, Prince and Emperor, trans. Wheeler Thackston (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), 327. 9 Ibid., 330. 10 For an example of how historians of the Mughal court read histories from the Delhi Sultanate to reconstruct the tragic events of the accidental death of Ghiyās ̱ al-Dīn Tughluq Shāh, see M. Ali, “The Use of Sources in Mughal Historiography,” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 5, no. 3 (1995): 362–4. 11 On Badāʾūnī, see H. Mukhia, Historians and Historiography during the Reign of Akbar, Vikas History Series (New Delhi: Vikas Publications House, 1976), 89–131. For Firishta, see G. Hambly, “Ferešta, Tārīk-e,” EIr. On the Tārīkh-i alfī, see S. A. A. Rizvi, “Tarikh-i-Alfi,” in Historians of Medieval India, ed.

Auer-12.indd 199

6/10/12 1:27 PM

200

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Mohibbul Hasan (Meerut: Meenakshi Prakashan, 1968; reprint, 1982), 119–28. 12 Elliot and Dowson, The History of India, 1:xvi. 13 Ibid.

Auer-12.indd 200

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Bibliography

Abbott, Nabia. Studies in Arabic Literary Papyri. Vol. 1, The University of Chicago Oriental Institute Publications. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1957. Abou El Fadl, Khalid. Rebellion and Violence in Islamic Law. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001. ʿAfīf, Shams Sirāj. Medieval India in Transition—Tarikh-i Firoz Shahi: A First Hand Account. Translated by R. C. Jauhri. New Delhi: Sundeep Prakashan, 2001. ———. Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī. Edited by Vilāyat Ḥusayn. Vol. 119, Bibliotheca Indica. Calcutta: Asiatic Society, 1888. Afsaruddin, Asma. “In Praise of the Caliphs: Re-Creating History from the Manāqib Literature.” International Journal of Middle East Studies 31, no. 3 (1999): 329–50. Ahmad, Aziz. “The Role of the Ulema in Indo-Muslim History.” Studia Islamica 31 (1970): 1–13. ———. Studies in Islamic Culture in the Indian Environment. 1966 ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1964. ———. “The Sufi and the Sultan in Pre-Mughal Muslim India.” Der Islam 38, nos. 1–2 (1963): 142–53. Ahmad, Nazir. “Diplomatic Relations Between the Sultans of Delhi and the Il-Khans of Iran.” In Islamic Heritage in South Asian Subcontinent, edited by Nazir Ahmad and I. H. Siddiqui, 60–75. Jaipur: Publication Scheme, 1998. ʿAjlūnī, Ismāʿīl b. Muḥammad al-. Kashf al-khafāʾ wa-muzīl al-ilbās ʿammā ishtahara min al-aḥādīth ʿalá alsinat al-nās. 2 vols. Beirut: Dār Iḥyāʾ al-Turāth al-ʿArabī, 1351–52/1932–33. Ajmal, Mohammad. “A Note on Adab in the Murshid-Murīd Relationship.” In Moral Conduct and Authority: The Place of Adab in South Asian Islam, edited by Barbara Daly Metcalf, 241–51. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984. ʿAlāʾ, ʿĀlim b. al-Fatāwá al-tātārkhānīyah fī al-fiqh al-ḥanafī. Edited by ʿAbd al-Laṭīf Ḥasan ʿAbd al-Raḥmān. 4 vols. 1st ed. Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmīyah, 2005.

Auer-12.indd 201

6/10/12 1:27 PM

202

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Alam, Muzaffar. The Languages of Political Islam: India 1200–1800. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004. ———. “Shariʿa and Governance in the Indo-Islamic Context.” In Beyond Turk and Hindu: Rethinking Religious Identities in Islamicate South Asia, edited by David Gilmartin and Bruce Lawrence, 216–45. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2000. Ali, Abdullah Yusuf. The Holy Qurʾan: Text, Translation and Commentary. Elmhurst: Tahrike Tarsile Qurʾan, 1987. Ali, M. Athar. “Capital of the Sultans: Delhi during the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries.” In Delhi through the Ages: Essays in Urban History, Culture and Society, edited by R. E. Frykenberg, 34–44. Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1986. ———. “The Use of Sources in Mughal Historiography.” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 5, no. 3 (1995): 361–73. Anonymous. Sīrat-i Fīrūzshāhī: Nuskhah-yi Khudā Bakhsh. Edited by S. H. Askari. Patna: Khuda Bakhsh Oriental Public Library, 1999. Anooshahr, Ali. The Ghazi Sultans and the Frontiers of Islam: A Comparative Study of the Late Medieval and Early Modern Periods. London: Routledge, 2009. Aquil, Raziuddin. “Miracles, Authority, and Benevolence: Stories of Karamat in Sufi Literature of the Delhi Sultanate.” In Sufi Cults and the Evolution of Medieval Indian Culture, edited by Anup Taneja, 109–38. Delhi: Indian Council of Historical Research, 2003. ʿAsqalānī, Ibn Ḥajar al-. Fatḥ al-bārī: Sharḥ Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī. 15 vols. 1st ed. Riyadh: Dār al-Islām, 2000. ʿAṭṭār, Farīd al-Dīn. Taz ̱kirat al-Awliyāʾ. Edited by Reynold A. Nicholson. 2 vols, Persian Historical Texts. London: Luzac & Co., 1905–07. Auer, Blain. “Concepts of Justice and the Catalogue of Punishments under the Sultans of Delhi (7th–8th/13th–14th Centuries).” In Public Violence in Islamic Societies: Power, Discipline, and the Construction of the Public Sphere, 7th–19th Centuries CE, edited by Maribel Fierro and Christian Lange, 238–55. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2009. ———. “Intersections between Sufism and Power: Narrating the Shaykhs and Sultans of Northern India, 1200–1400.” In Sufism and Society: Arrangements of the Mystical in the Muslim World, 1200–1800, edited by John Curry and Erik Ohlander, 17–33. New York: Routledge, 2011. ———. “Persian Historiography in India.” In Persian Prose from Outside Iran: The Indian Subcontinent, Anatolia, Central Asia after Timur, edited by John Perry, and Sunil Sharma, I.B.Tauris: London, forthcoming. Azmi, Altaf Ahmad. “Islamic Medicine in India during the Sultanate Period (1206–1413).” Studies in History of Medicine and Science 18, no. 1 (2002): 1–15. Babayan, Kathryn. Mystics, Monarchs, and Messiahs: Cultural Landscapes of Early Modern Iran. Cambridge: Harvard Center for Middle Eastern Studies, 2002. Bābur. Baburnama: Memoirs of Babur, Prince and Emperor. Translated by Wheeler Thackston. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996.

Auer-12.indd 202

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Bibliography

203

Badāʾūnī, ʿAbd al-Qādir b. Mulūk Shāh. Muntakhab al-tavārīkh. Edited by Mawlavī Aḥmad ʿAlī. 3 vols, Bibliotheca Indica. Calcutta: College Press, 1865–69. Banerjee, Jamini Mohan. History of Firuz Shah Tughluq. Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal, 1967. Baranī, Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn. Fatāvá-yi Jahāndārī. Edited by Afsar Salīm Khān. Vol. 25, Intishārāt-i Idārah-yi Taḥqīqāt-i Pākistān. 1st ed. Lahore: Research Society of Pakistan, 1972. ———. The Political Theory of the Delhi Sultanate (including a translation of Ziauddin Barani’s Fatawa-i Jahandari, circa, 1358–9 A.D.). Translated by Afsar Umar Salim Khan. Edited by Mohammad Habib and Afsar Umar Salim Khan. Allahabad: Kitab Mahal, 1961. ———. “Ṣaḥīfah-yi Naʿt-i Muḥammadī.” In Raza Library. Rampur. ———. Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī. Edited by Sayyid Ahmad Khan. Vol. 33, Bibliotheca Indica. Calcutta, 1862. Bartold, V. V. “Caliph and Sultan.” Islamic Quarterly 7, nos. 3 and 4 (1963): 117–35. ———. “Khalif i Sultan.” Mir Islama 1 (1912): 202–26, 345–400. Bashear, Suliman. “Muslim Apocalypses and the Hour: A Case Study in Traditional Interpretation.” Israel Oriental Studies 13 (1993): 75–99. Binbānī, Fayz Allāh. Tārīkh-i Ṣadr-i Jahān. Edited by Iqtidar Husain Siddiqui. Aligarh: Academic Books, 1988. Blair, Sheila S. “Sufi Saints and Shrine Architecture in the Early Fourteenth Century.” Muqarnas 7 (1990): 35–49. Bonner, Michael. “Al-Khalīfa al-Marḍī: The Accession of Hārūn al-Rashīd.” Journal of the American Oriental Society 108, no. 1 (1988): 79–91. Bosworth, Clifford Edmund. “The Early Islamic History of Ghūr.” Central Asiatic Journal 6, no. 2 (1961): 116–33. ———. “Maḥmūd of Ghazna in Contemporary Eyes and Later Persian Literature.” Iran 4 (1966): 85–92. ———. “The Persian Contribution to Islamic Historiography in the Pre-Mongol Period.” In The Persian Presence in the Islamic World (The Thirteenth Levi Della Vida Conference, in Honour of Professor Ehsan Yarshater), edited by Richard G. Havhanisian and Georges Sabagh, 218–36. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. ———. “The Titulature of the Early Ghaznavids.” Oriens 15 (1962): 210–33. Böwering, Gerhard. “The Concept of Time in Islam.” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 141, no. 1 (1997): 55–66. Boyle, John Andrew. “The Death of the Last ʿAbbasid Caliph: A Contemporary Muslim Account.” Journal of Semitic Studies 6, no. 2 (1961): 145–61. Brett, Michael. The Rise of the Fatimids: The World of the Mediterranean and the Middle East in the Fourth Century of the Hijra, Tenth Century CE. Edited by Hugh Kennedy, Paul Magdalino, David Abulafia, Benjamin Arbel, Mark Meyerson, and Larry Simon. Vol. 30, The Medieval Mediterranean. Leiden: Brill, 2001.

Auer-12.indd 203

6/10/12 1:27 PM

204

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Brown, Peter. The Cult of the Saints: Its Rise and Function in Latin Christianity. Edited by Joseph M. Kitagawa. Vol. 2, Haskell Lectures on History of Religions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981. Browne, Edward Granville. A Literary History of Persia: From the Earliest Times until Firdawsi (to 1000 A.D.). Vol. 1, Classics of Persian Literature. Bethesda: Iranbooks, 1997. Bulliet, Richard W. The Patricians of Nishapur: A Study in Medieval Islamic Social History. Vol. 16, Harvard Middle Eastern Studies. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1972. Burnett, C. S. F. “An Apocryphal Letter from the Arabic Philosopher Al-Kindi to Theodore, Frederick II’s Astrologer, Concerning Gog and Magog, the Enclosed Nations, and the Scourge of the Mongols.” Viator, no. 15 (1984): 151–67. Burton-Page, J. “The Tomb of Rukn-i Alam in Multan.” In Splendors of the East, edited by Mortimer Wheeler, 72–81. London: Putnam, 1965. Busse, Heribert. “Jerusalem in the Story of Muhammad’s Night Journey and Ascension.” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 14 (1991): 1–40. Cahen, Claude. “The Historiography of the Seljuqid Period.” In Historians of the Middle East, edited by Bernard Lewis and P. M. Holt, 59–78. London: Oxford University Press, 1962. Calder, Norman. “Tafsīr from Ṭabarī to Ibn Kathīr: Problems in the Description of a Genre, Illustrated with Reference to the Story of Abraham.” In Approaches to the Qurʾān, edited by G. R. Hawting and Abdul-Kader A. Shareef, 101–40. London: Routledge, 1993. Causse, M. “The Theology of Separation and the Theology of Community: A Study of the Prophetic Career of Moses According to the Qurʾān.” In The Qurʾan: Style and Contents, edited by Andrew Rippin, 37–60. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2001. Chāch, Badr-i. Qaṣā’id-i Badr-i Chāch. Edited by Muḥammad Hādī ʿAlī Ashk. Kānpūr: Naval Kishūr, 1877. Chodkiewicz, Michel. Seal of the Saints: Prophethood and Sainthood in the Doctrine of Ibn ʿArabī. Translated by Liadain Sherrard, Golden Palm Series. Cambridge: Islamic Texts Society, 1993. Cook, David. Studies in Muslim Apocalyptic. Vol. 21, Studies in Late Antiquity and Early Islam. Princeton, NJ: Darwin Press, 2002. Cooperson, Michael. Classical Arabic Biography: The Heirs of the Prophets in the Age of al-Maʾmūn, Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. Cornell, Vincent J. Realm of the Saint: Power and Authority in Moroccan Sufism. 1st ed. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1998. Cragg, Kenneth. Readings in the Qurʾān. Brighton: Sussex Academic Press, 2004. Crone, Patricia, and Martin Hinds. God’s Caliph: Religious Authority in the First Centuries of Islam. Vol. 37, University of Cambridge Oriental Publications. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986.

Auer-12.indd 204

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Bibliography

205

Crone, Patricia. God’s Rule: Government and Islam. New York: Columbia University Press, 2004. Dabashi, Hamid. “Historical Conditions of Persian Sufism during the Seljuk Period.” In The Heritage of Sufism: Classical Persian Sufism from its Origins to Rumi (700–1300), edited by Leonard Lewisohn, 137–74. Oxford: Oneworld, 1999. Darling, L. T. “Contested Territory: Ottoman Holy War in Comparative Context.” Studia Islamica 91 (2000): 133–63. Denny, Frederick. “‘God’s Friends:’ The Sanctity of Persons in Islam.” In Sainthood: Its Manifestations in World Religions, edited by Richard Kieckhefer and George Doherty Bond, 69–97. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988. DeWeese, Devin. Review of The Politics of Knowledge in Premodern Islam: Negotiating Ideology and Religious Inquiry, by Omid Safi. Journal of the American Academy of Religion 76, no. 1 (2008): 177–83. Di Giovanni, Norman Thomas. The Lesson of the Master: On Borges and his Work. New York: Continuum, 2003. Digby, Simon. “Before Timur Came: Provincialization of the Delhi Sultanate through the Fourteenth Century.” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 47, no. 3 (2004): 298–356. ———. “Qalandars and Related Groups: Elements of Social Deviance in the Religious Life of the Delhi Sultanate of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries.” In Islam in Asia, edited by Yohanan Friedmann, 60–108. Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1984. ———. “Review Article: The Sufi Order in Islam.” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 36, no. 1 (1973): 136–39. ———. “The Sufi Shaikh as a Source of Authority in Mediaeval India.” In Islam et Société en Asie du Sud (Collection Puruṣārtha, 9), edited by Marc Gaborieau, 57–77. Paris: Editions de l’Ecole des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, 1986. ———. “The Sufi Shaykh and the Sultan: A Conflict of Claims to Authority in Medieval India.” Iran 28 (1990): 71–81. Donner, Fred McGraw. The Early Islamic Conquests. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1981. ———. Narratives of Islamic Origins: The Beginnings of Islamic Historical Writing. Vol. 14, Studies in Late Antiquity and Early Islam. Princeton, NJ: Darwin Press, 1998. ———. “ʿUthmān and the Rāshidūn Caliphs in Ibn ʿAsākir’s Taʾrīkh madīnat Dimashq: A Study of Strategies of Compilation.” In Ibn ʿAsākir and Early Islamic History, edited by James E. Lindsay, 44–61. Princeton, NJ: Darwin Press, 2001. Duri, ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz. The Rise of Historical Writing among the Arabs. Edited by Lawrence I. Conrad, Modern Classics in Near Eastern Studies. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1983. Eaton, Richard Maxwell. “The Articulation of Islamic Space in Medieval Deccan.” In Essays on Islam and Indian History, 159–75. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. ———. The Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier 1204–1760. Edited by Barbara Metcalf. Vol. 17, Comparative Studies on Muslim Societies. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993.

Auer-12.indd 205

6/10/12 1:27 PM

206

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

———. “Temple Desecration and Indo-Muslim States.” In Essays on Islam and Indian History, 94–132. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2000. El-Hibri, Tayeb. Reinterpreting Islamic Historiography: Hārūn al-Rashīd and the Narrative of the ʿAbbāsid Caliphate. Edited by David Morgan, Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1999. Eliade, Mircea. The Myth of the Eternal Return: Cosmos and History. Vol. 46, Bollingen Series. 2nd pbk. ed. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2005. Elias, Jamal. “The Sufi Robe (Khirqa) as a Vehicle of Spiritual Authority.” In Robes and Honor: The Medieval World of Investiture, edited by Stewart Gordon, 275–89. New York: Palgrave, 2001. Elliot, H. M., and John Dowson. The History of India as Told by its Own Historians: The Muhammadan Period. 8 vols. London: Trübner and Co., 1867–77. Elmore, Gerald T. Islamic Sainthood in the Fullness of Time: Ibn al-ʿArabī’s Book of the Fabulous Gryphon. Edited by H. Daiber and D. Pingree. Vol. 32, Islamic Philosophy, Theology, and Science: Texts and Studies Leiden: Brill, 1999. Ernst, Carl W. Eternal Garden: Mysticism, History, and Politics at a South Asian Sufi Center. Edited by Annemarie Schimmel, SUNY Series in Muslim Spirituality in South Asia. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1992. ———. “From Hagiography to Martyrology: Conflicting Testimonies to a Sufi Martyr of the Delhi Sultanate.” History of Religions 24, no. 4 (1985): 308–27. ———. “An Indo-Persian Guide to Sufi Shrine Pilgrimage.” In Manifestations of Sainthood in Islam, edited by Grace Martin Smith and Carl W. Ernst, 43–67. Istanbul: Isis Press, 1993. ———. “The Textual Formation of Oral Teachings in Early Chishtī Sufism.” In Texts in Context: Traditional Hermeneutics, edited by Jeffrey R. Timm, 271–97. Albany: State University of New York, 1992. Ernst, Carl W., and Bruce B. Lawrence. Sufi Martyrs of Love: The Chishti Order in South Asia and Beyond. 1st ed. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002. Evstatiev, Simeon. “On the Perception of the Khātam an-nabiyyīn Doctrine in Arabic Historical Thought: Confirmation or Finality.” In Studies in Arabic and Islam, edited by S. Leder, H. Kilpatrick, B. Martel-Thoumian and H. Schönig, 455–67. Leuven: Uitgeverij Peeters, 2002. Fahd, Toufic. “The Dream in Medieval Islamic Society.” In The Dream and Human Societies, edited by Roger Caillois and Gustave E. von Grunebaum, 351–63. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1966. Farooqi, N. R. “The Legend of Sayyid Sâlâr Mas‘ûd Ghâzî.” Islamic Culture 75, no. 3 (1993): 73–84. Faruqi, Nisar Ahmed. “Amīr Khusraw in the Presence of his Mentor Ḥaḍrat Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyā.” Hamdard Islamicus 16, no. 2 (1993): 5–24. Fernandes, Leonor E. The Evolution of a Sufi Institution in Mamluk Egypt: The Khanqah. Edited by Klaus Schwarz. Vol. 134, Islamkundliche Untersuchungen. Berlin: Klaus Schwarz Verlag, 1988.

Auer-12.indd 206

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Bibliography

207

Fierro, Maribel. “The Polemic about the Karāmāt al-awliyāʾ and the Development of Ṣūfism in al-Andalus (Fourth/Tenth–Fifth/Eleventh Centuries).” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 55, no. 2 (1992): 236–49. Flood, Finbarr. “Ghūrid Architecture in the Indus Valley: The Tomb of Shaykh Sādan Shahīd.” Ars Orientalis 31 (2001): 129–66. Friedmann, Yohanan. “Finality of Prophethood in Sunnī Islām.” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 7 (1986): 177–215. Geary, Patrick J. Furta Sacra: Thefts of Relics in the Central Middle Ages. Rev. ed. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990. Gibb, Hamilton A. R. “Al-Mawardi’s Theory of the Caliphate.” In Studies on the Civilization of Islam, edited by Stanford Shaw and William Polk, 151–65. Boston: Beacon Press, 1962. ———. “Tarikh.” In Studies on the Civilization of Islam, edited by Stanford Shaw and William Polk, 108–37. Boston: Beacon Press, 1962. Graham, William. “Traditionalism in Islam: An Essay in Interpretation.” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 23, no. 3 (1993): 495–522. Guha, Ranajit. “On Some Aspects of the Historiography of Colonial India.” Subaltern Studies 1 (1982): 1–8. Gujarātī, Aḥmad Sharīf. Yūsuf Zulaikhā, 1580–1585: Dabistān-i Golkunḍah kī Pahlī Masnavī. Edited by Sayyidah Jaʿfar. Hyderabad: Milne kā patah Sayyidah Jaʿfar, 1983. Habib, Irfan. “Baranī’s Theory of the History of the Delhi Sultanate.” Indian Historical Review 7 (1981): 99–115. ———. “Ziya Barani’s Vision of the State.” Medieval History Journal 2, no. 1 (1999): 19–36. Hafsi, Ibrahim. “Recherches sur le Genre « Ṭabaqāt » dans la Littérature Arabe.” Pts. 1, 2 and 3. Arabica 23, no. 3 (1976): 227–65; 24, no. 1 (1977): 1–41; 24, no. 2 (1977): 150–86. Haji, Hamid. Founding the Fatimid State: The Rise of an Early Islamic Empire—An Annotated English Translation of al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān’s Iftitāḥ al-Daʿwa. Edited by Farhad Daftary. Vol. 6, Ismaili Texts and Translations Series. London: I.B. Tauris, 2006. Hallaq, Wael B. “Caliphs, Jurists and the Saljūqs in the Political Thought of Juwaynī.” Muslim World 74, no. 1 (1984): 26–41. Hambly, Gavin R. G. “From Baghdad to Bukhara, from Ghazna to Delhi: The khilʿa Ceremony in the Transmission of Kingly Pomp and Circumstance.” In Robes and Honor: The Medieval World of Investiture, edited by Stewart Gordon, 193–222. New York: Palgrave, 2001. Hamilton, Paul. Historicism. London: Routledge, 1996. Hanne, Eric J. Putting the Caliph in his Place: Power, Authority, and the Late Abbasid Caliphate. Madison: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2007.

Auer-12.indd 207

6/10/12 1:27 PM

208

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Hardy, Peter. “Force and Violence in Indo-Persian Writing on History and Government in Medieval South Asia.” In Islamic Society and Culture: Essays in Honour of Professor Aziz Ahmad, edited by Milton Israel and N. K. Wagle, 165–208. New Delhi: Manohar, 1983. ———. Historians of Medieval India: Studies in Indo-Muslim Historical Writing. London: Luzac, 1960. ———. “Maḥmūd of Ghazna and the Historian.” Journal of the Punjab University Historical Society 14 (1962): 1–36. ———. “The Tarikh-i Muhammadi by Muhammad Bihamad Khani.” In Essays Presented to Sir Jadunath Sarkar, 181–90. Hoshiarpur: Panjab University, 1958. Hartmann, Angelika. an-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh (1180–1225): Politik, Religion, Kultur in der späten ʿAbbāsidenzeit. Vol. 8, Studien zur Sprache, Geschichte und Kultur des Islamischen Orients. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1975. Hasan, Nurul. “Sahifa-i Na’t-i Muhammadi of Zia-ud-Din Barani.” Medieval India Quarterly 1, nos. 3–4 (1950): 100–05. Hasan, Perween. “The Footprint of the Prophet.” Muqarnas 10 (1993): 335–43. Ḥasanī, ʿAlāʾ Dīn ʿAlāʾ b. Saʿd al-. Jāmiʿ al-ʿulūm. Edited by Sajjad Husain. New Delhi: Indian Council of Historical Research, 1987. Hawting, G. R. “Two Citations of the Qurʾān in ‘Historical’ Sources for Early Islam.” In Approaches to the Qurʾān, edited by G. R. Hawting and Abdul-Kader A. Shareef, 260–8. London: Routledge, 1993. Hinds, Martin. “‘Maghāzī’ and ‘Sīra’ in Early Islamic Scholarship.” In The Life of Muhammad, edited by Uri Rubin, 1–10. Brookfield: Ashgate, 1998. Hobsbawm, Eric. “Introduction: Inventing Traditions.” In The Invention of Tradition, edited by Eric Hobsbawm and T. O. Ranger, 1–14. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992. Hodgson, Marshall G. S. The Venture of Islam. 3 vols. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1977. Hodivala, Shahpurshah Hormasji. Studies in Indo-Muslim History: A Critical Commentary on Elliot and Dowson’s History of India as Told by its own Historians. 2 vols. Bombay, 1939–57. Holt, P. M. “The Position and Power of the Mamlūk Sultan.” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 38, no. 2 (1975): 237–49. ———. “Some Observations on the ʿAbbāsid Caliphate of Cairo.” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 47, no. 3 (1984): 501–07. ———. “The Structure of Government in the Mamluk Sultanate.” In The Eastern Mediterranean Lands in the Period of the Crusades, edited by P. M. Holt, 44–61. Warminister: Aris and Phillips Ltd., 1977. Hujvīrī, ʿAlī b. ʿUs ̱mān. Kashf al-maḥjūb. Edited by V. A. Zhukovskii. Vol. 89, Zabān va farhang-i Īrān. 8th ed. Tehran: Ṭahūrī, 1381Sh/2002.

Auer-12.indd 208

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Bibliography

209

Humphreys, R. Stephen. “Qurʾānic Myth and Narrative Structure in Early Islamic Historiography.” In Tradition and Innovation in Late Antiquity, edited by Frank M. Clover and R. Stephen Humphreys, 271–90. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1989. Hurvitz, Nimrod. “Biographies and Mild Asceticism: A Study of Islamic Moral Imagination.” Studia Islamica, no. 85 (1997): 41–65. Ibn Baṭṭūṭa. Riḥlat Ibn Baṭṭūṭa. 2 in 1 vol. Cairo: al-Maṭbaʿah al-Azharīyah, 1928. Ibn al-Jawzī, Abū al-Faraj. al-Khalīfah al-ʿādil ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭāb: Amīr al-muʾminīn. 1st ed. Amman: Dār al-Isrāʾ, 2004. Ibn Isḥāq, Muḥammad. The Life of Muḥammad: A Translation of Ibn Isḥāq’s Sīrat Rasūl Allāh. Translated by Alfred Guillaume. Karachi: Oxford University Press, 2004. Ibn Taymiyyah. al-Siyāsah al-sharʿiyyah. Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyyah, 1988. Ikram, S. M. Muslim Civilization in India. New York: Columbia University Press, 1964. Imber, Colin. “What Does Ghazi Actually Mean?” In The Balance of Truth: Essays in Honour of Professor Geoffrey Lewis, 165–78. Istanbul: Isis Press, 2000. Ishaq, Muhammad. India’s Contribution to the Study of Hadith Literature. 2nd ed. Dacca: University of Dacca, 1976. Islam, Riazul. “The Rise of the Sammas in Sind.” Islamic Culture 22 (1948): 359–82. ———. Sufism in South Asia: Impact on Fourteenth Century Muslim Society. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002. Islam, Zafarul. “The Contribution of the Tughluq Sultans to Islamic Jurisprudence.” Majallat al-Taʾrīkh al-Islāmī 2, no. 3–4 (1997): 516–28. ———. “Development of Fiqh Literature in the Sultanate Period.” In Islamic Heritage in South Asian Subcontinent, edited by Nazir Ahmad and I. H. Siddiqui, 83–111. Jaipur: Publication Scheme, 2000. Jackson, Peter. The Delhi Sultanate: A Political and Military History. Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999. ———. “The Mamlūk Institution in Early Muslim India.” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, no. 2 (1990): 340–58. ———. “The Mongols and the Delhi Sultanate in the Reign of Muḥammad Tughluq (1325–1351).” Central Asiatic Journal 19, no. 1–2 (1975): 118–57. ———. “Turkish Slaves on Islam’s Indian Frontier.” In Slavery & South Asian History, edited by Indrani Chatterjee and Richard Maxwell Eaton, 63–82. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006. Jauhri, R. C. “Shams Siraj ʿAfif and his Tarikh-i-Firuzshah: A Study in Persian Tradition of Writing History.” In Indo-Persian Cultural Perspectives: Prof. Bhagwat Saroop Memorial Volume, edited by Mohammad Aslam Khan and Ravinder Gargesh Chander Shekhar, 65–79. Delhi: Saud Ahmad Dehlavi, 1998. Johansen, Baber. “Sacred and Religious Elements in Hanafite Law: Functions and Limits of the Absolute Character of Government Authority.” In Islam et Politique au Maghreb, edited by Ernest Gellner and Jean-Claude Vatin, 281–303. Paris: Éditions de Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, 1981.

Auer-12.indd 209

6/10/12 1:27 PM

210

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Johns, A. H. “Joseph in the Qur’ān: Dramatic Dialogue, Human Emotion and Prophetic Wisdom.” Islamochristiana / Dirāsāt Islāmīya Masīḥīya 7 (1981): 29–55. Juynboll, G. H. A. “Some New Ideas on the Development of Sunna as a Technical Term in Early Islam.” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 10 (1987): 97–118. Jūzjānī, Minhāj Sirāj. T̤abaḳāt-i Nāṣirī: A General History of the Muhammadan Dynasties of Asia, including Hindustan; from A. H. 194 (810 A.D.) to A.H. 658 (1260 A.D.) and the Irruption of the Infidel Mughals into Islam. Translated by H. G. Raverty. 2 vols. New Delhi: Oriental Books Reprint Corporation, 1970. ———. Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī. Edited by ʿAbd al-Ḥayy Ḥabībī. 2 vols. 2nd ed. Kabul: Anjuman-i Tārīkh-i Afghānistān, 1342–43/1923–24. Kafadar, Cemal. Between Two Worlds: The Construction of the Ottoman State. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995. Kāfiyajī, Muḥyī al-Dīn al-. al-Mukhtasar fi ʿilm al-taʾrīkh. Edited by Muḥammad Kamāl al-Dīn ʿIzz al-Dīn. Beirut: ʿĀlam al-Kutub, 1990. Kaltner, John. Inquiring of Joseph: Getting to Know a Biblical Character through the Qurʾan, Interfaces. Collegeville: Liturgical Press, 2003. Karim, Abdul. “The Khalīfa as Recognized in the Coins of Bengal Sulṭāns.” Journal of the Numismatic Society of India 17, no. 2 (1955): 86–91. Kassis, Riad Aziz. The Book of Proverbs and Arabic Proverbial Works. Vol. 74, Supplements to Vetus Testamentum, 1999. Kennedy, Hugh. The Prophet and the Age of the Caliphates: The Islamic Near East from the Sixth to the Eleventh Century. Edited by P. M. Holt, A History of the Near East. London: Longman, 1986. Khalidi, Tarif. Arabic Historical Thought in the Classical Period. Edited by David Morgan, Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994. Khan, Ahmad Nabi. “The Mausoleum of Šaiḫ ‘Alā’ al-Dīn at Pākpattan (Punjāb): A Significant Example of the Tuġluq Style of Architecture.” East and West 24, no. 3–4 (1974): 311–26. Khan, Iqtidar Alam. “Medieval Indian Notions of Secular Statecraft in Retrospect.” Social Scientist 14, no. 1 (1986): 3–15. Khan, M. S. “The Life and Works of Fakhr-i Mudabbir.” Islamic Culture 51, no. 2 (1977): 127–40. Khānī, Muḥammad Bihāmad. Tārīkh-i Muḥammadī. MS B. L. Or. 137. ———. Tarikh-i Muḥammadi: Portion Dealing with the Account of Sultan Firoz Shah, His Successors, and the Minor Kingdoms, from AH 752/AD 1351 to AH 842/AD 1438. Translated by Muhammad Zaki. Aligarh: Aligarh Muslim University Press, 1972. Khusraw, Amīr. The Campaigns of ‘Alā‘u’d-Dīn Khiljī: Being the Khaẓā’inul futūḥ (Treasures of Victory). Translated by Mohammad Habib. Madras: D. B. Taraporewala Sons & Co., 1931. ———. Khazāʾin al-futūḥ. Edited by Mohammad Wahid Mirza. 2nd ed, Bibliotheca Indica. Islamabad: National Book Foundation of Pakistan, 1976.

Auer-12.indd 210

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Bibliography

211

———. Mas̱navī-yi Nuh Sipihr. Edited by Mohammad Wahid Mirza. Calcutta: Baptist Mission Press, 1948. Kinberg, Leah. “Muḥkamāt and Mutashābihāt (Koran 3/7): Implications of a Koranic Pair of Terms in Medieval Exegesis.” Arabica 35, no. 3 (1988): 143–72. Kirmānī, Muḥammad b. Mubārak. Siyar al-Awliyāʾ. Lahore: Muʾassasah-yi Intishārāt-i Islāmī, 1978. Kisāʾī, Muḥammad b. ʿAbd Allāh. The Tales of the Prophets of al-Kisāʾi. Translated by Wheeler Thackston. Edited by Ilse Lichtenstadter. Vol. 2, Library of Classical Arabic Literature. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1978. Kister, M. J. “Legends in tafsīr and ḥadīth Literature: The Creation of Ādam and Related Stories.” In Approaches to the History of the Interpretation of the Qurʾān, edited by Andrew Rippin, 82–114. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1988. Knappert, Jan. Islamic Legends: Histories of the Heroes, Saints, and Prophets of Islam. Vol. 15:1, Religious Texts in Translation Series Nisaba. Leiden: Brill, 1985. Kugel, James L. In Potiphar’s House: The Interpretive Life of Biblical Texts. 1st pbk. ed. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1994. Kuhrāmī, Ṣadr al-Dīn Yaʿqūb Muẓaffar. Fiqh-i Fīrūz Shāhī. MS B. L. 2564. Kumar, Sunil. “Assertions of Authority: A Study of the Discursive Statements of Two Sultans of Delhi.” In The Making of Indo-Persian Culture: Indian and French Studies, edited by Muzaffar Alam, Françoise ‘Nalini’ Delvoye, and Marc Gaborieau, 37–65. New Delhi: Manohar, 2000. ———. The Emergence of the Delhi Sultanate 1192–1286. New Delhi: Permanent Black, 2007. ———. “The Ignored Elites: Turks, Mongols and a Persian Secretarial Class in the Early Delhi Sultanate.” Modern Asian Studies 43, no. 1 (2009): 45–77. Kwiatkowski, Will. “The David Collection Steele: A New Source for Firuz Shah Tughluq’s Jajnagar Campaign.” Journal of the David Collection 3 (2010): 114–29. Lal, Kishori Saran. Twilight of the Sultanate: A Political, Social and Cultural History of the Sultanate of Delhi from the Invasion of Timur to the Conquest of Babur 1398–1526. New York: Asia Publishing House, 1963. Lambton, A. K. S. “Changing Concepts of Justice and Injustice from the 5th/11th Century to the 8th/14th Century in Persia: The Saljuq Empire and the Ilkhanate.” Studia Islamica 68 (1988): 27–60. ———. “The Dilemma of Government in Islamic Persia: The Siyāsat-Nāma of Niẓām al-Mulk.” Iran 22 (1984): 55–66. ———. “Islamic Mirrors for Princes.” In Convegno internazionale sul tema la Persia nel Medioevo, 419–42. Rome: Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, 1970. ———. “Justice in the Medieval Theory of Persian Kingship.” Studia Islamica 17 (1962): 91–119. ———. State and Government in Medieval Islam: An Introduction to the Study of Islamic Political Theory: The Jurists. Vol. 36, London Oriental Series. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981.

Auer-12.indd 211

6/10/12 1:27 PM

212

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

———. “The Theory of Kingship in the Naṣīḥat ul-Mulūk of Ghazālī.” Islamic Quarterly 1 (1954): 47–55. Lane-Poole, Stanley. The Coins of the Sultáns of Dehlí in the British Museum. Edited by Reginald Stuart Poole, Catalogue of Indian Coins in the British Museum. London: Gilbert & Rivington, 1884. Lange, Christian. Justice, Punishment and the Medieval Muslim Imagination, Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008. Laoust, Henri. Le Traité de Droit Public d’Ibn Taimiya. Traduction annotée de la Siyâsa shar’iyya. Beirut: Institut Français de Damas, 1948. Lapidus, Ira M. “State and Religion in Islamic Societies.” Past and Present 151 (1996): 3–27. Lawrence, Bruce. “Review Article.” Religious Studies Review 4, no. 3 (1978): 171–79. Leder, Stefan. “The Literary Use of the Khabar: A Basic Form of Historical Writing.” In The Byzantine and Early Islamic Near East, edited by A. Cameron and L. Conrad, 277–315. Princeton, NJ: Darwin Press, 1992. Levanoni, Amalia. “The Mamluk Conception of the Sultanate.” International Journal of Middle East Studies 26, no. 3 (1994): 373–92. Lifshitz, Felice. “Beyond Positivism and Genre: ‘Hagiographical’ Texts as Historical Narrative.” Viator 25 (1994): 95–114. Lindsay, James. “ʿAlī Ibn ʿAsākir as a Preserver of Qiṣaṣ al-Anbiyāʾ: The Case of David b. Jesse.” Studia Islamica 82 (1995): 45–82. ———. “Professors, Prophets and Politicians: ʿAlī ibn ʿAsākir’s Taʾrīkh madīnat dimashq.” PhD, University of Wisconsin–Madison, 1994. Lowin, Shari L. The Making of a Forefather: Abraham in Islamic and Jewish Exegetical Narratives. Edited by Wadad Kadi and Rotraud Wielandt. Vol. 65, Islamic History and Civilization: Studies and Texts. Leiden: Brill, 2006. Madelung, Wilferd. “The Assumption of the Title Shāhānshāh by the Būyids and ‘The Reign of the Daylam (Dawlat al-Daylam).’” Journal of Near Eastern Studies 28, no. 2 (1969): 84–108; 68–83. Mahmood, Tahir. “The Dargah of Sayyid Salar Masʿud Ghazi in Bahraich: Legend, Tradition and Reality.” In Muslim Shrines in India: Their Character, History and Significance, edited by Christian W. Troll, 24–43. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2003. Majumdar, A. K. “Sind.” In The Delhi Sultanate, edited by Ramesh Chandra Majumdar, 221–27. Bombay: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, 1967. Manz, Beatrice Forbes. The Rise and Rule of Tamerlane. Canto ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999. Marcotte, Roxanne D. “Anūshīrvān and Buzurgmihr—The Just Ruler and the Wise Counselor: Two Figures of Persian Traditional Moral Literature.” Rocznik Orientalistyczny 51, no. 2 (1998): 69–90. Marlow, Louise. Heirarchy and Egalitarianism in Islamic Thought, Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.

Auer-12.indd 212

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Bibliography

213

———. “Kings, Prophets, and the ʿUlamāʾ in Mediaeval Islamic Advice Literature.” Studia Islamica 81 (1995): 101–20. Mayaram, Shail. Against History, Against State: Counter Perspectives from the Margins. New York: Columbia University Press, 2003. Mazzeo, Joseph. “Allegorical Interpretation and History.” Comparative Literature 30, no. 1 (1978): 1–21. Meisami, Julie Scott. Persian Historiography to the End of the Twelfth Century, Islamic Surveys. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1999. ———. “Rulers and the Writing of History.” In Writers and Rulers: Perspectives on their Relationship from Abbasid to Safavid Times, edited by Beatrice Gruendler and Louise Marlow, 73–95. Wiesbaden: Reichert, 2004. Meri, Joseph W. “The Etiquette of Devotion in the Islamic Cult of Saints.” In The Cult of Saints in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages: Essays on the Contribution of Peter Brown, edited by James Howard-Johnston and Paul Antony Hayward, 263–86. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999. Meserve, Ruth I. “The Inhospitable Land of the Barbarian. (1. Chinese views; 2. Indian views; 3. Persian and Arabic views; 4. The Land of Gog and Magog: Islamic, Christian, and Talmudic views; 5. Greek, Roman and Byzantine views.).” Journal of Asian History 1, no. 16 (1982): 51–89. Mikhail, Hanna. Politics and Revelation: Māwardī and After. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1995. Mojaddedi, Jawid A. The Biographical Tradition in Sufism: The ṭabaqāt Genre from al-Sulamī to Jāmī. Edited by Sue Hamilton, Curzon Studies in Asian Religion. Richmond: Curzon Press, 2001. Moin, M. “Qadi Minhaj al-Din Siraj al-Juzjani.” Journal of the Pakistan Historical Society 15 (1967): 163–74. Morgan, David. The Mongols. Edited by James Campbell and Barry Cunliffe, The Peoples of Europe. Oxford: Blackwell, 1990. ———. “Persian Historians and the Mongols.” In Medieval Historical Writing in the Christian and Islamic Worlds, edited by David Morgan, 109–24. London: School of Oriental and African Studies University of London, 1982. Mottahedeh, Roy P. Loyalty and Leadership in an Early Islamic Society. Rev. ed. London: I.B.Tauris, 2001. ———. “Some Attitudes Towards Monarchy and Absolutism in the Eastern Islamic World of the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries A.D.” Israel Oriental Studies 10 (1980): 86–91. Mubārak Shāh, Muḥammad b. Manṣūr (Fakhr-i Mudabbir). Ādāb al-ḥarb wa ‘l shujāʿah. Edited by Aḥmad Suhaylī Khvānsārī. Tehran: Intishārāt-i Iqbāl, 1346Sh/1967. ———. Ta’ríkh-i Fakhru’d-Dín Mubáraksháh being The Historical Introduction to the Book of Genealogies of Fakhru’d-Dín Mubáraksháh Marvar-rúdí [sic] completed in A.D. 1206. Edited by E. Denison Ross. Vol. 4, James G. Forlong Fund. London: Royal Asiatic Society, 1927.

Auer-12.indd 213

6/10/12 1:27 PM

214

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Mukhia, Harbans. Historians and Historiography during the Reign of Akbar, Vikas History Series. New Delhi: Vikas Publications House, 1976. Muslim, Abū l-Ḥusayn b. al-Ḥajjāj al-Qushayrī al-Nīsābūrī. Ṣaḥīḥ. Edited by Muḥammad Fuʾād ʿAbd al-Bāqī. 5 vols. Cairo: Dār Iḥyā al-Kutub al-ʿArabīyah, 1955–56. Neuwirth, Angelika. “Qur’an and History—A Disputed Relationship Some Reflections on Qur’anic History and History in the Qur’an.” Journal of Qur’anic Studies 5, no. 1 (2003): 1–18. Niẓām al-Mulk. Siyāsatnāmah. Edited by Hubert Darke. Tehran: Bungāh-i Tarjamah va Nashr-i Kitāb, 1962. Niẓāmī, Ḥasan. Tāj al-maʾāsir. MS B. L. Add. 7623. ———. Taj ul ma’athir: The Crown of Glorious Deeds. Translated by Bhagwat Saroop. Edited by M. Aslam Khan and Chander Shekar. Delhi: Saud Ahmad Dehlavi, 1998. Nizami, Khaliq Ahmad. “The Futuhat-i-Firuz Shahi as a Medieval Inscription.” Paper presented at the Seminar on Medieval Inscriptions, Aligarh, India, February 6–8, 1970. ———. “Iltutmish the Mystic.” Islamic Culture 20, no. 2 (1946): 165–80. ———. “The Impact of Ibn Taimiyya on South Asia.” Journal of Islamic Studies 1, no. 1 (1990): 120–49. ———. The Life and Times of Shaikh Nizam-u’d-din Auliya. Edited by Khaliq Ahmad Nizami, Muslim Religious Thinkers of South Asia. Delhi: Idarah-i Adabyat-i Delli, 1991. ———. On History and Historians of Medieval India. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal, 1983. ———. Royalty in Medieval India. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers, 1997. ———. “Some Aspects of Khānqah Life in Medieval India.” Studia Islamica 8 (1957): 51–69. ———. Some Aspects of Religion and Politics in India during the Thirteenth Century. Bombay: Asia Publishing House, 1961. ———. Supplement to Elliot & Dowson’s History of India: Vol. III The Khaljis and the Tughluqs. Vol. 16, IAD Oriental (Original) Series. Delhi: Idarah-i Adabiyat-i Delli, 1981. ———. “Ziya-ud-din Barani.” In Historians of Medieval India, edited by Mohibbul Hasan, 37–52. Meerut: Meenakshi Prakashan, 1968. Noth, Albrecht, and Lawrence I. Conrad. The Early Arabic Historical Tradition: A Source-Critical Study. Translated by Michael Bonner. Vol. 3, Studies in Late Antiquity and Early Islam. 2nd ed. Princeton, NJ: Darwin Press, 1994. Ohlander, Erik S. Sufism in an Age of Transition: ʿUmar al-Suhrawardī and the Rise of the Islamic Mystical Brotherhoods. Vol. 71, Islamic History and Civilization. Leiden: Brill, 2008. Peacock, A. C. S. Mediaeval Islamic Historiography and Political Legitimacy: Balʿamī’s Tārīkhnāma, Routledge Studies in the History of Iran and Turkey. London: Routledge, 2007.

Auer-12.indd 214

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Bibliography

215

Peters, Rudolph. Crime and Punishment in Islamic Law: Theory and Practice from the Sixteenth to the Twenty-first Century. Edited by Wael B. Hallaq, Themes in Islamic Law 2. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005. Petersen, Erling Ladewig. ʿAlī and Muʿāwiya in Early Arabic Tradition: Studies on the Genesis and Growth of Islamic Historical Writing until the End of the Ninth Century. Translated by P. Lampe Christensen. Copenhagen: Munksgaard, 1964. Pollock, Sheldon, ed. Literary Cultures in History: Reconstructions from South Asia. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003. Powers, David S. “The Exegetical Genre nāsikh al-Qurʾān wa mansūkhuhu.” In Approaches to the History of the Interpretation of the Qurʾān, edited by Andrew Rippin, 117–38. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1988. Pritchett, Frances W. The Romance Tradition in Urdu: Adventures from the Dāstān of Amīr Ḥamzah. New York: Columbia University Press, 1991. Pritsak, Omeljan. “Āl-i Burhān.” Der Islam 30 (1952): 81–96. Qāḍī, Wadād al-. “The Development of the Term Ghulāt in Muslim Literature with Special Reference to the Kaysāniyya.” In Akten des VII. Kongresses für Arabistik und Islamwissenschaft, Göttingen, 15. bis 22. August 1974, edited by Albert Dietrich, 295–319. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1976. Qamaruddin, Muhammad. Crime and Punishment in the Delhi Sultanate, 1206–1526. 1st ed. Delhi: Adam Publishers & Distributors, 1992. Qureshi, Ishtiaq Husain. The Administration of the Sultanate of Delhi. 2nd rev. ed. Lahore: Sh. Muhammad Ashraf, 1944. Qushayrī, ʿAbd al-Karīm b. Hawāzin. al-Risālah al-Qushayriyah fī ʿilm al-taṣawwuf. Edited by Muḥammad ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Marʿashlī. Beirut: Dār Iḥyāʾ al-Turāth al-ʿArabī, 1998. Rabbat, Nasser. “The Meaning of the Umayyad Dome of the Rock.” Muqarnas 6 (1989): 12–21. Radtke, Bernd. “Al-Hakīm al-Tirmidhī on Miracles.” In Miracle et Karāma: Hagiographies Médiévales Comparées, edited by Denise Aigle, 287–99. Turnhout: Brepols, 2000. ———. “The Concept of Wilāya in Early Sufism.” In The Heritage of Sufism: Classical Persian Sufism from its Origins to Rumi (700–1300), edited by Leonard Lewisohn, 483–96. Oxford: Oneworld, 1999. Rappaport, Roy A. “Enactments of Meaning.” In Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity, 104–38. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999. Raza, S. Jabir. “Nomenclature and Titulature of the Early Turkish Sultans of Delhi Found in Numismatic Legends.” In Medieval Indian Coinages: A Historical and Economic Perspective, edited by Amiteshwar Jha, 85–96. Nasik: Indian Institute of Research in Numismatic Studies, 2001. Renard, John. Friends of God: Islamic Images of Piety, Commitment, and Servanthood. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008.

Auer-12.indd 215

6/10/12 1:27 PM

216

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

———. Islam and the Heroic Image: Themes in Literature and the Visual Arts. Edited by Frederick M. Denny, Studies in Comparative Religion. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1993. Rizvi, Saiyid Athar Abbas. A History of Sufism in India. 2 vols. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal, 1978. ———. “Tarikh-i-Alfi.” In Historians of Medieval India, edited by Mohibbul Hasan, 119–28. Meerut: Meenakshi Prakashan, 1968. Reprint, 1982. Robinson, Chase F. Islamic Historiography, Themes in Islamic History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003. Rogers, J. M. “Waqf and Patronage in Seljuk Anatolia: The Epigraphic Evidence.” Anatolian Studies 26 (1976): 69–103. Rosenthal, Franz. A History of Muslim Historiography. 2nd rev. ed. Leiden: Brill, 1968. ———. Knowledge Triumphant: The Concept of Knowledge in Medieval Islam. Leiden: Brill, 1970. Rubin, Uri. The Eye of the Beholder: The Life of Muḥammad as Viewed by the Early Muslims. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995. ———. “Pre-existence and Light: Aspects of the Concept of Nūr Muḥammad.” Israel Oriental Studies 5 (1975): 62–119. ———. “Prophets and Caliphs: The Biblical Foundations of the Ummayad Authority.” In Method and Theory in the Study of Islamic Origins, edited by Herbert Berg, 73–100. Leiden: Brill, 2003. Sachedina, Abdulaziz Abdulhussein. The Just Ruler in Shi’ite Islam: The Comprehensive Authority of the Jurist in Imamite Jurisprudence. New York: Oxford University Press, 1998. Safi, Omid. The Politics of Knowledge in Premodern Islam: Negotiating Ideology and Religious Inquiry. Edited by Carl W. Ernst and Bruce B. Lawrence, Islamic Civilization and Muslim Networks. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2006. Safran, Janina M. The Second Umayyad Caliphate: The Articulation of Caliphal Legitimacy in al-Andalus. Vol. 33, Harvard Middle Eastern Monographs. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2000. Sarkar, Nilanjan. “‘The Voice of Maḥmūd’: The Hero in Ziyā Baranī’s Fatāwā-i Jahāndārī.” The Medieval History Journal 9, no. 2 (2006): 327–56. Schimmel, Annemarie. And Muhammad is His Messenger: The Veneration of the Prophet in Islamic Piety. Lahore: Vanguard Books Ltd., 1987. ———. Mystical Dimensions of Islam. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1975. Schwartzberg, Joseph. A Historical Atlas of South Asia. 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992. Sharif, Miʿraj Muḥammad. “The Sultan and the ʿUlamāʾ in the Turkish Sultanate of Delhi (1206–1413).” Iqbal 13, no. 3 (1965): 31–58.

Auer-12.indd 216

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Bibliography

217

Sharma, Sunil. “Amir Khusraw and the Genre of Historical Narratives in Verse.” Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East 22, nos. 1–2 (2002): 112–8. Sharon, Moshe. “The Umayyads as Ahl al-Bayt.” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 14 (1992): 115–52. Shoshan, Boaz. Poetics of Islamic Historiography: Deconstructing Tabari’s History. Edited by Wadad Kadi and Rotraud Wielandt. Vol. 53, Islamic History and Civilization: Studies and Texts. Leiden: Brill, 2004. Siddiqi, Amir Hasan. “Caliphate and Kingship in Mediæval Persia.” Islamic Culture 9–11 (1935–1937): 9:560–79, 10:97–126, 10:260–79, 10:390–408, 11:37–59. ———. Caliphate and Kingship in Medieval Persia. Vol. 14, Studies in Islamic History. Philadelphia: Porcupine Press, 1977. ———. Caliphate and Sultanate. 2nd ed. Karachi: Jamiyat ul-Falah Publication, 1963. ———. “Insignia of Sovereignty during the Caliphate.” Proceedings of the Pakistan History Conference 3 (1953): 67–75. Siddiqui, Iqtidar Husain. Authority and Kingship under the Sultans of Delhi (ThirteenthFourteenth Centuries). Delhi: Manohar, 2006. ———. “Fresh Light on Ḍiyā’ al-Dīn Baranī: The Doyen of Indo-Persian Historians.” Islamic Culture 63, nos. 1–2 (1989): 69–94. ———. “Intellectual Dimension of the Tabaqat Form of Persian Historiography, Produced in Pre-Mughal India.” In Islamic Heritage in South Asian Subcontinent, edited by Ahmad Nazir and Iqtidar Husain Siddiqui, 125–50. Jaipur: Publication Scheme, 1998. ———. “Kalpi in the 15th Century.” Islamic Culture 61, no. 3 (1987): 90–120. ———. “A Note on the Dargah of Salar Masʿud in Bahraich in Light of the Standard Historical Sources.” In Muslim Shrines in India: Their Character, History and Significance, edited by Christian W. Troll, 44–47. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2003. ———. “The Origin and Growth of Islamicate Historiography in India: Analysis of the Thirteenth Century Indo-Persian Historians’ Approach to the History of the Foundation of Muslim Rule in South Asian Sub-Continent.” Journal of Objective Studies 1, nos. 1–2 (1989): 65–88. ———. “The Sultan and the Hindus: A Re-appraisal of Hindu Muslim Relations in the Sultanate of Delhi during the 13th Century.” Journal of Objective Studies 6, no. 2 (1994): 39–49. Siddiqui, Mahmud Husain. The Memoirs of Sufis Written in India: Reference to Kashaf-ul-mahjub, Siyar-ul-Auliya, and Siyar-ul-Arifin. 1st ed. Baroda: Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda Press, 1979. Sijzī, Amīr Ḥasan. Favāʾid al-fuʾād. 1st ed. Lahore: Malik Sirāj al-Dīn 1966. ———. Nizam ad-din Awliya: Morals for the Heart. Translated by Bruce B. Lawrence. Edited by Bernard McGinn, Classics of Western Spirituality. New York: Paulist Press, 1992.

Auer-12.indd 217

6/10/12 1:27 PM

218

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

Simidchieva, Marta. “Kingship and Legitimacy in Niẓām al-Mulk’s Siyāsatnāma, Fifth/Eleventh Century.” In Writers and Rulers: Perspectives on their Relationship from Abbasid to Safavid Times, edited by Beatrice Gruendler and Louise Marlow, 97–131. Wiesbaden: Reichert, 2004. Sirhindī, Yaḥyā b. Aḥmad. The Tārīkh-i-Mubārakshāhī. Translated by K. K. Basu. Vol. 63, Gaekwad’s Oriental Series. Baroda: Oriental Institute, 1932. ———. Tārīkh-i Mubārak Shāhī. Edited by Hidayat Husain. Vol. 254, Bibliotheca Indica. Calcutta: Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1931. Spiegel, Gabrielle M. The Past as Text: The Theory and Practice of Medieval Historiography. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997. Srivastava, Ashirbadi Lal. The Sultanate of Delhi: Including the Arab Invasion of Sindh 711–1526 A.D. 1st ed. Agra: Shiva Lal Agarwala, 1950. Storey, C. A., and François de Blois. Persian Literature: A Bio-Biographical Survey. 5 vols. London: Luzac & Co., 1970. Stroumsa, Sarah. “The Signs of Prophecy: The Emergence and Early Development of a Theme in Arabic Theological Literature.” The Harvard Theological Review 78, nos. 1–2 (1985): 101–14. Ṭabarī, Abū Jaʿfar al-. The History of al-Ṭabarī (Taʾrīkh al-rusul wa ‘l-mulūk). Edited by Ehsan Yar-Shater. 40 vols, Bibliotheca Persica. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1986–2007. ———. Jāmiʿ al-bayān ʿan taʾwīl āy al-Qurʾān. 30 vols. 2nd ed. Egypt: Muṣṭafá al-Bābī al-Ḥalabī, 1954–1968. Talmon, Shemaryahu. “The ‘Desert Motif ’ in the Bible and in Qumran Literature.” In Biblical Motifs: Origins and Transformations, edited by Alexander Altmann, 31–63. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1966. Tambiah, Stanley Jeyaraja. Culture, Thought, and Social Action: An Anthropological Perspective. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1985. Taylor, Christopher Schurman. In the Vicinity of the Righteous: Ziyāra and the Veneration of Muslim Saints in Late Medieval Egypt. Edited by Ulrich Haarman and Wadad Kadi. Vol. 22, Islamic History and Civilization: Studies and Texts. Leiden: Brill, 1999. Tayob, Abdelkader. “Political Theory in Ṭabarī and his Contemporaries: Deliberations on the First Caliph in Islam.” Journal for Islamic Studies 18–19 (1998–99): 24–50. ———. “Tabari on the Companions of the Prophet: Moral and Political Contours in Islamic Historical Writing.” Journal of the American Oriental Society 119, no. 2 (1999): 203–10. Thaʿlabī, Aḥmad b. Muḥammad. ʿArāʾis al-majālis fī qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ, or, Lives of the Prophets. Translated by William M. Brinner. Edited by Suzanne Pinckney Stetkevych. Vol. 23, Studies in Arabic Literature. Leiden: Brill, 2002. Tirmidhī, Muḥammad b. ʿAlī Ḥakīm al-. The Concept of Sainthood in Early Islamic Mysticism: Two Works by Al-Ḥakīm Al-Tirmidhī. Translated by Bernd Radtke and John O’Kane. Edited by Ian Richard Netton, Curzon Sufi Series. Richmond, Surrey: Curzon Press, 1996.

Auer-12.indd 218

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Bibliography

219

———. Kitāb khatm al-Awliyāʾ. Edited by ʿUthmān Yaḥyá. Vol. 19, Buḥūth wa-dirāsāt. Beirut: al-Maṭbaʿah al-kāthūlīkiyah, 1965. Treadwell, Luke. “Shāhānshāh and al-Malik al-Muʾayyad: The Legitimization of Power in Sāmānid and Būyid Iran.” In Culture and Memory in Medieval Islam: Essays in Honour of Wilfred Madelung, edited by F. Daftary and J. W. Meri, 318–37. London: I.B. Tauris, 2003. Trimingham, J. Spencer. The Sufi Orders in Islam. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971. Tughluq, Fīrūz Shāh. The Futuhat-i Firuz Shahi. Translated by Azra Alavi. Edited by Azra Alavi. Delhi: Idarah-i Adabiyat-i Delli, 1996. ———. Futūḥāt-i Firūz Shāhī. Edited by Mir Hasan. Delhi: Rizvi Press, 1885. ———. Futūḥāt-i Fīrūz Shāhī. Edited by Abdur Rashid. Aligarh: Department of History Aligarh Muslim University, 1954. ———. “Futūḥāt-i Fīrūzshāhī.” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal 7, no. 1 (1941): 61–89. ———. “The Victories of Sulṭān Fīrūz Shāh of Tughluq Dynasty: English Translation of Futūḥāt-i Fīrūz Shāhī by N. B. Roy.” Islamic Culture 15, no. 1 (1941): 449–64. Vernon, Richard. “The Secular Political Culture: Three Views.” The Review of Politics 37, no. 4 (1975): 490–512. Wagoner, Phillip B. “‘Sultan Among Hindu Kings’: Dress, Titles, and the Islamicization of Hindu Culture at Vijayanagara.” Journal of Asian Studies 55, no. 4 (1996): 851–80. Wagoner, Phillip B., and John Henry Rice. “From Delhi to the Deccan: Newly Discovered Tughluq monuments at Warangal-Sult̤ānpūr and the Beginnings of Indo-Islamic Architecture in Southern India.” Artibus Asiae 61, no. 1 (2001): 77–117. Wansbrough, John E. The Sectarian Milieu: Content and Composition of Islamic Salvation History. Vol. 34, London Oriental Series. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978. Weber, Max. The Theory of Social and Economic Organization. Translated by A. M. Henderson and Talcott Parsons. Edited by Talcott Parsons. 1st American ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 1947. Welch, Anthony. “A Medieval Center of Learning in India: The Hauz Khas Madrasa in Delhi.” Muqarnas 13 (1996): 165–90. ———. “The Shrine of the Holy Footprint in Delhi.” Muqarnas 14 (1997): 166–78. Welch, Anthony, and Howard Crane. “The Tughluqs: Master Builders of the Delhi Sultanate.” Muqarnas 1 (1983): 123–66. Wensinck, A. J. “The Refused Dignity.” In ʿAjab-Nāma: A Volume of Oriental Studies Presented to Edward G. Browne, 491–99. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1922. Wheeler, Brannon M. Mecca and Eden: Ritual, Relics, and Territory in Islam. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006. ———. Moses in the Quran and Islamic Exegesis, RoutledgeCurzon Studies in the Quran. London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2002.

Auer-12.indd 219

6/10/12 1:27 PM

220

Symbols of Authority in Medieval Islam

White, Hayden. “The Fictions of Factual Representation.” In The Literature of Fact: Selected Papers from the English Institute, edited by Angus Fletcher, 21–44. New York: Columbia University Press, 1976. Wickens, G. M. “Nasir ad-din Tusi on the Fall of Baghdad: A Further Study.” Journal of Semitic Studies 7, no. 1 (1962): 23–35. Wilson, C. E. “The Wall of Alexander against Gog and Magog; and the Expedition Sent Out to Find It by the Khalif Wāthiq in 842 A.D.” Hirth Anniversary Volume (1923): 575–612. Wink, André. Al-Hind: The Making of the Indo-Islamic World. Vol. II, The Slave Kings and the Islamic Conquests 11th–13th Centuries. Leiden: Brill, 1997. Wright, H. Nelson. Catalogue of the Coins in the Indian Museum Calcutta: Including the Cabinet of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. Vol. 2. Oxford: Published for the Trustees of the Indian Museum at the Clarendon Press, 1907. Wurtzel, Carl. “The Umayyads in the History of Khalīfa b. Khayyāṭ.” PhD diss., Yale University, 1977. Yarshater, E. “The Theme of Wine-Drinking and the Concept of the Beloved in Early Persian Poetry.” Studia Islamica, no. 13 (1960): 43–53. Zadeh, Travis. Mapping Frontiers Across Medieval Islam: Geography, Translation, and the ʿAbbāsid Empire. London: I.B. Tauris, 2011. Zaman, Muhammad Qasim. “The Caliphs, the ʿUlamāʾ, and the Law: Defining the Role and Function of the Caliph in the Early ʿAbbāsid Period.” Islamic Law and Society 4, no. 1 (1997): 1–36. ———. “Maghāzī and the Muḥaddithūn: Reconsidering the Treatment of ‘Historical’ Materials in Early Collections of Hadith.” International Journal of Middle East Studies 28, no. 1 (1996): 1–18. ———. Religion and Politics under the Early ʿAbbāsids: The Emergence of the Proto‑Sunnī Elite. Edited by Ulrich Haarmann and Wadad Kadi. Vol. 16, Islamic History and Civilization: Studies and Texts. Leiden: Brill, 1997.

Auer-12.indd 220

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Index

Aaron, 33, 72 ʿAbbāsids (132–656/750–1258), 1–2, 3, 4, 7, 13, 52, 64, 65, 105, 107, 109–110, 111, 116, 120, 121, 124, 125, 126–127, 157 ʿAbd Allāh b. ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib (d. ca. 570 C.e.), 49 ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Ardabīlī, 110 ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Duri, 51 ʿAbd al-Malik (65–86/685–705), 75 ʿAbd al-Malik ʿIṣāmī (b. ca. 711/1310– 11), 15, 22 ʿAbd al-Qādir b. Mulūk Shāh Badāʾūnī (947–1024/1540–1615), 159 ʿAbd al-Raḥmān III (r. 300–50/912–61), 121 Abraham (Ibrāhīm), 6, 35–37, 39, 46 Abū Bakr (r. 11–13/632–34), 13, 86, 127, 128–129, 131. See also Rāshidūn Abū Ḥanīfah al-Dīnawarī (d. ca. 282/895), 39, 65 Abū ‘l-Fatḥ Abū Bakr al-Muʿtaḍid b. Abū Rabī Sulaymān (r. 753–63/1352–62), 114 Abū Nuʿaym al-Iṣfahānī (d. 430/1038), 78 Abū Saʿīd ʿAbd al-Mālik b. Qurayb

Auer-12.indd 221

al‑Aṣmaʿī (d. 213/828), 64 Abū Ṭālib, 132 Abū Yūsuf (d. 182/798), 65 Adam, xviii–xix, 11, 39, 40, 49, 54 ʿAfīf, Shams al-Dīn Sirāj (b. 757/1356), 21–22, 30, 32–34, 36, 38–39, 43–46, 55, 57–59, 60, 66–69, 69–74, 80, 84, 86, 90, 95, 96, 97–99, 99–102, 113–115, 139, 147, 151–152, 153–155, 158–159 ʿAhd Ardashīr, 15 ʿahd (promise), 88–89 ahl al-bayt (people of the house), 132. See also Muḥammad (Prophet): family of Ahmad, Aziz, 4, 93–94, 120 Aḥmad b. Ayāz, 152 Ajūdhan, 99 Akbar (r. 963–1014/1556–1605), 159 ʿAlāʾ al-Dīn Muḥammad Shāh (r. 695– 715/1296–1316), 21, 34, 84, 85–86, 90, 94, 103, 119–120, 142–144, 145 Alam, Muzaffar, 15, 139 Alexander, 123–124 ʿAlī (b. Abī Ṭālib), 86, 119, 121, 127, 131–133 ʿAlī b. ʿAsākir (499–571/1105–76), 40

6/10/12 1:27 PM

222

Mapping Frontiers across Medieval Islam

ʿAlī b. Būya (r. 320–38/932–49), 105 Āl-i Burhān, 87 allegiance (bayʿa), 111. See also bayʿa (oath of allegiance) alms (ṣadaqāt), 97 Alp Qutlugh Jābughā Ulugh, 15 amīr, 117, 129 Amīr Ḥasan Sijzī (655–737/1275–1336), 79, 120 Amīr Khusraw, xviii–xix, 22, 33, 79, 102–103, 120, 144 Amīr Khvurd (fl. 752–90/1351–82), 77–78, 79, 94 Amīr Tīmūr (r. 771–807/1370–1405), conquest of Delhi, 1, 19, 84, 101, 156–158 angel(s), 56, 187n104 Gabriel, 70 Hārūt and Mārūt, 57 anṣār, 81, 128 Anūshīrvān, 14, 130, 149, 194n103 apocalypse, 122–124 Apocrypha, 11 Arabia, 129 Ārām Shāh, 40 architecture, 74, 76, 78, 96–97, 148 Muʿizzī and Khaljī, 97 Ardashīr-i Bābakān (r. 226–241 C.e.), 138 Ascension (miʿrāj), 75 atabeg, 117 ʿAṭṭār, Farīd al-Dīn, 101, 102 authority, 76, 137 “clear authority” (sulṭān mubīn), 33 moral, of Sufi shaykhs, 93, 95 Muslim/Islamic, 104, 111, 119, 130, 135 political, 78 sultanic, 99, 107, 118, 155 symbols of, 113, 115, 158, 159, 178n100 awāʾil tradition, 130 awliyāʾ (friends of God), 12, 49, 52, 56,

Auer-12.indd 222

66, 80, 86 development of Sufism, 77–79 as protectors, 81, 84 qualities and traits of, 70, 98–99 Ayyūbid dynasty (r. 564–648/1169– 1250), 109 Bābā Farīd (Farīd al-Dīn Masʿūd, ca. 571–644/1175–1265), 84, 95, 99, 185n82 Bābā Ṭāhir, 87 Bābur, 158, 168n17 Badr, battle of, 131 Baghdad, 2, 3, 52, 105, 107, 108, 114, 115, 116, 118, 119, 120, 121, 122 Bahādur Shāh II (r. 1253–74/1837–58), 1, 178n100 Bahāʾ al-Dīn Rāzī, 124 Bahāʾ al-Dīn Zakariyāʾ (578–661/1182 or 83–1262), 78, 185n82 Baḥīrā, 54 Bahmanī sultan Muḥammad (r. 759–76/1358–75), 116 Bahraich, 97, 101 Bahrain, 129 Balādhurī, xvii Balʿamī, Abū ʿAlī (d. 363/974), 36, 38 Balban family, 94 Balkh, 83 banner (livāʾ), 110, 113, 119 barakah (blessing), 84, 96 Barmakids, 21 barrier (saddī), 123–124 Bāṭinī (ideology), 36 bayʿa (oath of allegiance), 111, 113, 116, 132 Bayhaqī, Abū ‘l-Faz̤l (385–470/995– 1077), 136 Bengal, 30, 89, 115, 157, 165n53, 184n57 Bible, 42 Hebrew, 11 biography(ies), 103 of caliphs (sīrat al-khulafāʾ), 104

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Index of the Prophet, 66 sacred, 80, 85, 87, 88, 93 sīrah, 61 of Sufi shaykhs, 79–80 “boldness” (shāhāmah), 27 Borges, Jorge Luis, xvii–xix Bosworth, C. E., 118, 119 bounty (faz̤l), 73 “bravery” (jalādah), 27 British colonial period, 1, 159 Buddha, 74 Bukhara, 42, 87, 183n48 al-Bukhārī, Imām Muḥammad b. Ismāʾīl (194–256/810–70), 64, 190n42 Bulliet, Richard, 17 Burhān al-Dīn b. al-Barqaḥ, 110 Būyids, 3, 16, 52, 105, 107, 136 Byzantium, 129 Caesar (Qayṣar; qayāṣira), 129–130 Cairo, 2, 52, 74, 76, 111 calamities (balāʾ), 32 caliphate, 2, 13, 14, 15, 53, 104, 117, 121 decentralization of, 105 of prophethood (khilāfat-i nubuvvah), 133 caliph(s), 12, 106, 110, 157 authority of, 104–105, 108, 115, 120 banner (livāʾ), 110, 113, 119 declaring oneself, 53 investiture (manshūr), 52, 75, 106, 107–108, 110, 111, 113–116, 119, 188n11 khalīfah (pl. khulafāʾ), 64, 66, 94, 130 mandate (ʿahd), 119 office/figure of, 121, 133 rightly-guided (rāshidūn), 6, 86, 127, 133 robe (jāma-yi khilāfat), 52 robe (khilʿat), 107, 110, 113–115 sultans and, 106, 108, 110, 113, 116, 118 Caucasus region, 124

Auer-12.indd 223

223

Cemal Kafadar, 29 Chaghatay Khānate, 84 chapters (s. ṭabaqah), 19, 40, 49, 127, 192n78 Chingiz Khān, 122, 124–125 Chishtī, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān (d. 1094/1683), 98, 101 Chishtī, Muʿīn al-Dīn (536–633/1141– 1236), 13, 77, 93–94 Chishtī shaykhs, 93–94, 182 Chishtiyyah, 13, 77–78, 179n2, 180n9 Christ, 74 clemency (ḥilm), 73, 91, 131, 151 coinage, 55, 76, 108, 110, 111, 117, 120, 127, 139, 190n25, 193n90 commander (amīr), 129 commander of the faithful (amīr almuʾminīn), 118, 130. See also titles communalism, 160 Companions (ṣaḥābah), 67, 122, 129, 130, 131, 132 compassion (shafaqat), 72, 99–100, 140 courage (shajāʿat), 131 court counselor (nadīm), 20 Crane, Howard, 97 Crone, Patricia, 2 dalāʾil (literature), 74 Darling, Linda, 29 Dātā Ganj Bakhsh. See Hujvīrī, ʿAlī b. ʿUs̱mān (d. ca. 465/1072) Dawlatābād, 148 Day of Judgment (yawm al-qiyāmah), 81–82 Deccan, 157 delegations, 116 Delhi, 95, 101, 106 as capital, 75, 158 center, 2, 157 city of Islam (madīnat al-Islām), 120 place in broader Muslim world, 18 sacking of, 84, 90, 156–157 Delhi Sultanate

6/10/12 1:27 PM

224

Mapping Frontiers across Medieval Islam

ʿAbbāsid caliphate, ties to, 13–14, 107, 111, 116, 126–127 demise of, 21 establishment of, 1–2, 13, 24, 27, 126 form of governance, 155 implementation of sharīʿāh, 14, 137–138. legal system in, 141 legitimacy, 2–4, 40, 133 link to Prophet, 133–134 salvific function of, 125–126 Sufism in, 78–80 Dhū ‘l-Nūn Miṣrī (180–246/796–861), 102 Dhū ‘l-Qarnayn (“two-horned”), 123 di Giovanni, Norman Thomas, xviii disciple (s. murīd, pl. murīdān), 88, 93 dissenters (s. rāfiz̤, pl. ravāfiz̤), 36–37, 120 divine inspiration. See ilhām (divine inspiration) intervention, 33 retribution, 95 right to rule, 34, 101, 114, 117, 136 role in lives of rulers, 55 union/humans and, 43, 88 Dome of the Rock, 74–75 Donner, Fred, 9, 34 Dowson, John (1820–81), 7 dream interpretation/oneiromancy, 45–46, 97–98, 101 Egypt, 44, 52, 109, 110, 113, 121, 129, 137, 182n29 Elliot, Henry (1808–53), 7, 160 emissaries, 116 Ernst, Carl, 7, 9, 79, 108 eschatology, traditions of, 123, 125 “the Hour” (al-sāʿat), 122 ethnicity, 14 execution, 95, 101, 122, 151, 152, 154, 155. See also siyāsah

Auer-12.indd 224

exegesis (tafsīr), 38, 61, 63, 64 motifs, 42 tradition, 11, 35, 82 exemplary figures, 12, 43, 47–48, 50, 54 Muḥammad, 48, 60 Fakhr-i Mudabbir (ca. 552–633/1157– 1236), 15, 22, 24, 39, 55, 137–138, 139 faqr (voluntary poverty), 57, 86, 93 Farīd al-Dīn Masʿūd. See Bābā Farīd Fatāvá-yi Jahāndārī [Edicts of world rule], 15, 21, 57, 138–139, 142, 148 “father of humanity” (abū ‘l-bashar), 11, 39 Fatḥ Khān, 75 Fāṭimah (daughter of Muḥammad), 121 Fāṭimids (r. 297–567/909–1171), 121 favor/gaze (naẓar), 88, 93 fighting and combat (muqātalah va muḥārabah), 100 fiqh (literature), 63, 142, 148 Firdawsī (ca. 329–411/940–1020), 14–15, 39 Fīrūzābād, 37 Fīrūz Shāh Tughluq (r. 752–90/1351–88), 4, 20, 21–22, 53, 57, 75–76, 77, 152, 153, 156–157 activities on example of the Prophet, 67–71, 74, 102 caliphal investiture of, 52, 108, 113–115, 117 clemency of, 44, 150–151 end-of-life activities, 101–102 Joseph and, 44–46 military campaigns, 30–33, 66–67 Moses and, 33, 72 piety of, 34 sharīʿah and, 145–148 Sufi shaykhs and, 84, 86, 90–91, 95, 97–98, 99–101, 102–103 Sunnī-Shīʿah polemics, 37 titles of, 52

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Index

225

Fleischer, Cornell, 18 Flood, Finbarr, 78 footprint (of Muḥammad), 74–76, 178n100 mawṭī, 75 forgiveness, 141 ʿafv, 72, 100, 151, 198n64 Friday prayers, 110, 114, 138 Futūḥ al-salāṭīn, 15 Futūḥāt-i Fīrūz Shāhī, 37, 75, 146

Sufi encounters with, 88 Gog and Magog (Yājūj wa Mājūj), 123–124 governance, 3, 51, 136 form/system of, 49, 137, 145, 155 Mughal, 15 religion and, 60, 86 governor (wālī), 129 Graham, William, 61 Gujarat, 32, 157

Gabriel (angel), 70 Gardīzī, ʿAbd al-Ḥayy, 39 Gay, Peter, 9 genealogy, 14, 127 literary, 63–64 of Muslim authority, 39, 117, 121, 158 to Prophet, 76, 132 generosity, in bestowing gifts (īs̱ār va iftikhār), 100 ghazā, 29, 168n17 al-Ghazālī (450–505/1058–1111), 15, 55, 154 ghāzī (warrior), 26, 29, 168n14 Ghazna, 25, 83 Ghaznavids, 16, 60, 83, 118, 136 Ghiyās̱ al-Dīn Balban (r. 664–85/1266– 87), 20, 53, 118, 130, 143, 150 Ghiyās al-Dīn Muḥammad of Ghūr (r. 558–99/1163–1203), 116 Ghiyās̱ al-Dīn Tughluq Shāh (r. 720–24/1320–24), 21, 90, 126 Ghiyās̱ al-Dīn ʿIvaz̤ (r. 610–24/1213–27), 89, 115 Ghiyās̱pūr, 91 Ghūrids, 1, 19, 20, 25, 78, 96, 118, 119, 132, 158 Gibb, H. A. R., 10 God caliph of (khalīfat Allāh), 4 shadow of, on earth (ẓill Allāh fī ‘l-ʿarḍ), 4 speech from, 82

Habib, Mohammad, 3 ḥadd punishments, 138 ḥadd sharʿī, 149 ḥadīth, 15, 50, 56, 58, 60, 63, 66, 69, 70, 99, 102, 111, 116 on attributes/traits of rulers, 71–73 on caliphate and kings, 133, 138–140 expert (muḥaddith), 110 ḥadīth scholars (aʾimma-yi ḥadīs̱), 64–65 “imāms of ḥadīth” (aʾimma-yi ḥadīs̱), 63 on Muslims attacking other Muslims, 148 speech for friends of God, from God, 82–83 sultans/sultanic acts and, 61–64, 154–155 use in historiography, 6–7, 13 hagiography, 79 Hakim, xvii–xviii al-Ḥākim II (r. 741–53/1341–52), 110 Hamadānī, ʿAlī (714–86/1314–85), 15 Ḥamza b. ʿAbd al-Muṭṭalib, 131 Ḥanafī (school), 17, 65 Hanne, Eric, 105 Hānsī, 84 Hardy, Peter, 8, 9, 20, 22 Hārūn al-Rashīd (r. 170–93/786–809), 64, 65, 73, 118, 119 Hārūt (angel), 57. See also angel(s) al-Ḥasan b. Muḥammad al-Ṣaghānī (577–650/1181–1252), 116

Auer-12.indd 225

6/10/12 1:27 PM

226

Mapping Frontiers across Medieval Islam

Ḥasan Niẓāmī (fl. 602/1206), 24, 27, 29, 61, 138, 157 Hasan, Perween, 74 Ḥasan (son of ʿAlī), 132 heroic tales, 26, 123, 124 hierarchy, 111 Hijaz, 129 hijra (emigration), 81 ḥikāyat, 149 Himalayan Mountains, 115 Hinds, Martin, 2 Hindu(s), 8, 12, 16, 29, 76, 160 Hippocrates (Buqrāt), 71 Ḥiṣār Fīrūzah, 84 historians courts and, 16–18 muvarrikhān, 65 role of, 16, 136–137, 160 Historia universal de la infamia, xvii historiography, xix, 5, 10, 16, 34–35 in Delhi Sultanate/history of, 62, 64, 79, 104, 130, 134, 138 didactic mode/style of, 55, 63–64, 95 historical–critical method, 9 and investiture narrative, 117 Islamic/Muslim, 7–8, 10, 27, 164n36 nationalist, 8, 160 patronage and, 49 Persian, 6–7, 11, 95 premodern, 6, 10 role in caliphal legitimacy, 121, 127 siyāsah-oriented, 137 source-based approach, 7 Sufi shaykhs and, 85, 86, 94 symbols of authority and, 159 themes in, 60, 147–148, 150 history as fulfillment of God’s will, 10 ḥadīth and, 63–64, 176n55 literary, 66 mythologizing of, 75 sacred, xix, 40, 50–51 social, 17–18

Auer-12.indd 226

tārīkh/taʾrīkh, 11, 61, 63 universal, 11–12, 19, 38–39, 49, 65, 127, 157 writing/structure of, xviii–xix, 49 Hodgson, Marshall, 14, 136 Holt, P. M., 4, 110, 113 hospitals, 70–71 Hujvīrī, ʿAlī b. ʿUs̱mān (d. ca. 465/1072), 83, 85, 86 Hūlāgū (ca. 613–63/1217–65), 1, 122 humility (tavāz̤u ʿ), 91 Humphreys, Stephen, 27 Hurvitz, Nimrod, 103 Ḥusayn (son of ʿAlī), 132 Ibn Abī Ṭāḥir Ṭayfūr, xvii Ibn al-ʿArabī (560–638/1165–1240), 82 Ibn al-Athīr (555–630/1160–1233), 38 Ibn Baṭṭūṭa (703–70/1304–69), 30, 96, 110–111 Ibn Isḥāq (85–150/704–67), 54, 64, 68, 75, 127 Ibn Khaldūn (723–808/1332–1406), 34 Ibn al-Muqaffaʿ (ca. 102–39/720–56), 14, 15 Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyyah (691– 751/1292–1350), 137 Ibn Saʿd (b. ca. 168–230/784–845), 66 Ibn Taymiyyah, 110–111, 137 Ibrāhīm b. Sikandar II (r. 923–32/1517– 26), 158 ʿĪd prayers, 110, 114 ilhām (divine inspiration), 32, 79, 86 Iltutmish, Shams al-Dīn (r. 607– 33/1210–36), 15, 19, 24, 30, 53, 118, 125, 132 birth story, 54 caliphal investiture and, 108, 114–117, 188n11 flood of Noah and, 25–29 story of Joseph and, 40–42 Sufi shaykhs and, 87–89 imagery, 104

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Index Qurʾānic, of apocalypse, 123 of sultan, 80, 131, 145 of Sunnī rulers, 116 imām, 26, 106, 120 Imām Muḥammad al-Bāqir (d. 113/732), 82 impartiality, 148–151, 155 imperial apparatus, 68, 117 government (jahānbānī), 56 pilgrimages, 97, 98 power/authority, 55, 130, 143 project, 16, 18, 20, 77, 159 punishments (siyāsāt-i mulkī), 140 India, 126 Hindustan, 25, 125, 146, 158 Islam in, 129 as Paradise, xviii–xix infidelity (kufr), 122, 129, 132 infidels (kuffār), 26, 120 initiation (ritual), 90, 101 innovations (bidʿat-hā), 132, 146 intelligence and insight (hūshiyārī va bīdārī), 100 intercessor (shafīʿ), 81, 96 investiture (manshūr), 13, 114 Iraq, 128, 129, 133 Iskandarnāmah, 15 Islam events of, 35 ideals of rule, 9 precedence (sābiqah), in accepting Islam, 127 sacred history of, xix Islamicate, definition, 14 Islam, Zafarul, 142, 148 isnād (transmission), 61–62, 154 Jackson, Peter, 27, 53 Jacob (Yaʿqūb), 39 jāhiliyyah (“age of ignorance”), 51 al-Jāḥiẓ (ca. 160–255/776–868), 54 Jalāl al-Dīn Fīrūz Shāh (r. 689–95/1290–

Auer-12.indd 227

227

96), 94, 108 Jamāl al-Dīn al-Mizzī (654–742/1256– 1341), 111 Jamshīd, 14, 130 Jerusalem (Bayt al-Maqdis), 39, 44, 74, 76 Jews, 36 exodus of, 30, 32 Jhelum River, 25–26, 29 jihād, 29, 122 Johansen, Baber, 141 Joseph (Yūsuf), 37–39, 40–46 judge (qāz̤ī, pl. quz̤āt, qāz̤iyān), 26, 30, 131, 137, 143 chief (qāz̤ī al-quz̤āt), 19 judiciary/courts, 137, 147, 152, 153–154, 155 justice, 69 impartiality of sultan, 148–151, 155 justice and beneficence (ʿadl va iḥsān), 145 justice and grace (ʿadl va faz̤l), 100 prophetic example of, 154 punishment and, 153–154 ʿadl, 43–44, 73, 130, 135, 140 al-Juwaynī (419–78/1028–85), 4, 106 Jūzjānī, Minhāj Sirāj (b. 589/1193), 6, 48–49, 53, 54, 62, 66, 75, 80, 96, 130, 131, 157, 158, 159 caliphal investiture narratives and, 107–108, 114–117, 118–120 conquest motif and, 26–30 images of shaykhs and sultans and, 87–90, 99 Joseph story and, 38–42 Mongol conquests and, 122–126 prophetic imagery and, 48–50 Rāshidūn and, 127 Seal of the Prophets and, 51 universal history, 19 Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn Baranī and, 20

6/10/12 1:27 PM

228

Mapping Frontiers across Medieval Islam

kalām literature, 34, 54 as speech from God, to prophets, 82–83 al-Kāmil fī al-taʾrīkh [The complete history], 38 karāmāt. See marvels Karrāmī (school), 17 Karrāmiyyah (ideology), 36 Kashf al-maḥjūb, 83 Kay Kāʾūs, 15 khabar, 61. See also ḥadīth Khalidi, Tarif, 9 Khalīfa b. Khayyāṭ al-ʿUṣfurī (d. 240/854), 66 khalīfah, 120. See also caliph(s) khān, 101, 117 khāngāh (Sufi hospice), 84 Khān-i Jahān, 68, 148, 153–154 Khārijī, 133 Kharijites, 37 khātam. See seal (khātam, khatam, khatm) Khatm al-walāyah [The sealing of the friendship with God], 82 Khiljī dynasty, 94, 108 Khiz̤r, 82 Khiz̤r Khān (r. 817–23/1414–21), 53, 158 Khokar tribes, 25, 26 Khosroes (akāsira), 130 Khurasan, 36, 82, 83, 129, 131 khusraw, 117. See also titles Khusraw (Kasrā), 129 Khusraw Khān, 4 khuṭbah, 108, 114 Khvadāy-nāmag (“Book of kings”), 14 Khvājah Aḥmad, 153–154 Khwārazm, 25 kingdom(s) “kingdom of the afterlife” (mamlakat-i ākhirat), 58 “kingdom of the regions of India”

Auer-12.indd 228

(mamlakat-i aqālim-i Hind), 115 “kingdom of the world” (mamlakat-i dunyāvī), 57 “two kingdoms” (dū mamlakat), 59–60 King Pratāparudra (r. 1289–1323 C.e.), 85 king(s) bādshāh (kingship), 84, 111, 130, 140, 143, 189n13 duties of, and sharīʿah, 138 “kings of Islam” (bādshāhān-i Islām), 12 mulūk, 66 kingship attributes of, 151 jamshīdī, 87, 130 mulk, 134 Persian, 52 “prediction of kingship” (bishārat-i mulk va salṭanat), 90–91 pre-Islamic Persian, 7, 14, 29, 117, 130, 135–136, 142 stages of, 100 al-Kisāʾī, 35 Kitāb ḥujaj al-nubuwwah [The proofs of prophethood], 54 Kitāb al-ṭabaqāt al-kabīr [Great book of classes], 66 knowledge (ʿilm), 34, 131 “of history” (ʿilm-i tārīkh), 35, 37, 38, 63, 65 of Islam (ʿilm-i Islām), 57, 86, 129 Kollam, 115 Kūfa, 133 Kugel, James, 42 Kumar, Sunil, 9, 40, 87, 143–144 Künh ül-ahbar [Essence of history], 18 Lahore, 83, 126 Lakhnawtī, 90 Lambton, Ann, 136 Lapidus, Ira, 3 law (fiqh), 63 leadership (imāmah), 4, 105–106

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Index legitimacy/legitimation of, 15, 34, 74, 106, 111, 119 from caliphs, 107, 132 of Delhi Sultanate/sultans, 2, 4, 11, 14, 52–53, 53, 59, 76, 104, 110, 115, 134, 135, 142, 149 function of ḥadīth, 48, 62, 65, 155 Islamic, 15–16, 38, 135 of kingship, 56, 140 of political authority, 60, 155 religious, 13, 40, 42 through Sufis/dervishes, 87, 88, 90, 98 Sunnī, 14, 108, 117 “theocratic legitimization”, 34 light (nūr), 54 Lindsay, James, 40 literary culture/imagery of Sufi shaykhs, 78, 99 strategy, 146 styles, of historical writing, 22 works of praise, 56 literature advice, 2, 15, 21, 24, 34, 44, 55, 104, 139 awāʾil tradition, 130 “books of pilgrimage” (kutūb alziyārah), 96 fiqh, 148 Islamicate, 38 lyric poems (qaṣīdah, pl. qaṣāʾid), 110 Pahlavī, 15 Sufi/mystical, 79, 88, 99–100, 101 taz̤kirah, 93–94 on tomb visitation, 96 veneration of the Prophet, shamāʾil and dalāʾil, 74 Lodī dynasty (r. 855–932/1451–1526), 158 loyalty, 113 madrasah, 74, 75 maghāzī (texts), 6, 64, 66 Magi, cult of, 129

Auer-12.indd 229

229

Maḥmūd of Ghazna (r. 388–421/998– 1030), 83, 118, 148 majesty and awe (ʿaẓmat va rʿub), 100 malfūẓāt/majālis (textual traditions), 79, 93, 94 malik, 117–118 Malik Ḥusām al-Dīn, 89–90. See also Ghiyās̱ al-Dīn ʿIvaz̤ (r. 610– 24/1213–27) Malik Sayyid al-Ḥujjāb Maʿrūf, 93 Mamlūks, 2, 4, 52, 109–110, 113, 137 mamlūk sultans, 53 al-Maʾmūn (r. 189–218/813–33), 2, 64 manāqib (literature), 22, 24, 127 manshūr (investiture), 13, 107. See also caliph(s): investiture Manṣūr b. Nūḥ (r. 350–65/961–76), 36, 38 maqāmāt (stages), 99–100, 177n88 al-Maqdisī, al-Muṭahhar b. Ṭāhir (fl. 355/966), 65 Marlow, Louise, 139 Mārūt (angel), 57 marvels (karāmāt), 79, 85–88, 102, 182nn34–35 Masʿūd Ghāzī in Bahraich, 101 material (sphere), 57–58 mausoleum complexes, 96. See also architecture; tombs al-Māwardī (364–450/974–1058), 4, 105–106, 135–136 Maʿbar, 115, 116 Mecca, 76, 81, 101, 102 Medina, 67, 68, 81, 130, 133 meditative seclusion (khalvat), 102 Meisami, Julie, 9 messenger of God (rasūl Allāh), 51 miḥna (“inquisition”), 2 miracles (muʿjizāt), 49, 57, 85, 129, 182n34 Mongol(s), 1, 18, 19, 29, 84, 100, 101, 108, 122, 124, 125, 126, 152 “eruption of the infidels” (khurūj al-

6/10/12 1:27 PM

230

Mapping Frontiers across Medieval Islam

kuffār), 122 immigrants to India, 144 Moses, 6, 30, 32–33, 39, 46, 72 Khiz̤r and, 82 mosques, 69, 74, 75 motifs, 6, 10, 12, 14, 26, 30, 54, 86 of caliphs, 104 of justice, 130, 135 Qurʾānic, 27, 29 Mottahedeh, Roy, 136 Muʿāwiyah (r. ca. 41–60/661–80), 132–133 Mubārak Shāh (r. 824–37/1421–34), 158 Mughals, 15, 29, 75, 158 historiographical tradition, 91 muhājirīn (emigrants), 128 Muḥammad Bihāmad Khānī (fl. 842/1438), 20, 156, 157 Muḥammad b. Tughluq (r. 724– 52/1324–51), 4, 20, 30, 57, 77, 84, 100, 139, 151, 152 caliphal investiture and, 108, 110–111, 114, 116 coins of, 55, 139 sharīʿah and, 142, 145–146 Sufi shaykhs and, 90–91, 97 Muḥammad b. ʿUmar b. Wāqid (130– 207/747 or 48–822), 64, 65, 127 Muḥammad Khwārazm Shāh (r. 596–617/1200–20), 124–125 Muḥammad (Prophet), 39, 130, 141, 146, 148, 157. See also seal (khātam, khatam, khatm) angel Gabriel and, 70 caliphate and, 113, 117, 120, 128–129, 131, 132, 133 description/veneration of, 74 events from biography of, 68 family of (ahl al-bayt), 53, 86, 127 in historiography, 20, 21, 35, 49, 65, 157 imagery of, and sultans, 60, 66, 102 knowledge of sayings of (ʿilm-i ḥadīs̱),

Auer-12.indd 230

63 as model for rulers, 10–13, 14, 46, 47–48, 56, 57, 60, 62, 67, 70, 74, 102, 145 qualities of, 49, 59 relics of, 74–75 revelation of, 52 sayings of, 45, 56, 61, 63, 64, 66, 69, 122, 154 signs of prophethood, 53–54 Sufism and, 86, 101 Muḥammad Qāsim Hindū Shāh Astarābādī (ca. 980–1033/1572–1623 or 1624), 159 Muḥyī al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Sulaymān al-Kāfiyajī (788–879/1386–1474), 34 Muʿizz al-Dawla, 3 Muʿizz al-Dīn Aḥmad Sanjar, 154 Muʿizz al-Dīn Muḥammad b. Sām (r. 569–602/1173–1206), 1, 24, 25, 27, 114, 122–124, 157, 158 Muʿizziyyah (lineage), 40 murshid (guide), 88. See also Sufi shaykhs Muslim community (ummah), 105 Muṣṭafá ʿĀlī (948–1008/1541–1600), 18 al-Mustakfī (r. 333–34/944–46), 105 al-Mustakfī (r. 701–40/1302–40), 111 al-Mustanṣir (r. 623–40/1226–42), 108, 113, 116 al-Mustaʿṣim (r. 640–56/1242–58), 2, 108, 122 al-Mustaz̤ī (r. 566–75/1170–80), 116 al-Muʿtaḍid (r. 753–63/1352–62), 52 al-Mutawakkil, Abū ʿAbd Allāh (r. 763–79/1362–77), 115 al-Muṭīʿ (r. 334–63/946–74), 105, 118 myth/mythical elements, 6, 9, 11, 37, 75, 119, 123–124 Narmada River, 103 narratives, 26, 48, 87, 129 of Bābā Farīd and Sīdī Muwallih, 95

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Index caliphal, 104, 108, 117, 128–129, 134 of heroes and prophets, 54 historical, 7, 16, 107, 122, 139, 142 legitimating role of, 89, 155 of Muḥammad, and sultans, 62, 66 “narrative expansions”, 42, 44 pre-Islamic, 6–7, 11–12, 14–15, 19, 29, 38–40, 49, 52 of punishment, 150 religious/Qurʾānic, 6, 10, 12, 19, 27, 39, 41, 43 structure of, 38, 48, 60 on Sufis/mystical, 88, 90, 93, 95, 97 on sultans, 80, 102 Naṣīr al-Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i Dihlī (d. 757/1356), 91 Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Damghān Shāh (r. 745–57/1344–56), 116 Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh (ruler of Kalpi), 158 Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh II (r. 796–801/1394–98), 156 Nāṣir al-Dīn Maḥmūd Shāh (r. 644–64/1246–66), 19, 48–49, 75, 99, 108, 115, 118, 119 Nāṣir al-Dīn Tūsī (597–672/1201–74), 15, 122 Naṣir b. Yaʿqūb al-Dīnawarī (fl. 397/1006), 98 al-Nāṣir li-Dīn Allāh (r. 575–622/1180– 1225), 116–117 naẓar (favor, gaze), 27, 88–89, 93 Night Journey (isrāʾ), 59, 75 Nimrod (Nimrūd), 35, 144 Nishapur, 17–18, 106 Niẓām al-Dīn Awliyāʾ (ca. 640 or 41–725/1243 or 44–1325), 79, 84, 85–86, 91, 93–94, 98–99, 103 Niẓām al-Mulk (408–85/1018–92), 15, 44, 136 Niẓāmī (b. ca. 535/1141), 15 Nizami, K. A., 3, 9, 89, 110, 120 Niẓāmiyyah madrasah, 106

Auer-12.indd 231

231

Noah (Nūḥ), 6, 27, 39, 46, 103 Noth, Albrecht, 127 Nūḥ b. Naṣr (r. 331–43/943–54), 118 Nuh sipihr [The nine spheres], xviii oath of allegiance (bayʿa), 111, 113, 116, 132 Ögedei, 126 oneiromancy, 98 orthodoxy, 2, 12, 48, 78 orthopraxy, 48 Oxus River, 25 Pahlavī (literature), 14–15 Pānīpat, Battle of, 158 Paradise, 45 jannah, xviii–xix, 69 parts (s. qism), 22 patriciate, 17–18 patronage, 38, 49, 74, 75, 97, 158 of court, 16, 159 of institutions of law, 148 pilgrimage routes and, 96 of Sufi hospices, 84 patrons, of mausolea, 96–97 Peacock, A. C. S., 38 Persian (language), 159–160 Pharaoh, 144 piety, 103 of Sufi shaykhs, 79, 94, 96, 97 of sultans, 34, 46, 57, 98, 114 pilgrimage, 76, 78, 96, 97, 99, 101, 103 “books of pilgrimage” (kutūb alziyārah), 96 to Mecca, 101 ziyārat, 96, 98 polemics (sectarian), 36–37 political power, and religious authority, 2–3, 5, 8, 48, 57, 133, 137, 155 polytheism (shirk), 129, 132 poverty, 57, 94 power dawlat va salṭanat, 88

6/10/12 1:27 PM

232

Mapping Frontiers across Medieval Islam

Qarā Khiṭāi, 25 religiously sanctioned, 12, 77 qāz̤ī (judge), 26, 30, 143 struggle between caliph and sultan, judgment of, 147 117 qiṣaṣ al-anbiyāʾ (stories of the prophets), sulṭah, 4 35, 39–40, 57 of sultan, from dervishes, 90 qualities (ṣifāt), 49 Pratt, Mary Louise, 9 Qurʾān, 15, 26, 37, 47, 51, 82, 84, 132, predestination, 124–125 141 proofs (s. ḥujjah), xviii allegorical verses (mutashābih), 60 prophethood, 53, 86 themes from, 6 nubuwwah, 82 time/history, and, 10, 43 prophets use in historiography, 7, 11, 27, 29, 35, anbiyāʾ, 63, 64 38, 43, 68, 128, 164n36 associated with kings, 34 ʿUthmān and, 131 intercession of, 57 verses established in meaning miracles (muʿjizāt) of, 85 (muḥkam), 60 pre-Islamic, 6, 11, 12, 19, 40, 49 Qureshi, Ishtiaq Husain, 108, 119 qualities of, 49 al-Qushayrī, Abū ‘l-Qāsim (376– revelation (waḥy) of, 86 465/986–1072), 100 “stories and records of the prophets and Quṭb al-Dīn Aybeg (r. 602–07/1206–10), kings” (qiṣaṣ va akhbār-i anbiyāʾ va 22, 24, 25, 27, 40–41, 53, 61 mulūk), 62 Quṭb al-Dīn Mubārak Shāh (r. 716– stories/tales of the prophets (qiṣaṣ 20/1316–20), 13, 53, 120 al-anbiyāʾ), 11–12, 38 Quṭb al-Dīn Munavvar, 91, 95, 100 tales of, 6, 36 protection Rabbat, Nasser, 75 of God, 81 “rain of mercy” (bārān-i raḥmah), 33 walāyah, 79, 101 ranks (darajāt), 86 protector (vālī), 91 Rann of Kutch, 102 punishment, 146. See also execution kūnchī ran, 32–33 capital, 145, 149, 151, 153 Rappaport, Roy, 113 death penalty, 146–147, 153–154 imperial punishments (siyāsāt-i mulkī), Rāshidūn, 6, 127–128, 131, 133 “four friends of the Chosen One” 140 (chahār yār-i Muṣṭafá), 128 intra-communal, 148, 149 “virtues of the four friends of the “punishment of public shaming” Chosen One” (manāqib-i chahār (tadāruk-i maʿnavī), 67 yār-i Muṣṭafá), 127 siyāsah, 14 ravāfiz̤, 37, 120, 146 of Sultan, 67 Rāvandī, Muḥammad b. ʿAlī threat of, afterlife, 45 (fl. 599/1202), 53, 87 Punjab, 83, 84, 96, 156 Raverty, Henry (1825–1906), 6–7, 54 relics, 74, 76 qadam sharīf (“noble footprint”), 75, 76 religion al-Qāḍī al-Nuʿmān (d. 363/974), 121

Auer-12.indd 232

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Index and kingship, 145 Islam as primordial, 11 “religion and governance” (dīn va dawlat), 60 “religion and justice are twins” (al-dīn wa ‘l-ʿadl tawʾamān), 139 “religion and kingship/rule are twins”, 138 “religion and the world” (dīn va duniyā), 60 religious authority, and political power, 2–3, 5, 8, 48, 57, 133, 155 institutions, 3 modes of expression, 6 violence, 8 Renard, John, 26, 54, 88 renunciation (darvīshī), 79, 87, 130 resurrection (qiyāmat), 123, 154 revelation, 59–60, 74 to Moses, 72 waḥy, 83, 86, 183 rhetoric, 48, 130, 138, 146 of Islamic empire, 5 riddah (“turning away,” apostasy), 128 “rightly-guided” caliphs (rāshidūn). See caliph(s): rightly-guided rijāl as a term, 66 literature, 66 ritual (public), 111, 113 Robinson, Chase, 9, 10, 62 Rosenthal, Franz, 7, 34 Rubin, Uri, 11, 48 rulers, 87 ideal, 59, 99–100, 100, 114 judgment and, 44, 149 qualities of, 71–73, 119 sharīʿah-minded, 145 rule(s) concepts of, 117 ḥukm, of God and the Prophet, 141 “rulings of sharīʿah” (aḥkām-i sharīʿah),

Auer-12.indd 233

233

12, 56 z̤avābiṭ, 135, 145 Sadīd al-Dīn Muḥammad ʿAwfī (fl. 625/1228), 114 ṣadr-i jahān, 19 Safi, Omid, 87, 116 saints/sainthood as awliyāʾ, 80–81 as walāyah, 80–81. See also walāyah Saljūqs, 15, 16, 53, 83, 105, 106–107, 116, 117, 154 Sāmānids, 16, 38, 65, 118 Samarqand, 156 Sammā Dynasty (r. 752–926/1351– 1520), 30, 32, 66, 98 Sasanid historiography, 10 rulers, 138, 149 Satan, 83 sayyid, 53. See also titles Sayyid Sipah Sālār Masʿūd Ghāzī of Bahraich, 97–98, 101 Sayyid sultans/dynasty (r. 817–55/1414– 51), 53, 158 Schimmel, Annemarie, 89 scourge (dirra), 131, 150, 194 seal (khātam, khatam, khatm) “of friendship with God” (khātam al-walāyah), 82 physical, 53–54 “of prophethood” (khātam alnubuwwah), 81, 82 of the prophets (khātam al-nabiyyīn), 50–53, 82 “of the prophets” on coins, 55 “of protection” (khātam al-walāyah), 81 “seal of kingship” (khatam-i bādshāhī), 53, 90 “seal of the sultans” (khatm-i salāṭīn), 51–53 secular (governance), 3, 155 Shāfiʿī (school), 17

6/10/12 1:27 PM

234

Mapping Frontiers across Medieval Islam

shāhānshāh, 52, 117 Shāh ʿIzz al-Dawlah, 73 Shāhnāmah, 14–15, 39 Shāhnāmah-yi Hind, 15 Shāh Rukh (r. 811–50/1409–47), 158 Shajarah-yi ansāb, 22, 39, 139 shamāʾil (literature), 74 Shams al-Dīn Dhahabī (673–748/1274– 1347 or 48), 111 Shams al-Dīn Ilyās Shāh (r. 743– 59/1342–58), 30 Shamsiyyah (sultans), 40, 42 Shansabāniyyah, 118 Sharaf al-Dīn Pānīpatī (Bū ʿAlī Qalandar; d. 724/1324), 90 sharīʿah, 3, 4, 95, 98, 102, 130, 140, 143, 146, 150 as basis for Islamic credentials, 14, 15, 61 authority/legitimacy and, 135–137, 144 punishment and, 153 rulings of sharīʿah (aḥkām-i sharīʿah), 129 sharīʿah-minded ruler, 145 siyāsah and, 137, 139, 141, 148, 155 under ʿulamāʾ, 148 al-Shaybānī, Muḥammad b. al-Ḥasan (d. 189/805), 65 shaykhs, 72 “of the people of certainty” (mashāʾikh-i ahl-i yaqīn), 72 Shihāb al-Dīn al-ʿUmarī (697– 749/1297–1348), 142 Shiraz, 105 Shīʿah, 12, 36–37, 146 rāfiz̤ī, 122 writings of, 82 Shuʿayb Firdawsī, 101 Siddiqui, Iqtidar Husain, 9, 139–140, 143 Sīdī Muwallih, 94 Sind, 30, 32, 66, 115, 152

Auer-12.indd 234

sīrah, 22, 61 Sīrat-i Fīrūz Shāhī, 115 Sirhindī, Yaḥyā b. Aḥmad, 53, 158 siyāsah, 130, 137, 140, 142, 144, 145 sharīʿah and, 139, 141, 148, 155 sharʿiyyah, 137 Siyāsatnāmah, 15, 44, 136 slave (ghulām), 40, 41 “slave soldier”, 25 social life/hierarchy, 14, 70 Socrates (Suqrāt), 71 South Asian studies, 21 sovereignty, 117, 136 space, sacred, 75, 76 speech, from God, 82 Spiegel, Gabrielle, 5 spiritual guide, 82 sphere, 57–58 Sri Lanka, 115 strife (fitna), 128 Stroumsa, Sarah, 34 subaltern, 16, 165 succession, of rule, 89 successorship (in Sufi context), 101 “successors of the Prophet” (khalīfat-i payghambar), 86 Sufi hospice (khāngāh), 84 Sufi(s), 81, 88, 94 orders (s. ṭarīqah), 13, 97 paths of, 99–100 Sufi shaykhs, 78, 157 blessings of, 87, 91, 93, 98 images of, 79, 100, 102 literature of/on, 78 as model for sultans, 13, 15 moral attributes of, 99, 151 as murshid, 88 as protected/protectors, 84–85 Sufism (taṣavvuf), 77–78, 85, 86 ṭarīqat-i mashāʾikh, 63 Suhravardī, Shihāb al-Dīn Abū Ḥafṣ ʿUmar (539–632/1145–1234), 13

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Index Suhravardiyyah, 13, 78 al-Sulamī, Abū ʿAbd al-Raḥmān (d. 412/1021), 78 sulṭān, 120 sultans, 60, 61, 72, 87 “attributes” (maqāmāt), 71–73 authority of, 134, 137, 141, 149, 152 caliphs and, 4, 106, 108, 110, 113, 116, 118 charity of, 70–71 compared to prophets, 54, 56, 103 divine inspiration, 59–60 God’s shadow on earth (ẓill Allāh fī ‘l-ʿarḍ), 4, 118 “helper of the commander of the faithful” (nāṣir amīr al-muʾminīn), 118 imagery of, 79, 131–132 inheritors of authority through prophets, 71 lives of, 51, 66 “path-followers of the predecessors” (sunniyān-i salaf), 12 qualities/traits of, 151 relationship with ʿulamāʾ, 137, 138 “religion-seeking sultans” (salāṭīn-i ṭālibān-i dīn), 12, 72, 100 salāṭīn, 63, 64, 129 “seal of the sultans” (khatm-i salāṭīn), 51, 53 as shaykhs/friends of God, 79, 99, 100–101 Sufis and, 89–91, 93 “Sultan among Hindu kings” (hiṃdurāya suratrāṇa), 16 Sultan of Islam (sulṭān-i Islām), 75 “sultan of shaykhs” (sulṭān almashāʾikh), 79 “sultans who protect the faith” (sulṭānān-i dīn-parvar), 12 “Supreme Sultan” (sulṭān al-aʿz̤am), 30 titles and, 60, 115, 117 Sūmra rulers, 30 sunnah, 12, 47–48, 56, 132

Auer-12.indd 235

235

of Muḥammad, of sultans, 61, 67–68 Sunnī, 99 historical vision, 37 legitimacy, 108, 116 Muslims (sunniyān), 120 projections of orthodoxy, 12 Sunnī-Shīʿah polemics, 37 supplication to God (duʿāʾ), 73 “Sūrah Yūsuf ”, 38, 42–43 “Sūrat al-Anfāl”, 80, 128 “Sūrat al-Kahf ”, 81, 82, 123–124 “Sūrat Yā Sīn”, 43 symbols/symbolism, 48, 55, 119, 178n100 of authority, 158, 159 of rank, 115 of relics, 74 power and, 76, 113 Syria, xviii–xix, 109, 128, 129 ṭabaqāt, 22, 166 as a term, 66 Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī, 6, 19, 20, 29, 39, 40, 54, 62, 80, 118 al-Ṭabarī, Abū Jaʿfar (224–310/839–923), 11, 36, 38, 39, 61, 65, 132 Tāj al-Dīn Yildiz al-Muʿizzī (d. ca. 611/1215), 132 Talmud, 11 Tambiah, Stanley, 76 Ṭamghāj, 124 Tansarnāmah, 15 Tarain, Battle of, 1 taʾrīkh, 11, 61 as a term, 66 tārīkh, 22, 63. See also knowledge (ʿilm): “of history” Tārīkh-i Fakhr al-Dīn Mubārak Shāh, 137–138 Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī (of ʿAfīf), 22, 45, 51, 80, 95, 99, 139 Tārīkh-i Fīrūz Shāhī (of Baranī), 20–21, 63, 77, 86, 127, 145

6/10/12 1:27 PM

236

Mapping Frontiers across Medieval Islam

Tārīkh-i Mubārak Shāhī, 53, 158 Tārīkh-i Muḥammadī, 20, 157 Tayoub, Abdelkader, 132 taz̤kirah (literature), 93–94 Taʾrīkh al-rusul wa’l-mulūk [The history of prophets and kings], 11, 38, 61 Taʾrīkh madīnat Dimashq, 39 al-Thaʿālibī, Abū Manṣūr (350–429/961– 1038), 39, 65 Thaʾlabī, Aḥmad b. Muḥammad (d. 427/1036), 39 Thatta, 30, 32, 66–67, 98, 102 themes (Islamic), 6, 10, 27, 33 theocracy, 4 Tīmūrids, 158 Tirmidhī, Abū ʿĪsā (d. 279/892), 74 al-Tirmidhī, Muḥammad b. ʿAlī Ḥakīm (d. ca. 318/936), 81–82 titles, 51, 117, 118 Arabic, 117 “assistant to the lord of the faithful” (ẓahīr amīr al-muʾminīn), 118 caliph of God (khalīfat Allāh), 120 Chief of Sultans (sayyid al-salāṭīn), 114 commander of the faithful (amīr al-muʾminīn), 118, 120, 130 exalted leader (al-imām al-aʿāẓam), 120 “helper of the commander of the faithful” (nāṣir amīr al-muʾminīn), 118 Khvājah-i Jahān, 152 malik, 117–118 Partner of the Commander of the Faithful (qasīm amīr al-muʾminīn), 115, 118, 119 Persian, 52, 117 “shadow of God in the worlds” (ẓill Allāh fī ‘l-ʿālamīn), 118 sultan is God’s shadow on earth” (al-sulṭān ẓill Allāh fi ‘l-ʿarḍ), 118 Sword of the Caliphate (sayf al-khilāfat), 115 Turkish honorifics, 117

Auer-12.indd 236

yamīn al-dawlah or “the right hand of power”, 118 yamīn-i khalīfat Allāh or “the right hand of God’s caliph, 118 tombs, 74, 75, 96, 98 visitation/construction of, 13, 99 traditionalism, 66 Islamic/Muslim, 61–62 literary, 63 Transoxiana, 115, 129, 131 tropes, 53 of shaykh/Sufi, 93, 101 “truth” (ṣidq), 35, 37 Tughluqs, 4, 53, 97, 148, 156 Ṭughril Beg (447–55/1055–63), 53, 87 Turkish honorifics, 117. See also titles Turkistan, 115 Turks, 126 turk, 123 al-Ṭurṭūshī (d. ca. 520/1126), 15 ʿulamāʾ, 4, 72, 89, 135, 148, 155 relationship with sultan, 137, 138 ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭāb (r. 13–23/634–44), 86, 127, 129–131, 145, 149 ʿUmar b. al-Qūṭiyyah (d. 367/977), 121 Umayyads, 6, 75, 121 Umayyads, of Spain (r. 316–422/929– 1031), 121 ʿUthmān, 86, 127, 131 Uways al-Qaranī (d. 37/657), 101 Vaḥīd Qurayshī, 93 Vijayānagara, 16 wakefulness and vigilance (intbāh va ʿibrat), 100 walāyah, 80, 82–83, 91, 181n15 concept of, 84, 86 Waldman, Marilyn, 9 wālī (governor), 129 walī (protector), 81, 86. See also awliyāʾ (friends of God)

6/10/12 1:27 PM

Index al-Wāqidī. See Muḥammad b. ʿUmar b. Wāqid war ghazv, 25 jangī, 67 jihād, 122 Warangal, 85–86 Welch, Anthony, 97 White, Hayden, 5, 6, 9 wisdom and discernment (kiyāsat va firāsat), 100 Yemen, 129 pre-Islamic kings of, 7 al-Ẓāhir Baybars (r. 658–76/1260–77), 109, 113

Auer-12.indd 237

237

Zaman, Muhammad Qasim, 3, 6, 133 z̤avābiṭ (rules), 3, 14, 148 Z̤iyāʾ al-Dīn Baranī (ca. 684–758/1285– 1357), 15, 22, 24, 38, 42–43, 77, 94–95, 96, 97, 138, 157, 159 on caliphal investiture of the Delhi Sultans, 107–108, 111, 113, 114, 117, 120 on example of the Prophet Muḥammad, 55–57 on ḥadīth and historiography, 63–66 on historiography, 20–21, 35–37 on Rāshidūn, 127–133 on sharīʿah, 142–145, 148–150 on siyāsah, 139–141 Sufism and, 78–79, 85–87, 103 Zoroastrians, 129

6/10/12 1:27 PM