Rituals of the Imperial Court and Sufi Khanqahs in

Fourteenth Century CE Delhi

Dias Mario Antony
University of Delhi

Introduction

There is a general tendency to view the emperor as the source of all authority and power in an

empire. This line of thought has not spared the analysis of Delhi Sultanate either. My attempt at

analysing the rituals in the Delhi Sultan's Court and the Sufi Khanqah during the period of

fourteenth century CE has revealed an image which could not have been further removed from

this misconception about the nature of the Delhi Sultanate. Along with the existence of parallel

centres of power, I will also look at the way in which the description of rituals in the khanqah

and the imperial court as recreated in the sources of our period give us an idea about the

Sultanate society of the period. I must however admit that limited time and resources has

confined my study to the use of mainly two sources – Amir Hasan Sijzi's Fawaid al-Fuad and

Shams-i Siraj Afif's Tarikh-i Firuz Shahi.

Fawaid al-Fuad and the norms of ideal conduct

The Fawaid al-Fuad is in the format of a Malfuz. A Malfuzat is a recording of the teachings of

mystic teachers, pirs and shaikhs. It is however not just a mere dry narrative of the shaikh's

teachings. Amir Hasan Sijzi's Fawaid al-Fuad is a highly interactive record which captured the

dialogical aspect of the Nizam al-Din Awliya's majlis. It carried with it a certain 'orality'. Nizam

al-Din Awliya is described in the text as graciously answering questions, joking and preaching to

his disciples with the help of anecdotes and parables. The text in a way reproduced the shaikh's

majlis for the reader.1

1. Sunil Kumar, The Emergence of Delhi Sultanate 1192-1286, (Delhi: Permanent Black, 2007) pp. 374.
Before one drowns in the eloquence of the text, it has to be kept in mind that although the

Fawaid al-Fuad gives us a sense of 'orality' and hence the perception of an objective

representation of what would have transpired in the majlis, it cannot be taken as a verbatim

record of the shaikh's teachings. There were the obvious choices which every writer could

excercise. The choice of what was to be included and not. There was also careful editing done to

give it the form of a conversation between the shaikh and his disciples. Sijzi also tried to lend

legitamacy and credibility to his work by underlining that it was compiled and edited by the

Shaykh himself. The fact that he recorded the date of each majlis was also a similar attempt at

lending credibility to the account. All this required the hand of a skilled writer and that was

exactly what Amir Hasan Sijzi was.

The Fawaid al-Fuad was compiled over a period from 1308-1322 covering a span of time which

overlapped with the reign of Ala al-Din Khalaji (r. 1296-1316) and Mubarak Shah Khalaji (r.

1316-1320). At the time of writing of the text it must be kept in mind that Nizam al-Din Awliya

was a powerful figure commanding the respect of many, including many prominent men like

Ziya al-Din Barani, Amir Khusrau and Amir Hasan Sijzi himself who was a courtier. However

he was never really in a position to rival the Sultan, who at this point in time was military

powerful and rich on resources. There was a certain negotiation for space which was taking

place, but all this happened carefully and deliberately without irking out the Sultan. 2It is one of

the reasons why the Fawaid al-Fuad never discusses a reigning Sultan. On the other hand it

regularly invokes the spiritual predecessors of the protagonist in the particular malfuz. The

malfuz thus was in a sense a parallel narrative to that of the tawarikhs which in a way created a

discourse which centered the power upon the Sufi Shaikhs.3 The examination of the rituals of

Nizam al-Din Awliya's khanqah also tell us a similar story.

2. Sunil Kumar, Transitions in the relationship between political elites and Sufis: the 13th and 14th century Delhi
Sultanate, 13.
3. Ibid., 11.
The Sufi Shaikh's court may not have had the glitter, glamour and extravagance of the emperor's

but it was wrapped in a cobweb of rituals and symbolisms. In almost every majlis that Sijzi

attended, he would greet the Shaikh by kissing his feet with utter happiness. One cannot ignore

the semblance it bears with the practice of paibos in the courts of the Delhi Sultans since the

times of Balban. This was clearly a ritual which was transposed from the court of Sultan of the

temporal realm to court of the Sultan of the Spiritual realm. The Shaikh's assembly was also

structured and ordered. The following account of Sijzi from Thurday, the 11th of Dhu'l-Hijja, A.H

709 (31 May, 1309) clearly lays it out for us:

“I obtained the blessing of kissing the master's feet. Conversation turned to proper

conduct in the saint's assembly, that is, how to enter the presence of the pir and

locate the right place to sit down. “Proper Conduct”, observed the master, “is that a

person who enters the saint's assembly should sit down in whatever empty place he

espies. It is not fitting, at the moment that one comes to visit the pir, to be

thinking: 'Whom should I sit ahead of or behind?' Wherever a person sees an

opening he should sit down, since every visitor is on the same footing.

In Conclusion the master declared: “Proper conduct is that whoever comes into an

assembly and finds an empty place should sit down there, and if there is no place,

then he should sit down outside the circle. Under no circumstance should he sit

down in the middle for whoever sits in the middle of circle will be cursed”.4

The Shaikh was the sole authority in his wilayat. Authority could be passed on from the master

to his follower but which had no scope for sharing in the same territory when the master was

alive. Everyone else were equals. The Shaikh by his access to the divine secrets which were

4. Amir Hasan Sijzi, Nizam ad-Din Auliya, Translated by Bruce B. Lawrence, Morals for the Heart, (New York,
Mahwah: Paulist Press, 1992), 120.
batin, was the only person who stood above the equals. Everyone else had to take the hand of the

master to tread the right spiritual path. 5 This was a spiritual empire where the Shaikh was the

Sultan among his people and this clearly gets reflected in the way in which the majlis was

structured and conducted.

The Shaikh's assembly was also a disciplining system. Those who kissed the feet and hand of

Shaikhs and dervishes hoped that thereby the hand of forgiveness would be extended to them. 6

Disobedience could be punished by the Shaikh's curse. A huge premium was placed on

unquestioned obedience and service to the spiritual master. Obedience and service was always

rewarded. The rewards were mostly in the form of favourable outcomes. The favourable

outcome emanating from the Sufi Shaikh's ability to invoke blessings from Allah. The spiritual

wealth thus accumulated was not one which would perish with death. It was a reward which

transcended temporal boundaries. Sijzi's account of Nizamudin Auliya's teachings from Sunday,

3 Sha'ban A.H 707 (27th January 1308) emphasises on obedience to the Shaikh:

“The master began to discuss how one ought to be respectful to the Pir and give

answers that are pleasing to him. Once, on the eve of the 'id celebration, Khwaja,

Junayd Baghdadi- may God sanctify his lofty secret- was sitting in his khanqah.

Four men from the Unseen came to pay their respects to him. Turning to one of

them, he asked, “ Where will you go in the morning to say you 'id prayers?” “To

Blessed Mecca” was the reply. “And you?” he asked the second. “To Exalted

Medina” was the reply. “As fo you?” he queried the third. “To the Sanctified House,

that is, Jerusalem,” was the reply. “And what about you?” he demanded of the

fourth. Bowing down before Junayd, the fourth replied, “I will remain in Baghdad

in the service of the master.” To the fourth visitor Junayd exclaimed, “It is you who

5. Sijzi, Nizam ad-Din Auliya, 171.

6. Ibid., 297.
 are the most devout, you are the most knowledgeable, you are the most virtuous of

all!”.7

By citing this anecdote from the life of Khwaja Junayd Baghdadi, Shaikh Nizam al-Din Awliya

gave a clear invocation to respect the master and to be in constant obedience. Obedience and

service to the master according to him was the most desirable form of devotion which would be

rewarded in the form of spiritual gifts and knowledge of the right path.

Physical proximity to the Shaikh is another interesting factor to be observed. The body of the

Shaikh was the source of spiritual power. There was an emphasis laid on proximity to the

spiritual master. Visiting and being with the Shaikh was a ecstatic experience for many. The mere

presence of the Shaikh was awe inspiring for many. In short both the Sultan's court and the

Shaikhs khanqah carried with it a sense of awe in front of sheer power and authority- one

temporal, another spiritual. Amir Khusraw would describe Shaikh Nizam al-Din Auliya as “An

emperor in a faqir's cell”.

The recreation of the rituals in Sham-i Siraj Afif's Tarikh-i Firuz Shahi

Shams-i Siraj Afif's Tarikh-i Firuz Shahi is a court chronicle which was written in the 1420's

about Firuz Shah Tughluq's reign (r. 1351-1388). Afif was writing in the post-Tughluqid period,

after Timur’s invasion. The Sultanate had broken up and a number of new regional Sultanates

had come into being. Afif had witnessed the chaos following Firuz Shah Tughluq’s death. For

him, Firuz Shah Tughluq’s period was full of nostalgia. It was a period of peace and stability

when the Sultanate extended from Bengal to Gujarat. He painted the sultan as holy man and

remarks that it was his existence that kept the city from destruction.8

7. Sijzi, Nizam ad-Din Auliya, 83.

8. R.C Jauhri, Medieval India in Transistion – Tarikh-i-Firuz Shahi, A First Hand Account (New Delhi: Sundeep
Prakashan 2001), 34.
By the time Afif was writing his chronicle it must also be kept in mind that the stature of the of

the Sufis has greatly increased. Fifteenth century sultans and their military commanders and

common soldiers acknowledged this new structure through their association with Sufi khanqahs

and prigrimages to Sufi shrines. In the 1420s when Afif produces his retrospective account of

Firuz Shah Tughluq’s reign we must then remember that it is these early fifteenth century notions

of society which get reimposed onto an earlier period of the reign of Firuz Shah Tughluq. 9 There

would also be an attempt to paint the rituals in a more grandiose manner suggestive of a period

which was much more prosperous and stable than the period which he was writing from.

Keeping these contexts in mind let us now examine the rituals Firuz Shah Tughluq's court as

recreated in Shams-i Siraj Afif's Tarikh-i Firuz Shahi. I have used the word 'recreated'

deliberately to convey the idea that the texts and the way they represent rituals have to be

contextualized within the politics and nature of the text.

One ritual which everyone has taken notice of is the practice of sijda and paibos that had become

common in the courts of the Delhi Sultans since the times of Balban. This was the persianate

practice of prostrating and kissing the feet of the Sultan. The Sultan was the 'shadow of God on

Earth'. He was the one bestowed with authority to lead and protect his subjects from all harms

material. According to Afif, when Zafar Khan came to Sultan Firuz Shah Tughluq seeking help

in his distress he performed the Paibos and on seeing the awe and glory of the court fell

unconscious for he had never seen a court so magnificient.10 Even though the latter part of the

story may be an exxageration on part our chronicler, it would safe to assume that the court was

indeed a grand spectacle given that Firuz Shah Tughluq is an emperor known to mark his

uniqueness in everything he did. The two last levels of the Qutb Minar made of white marble

bear a testimony to this.

9. Kumar, Political Elites and Sufis, 22.

10. Jauhri, Tarikh-i-Firuz Shahi, 99.
Afif also provides us with a vivid and detailed account of how Firuz Shah Tughluq's Court was

held. After the devotional recitations and the prayers were over, the courtiers would get to the

court in order. The Sultan used to be the first to walk in and seat himself on the throne. Followed

by the Sultan, a retinue of people would follow each according to their rank who would come in

and take their place.11 The Court reflected the world outside. It became an indicator of how

power was structured within the empire itself. The power resided in the body of the emperor. The

rituals articulated this in the clearest possible manner. The next in power to the Sultan was the

person who sat closest to the Sultan in the Court. This physical proximity to the body of the

emperor defined the status and authority that the person held within the Sultan's realm.

The adherence to these rituals were an acknowledgement of the power of the Sultan as well as

the power structures which were there in the empire. Non-adherence was trangression, which had

to be punished. Afif quite approvingly recounts that once during the reign of Muhammad Shah

Tughluq (1324-51), Malik Kabir was appointed the Deputy of the Sultan (Naib) during his

absense. It so happened that Malik Mujeer who was then passing by the vicinity of Delhi did not

pay the customary respects by visiting the court. Malik Kabir who was enraged by this

impudence summoned him to the court. When at the court, Malik Mujeer pushed it further by not

offering the usual salutations even when told to do so and did not perform the sijda. The line had

been crossed. Malik Kabir was infuriated and ordered Malik Mujeer to be cut into two pieces.

There was no mercy. The order was carried out and Malik Mujeer slaughtered in front of the

court. After the incident Malik Kabir sent a full report of the incident to Muhammad Shah

Tughluq who was then at Thatta, who accepted whatever was done by Malik Kabir. 12 Even

though this is an account taken from the period of another ruler, we have no reason to believe

things were any different during the reign of other rulers, judging by the general sense of

approval of the punishment meted out. Impudence to a ritual submission was never tolerated.

11. Jauhri, Tarikh-i-Firuz Shahi, 163-164.

12. Ibid., 247.
For a Sultan like Firuz Shah Tughluq who would constantly try to define himself as someone

different from his previous ruler, rituals would play a very important role in the articulation of

his sovereignity. The reading of the Khutba became one such tool. The earlier practice was to

recite only the name of the living Sultan in the Friday and Eid prayers. Sultan Firuz Shah

Tughluq would however alter this practice. After his accession, when the time of reciting his

name in the Khutba came, the Sultan ordered that first of all, the names of all the previous Delhi

Sultans be included and only then his name be mentioned.13 This event is corraborated by its

mention in the Futuhat-i Firuz Shahi which was originally an inscription on the monarch’s

masjid-i jami. In a way, it created a genealogy for the Sultan's authority.14

Negotiations between the rituals of the temporal and the spiritual realms

The ritual articulations of sovereignity by the Sultan and the Shaikh were in a constant state of

negotiation with each other. In the Fawaid al-Fuad we see that there is careful attempt not to

mention the one authority which would pose a challenge to the way in which the Sufi Shaykh's

khanqah was ordered – the regnant Sultan.

A major Sufi Shaikh who had his wilayat or spiritual rule overlapping with the territory of the

Sultan which he held by the force of his arms and civil administration could not afford to be seen

under the Sultan's patronage or receiving the Sultan's largesse or attending the Sultan's court,

which would involve following the rituals of the Sultan's court which as we have seen were

meant to emphasise the supremacy of the Sultan over all those who attended it. Similarly even

willingly permitting the Sultan to visit his khanqah would mean receiving the Sultan with a

submissive ritualistic gesture, disregard for which could attract the Sultan's ire. Thus we see that

when Sultan Ala al-Din Khaliji insisted on visiting the Nizam al-Din Awliya, the Shaikh

13. Jauhri, Tarikh-i-Firuz Shahi, pp. 79 and Futuhat-i Firuz Shahi translated by Azra Alavi, (Delhi: Idarah-i-
Adabiyat-Delli, 2009) pp.21.
14. Kumar, Political Elites and Sufis, 18.
famously replied, “The house of this weak one has two doors. If the Sultan enters by one door, I

will go out by the other”. The sultans could recruit as clients of their patronage Sufi shaikhs with

lesser claims to authority. The great shaikhs would have to reject such a patronage.15 Even if they

did receive any patronage, it would be quickly dispersed off as charity.

However when we read Afif's Tarikh-i Firuz Shahi for such instances of negotiations, we get a

completely different picture. It shows the image of Sultan Firuz Shah Tughluq as a person who

upon his accesssion would visit the hospices of the prominent Sufi shaikhs seeking their

blessings. All his prominent campaigns seem to have started after he saught the blessing of the

great shaikhs.

When Firuz Shah met Qutb al-Din Munnawwar at Hansi the Shaikh and the Sultan greeted each

other by shaking hands.16 This was a more egalitarian ritual. Both the Sultan and the Shaikh had

dropped their usual practices in each others presence. The same thing happens when Firuz Shah

meets Shaikh Nur al-Din when he succeeded to the seat of honorable Shaikh Qutb al-Din

Munnawwar who had expired by then.

“When Sultan Firuz Shah arrived in the vicinity of the Shaikh's hospice the holy

Shaikh thought of standing up to receive the Sultan with grace but the Sultan

checked the Shaikh from offering such respect and insisted on oath that the

honorable Shaikh Nur al-Din may not descend from his prayer carpet. After the

shaking of hand and salutations both the chosen men sat together. The Shaikh as per

custom begen his sermon and preaching. After listening to the Shaikh, the Sultan

also conversed like rulers, and said, “I have founded the city of Hissar Firuzah for

the comfort and benefit of the people of Islam and it would be extremely

15. Simon Digby, The Sufi shaikh and the Sultan: A Conflict of Claims to Authority in Medieval India, Iran, Vol. 28.
(1990), pp. 71-81.
16. Jauhri, Tarikh-i-Firuz Shahi, 65.
 appriopriate if the holy Shaikh also blessed and graced the city by living there. A

hospice would also be built for the pious Shaikh and necessary grants (funds) will

be made available for meeting expenses for the maintenance of the hospice. If the

holy Shaikh lived in the city of Hissar Firuzah, it is hoped that on account of the

blessings of the Shaikh's steps, the inhabitants of Hissar would be protected and

saved from all possible hardships and misfortunes.” The Shaikh asked if the wish

of the Sultan be treated as a royal commond or the choice was left to the Shaikh.

Firuz Shah said, “God forbid, that I may ever command the Shaikh. If the holy

Shaikh himself opts for living in Hissar Firuzah, then the city and its inhabitants

would be considered fortunate.” The respectable Shaikh said that Hansi was the

jurisdiction place of his grandfather and father and declined.” 17

Afif makes us think at this point that as much as the Sultan recognises the ability of the Shaikh to

bless his city with his blessed steps, the Shaikh also recognises the Sultan's temporal authority.

What we must however keep in our mind while looking at such an account is the fact that it is a

retrospective account written from the 1420's. Afif in this case is probably transposing the

society of the times in which he is writing from onto to the realm of Firuz Shah Tughluq which

was a completely different world altogther. By the time when Afif was writing his chronicle we

have already seen that the respect that the sufi shaikhs commanded had greatly increased. Even

the fifteenth century Sultans and their military commanders and common soldiers acknowledged

this new structure through their association with Sufi khanqahs and prigrimages to Sufi shrines.

It is looking at Firuz Shah Tughluq's reign from such a time period that Afif takes his ideal ruler

on a journey seeking the blessings of the various Sufi saints. For Afif the turmoil of the post-

Tughluqid post-Timurid time period which he was writing in would have inspired him see the

image of an ideal king in Firuz Shah Tughluq. The Sultan assumed the character of a person who

was almost sufi like in disposition. He would in fact write, “Though Firuz Shah was King but in

17. Jauhri, Tarikh-i-Firuz Shahi, 94-95.

reality, due to his learning and superior self, he could be considered to belong to the category of

saints and Ulema.” 18

This even plays out when Afif discusses Firuz Shah Tughluq's succession and describes it as

being similar to the ritualistic conventions of succession of the great shaikhs. Afif tells us that

one of the conditions in the succession to the leadership (Imamat) among the Sufis was that

when a saint was about to die, he would select one of his disciples to succeed him and entrust to

him the prayer carpet, but the said disciple would refuse to accept the great burden. Yet the saint

would nominate him and depart from the world. It was an authorization by investiture. Such a

succession had a high place. Similarly after the death of Sultan Muhammad Shah Tughluq, the

entire assemblage of Khans, Maliks, Qazis, Ulema and Shaikhs present at Thatta unanimously

desired to enthrone Firuz Shah as the Sultan, but Firuz Shah declined to accept the burden of

kingship. It was only after a lot of persuasion that he would finally do so. Afif comments that

such a quality was to be found only among the saints of God and not others. 19 Whether the

incident really happened, we do not really know, but it definitely points towards two things.

Firstly the respect which the Sufi Shaykhs commanded during the period when Afif was writing

his history and secondly an attempt on part of Afif to nostalgically portray Firuz Shah Tughluq as

the ideal ruler. A larger idea which emerges out of this is the emergence of the idea of the Sufi

Shaikh as the ideal human during the time Afif is writing his history.

Conclusion

Rituals are always a public process and carry along with it an enormous amount of power. The

kind of power that it exudes would however change depending upon the society, the context and

the ritual. Both in the shaikh's khanqah and the imperial court it defines the structures of power

and authority. It in a way becomes a reflection of how the Shaikh and the Sultan imagines their

18. Ibid., pp.33.

19. Jauhri, Tarikh-i-Firuz Shahi, pp.48.
realm. There is a clear articulation of sovereignity which takes place through the rituals in both

the khanqah and the imperial court.

When Sijzi writes his Fawaid al-Fuad, we see that the only people which does not fall in the

ritual structure of the Shaikh is the Sultan and within that of the Sultan is the Shaikh. However

by the time when Afif would write his history, there is a carefully negotiated space for both.

There is a mutual recognition of the temporal empire of the Sultan and the spiritual empire of

Shaikh.

The difference in the nature of the empire of the Sultan and the shaikh really plays out well when

we look at how rituals in the process of disciplining through recreation of norms, turns coercive.

Non adherence meant punishment. In fact even the act of punishment took a ritualistic form. In

the temporal realm, regulated pain could be inflicted on the deviants body, an organized ritual in

which the body was marked by the power of the sovereign. The Sufi Shaikh relied upon his

ability to call upon divine chastisement to punish those in defiance. Rewards could also act as the

coercive agent. Material benefits when it came to the Sultan and blessings when it came to the

Shaikh. The difference in the modes of coercion clearly delineates the respective realms of

authority. Amir Khusraw calling the Shaikh an “emperor in a faqir's cell” and Afif comparing the

Sultan to the category of saints meant that both were persons of a stature so equal that they were

interchangeable; one lording over the temporal realm and the other over the spirtiual realm. What

clearly emerges out of all this is a completely different picture of the Delhi Sultanate- A

Sultanate which had not one but two Sultans!

________________________________
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