The Sufi Shaykh and the Sultan: A Conflict of Claims to Authority in Medieval India

Author(s): Simon Digby

Source: Iran , 1990, Vol. 28 (1990), pp. 71-81
Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd.

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/4299836

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THE SUFI SHAYKH AND THE SULTAN: A CONFLICT OF CLAIMS TO
AUTHORITY IN MEDIEVAL INDIA

By Simon Digby
Jersey

The claims of Sufi shaykhs to be sources of authority Din Kubra had pronounced that the Khwarazmshah
in medieval India, and in particular in the greater
and his whole kingdom were the blood-price (diyat) for
Delhi sultanate of the thirteenth and fourteenth the murder of one of his disciples, the Shaykh added:
Christian centuries, have been surveyed elsewhere"O bythat I had not spoken this word (dh nafas-i khwud-
the present writer, but space prevented a detailed
rd b&rzin na-midwurdam!)"
examination of the relations between Sufi shaykhs on spoken words (nafas, "breath") of a shaykh had
Such
whose behalf a claim of territorial wildyat was
an especial force which the Shaykh himself would be
advanced and the Muslim rulers or de facto powerless to reverse. In this case, the consequence of
powerholders of the same regions.' Shaykh Najm al-Din's words were that KhwSrazm was
overrun in Chinggiz Khan's first western campaign.8

I THE SUFI SHAYKH'S WILAYAT IN CON- The Sultan could recruit, as objects of his bounty
TEMPORARY SOURCES and clients of his patronage, Sufis with lesser claims
than the great shaykhs, who were obliged by their own
pretensions
The territorial wildyat of the Sufi shaykh was con- to reject such patronage. Thus Sufi shaykhs
sidered as having a direct influence on are
thestated to have been put in charge of 120 khdnaqdhs
political
endowed
events and material destiny of the realm over by the
which it Sultan Feroz Shah Tughluq (regn.
1351-88)
was exercised.2 Thus the prosperity of the in the
reign ofcapital city of Delhi. With the three
Sultan CAlad al-Din Khalji (regn. 1296-1316) might be at each stop prescribed by Muslim
days' hospitality
tradition,
attributed to the influence of the unbounded Muslim travellers might spend 360 days or a
blessings
of "the King of Shaykhs" Nizam al-Dinwhole year round in the capital city.' But if a major
"AwliydI".3
Sufi shaykh laid claims to wildyat or spiritual rule over a
Equally, the decline in the fortunes of the sultanate
might be attributed to the removal of such spiritualthe Sultan held by the force of his arms
territory which
protection. CIsami, writing some twenty-fiveand or
ordered
thirtythrough the civil administration, he could
years after the event in a new secessionist ill afford state
Muslim to be seen to be under the Sultan's patronage,
in the Deccan, maintained that the power as indicated
and pros-by such gestures as accepting largesse, alms
perity passed away from Delhi with the death of from the Sultan; or attending upon
or grants, directly
Shaykh Nizam al-Din: the Sultan at his court, which would involve the
He was one of the friends of God observance of court etiquette designed to emphasize
Through whom the realm of Hind6stan was main-
the supremacy of the sovereign over all who attended;
tained. or even willingly permitting the Sultan to visit his own
First that man of wise dominion khdnaqdh, with the shaykh receiving the Sultan with the
Set out from Dehli to another kingdom;4 same politeness as was the lot of other visitors.
After this that city and country were ruined; From the point of view of the Sultan, the failure of
Discord prevailed in that realm.5 the shaykh to perform such gestures might constitute a
threat to his authority, because of the visible
This belief in the ability of Sufi shaykhs to exercise,
independence
through their spiritual strength, a decisive influence on of the shaykh from that authority and the
the outcome of material events is well illustrated by apossibility that the shaykh's khdnaqdh might provide a
number of references in the conversations of Shaykhrefuge and a rallying point for dissidents and plotters
against it."' Some Sultans may not have taken Sufi
Nizam al-Din himself to the ever-present menace of
attacks of the Mongols: claims to wildyat seriously, even though these are
referred to in nearly contemporary chronicles as well as
1. When the Mongols besieged Multan, Shaykh
hagiographic sources. Nevertheless, such claims
Qutb al-Din Bakhtyar one night gave an arrow into the
remained a source of vague and recurrent unease. That
hands of the ruler Qubacha, with instructions to loose
they could constitute a real threat to the power of a
it in the darkness against the army of the unbelievers.
reigning Sultan was demonstrated by the conspiracy
In the morning the besieging host had vanished.6
with the Shaykh Sidi Muwallih as its figurehead in the
2. In the year when the wildyat of Shaykh Farid al-
reign ofJalil al-Din Feroz Khalji (regn. 1290-6," and
Din (Nizam al-Din's predecessor) was removed by
by examples from later Indo-Muslim history and from
death, the Mongols came and devastated the Panjab.7
elsewhere in the Islamic world.'2
3. When in Khwairazm the great Shaykh Najm al- Nizam al-Din "Awliya" Chishti (d. 1325), the most
71

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72 JOURNAL OF PERSIAN STUDIES

powerful shaykh of the capitalMuslims.

city at If the
theKingtime
says anything
when further
the I will leave
power of the Delhi Sultanate this itself had attained its
place also."17
greatest extent at the beginning ofCAl'
The Sultan the fourteenth
al-Din was much pleased with the
century, was given by his followers
answer that thethe
princehonorific of
brought back, and he remarked
that of
Sultdn al-mashidikh ("the Sultan he knew that all this had
shaykhs"). Thisnothing to do with "the
regal
imagery is pursued in a famous
Sultan ofencomium on
Shaykhs" (i.e. with the
Nizam al-Din himself),
adding that this would have caused the ruin of his
Shaykh by the poet Amir Khusraw:
An emperor in afaqfr's cell, realm.
A "Refuge of the World" for the After this the
heart of Sultan
theannounced
world, his intention of
A King of Kings without throne or crown,
visiting the Shaykh, who sent a message back that
With kings in need of the dust of hisis feet."3
"there no need to come." He himself was occupied
It is accordingly no matter for
with surprise
"prayer in absentia" that
(ducd-yi the
ghaybat) and such
conflict between royal and Sufi
prayer
claims
had peculiar
ofefficacy.
authority
When afterin
this message
the Sultancentred
this period of the Delhi sultanate continued to press
aroundhim, the Shaykh pro-
the
person of Shaykh Nizam al-Din. nounced:
Four anecdotes in the
Siyar al-awliyd', a biographical "The house ofregarding
source this weak one has two doors. If the
Nizam
al-Din compiled within a generation of
Sultan enters by one his
door, I will death,
go out by the other!"'8
illustrate the tensions which arose between
3. According to the S(yarthe Shaykh
al-awlyd', the youthful son
and successive Sultans of Delhi.
and successor of CAla' al-Din Khalji, Sultan Qutb al-
Din Mubarak (regn. 1316-20) was hostile to Shaykh
1. The reign of Sultan FEr6z Shah Khalji preceded
Nizam al-Din for two reasons. The first was that the
the period of Nizdm al-Din's greatest influence in the
capital city. Knowing the reluctance of the ShaykhSultan
to had built a congregational mosque (masjid-i
meet him, the Sultan conspired with the poet Amir
jdmic) at Siri (the most recent "New City" of Delhi).19
Khusraw, who was both a murfd (disciple) of the
On the first Friday (after its completion) he summoned
all the shaykhs and Culamad to offer their prayers there.
Shaykh and mushafddr (keeper of the Qurdmn) of the
Nizam al-Din sent back an answer that he had a
Sultan himself. The Sultan planned to go in the com-
pany of the poet and pay an unexpected call upon themosque close to him, and that it was more fitting that
Shaykh. Amir Khusraw felt bound secretly to inform he should offer his prayers there.
the Shaykh of this plan. Nizdm al-Din left Delhi The second reason was that all the imdms, shaykhs and
immediately for a visit to the resting-place of his other
pfr men of religion used to assemble on the first day
(predecessor) at Ajodhan.'4 of the month to offer their greetings to the Sultan.
Shaykh Nizam al-Din did not go, but used to send his
2. In the reign of cAl' al-Din Khalji the influence of
Nizam al-Din had reached its apogee and "culamd, servant Iqbal. This afforded an opportunity for "the
envious" (hdsiddn) to stir up trouble. The young Sultan
shaykhs, maliks and amfrs were his servants." Envious
in his pride said that if Nizam al-Din did not come on
people (dhsiddn) described the lavishness of the
the first of the month he would have him brought
hospitality which the Shaykh dispensed and brought
such reports about him as led the Sultan, who (we forcibly.20
are
Nizam al-Din went to the tomb of his mother, who
told) had a suspicious and vengeful nature, to fear that
the Shaykh would bring injury to his rule, of the sameburied in Delhi, and stated that the Sultan desired
was
to injure him. If before the end of the month "his
kind as "others of this group (.tfifa)" had brought business
to was not settled" (kadr-i u ba-kifdyat na-rasad), he
rulers in the past.'5
would not come to visit her then. The first of the
The Sultan accordingly devised a ruse to ascertain
whether the Shaykh had intentions of seizing power. month (it is explained) was the anniversary of the
Shaykh's
He indited a letter to him to the effect that, since the mother's death. After his return from this
Shaykh was the "Lord of Mankind" by whom people's visit, as the first of the month drew near, Nizam al-
Din's followers became increasingly concerned; but the
needs were fulfilled and since God had given temporal
Shaykh deriving assurance from his submission of the
power to the writer (the Sultan), it would be appropri-
ate for him to submit to the Shaykh's judgement matter
in to his mother, sat waiting for what the future
matters arising in the kingdom. 16
had in store. On the last night before the beginning of
the new month, Khusraw Khan, the favourite of the
The Sultan sent the letter by the hand of his son
Sultan, treacherously cut off his head, throwing the
Khiir Khan, who was a murfd of the Shaykh and was
Sultan's body down from the roof of the palace and
not aware of the background to its dispatch. The
setting the head on top of a lance to display it to the
Shaykh took the letter in his hand and remarked
without studying it: populace.2
"What business have darweshs with the doings 4.
of The conflict between Shaykh Nizam al-Din and
Kings? I am a darwish who has made a retreat from Sultan
the Ghiyath al-Din Tughluq (regn. 1320-5) has
city, and I am occupied in praying for the King andpassed
for into folk tradition.22 The background to the

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 THE SUFI SHAYKH AND THE SULTAN 73

The effective outcome

quarrel is not adequately explained in ourof the last incident was main
earliest
check
source, the Siyar al-awliy&d, on the
but pretensions
the accountof the of
Shaykh.
theNizam al-Din
had been compelled
sixteenth-century Siyar al-cdriftn (whose to appear at the Sultan's
author
customarily devotes more attention
inquest than
(mahiar) and to submit his prede-
to judgement. The
cessor to the topic of the humiliation
maintenance was evidently
of mitigated by the Sultan's
khdnaqdhs)
plausible.
After the murder of Sultan Qutb al-Din Mub5rak,
his usurping successor Khusraw Khan distributed large
sums to darweshs in the city. Three shaykhs of note
refused to receive these offerings; but Nizam al-Din
took the five lakhs of tankas which he had been sent, and
shared this sum out among thefaqTrs and the deserving
poor of the city. Other shaykhs who had received such
sums from Khusraw Khan kept them in trust. After
Ghiyath al-Din Tughluq defeated Khusraw Khan and
ascended the throne, he sought to recover the dona-
tions which had left the treasury depleted. Nizdm al-
Din argued that the sum he had received was from the
bayt al-mal (the public treasury of Muslim believers)
and he had therefore distributed it to the deserving,
keeping nothing for himself. The Sultan was silenced by
this reply, but his heart was turned against Nizdm al-
Din.23
The sequel to this was that, at the instance of a
hostile group motivated by envy (hasad), Sultan
Ghiyath al-Din allowed proceedings to be instituted, in
which Nizam al-Din had to defend the legitimacy,
according to Muslim law, of his practice of sama'
(listening to music). The accusers were led, according
to Amir Khwurd in the Siyar al-awliyad, by an
immigrant shaykhzada called Husdm al-Din, who had
originally received hospitality from Shaykh Nizam al-
Din; and by Qazi Jalal al-Din, who held the office of
NJ'ib Hadkim (Deputy Governor of the city).24
Shaykh Nizam al-Din was obliged to appear in
person before a large gathering presided over by the
Sultan himself. Amir Khwurd says that this took place
at the Sultan's palace (dar-i sardy-i bddshdh), but Jamll
adds the detail that this was in the Sultan's new fortress
of Tughluqabad in south Delhi.25 The case was that
samad was unlawful according to the opinion of the
Imam Abui Hanifa. Arguments turned on whether
hadiths of the Prophet could be accepted which were
not recognized by the Hanafi school of law. Evidence
was given by Mawlana cAlam al-Din, a grandson of the
great Shaykh Bahd' al-Din Zakariyya' of Multan.
cAlam al-Din had written a treatise on the topic of the
lawfulness of samd and had travelled in "Baghdad and
Sham and Rum." He testified that sami was practised
by the shaykhs of those lands without prohibition. The
Sultan then complied with Nizam al-Din's request and
refused to make a pronouncement upon the subject.
According to a "less trustworthy source" also men-
tioned but not named by Amir Khwurd, the Sultan
pronounced samd lawful for Nizam al-Din, but not for
others "like the group (.tIifa) of the Qalandars and
Haydaris."26
a
early
Jamlli judicial
is
prudent consideration that the Shaykh and his fol-
lowers should not be pressed to an extreme confron-
tation. One of the principal attackers, Qaii Jalal al-
Din, had in the course of the proceedings uttered a
threat that, if Nizam al-Din continued to hold samad, he
would intervene by virtue of his office of Ndaib Hakim.
The Shaykh had replied that he should (i.e. would) be
retired from that office. According to Amir Khwurd,
he was relieved of it twelve days later; this author adds
that he soon "went on a journey" (i.e. died)." Accord-
ing to Jamall, just after Nizam al-Din had returned to
his khdnaqdh the news reached him that the Sultan was
much ashamed, and had dismissed the Qaai from his
post as Hakim.28
In this Sufi ideology the imposition of the will of the
Sultan against that of the Shaykh was unacceptable.
For if the Sultan could act thus with impunity, the
wilayat of the Shaykh was cast into doubts in the minds
of his followers. In the four accounts, surveyed above,
of Nizdm al-Din's relations with four different Sultans
of Delhi, the Shaykh's desire to avoid a meeting
prevailed without a contest in the first two instances
over the importunities ofJalal al-Din Fer6z Khalji and
CAld al-Din Khalji. In the third case the threat of
compulsion by Qutb al-Din Mubarak leads to the
brutal and exemplary death of the Sultan. But in the
fourth case the Shaykh was in fact compelled to attend
the Sultan's summons and hear his judgement. What
would be the consequences of this?
Possibly, in an attempt to avert further trouble, the
Nd'ib Hakim, who had been told by the Shaykh that he
would be retired from his post, was so retired. Thus the
nafas (pronouncement) of the Shaykh was not dis-
credited." Yet this retirement was not in itself a
sufficiently momentous consequence of the flouting of
the Shaykh's authority to satisfy his devotees.
Predictably, the Siyar al-awliyad reproduces remarks
of the Shaykh after the conclusion of the inquest
(mahiar). Surprisingly, they are said to be taken from a
now lost work of the main contemporary historian of
the Delhi sultanate, the Hasrat-nama ("Book of
Regret") of Ziya al-Din Barani. After the Shaykh had
returned home, he summoned Barani together with
Mawlina Muhyi al-Din Kashani and the poet Amir
Khusraw at the time of the midday prayer. He said
that the men of learning were filled with envy and
enmity, and had found the field open. In "our city"
(Delhi) the narrations offiqh had been preferred to
hadith; and hadfth of the Shafici school had been
ignored. What would be the fate of a city where such
insolence was committed? How could it flourish? It
would be strange if it was not reduced to a pile of

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74 JOURNAL OF PERSIAN STUDIES

bricks! As a result of the wickedness of the unsound a great expansion, he caused injuries to Shaykh Nasir
al-Din Mahmiid (Shaykh Nizam al-Din's khalifa or
faith of the culamd', upon the city there would rain from
heaven calamity and exile, famine and plague. successor at Delhi), who "in the opinion of everybody"
was the Shaykh of his age, and was obeyed by the
In the view of the writer, the comminations of the
whole population. Nasir al-Din Mahmfid, following
Shaykh were amply fulfilled. Within four years of the
event, all the culamjd who were in that mahizar, and the example of his pfrs (the great Chishti shaykhs),
others because of them, were exiled to Devgir thought it proper to endure all this and did not strive
(DawlatibSd). Most of them set out for Devgir, and fora retribution, until the time when this king at the end
mortal famine and epidemic appeared in the city of (ofhis life went to Thattha, which is a thousand karJhs
Delhi).3" These calamities were not at an end at the away from Delhi, on the campaign against the rebel
time of writing.1 Every word that had been spoken Taghi.38
by From there he summoned Shaykh Nasir al-
the blessed tongue of Hairat Sultdn al-mashrdikh (NizimDin Mahmfid together with Culamd' and holy men
al-Din) had come to pass.32 (from the capital of Delhi) to join him, and he did not
show to them the respect that they deserved. Trans-
The Siyar al-awliy*', which includes this notice of the
fate of the culamtd who participated in the mahiar andporting
of them thus brought the king from the throne
the city of Delhi itself, has no mention of the fate which
(takht) of sultanate to the planks (takhta) of the bier on
befell Sultan Ghiyath al-Din Tughluq. He was killed which he was borne back to the city (of Delhi).39
by the collapse of a pavilion of welcome after aDevout contemporaries sought for explanations of
victorious campaign, one stage away from the capital the lack of immediate retribution upon Sultan
to which he was returning. The pavilion was erected Muhammad
by bin Tughluq for his persecution of Sufi
his son and successor Muhammad bin Tughluq, and shaykhs and in particular for his coercion of Shaykh
some contemporaries considered that its collapse was Nasir al-Din Mahmiid, "the lamp of Delhi." The
not accidental.33 The silence of the Siyar al-awliyadShaykh himself, it is recorded, saw the Sultan's per-
secution as God's punishment for some undisclosed
regarding this event may have been a political one, as
fault of his own. "There was a matter between me and
the work was mostly written in the reign of a sovereign
of the dynasty who honoured the memory of his God. For that I suffered this."". The view of a fellow-
kinsman and predecessors.34 khalifa of Nizam al-Din, the aged Shaykh Burhdn al-
The death of Sultan Ghiyath al-Din Tughluq gave Din at Dawlatabad, was that the lack of divine retribu-
tion upon the Sultan was the result of Nasir al-Din
rise to one of the best known stories regarding Shaykh
Nizam al-Din, and to a popular proverb of which the Mahmfid's mild and forgiving character:
"When (Burhan al-Din Gharib) heard of the
Urdu translation is still current: "Delhi is yet far away!
(haniz Delh duir ast)" The Sultan, on his return fromimpolitenesses
a (bi-adabrhd) which Sultan Muhammad
victorious campaign in the east was threatening had
a committed against the Shaykh he wept and said:
further reckoning with the Shaykh, who is said to have "What can I do? Khond Mawlana Mahmfid (Nasir al-
made this pronouncement (nafas). The earliest clear Din Mahmfid) is mild and generous. At this time if he
reference to the Shaykh uttering the sentence is in the wishes he could bring down the whole of the army and
the people and the horses and elephants, not arousing
chronicle of Sihrindi, written just over a century later.35
Ibn Battilta, who was in Delhi a decade after the event,grief."41
ascribes the statement to astrologers, but he reportsHalf-a-century later and from the point of view of a
hagiographer of the rival Firdawsi silsila, it was the
that Nizim al-Din in an ecstasy had already bestowed
the kingdom on Muhammad bin Tughluq. It is pos- misconduct of Sultan Fer6z Shah Tughluq (regn.
sible that the association of the Shaykh with the1351-88) and of the shaykhs, culamad and population of
sentence had already been made, but Ibn Batti-ta,the
as city of Delhi in putting to death two disciples of
elsewhere, had misunderstood or misremembered the Shaykh Sharaf al-Din ManEri which brought about
narrative of his informant.36 the sequence of events of the downfall of the greater
Delhi sultanate.42 When the news of the execution of his
In spite of this anecdote of NizSm al-Din's
disciples reached Sharaf al-Din (in Bihar), he said:
premature approval of the new ruler, relations between
Sufi shaykhs and the reigning Sultan of Delhi reached "In a city where they have shed the blood of such
a nadir in the reign of Muhammad bin Tughluq
holy men--it would be strange if such a city continued
1325-51). Muhammad bin Tughluq's harsh treatment to flourish!"
of shaykhs, some examples of which are vividly des-It happened as he said. The ruin began in Fer6z
cribed by Ibn Battiita, continued for many years ShSh's lifetime. For all his pomp, the Sultan lost
control in the city itself. The son of the Sultan (i.e.
without injury to himself;"37 but in the opinion of the
author of the Siyar al-awliyd, it ultimately led to hisPrince Muhammad Shah) fought with the Wazfr
comfortless death in a distant land. Khan-i Jahan. Many Muslims were killed in the
incident and the city faced ruin. Then the royal slaves
Amir Khwurd observes that at the beginning of the
seized Delhi and fought with the son of the Sultan.
Sultan's rule, when the kingdom of Hindostan attained

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 THE SUFI SHAYKH AND THE SULTAN 75

After this, the Mughalsthat (i.e.

I haveAmir
attained, ITimur
have attainedwith
from thehisglance of
army) came and turned Delhithat darwish!"47
upside down.43
Though one may reject the explanation of
A fourteenth-century sourcethe cause
relates an alternative
of the de6bcle as being bestowal
Shaykh Sharaf
of kingship upon theal-Din's dis-Qaii
same Sultan. When
pleasure, this is an accurate brief
Hamid al-DIn summary
Nagawri (the Suhrawardi of the
friend of the
Chishticity
course of events in the capital shaykhof Qutb al-Din Bakhtyar
Delhi in theKaki) yearscame to
from 1387 to 1398.44 Delhi, he was in sama (musical parties) day and night,
until the Culamd arraigned him and made Sultan Iltut-
II SUFIS AND KINGMAKING: THE SHAYKH mish ask him for justification. QaZi Hamid stated that
he and the Sultan used to be in the same assemblies in
AS THE BESTOWER OF THE SULTAN'S GOOD
FORTUNE IN THE DELHI SULTANATE Baghdad, with the Qasi all night in samd and raqs
(dancing). The Sultan was the little slave-boy who
The corollary of the belief repeatedly visible in all
stood thenight by the lamp with a pair of scissors to
trim the wick.
narratives quoted above, that an offence against a Sufi
dardn shab turd mulk-i Hindistdn
shaykh will lead to the downfall of a ruler, is the belief
that such shaykhs also had the power to bestow bidddand z-dn chdkarf Cdrifdn
kingship
upon individuals whom they encountered, or to "Onforesee
that night for that service the 'knowers' (cdrifan,
the attainment of a throne by such men. Such mystics)
a beliefgave
is you the kingdom of Hind5stdn.'"48
more likely to flourish in a society where there Yet is no
another story of a bestowal of tidings of future
strong tradition of primogeniture or hereditarykingshiprule,
upon Iltutmish exists in four differing versions
and usurpations of power are common. This power
of varying degrees of elaboracy. The earliest exists in
attributed to Sufi shaykhs is one of the stockthe
images of
conversations of Shaykh NizSm al-Din, told by him
Persian poets of the period, among them Hdfiz: in 1309. The incident must be presumed, from the
personages,
dalq-i gadd-yi cishq-rd ganj buvad dar dstfn zid ba-saltanat rasad to have been set in Baghdad like the
harki buvad gadd-yi tu45 conferral recorded by cIsami reproduced above.49
"The cloak of the beggar of love has a treasure in its sleeve;
Shaykh Nizam al-Din's previous remarks in his conver-
Anyone who is your beggar swiftly attains sovereignty."
sation had been about Sultan Shams al-Din Iltutmish.
In India, during the Delhi sultanate and
Afterlater,
that he made another remark about him.
recorded examples of the bestowal of kingshipHe byhad
Sufis
met with Shaykh Shihab al-Din Suhrawardi
are numerous. The earliest anecdote is of the first
and Shaykh Awhad Kirmani, and one of them had said
to him, "You will be a King!"50
decade of the thirteenth century. HusSm al-Din CAwai
Khalji, who overran Bengal in the aftermath of the
In the early sixteenth century, Jamali sought to
initial conquest of Delhi, while he was travelling with a this information to another anecdote related by
attach
laden ass in the hilly region of modern Afghanistan
Juzjani of the purchase of Iltutmish by the trader
between Zawulistan and Ghor, was told by twofaqfrs:
Khwaja al-Din, who took him to sell in India. At the
"O Chief, go to Hind6stdn! We give you the country
age of fifteen, when he had discretion, the future Sultan
as far as Islam has spread!""46 passed before the khdnaqdh of Shaykh Shihbb al-Din
Such good fortune was less impressive if it was
Suhrawardi, and his gaze fell upon the Shaykh. Awhad
bestowed upon a prince who could claim to al-Din
be Kirmini was also present. The boy entered the
legitimate heir to a throne. In recollection and in folk
khdnaqdh and offered some broken pieces (of precious
tradition, such anecdotes were particularly liable to be
metal) from his waistband, asking for a recitation of
attached to slaves who rose to the throne; and thisthe
wasFdtiha. After the recitation, Shihib al-Din said:
the condition of the mamlzak or Slave Sultans of "I see the light of sultanate shining in the face of this
fellow!"
thirteenth-century Delhi. Jiizjani, the chronicler who
related the previous anecdote, records an anecdote of al-Din added:
Awhad
the second independent Sultan of Delhi, Shams al-Din
"From your baraka during his worldly rule his faith
will remain intact."5'
Iltutmish (regn. 1210-35). JfizjanI states that he heard
the story from a trustworthy witness who had heardLong it before JamMli's embellishments, another
from the lips of the Sultan himself: hagiographical tradition had transferred the credit of
As a boy-slave at Bukhara, the future Sultanthis wasbestowal to the first of the Chishti shaykhs in India,
sent out to purchase grapes. In the street he lostMucin
the al-Din. The transfer is first made by a less
money and started to cry. A faqfr took his hand, scrupulous source, one of the spurious collections of
bought some grapes, and told him: Malfigadt of the line of Chishti shaykhs produced in
"When you attain rule and dominion, take care that
direct and almost immediate imitation of the Fawdfid
you show respect tofaqrrs and holy folk!" al-fu'~d.52 The narration is (falsely) attributed to Qutb
The Sultan added:
al-Din Bakhtyir Kaki who has figured in previous
"I swore this to him, and the good fortune and rule
anecdotes:

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76 JOURNAL OF PERSIAN STUDIES

Shaykh Mucin al-Din Hasan in

Sijzi,
which Shaykh
it is set, the Awhad
middle of the thirteenth century.
The account
Kirmani, Shaykh Shihib al-Din is of the future
Suhrawardi and Sultan's
I visit to Shaykh
myself were sitting together andFarid
we al-Din
wereat Ajodhan.tales
telling Balban,
ofthen known by the
title of Ulugh
past saints. Sultan Shams al-Din-may God Khan, was defending the western
illuminate
his proofs-was then twelve marches
yearsofold and
the Delhi at that
sultanate against the incursions of
the
moment passed by with a cup in Mongols.
his hand. He The
cherished an ambition to succeed the
glance
of those holy men fell upon him, reigningandSultan, his father-in-law
straightaway a Nasir al-Din
pronouncement (nafas) came out from
Mahmuid. theKhan
Ulugh tongue
offeredof the Shaykh a sum of
Shaykh Mucin al-Din Hasan Sijzi: silver and the grants (mithdl) of four villages. Farid
accepted
"This child will be King of Delhi. Godthe silver
will notbuttake
not the grants. Balban then
demanded
him from the world till he reaches some statement of "what the Shaykh had in
kingship."
Then the khwdja (Qutb al-Din)mind."remarked:
Farid al-Din replied with a suitably oracular
pronouncement.
"The tidings (nafas) of holy men He recited two couplets of Persian
are a fine thing!""53
We may note that the author of
verse, this
which narrative
might be interpreted as an injunction to
(pseudo-Farid al-Din) has madethe the recipient
inquirer to rule wellmore
should of
he attain to power in
a child (kjdak), three years younger
spite ofthan
evident the youthful
imperfections of character ("he was no
warrior with some savings to offer the Shaykh
angel"). According as he
to the Siyar al-awliyd this answer
appears in Jamali's version. To achieve
appears to kingship at future
have pleased the this usurper.57
period he needs must have been a slave,
Perhaps the mostand the of
powerful cup
all the Sultans of Delhi
(kdsa) in his hand would indicatewasthatCAl'he al-Din
was Khalji
employed (regn. 1295-1316), who
as a youthful cupbearer (sdqzi). murdered his uncle and usurped the throne. The
The seventeenth-century Chishtifourteenth-century
hagiography verse
Siyarchronicle of CIsami, which
al-aqftdb also gives the creditdraws
fora these
significant "tidings"
amount of its to material from folk
Mucin al-Din; tradition, records that he received two nominations to
One day Mucin al-Din was sitting in the
sovereignty company
from the wilder ofbF-shar' end of the spec-
Awhad al-Din Kirmani and Shihab al-Din CUmar trum of Sufi behaviour. CIsami's first anecdote is of a
Suhrawardi. Suddenly the future Sultan passed
madmanbyknown (possibly in mockery) as Qai cAlam,
with a bow and arrow in his hand. who was in the habit of throwing stones from a balcony
"My friends!", Mucin al-Din observed, "this child in the same town of Karra, an important southern
frontier
will be Sultan of Delhi, for I have seen in the tablet (of town close to modern Allahabad, and of
the heavens) that he will not leave the world untilwandering
he through the bazaar there with an African
becomes Sultan of Delhi.""54 servant cracking a whip. He proffered a ring to CAl'
This anecdote has added a touch of grandeur to al-Din
its who was passing by, and proclaimed that the
realm of Hind6stan was bestowed upon him."58 The
predecessor, with the Shaykh looking at the "preserved
tablet" of the heavens, while the bow and arrow, gesture of this darwgsh seems to be a remote
reminiscence of the divine investiture of the Sasanian
substituted for the cup in the preceding source, suitably
prefigure a military career. rulers of Iran by the bestowal of a ring or wreath;59 a
In the case of the next slave to attain the throne of similar gesture by a darwish is also recorded in
Delhi, Sultan Ghiyath al-Din Balban (regn. 1266-87),
eleventh-century Iran.6o The second bestowal was from
two accounts of the bestowal of kingship resemble
the majdhkb or madman known as Khwija Gurg
those related with regard to the choice by faqirs of
("Wolf"), also of the town of Karra. Gurg greeted the
Iltutmish in his boyhood. In Delhi or in Bukharafuture
the Sultan as he rode up to the shop-platform where
boy-slave Balban made an offering to afaqTr, who thenhe was seated, remarking that God had made him the
bestowed the realm of Hind6stan upon him. rider The of Fortune (dawlat, also the power of the state).61
offering was a copper coin and the place of the incidentSultan Ghiyath al-Din Tughluq is said in a con-
temporary
was Delhi, according to the story told to Ibn Battuita in poem to have been nominated to the throne
Delhi itself in the third decade of the fourteenth
by a unnamed pfr whom he saw in a dream. It may
century."55 It was in Bukhara, and the gifthave
wasbeen
a politic of Amir Khusraw not to name the
pomegranate according to the verse chronicle of
pfr.62 In modern oral tradition of the Panjab, "BTaba"
cIsaiml, who wrote in the Deccan some twenty Farid al-Din is said to have nominated this monarch,
years
evidently many decades before the fulfilment of the
after the Arab traveller heard the story in Delhi.56
A third account, also recorded in the fourteenth
prophecy."63
Regarding Ghiyath al-Din's son and successor
century, regarding the bestowal of kingship on Balban,
when the latter was not a slave-boy but a powerful and
MuIhammad bin Tughluq, Ibn Battfita, a contempor-
ary foreign
ambitious general, is found in the Siyar al-awliyJJ. The observer, records the belief that Shaykh
Nizam of
incident is historically plausible and is an indication al-Din while in a state of ecstasy had said:
the growing influence of the Chishti silsila in the "We have given him the kingdom!"64
period

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 THE SUFI SHAYKH AND THE SULTAN 77

At the time when Ibn Battita wasfrom

3. The Tidings in the
Delhi, the al-Dfn
tongue of Niazdm worst
troubles between Sultan Muhammad bin Tughluq and
In the days when
the Sufi shaykhs were just beginning. ItSultan FEr5z was
is not a little boy, he
surprising
that this anecdote is not found in later Chishti went to kiss the Shaykh's feet (i.e. to pay his respects to
sources.65
the Shaykh) in Ghiyathpiir. The Shaykh was much
Nominations to sovereignty by Sufi shaykhs continue pleased by the greeting of Far6z.
in the period from the later fourteenth century to the "My boy (babd), what's your name?" the Shaykh
sixteenth century. In the case of the last major ruler ofasked.
the greater Delhi Sultanate, Sultan Fro6z Shah "Kamal al-Din," the future Sultan replied.
Tughluq, the panegyrical historian of his reign, Sultan FEr6z had the laqab (honorific name) KamSl
Shams-i Siraj CAfif, presents the Sultan himself in the al-Din ("Perfection of the Faith"). When the Shaykh
guise of a holy man. cAfif provides a predictably ornate heard this, he immediately pronounced:
version of the bestowal of kingship on his subject. He "Life to perfection (i.e. a long life)! Fortune (dawlat,
derives the ascent of the throne by Sultan FEr5z Shah implying sovereignty) to perfection! Grace (ni'mat) to
from the "tidings" (bashardt) spoken by four different perfection!"'67
Sufi shaykhs. This multiplicity itself perhaps reflects the
vogue among later fourteenth-century Sufis for acquir-
ing a plurality of spiritual lineages, becoming a 4. The Tidings from Shaykh Nasfr al-Dfn Mahmad
"gatherer of the threads" (jadmic al-saldsil).66 The struc-
ture of each of the four anecdotes given by CAfif has When Sultan Muhammad was pursuing the rebel
analogues elsewhere in the corpus of Sufi anecdotalTaghi to Thattha in Sind,68 he took Shaykh Nasir al-
literature. CAfif sets their patterns beside one another Din Mahmfid in his entourage. After Sultan Muham-
with the somewhat ingenuous artistry which is charac- mad's death in Thattha, Sultan FEr6z ascended the
teristic of his whole composition: throne. Shaykh Nasir al-Din Mahmfid sent him a
message, asking him if he was going to rule his people
justly? Otherwise, another ruler would be requested
from God (i.e. by the prayers of the Shaykh). Sultan
1. The Tidings of Shaykh CAld' al-Dfn, grandson of Shaykh FEr6z sent the reply that he would observe clemency
Farid al-Dfn
(hilm) and act with the consensus (ittifdq). When the
Shaykh heard this, he sent an answer that, if the Sultan
When Sultan Ghiyath al-Din Tughluq (uncle of
behaved with such humanity towards the people, he
FEr6z Shah) was muq.ta (Governor) of DipSlpfir, he
would ask for forty years (of life and rule) for him from
God.
went to meet Shaykh CAlI' al-Din (at Ajodhan). The
Shaykh had in front of him a roll of unsewn cloth. He CAfif here notes that some people told the story that
tore four-and-a-half yards (gaz) from the cloth andShaykh Nasir al-Din Mahmud sent thirty-nine dates to
gave it to Sultan Tughluq, telling him to tie it around the Sultan (i.e. one for each year of future rule beyond
his head. He gave twenty-seven yards to Sultanthe current year). His notice concludes:
Muhammad and forty yards to Sultan FEr6z, to be tied "Hurrah for Tidings upon Tidings!"69
around their heads. As a result of the pronouncements This last anecdote anticipates a trend, visible in the
of the Shaykh, they each ruled for the corresponding following century and later, of shaykhs participating in
number of years. After this, as the Shaykh had given the public acknowledgement or enthronement of
the whole of the remainder of the roll to Sultan FEr5z, Sultans.
the kingdom came to an end with him. "After his Among the successor states to the greater Delhi
departure (death), this city of Delhi came to an end,sultanate we have evidence of traditions of such
that is to say, it was sacked." nominations. Sufi shaykhs and their actual or alleged
bestowals of kingship also played a considerable part in
determining the rise to power of the new ruling
dynasties and the succession among their members.
2. The Tidings heard from the tongue ofShaykh Sharafal- In Bengal, the first area to break away from the
DFn (BuiiAli Qalandar) of Panipat control of the Delhi Sultans in the fourteenth century
CAli Mubarak, the future Sultan cAl~' al-Din CAli- Shah
When the same three members of the Tughluq (regn. in West Bengal 1339-46) saw Shaykh Jalal al-
dynasty went to meet Shaykh Sharaf al-Din, the Din Tabrizi, who promised him rule over "the prov-
Shaykh ordered his servitors (khddiman) to bring foodince of Bang" if he should build him a khanaqdh at
in a bowl (kasa). When all three of his visitors put their Pandwa.70
hands into the bowl, Shaykh Sharaf al-Din said: The chronicles of fifteenth-century Gujarit mention
"Three kings are eating from one bowl!" the nomination of the founder of the ruling house,

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 78 JOURNAL OF PERSIAN STUDIES

would wear a royal

Zafar KhSn, by the Suhrawardi BukhFir crown. He also
shaykh fromrevealed the site of
a buried treasure, instructing
Ucch, Jalal al-Din "Makhdfim-i Jahaniyin", Hasan to raise an army
a promi-
nent Sufi of the latter years of with it.77 SirajShih
Feroz al-Din's successors
Tughluq'sat Gulbarga claimed
that theircentury,
reign.71 In the course of the fifteenth lineage had conferred
some sovereignty
of on the
Jalal al-Din's descendants settled in Gujarat
Bahmani Sultans.78and inter-
Following the example of their
married with the ruling family. According
ancestor toSultans
they invested successive one with a turban,
possibly partial source, among these
a tunic and descendants of When the
a girdle of coarse (khddi) cloth.79
Jaldl al-Din, Shah cAlam of Sarkhejgarmentsplayed a decisive
of investiture were treated with disrespect by
part in the events which led to theSultan
succession
Mahmuid Bahmani in(regn.
1458 of the last
1482-1518),
Mahmfid Begarhi, the greatest of powerful
the Gujarat Sultans.
ruler of the dynasty, these are said to have
Mahmid Begarha was both a nephew bybymarriage
been bestowed the incumbent shaykhandon YuisufcAdil
a stepson of this shaykh.72 The "Bukhiri
Khih, Sayyids",
founder of the new ruling house of the Sultans of
descendants of Jalil al-Din, participated
Bijipuir.80 in a rite of
Following
enthronement. Thus in 1554 Sayyid Mubirak the sackBukhSari,
of Delhi in 1398, the last great
Chishti shaykh of
a descendant of "Makhdaim-i Jahdniydn", ledthe Delhi
thesultanate,
boy Sayyid Muham-
king Ahmad III up to the throne.73
mad GEsfidaraz, came to settle in the Bahmani capital
In the Deccan, the mid-fourteenth century
of Gulbarga and playedfounder
a decisive role in the succession
of Shihab al-Din Ahmad Shah Bahmani (Ahmad I) in
of the Bahmani
received "tidings"dynasty, H.asan
of his future Kangui, isfrom
sovereignty said to have 1422.81 The latter monarch, in order to support his
Shaykh Nizim al-Din of Delhi. The Shaykh had given authority, within a few years imported from Iran the
a general invitation to a feast at the khanaqgh, in which heirs of another shaykh of similar attributes and power-
the future Sultan Muhammad bin Tughluq had ful reputation, ShSh Nicmat Allah of MahSn. The
shared. As he left the Shaykh pronounced: historical record is clear that it was largely through the
"A Sultan has gone and a Sultan is coming!"74 support of GEsuidarSz that Ahmad I was victorious
The Shaykh then ordered his servitor to bring in a man over his brother the reigning Sultan Fer6z, and set
standing at the gate. After hesitating when he saw his aside the claims of his nephew Hasan; but Ahmad later
shabby clothes, the servitor brought in Hasan Kangfi. claimed that his elevation to the throne had been
As the food of the feast had already been distributed, preceded by a dream in which Shih Nicmat Allah Wall
NizSm al-Din gave him a round of bread which he of Kirman had with his own hands offered to him the
pronounced to be an umbrella (chatr) of sovereignty royal crown. The dream was followed (probably years
which would long endure.75 later) by a letter of investiture from this shaykh.82 Sultan
Other sources ascribe the promotion of Hasan Ahmad himself claimed the Sufi rank of WalF, and his
Khngui to the baraka of a shaykh established in the heirs retained this title down to the end of the
western Deccan, Shaykh Siraj al-Din Junaydi, whose dynasty.83 As was the case with the Muslim ruling
murfd Hasan became.76 Siraj al-Din is said to have house of Gujarat, Sufi shaykhs played a prominent part
placed his turban in Hasan's hands, and when the latter in the enthronement ceremony of the Bahmani Sultans
placed it upon his own head, the Shaykh said that he of the Deccan.84

S. Digby, "The Sufi Shaikh as a Source of Authority in Mediaeval

India", Purusdrtha IV (Paris, 1986) [= Digby 1986 (1)], pp. alfy.z,
asfiyy Digby Ms1914),
55-77.
(Lucknow, 11, folios 481 b-482a; Ghulaim Sarwar, KhazTnat al-
II, p. 58.
2 See Digby 1986 (1), pp. 62-3. '~ That such ascetics, retired from the world and disclaiming worldly
ambitions, should be a focus for the plots of those disaffected
3 Barani, Ta'rfkh-i Firjzshdhr (Calcutta, 1862), p. 325. Badaiyu-ni,
Muntakhab al-tawdrfkh (Calcutta, 1868), I, p. 266. Cf. also Barani's
towards the ruler is taken for granted in an anecdote of the Kitdb al-
remarks on the protective influence of Nizim al-Din's predecessor
Taj of pseudo-Jahiz, composed in Baghdad under the CAbbisids.
Shaykh Farid al-Din, and of other great shaykhs during the We are told
reign of that the Sasanian monarch Khusraw Parwiz caused a
Sultan Balban (1266-87); Barani, TFS, p. 112. foster-brother to set up as such a holy man, in order to act as agent-
4 I.e. the next world.
provocateur towards those disaffected against the monarch's rule; see
5 cIsami, Futah al-salatfn, ed. A. S. Usha (Madras, 1948), p. 456. Ch. Pellat, tr., Le livre de la couronne (Paris, 1954), pp. 125-7. Cf.
6 Amir Hasan CAlf Sijzi, Fawhdid al-fu'dd (Lahore, 1966), p. 185. Digby 1986 (1), pp. 66-7 for fears said to have been expressed by
7 Ibid., p. 374. an unnamed Sultan of Delhi regarding Mawldina Ashraf al-Din
8 Amir Khwurd, Siyar al-awliyd) (Delhi, A. H. 1302), p. 518. Tawwima that "from the excess of the obedience of the popula-
9 CAfif, Ta'rfkh-i Firjzshdhr (Calcutta, 1891), pp. 330-1. Regarding tion... he might seize the realm."
the establishment of such official khanaqdhs, Sayyid Jalil al-Din" Barani, TFS, 209-12; CIsdmi, 215-17. Among modern secondary
remarked that he had been appointed Shaykh al-Isldnz of Sind- works, see S. H. Hodivala, Studies in Indo-Muslim History (Bombay,
Siwistin by Sultan Muhammad b. Tughluq and had been given 1939), I. pp. 267-8; K. A. Nizami, Some Aspects of Politics and
charge of forty khdnaqdhs; but he went on Hajj and spent six years in Religion in India During the Thirteenth Century (Aligarh, 1961),
the Holy Places (HIaramayn); Alf al-Din Husayni, Khuldsat al- pp. 288-91; Digby, "Qalandars and Related Groups: Elements of

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 THE SUFI SHAYKH AND THE SULTAN 79

Social Deviance in the Religious Life'7of the Delhi

"This place Sultanate of to
also" refers theNizam al-Din's p
Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries", thein Y. Friedmann,
city to the suburbed.,
ofIslam
Ghiyathpfir, not
in Asia Jerusalem, 1984), I. pp. 67-8 1986
[= Digby 1984].
(1), p. 68. Even in this
case, the Sultan's treatment of the '"Shaykh was thought
Siyar al-awliy', by near-
pp. 132-5; cf. Jamali, Siyar
contemporaries to have had dire consequences for the
'9 This reference realm.
suggests Wethe completion
that
are told that a black wind arose on the day
mosque at of Sidi
Siri, Muwallih's ascribed to t
traditionally
death, and both Barani and CIsami attribute
century, thebe
should subsequent
dated to this reign.
drought and famine at Delhi and 20inSiyar
neighbouring
al-awliycd,areas to his
pp. 150-1. Barani gives a
death. Barani also ascribes the subsequent troubles
the growth of the
of the realm of
hostility ofthe Sultan tow
the Khalji Sultans to the misfortune prospect
of his death.
of the downfall of the Sultan, he re
2 Examples outside India of Sufi lineages
as day assuming
to observersroyal
whenpowers
he began to abuse
include the Safavids of Iran, descendants
and to of Shaykh
forbid the Safi al-Din
maliks of his court to
Ardabill, the Naqshbandi khwdjas who displaced the
Ghiyathpuir. Khans
Time andof the in divers form
again
Eastern Horde in eastern Turkistan insaid
the with
seventeenth century,
the tongue and
of recklessness that he w
the Qaramanlus of Anatolia in the thirteenth
tankas of century (see man
gold to the Neshri,
who brought the
Cihannuma (Ankara, 1949), I, pp. 42-2).
Then heIn met
the middle
Shaykh of the al-Din at the re
Nizam
nineteenth century, the Akhond dynasty rose
day after to power
death in theinenclosure
Swat. of Shaykh
Among unsuccessful Sufi contenders forwhere the Sultan
thrones one may did notthe
cite: show courtesy to
acknowledgecentury,
faqfr Shaydi in Bengal in the mid-fourteenth his salutation.
see IbnWishing to pi
Battfita, Rihla, tr. M. Hussain (Baroda,
Shaykh,1953), p. 237;
he took as a (Beirut,
companion the Shaykh
1964), p. 612; Shah Jalal Gujarati, an put to death
enemy for his
of Nizam royal and summoned
al-Din,
Rukn
pretensions by a Sultan of Bengal in the al-Dincentury,
fifteenth of Multan to the capital city
see cAbd
The Barani
al-Haqq Dehlavi, Akhbar al-akhyar (Delhi, A. H.variant
1309), has a briefer
p. 168; and account of th
Nizam of
the late eighteenth-century sajjada-nashFns al-Din,
Farid the "Pole-star
al-Din Chishti of the wo
at Pakpattan, who fought the Sikh misls at the head of their own
inhabitants"; Digby Ms 57, f. 144. Ibn Battf
levies of tribal devotees, see S. M. Latif, History of of
the Shaykhzada the Punjab,
Jam as Shaykh Shihab a
(Lahore, 1892), p. 313, and Richard account
M. Eaton,of "The Political and and death at
his imprisonment
Religious Authority of the Shrine of madBababin Tughluq;
Farid", in B. Rihla,
Metcalf,III, pp. 293-8; t
700.
ed., Moral Conduct and Authority: the Place ofThis
AdabShaykhzdda must
in South Asian Islamtherefore be di
(Berkeley, 1984), p. 350. Shaykhzdda Husam al-Din who a few years lat
Amir Khusraw Dehlavi, Majnan Layld, ed. M. Habib
proceedings al-Rahman
against Nizam al-Din before S
Khan (Aligarh, 1917), p. 13; idem, Khamsa,
Tughluq; ed.
see A.A.
note 24Ashrafi
below.
(Tehran, 1362 Shamsi), p. 150; quoted by Amir
21 Siyar Khwurd
al-awliy', at For
p. 151. the other accounts
head of his notice of "the coming Sultan
of the Kings of the Mubarak
Qutb al-Din time as and Shayk
beggars to the court of the Sultan of Hamid
Shaykhs Nizam al-Din",
Qalandar, Khayr Siyar
al-majalis, p. 258; Ja
al-awly', 130. pp. 74-5, 75-8. Jamali tells the same story o
Sultan and
4 Ibid., 135. For the transmission of authority Shaykh
in the with
Chishti the of
silsila same outcome,
circumstantial
the Delhi sultanate, see Digby, "Tabarrukdt details, Among
and Succession some of which conf
the Great Chishti Shaykhs of the Delhisource;
earlier Sultanate", in 16,
cf. notes R. E.25, 51.
Frykenberg, ed., Delhi Through the Ages
22 See (Delhi,
below, p. 1986)
76. [= Digby
1986 (2)], 63-103; and Digby, 1986 (1),
23 pp.al-'criJin,
Siyar 69-71. p. 88. For the theory of th
treasury
This appears to be an oblique reference to theand of distribution
conspiracy around to the need
Sidi Muwallih in the previous reign. ~Tifa isMohammedan
Aghnides, not used in the Theories of Financ
specific sense assigned to it in the historical scheme
pp. 431-79; of Qureshi,
cf. I. H. J. Spencer
The Administrat
Trimingham, The Sufi Orders in Islam4th
DelhT, (Oxford, 1971);1958),
ed. (Karachi, for pp. 241-2, qu
animadversions on this scheme, see Digby's review
24 Another in BSOAS
early source mentions as leade
XXXVI, (1973), pp. 136-7. The maliks compiled
and amfrs the
of mahiar (legal judgement) t
the quotation
above were major and minor grades ofMinhaj
officers of the
(the sultanate,
13th century inhistorian Jfizj
theory commandants of 1,000 and 100.
Tabaqdt-i Nasirt) and the Shaykh al-Islam; As
16 An anecdote narrated by Barant indicates
Maktubat-ithat 'Alad al-Din
Ashrafi, had Ms Or. 267, f
BM [BL]
some faith in the paranormal powers of part
the Shaykh Nizam
played by al-Din. The
this immigrant Shaykhz
Sultan, not having had news for forty days of
faintly the fate of
derogatory the army
though evidently current
which he had despatched in the autumn
cf.of 1309
Ibn to Warangal
Battfta, Rihla, in the
tr. Husain, pp. 71, 8
eastern Deccan under his slave-general Malik
above. It Na'ib from
is evident (Malik
Ibn Battfita's n
travels,
Kaffir), sent two of his high officials to Nizam and from
al-Din to the
findconversations
out of
how they had fared from the Shaykh's powers of and
GEsfidaraz discovery
from(kashfu
other references, t
kardmat). The Shaykh prophesied their victorious
between return,
the numerous and
foreigners from th
further victories thereafter; Barani, TFS, pp.
sought 330-2.
their A lengthier
fortunes at the court of the fou
Sultans
account of this consultation of the Shaykh byand
thethe old established
Sultan, with the Muslim fami
names of intermediaries and other apparently
see circumstantial
Ibn Battutia, Rihla, tr. Husain, p. 107
details, is given by Jamali, Siyar al-a&rifrn (Delhi, A.H. 1311),
Ta'rfkh-i Firozshdhf, pp. 461-2; Sayyi
Husayni,
pp. 78-9. For Jamali's credibility, see Jawami'
notes 21, al-kalim (Kanpur-Hyder
25, 51 below.
Another incident shows amicable relations between
1352 Fasli), p. 136; Sultan 'Ala1
Sihrindi, Ta'?rkh-i Mubadr
al-Din and the Shaykh. When there 2"was grave
Siyar trouble(Calcutta,
al-'driftn from the 1931), pp. 88-9.
Mongols (mal&in, "the accursed ones"),butSultan
Jamali'Alf5
is inclined
al-Din to fill
sent a out from ima
messenger to Nizam al-Din, telling himrather
to than
come from
within another
the citytradition the det
walls of Delhi, and the Shaykh is shown as about
earlier sources;to move into 1984,
see Digby the p. 93.
city on the morrow or the day after26 Siyar
that; al-awliy&,
HIamid Qalandar,pp. Khayr
526-30. For the Qalan
al-majalis, ed. Nizami (Aligarh, 1959),
thepp. 261-2. The
problems most
posed by likely
them, see Digby 198
occasion for this incident is just before the al-awly
27 Siyar battle of Kili
a, p. in 1299.
528-9. Maktabat-i AshraJff,

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80 JOURNAL OF PERSIAN STUDIES

enemies of the Shaykh "fell ill in that very

9 Siyar assembly,
al-awliyad, and in
pp. 245-6. More correctly, two
the Sultan or
summoned
three days most of the accusers took their
Shaykh Nasir baggage
al-Din Mahmfid to the
and other caravan
notables of Delhi to
of the Last Day." Kathiawar before his army crossed the Rann of Kacch to Thattha
28 Siyar al-'driftn, p. 90. The Qdz'rs name in Sind. is there given as Rukn al-
Din. 40 Ibid., p. 246. Cf. Khayr al-majalis, Nizami's introduction, p. 58.
29 See the anecdote of the undoing of the Khwrazmshih, quoted
4' Husayni, Jawdmi' al-kalim, p. 240.
above. 42 For the hostility between the Chishti and Firdawsi silsilas, see
Digby, 1986 (1), pp. 63-7.
30 Two years after the death of Nizdm al-Din, the transfer of the
population of Delhi to Devgir or Dawlatabad was initiated 43 in
Shaykh Shu'ayb, Mandqib al-a.sfiyd. (Calcutta, 1895), p. 130.
1327. The date of the move, which has been contested, is 44con-
See K. S. Lal, Twilight of the Sultanate, (Bombay, 1963), pp. 1-15,
27-31; substantially reinterpreted by Digby, War-Horse and
firmed by the variant recension of Barani, Ta'rfkh-i FkrjzshdhT,
Digby Ms 57, f. 160; Bodleian Ms 173, f. 191; Bihamad Khani,
Elephant in the Delhf Sultanate (Oxford, 1971), pp. 74-82.
Ta'rfkh-i MuhammadF, BM [BL] Ms Or. 137, ff. 399-400. The
45 DTwdn-i Hafiz, ed. M. Qazwini and A. Ghanl (Tehran, 1320
Shamsi, No. 411, p. 284. Cf. ibid., No. 49, bayt 7, p. 35:
mention of famine and plague (wabd) appear to refer to the period
of the return of Muhammad bin Tughluq to Delhi with an armyKings are the direction of prayer of the world, and yet
bearing the disease (possibly the great bubonic plague of the BlackIts reason is service of the presence of darvishs.
Death) after his Warangal expedition; see Barani, Ta'rfkh-i Frjzt- 4'Minhij-i Sirlj Jiizjani, Tabaqdt-i Ndsirf (Calcutta, 1864),
shdhr, pp. 481-2; Digby Ms 57, f. 161; Bodleian Ms 173, ff. 194-5; pp. 160-1.
mIsSmi, pp. 469-71. The standard recension of Barani is specific 47 Ibid.,
on p. 167.
famine around Delhi at the time of the Sultan's return, while48the 'Isimi, p. 119; cf. Nizami, Some Aspects of Religion and Politics in India
variant mentions the gradual drifting back of the population from During the Thirteenth Century, pp. 302-3.
Dawlatabad which preceded this. IsSmi is clear that the epidemic 49 The earliest anecdote, recorded by JiizjanT with a more than fair
still affected the army when the Sultan marched from Dawlatabad semblance of historicity, is set in Bukhara. In the late twelfth-
to Delhi; and GEsfidardz describes its ravages in Delhi around century, a boy-slave could have been brought from Bukhara to
1337, see Husayni, Jawamical-kalim, p. 293. A. M. Husain givesBaghdad, a but this diminishes the likelihood of him subsequently
date of January 1335 to July 1337 for "the Emperor's journey becoming a slave-elite soldier in the Ghorid army of India. For the
from Delhi to Warangal and back," but advances no reasons for purpose of this anecdote and those which follow, Baghdad had a
his conjecture; see his Tughluq Dynasty (Calcutta, 1963), p. 657.much greater Sufi charisma in this period; and the future ruler's
The question arises whether these words are part of the quotation transfer there would have been necessary for his encounter with
from the lost Hasrat-ndma of Barani, or a remark of Amir Khwurd some of the shaykhs mentioned. See also notes 50, 53 below.
himself. If they were the latter, they could date from as late aso ca.
Fawd)id al-fu'dd, p. 358; conversation of 13 Safar 1319/5 April
1400, when the latest additions to the text of the Siyar al-awliy&d 1319. The association of Shihab al-Din Suhrawardi and Awhad al-
appear to have been made. This is improbable in view of the Din Kirmani in Baghdad is well attested: see the early anonymous
tranquillity and partial return to prosperity of the early decades Mandqib-i
of Awhad al-Drn, ed. B. Firuzanfarr (Tehran, 1347 Shamsi),
the reign of Fer6z Shah Tughluq. If, as is likely, the words are passim.
those of the Hasrat-ndma, it is unlikely that they were written at the
51 Siyar al-drifin, pp. 112-13. As elsewhere, Jamali has tidied up the
same time as the accounts by Barani in his Ta'rfkh-i Fkrjzshdahanecdote of as found in his source and adorned it with picturesque
Muhammad bin Tughluq's reign. The first of these was evidently details giving it a bogus but attractive circumstantiality.
"2 M. Habib first recognized the character of such spurious collec-
completed in 1354, and the revised version two years later. In these
there is no mention of Nizam al-Din's displeasure among the causes tions of Chishti Malf7zd~t, and he also noted the evidence for their
of the disasters, which are there ascribed to the waywardness of the circulation before the middle of the fourteenth century; see Habib,
Sultan Muhammad. It would therefore seem likely that the Hasrat- ed. Nizami, Politics and Society During the Early Medieval Period
ndma is a composition from an earlier phase of Barani's thought, (Aligarh-New Delhi, 1974), I, pp. 402, 410-11; cf. Hamid
probably written between 1335 and 1340. Qalandar, Khayr al-majalis, pp. 52-3. Further evidence for this
32 Siyar al-awliyd', pp. 531-2. dating is provided by citations of the malffiz-i Khwdja Quktb al-Drn in
3 The accusation is openly voiced by Ibn Battuita, whose account
the (genuine) Malfagt of Sharaf al-Din ManEri, Mukhkh al-ma'dnf,
was recorded, out of range of the wrath of the Tughluqs, in the Digby Ms 8, ff. 27a, 45b. The presence of Mui'n al-Din in this
distant Maghrib; Rihla, III, pp. 212-13; tr. Gibb, III, pp. 654-5. company at Baghdad is at best doubtful; see Digby 1986 [1],
34 Cf. the efforts of FEr6z Shah to procure letters of satisfaction p. 62; P. M. Currie, The Shrine and Cult of Mu'Tn al-DTn (Delhi,
(khuth7t-i khwushniadit from the heirs of those whom Sultan Muham- Oxford University Press, 1989), Map on front endpaper of places
mad had killed or mutilated; Futaihft-i Ftrjzshdhi, ed. S.A. Rashid associated by successive hagiographers with the travels of the
(Aligarh, 1954), p. 16; tr. in Elliot and Dowson, History of India, Shaykh.
IV, p. 385. 51 Pseudo-Farid al-Din, Fawaid al-salikfn (Delhi, Mujtabai Press,
3" Sihrindi, Ta'rTkh-i Mubdrakshdhi, p. 97. A calque of this story, set in 1311/1892). p. 16.
the Deccan some fifty years later, displays the Bahmani Sultan 54 Ilihdiya Chishti, Siyar al-aqtab, p. 134. Ilahdiya is drawing upon
Mujahid Shah (regn. 1375-8) struck down by the sword of an Pseudo-Farid quoted above, affording an identifiable instance of
African slave as he returned from the siege of Adhoni for a the travelling of a visibly falsified anecdote from a less reputable
reckoning with Shaykh Siraj al-Din Junaydi; see Muhammad source into a more honest, if credulous, compilation.
SultSn, Armughdn-i Sultant (Agra, 1902), p. 167. * Rihla, III, p. 171; tr. Husain, p. 36.
36 Rihla, III, 212-13. For the bestowal of the kingdom by Sufi shaykhs 5b 'Isami, pp. 123-4.
and this instance, see below. 7 Siyar al-awliya), pp. 79-80. The story of the visit of Ulugh Khan,
"7 Rihla, III, pp. 293-311; tr. Gibb, III, pp. 697-706; for the Sultan's without mention of the inquiry and prophecy, is told in Fawarid al-
quarrel with the shaykhs, see M. Habib, "Shaikh Nasiruddin fu'ad, p. 171, and again in Siyar al-awliy&, p. 250.
Mahmud Chiragh-i-Delhi as a Great Historical Personality", repr.
-a Isami, pp. 225-6. The name of this man, which can be inferred
in Politics and Society during the Early Medieval Period: Collected Works from p. 225, line 2, and p. 226, line 5, is given in the rubric on
of Professor Mohammad Habib, ed. Nizami (Aligarh-Delhi, 1974), p. 224. He is described as from Damascus.
pp. 367-73. 9 For depictions of the divine bestowal on Sasanian monarchs, see F.
Sarre, Die Kunst des alten Persien (Berlin, 1922), pp. 37-8, 42, Pls 70,
- See Digby, "Muhammad bin Tughluq's Last Years in Kathiavad
and his Invasions of Thatha", in H. Khuhro, ed., Sind Through the 71, 78, 81. For the survival of this symbolism in the Islamic world,
Centuries (Karachi, 1981), pp. 130-8, and references there given. see Ernest J. Grube, "Fostat Fragments" in B. W. Robinson, ed.,

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 THE SUFI SHAYKH AND THE SULTAN 81

above Book
Islamic Painting and the Arts of the and the rubric of Amir Khwurd
(London, cited in note
1976), p.13. 35.
60 For Bdbd Tdhir's bestowal of a 7"ring
Tabitabii, Burhdn-ithe
from ma'dthir
top (Delhi-Hyderabad,
of his waterpot 1936), p. 12;
Firishta,
(ibrfq) on the Seljuk Sultan Tughril Ta'rfkh
Beg, see(Bombay, 1832), I, p. 520;
Rawandi, Rdhat(Kanpur,al-
1874), I,
sudar (London, 1921), p. 99. 274; .Zafar al-walih, I, p. 159. For Shaykh Nizam al-Din bestowing
61 cIsami, p. 229. That the name of the
a round majdhiub
(qurs) was
of bread, of. Khayr Gurg,
al-majalis, p. 10. and not
Karak as remembered in modern times,
76 Muhammad Sultan,is evident
Armughan-i Sultant, from his
p. 157, citing Rafi al-Din
recorded remarks and verses; see Shirazi,
Digby 1984,
Tadhkirat pp. 98, 107 note 116.
al-mulak.
62 Amir Khusraw, Tughluq-ndma (Hyderabad-Awrangabad,
77 Armughdn-i Sultanf, p. 158. The story of the buried 1352/
treasure
1933), pp. 72-3, lines 1373-4. probably has a common origin with Firishta's tale of Hasan KIngfi
63 S. M. Ikram, Jb-i Kawthar (Lahore, discovering a treasure p.
1965), in the vicinity
395. of Delhi; this
Both Firishta,folk
Ta'rikh,
tradition and Amir Khusraw's unnamed Bombay 1832, pfr I, p. 519.of H. K.
noteSherwani 62 states that cAla' al-Din
probably
refer to Shaykh Farid al-Din's grandson
Hasan Kangu was and successor,
crowned by Shaykh Sirij'Ala' al-Din
al-Din Junaydi in the
"Mawj-i Darya". The connection of enthronement
the Tughluq ceremony at Dawlatabad
family in 1347,
withbut thethis
references
shaykh dated from before they attainedwhich he givesthe do not support this
throne. assertion, and the b.
Muhammad Shaykh's
Tughluq erected the tomb of thename is absent from
Shaykh whichthe list ofis participants in the enthronement
still standing,
and appointed his son Mucizz al-Din to high
mentioned by cIsami,office
a contemporary in witness;
Gujarat; see The
see Sherwani,
Siyar al-awly*, p. 196. For Ghiyath Bahmanis of theal-Din and his
Deccan (Hyderabad, next
1953), pp. two
37 and 46, note 83;
successors being given sovereignty by Firishta,
this Ta'rfkh
shaykh, (Bombay, see 1832), I, p. 528Ta'rFkh-i
cAfif, (= Kanpur 1874, I,
Figrjzshdhf (Calcutta, 1891), pp. 27, 277); 'Is~mi, pp. 554-8.below. Cf. also cAfif,
translated
op. cit., p. 371; Barani, TFS, p.78 543;
Armughdn-iHodivala,
Sultadnt, p. 177. Studies in Indo-
Muslim history, I, pp. 334-5. 79 Ibid., pp. 164-5. The investiture of Mujdhid Shah by Siraj al-Din
himself
64 Rihla, III, p. 211; tr. Gibb, III, p. is mentioned.
652. Nizam al-Din died shortly
(probably some months) afterwards, 80 Armughan-i and
Sultant, p.Ibn
178. Battuta mentions
that the future Sultan carried"' Burhan-i
the ma'dthir,
bier p.of 48; cf.the Shaykh
ibid., pp. onofhis
46-7, for an account Sayyid
shoulders, a detail which is corroborated by another
Muhammad Gesfidaraz's alienation from the contempor-
Sultan's brother and
ary Arabic source; Rihla, III, p. 211; FEr6z
predecessor, tr.Shah Gibb,
Bahmani. III, p. 654; see
Hodivala, op. cit., I, p. 292. Understandably, mention
82 CAbd al-cAziz b. Shar Malik Wacizi, Risalaof this,
dar siyar-i Shdh like
Nicmat
the Shaykh's words of bestowal, Alldhhas
Wall, inbeen
J. Aubin, omitted
ed., Matieriaux pour from the
la biographie de Shah
accounts of the burial of Nizam al-DinNicmatullah byKermaniAmir(Teheran-Paris,
Khwurd 1956), pp. 316-17.
and As was the
later
hagiographers; cf. the account ofcase between
his the Sultans ofin
funeral Gujarat and the descendants
Siyar al-awliyd', ofJalal al-
p. 155. Din Bukhari, intermarriage took place in the Deccan kingdom,
65 Cf. the explanation of the cause of the same Sultan's death in ibid., with the Bahmanis giving daughters to the family of Nicmat Allah;
pp. 245-6, cited above, p. 74 see Burhdn-i ma'dthir, p. 68.
66 Notable examples among shaykhs in India who were the Sultan's 83 Some confusion has been created by the late sixteenth-century
contemporaries are Sayyid Jalal al-Din "Makhdaim-i Jahaniyin" historian Tabatabdai, who, when describing the alleged encounter
and Sayyid AshrafJahangir Simnani. of Hasan Kangfi with Shaykh Nizam al-Din, refers to the future
67 There is some similarity to Hamid Qalandar's anecdote of why he Sultan by the anachronistic title of al-Wali al-Bahmani; Burhan-i
himself had taken the name and garb of Qalandar, see Khayr al- ma'athir, p. 12. Sherwani compounds this confusion with some
majalis, pp. 10-11; Digby 1984, pp. 71-2. Both anecdotes show errors of his own; see The Bahmanis of the Deccan, pp. 37, 46 note 82.
Nizam al-Din taking a benevolent interest in small boys attending Only the title al-Bahmani is found on the coinage of Sultan Shihib
his khdnaqdh, impelled by their name or behaviour to make a al-Din Ahmad I, the immediate khalifa of Shah Nicmat Allah; see
prophecy regarding their future. A. Wahid Khan, Bahmani Coins (Hyderabad, 1964), p. 78.
* See p. 74 above, and notes 37, 38. However, al-Wali al-Bahmani is found in the painted inscriptions
69 CAfif, Ta'rikh-i FIrzshdhT, pp. 27-9. cAfif consciously imitates of his tomb, thought to be nearly contemporary; one may also
accounts of manaqib (virtues, eminent deeds of Sufis or other good note among his titles given there afial khalffati 'lldhfi :l-calamfn (sic);
Muslims). The close of the notice again suggests an influence of see G. Yazdani, Bidar: Its History and Monuments (Oxford, 1947),
Hamid Qalandar's Khayr al-majalis as a model; cf. Digby 1984, p. 125. The strict contemporaneity of this inscription is put in
pp. 71-2. cAfifs account of these tidings is reproduced in Makki, doubt by the fact that the date of death, given as 839/1436,
Zafar al-walih, ed E. Denison Ross as An Arabic History of Gujarat conflicts not only with Firishta as noted by Yazdani, loc. cit., but
(London, 1910-28), III, pp. 893-4. also with numismatic evidence which supports 838. The use of the
70 Salim, Riy(i al-saldain (Calcutta, 1890), p. 94. title by Ahmad I is also attested by CAbd al-'Aziz b. Sher Malik,
71 Sikandar b. Muhammad curf Manjhfi, Mirait-i Sikandarf, ed. S. C. writing in the following reign; see Aubin, op. cit., p. 316. The title
Misra and M. L. Rahman (Baroda, 1961), pp. 10-11. Significant al-Wali joined to al-Bahmani is first found on the coinage in the
details include the bestowal of a leopard-skin by the Shaykh on reign of 'Al' al-Din Ahmad II, with earliest recorded date 838/
Zafar Khan, and the prophecy that rule in Gujarat would remain 1434-5 and it is last recorded on an undated gold coin of Mahmfid
in Zafar Khan's house for a number of generations corresponding Shah (regn. 1482-1518); see Wahid Khan, Bahmani Coins, pp. 87,
to the number of dates that he had offered to the Shaykh: "Some 148. But the regnal name of Mahmfid's grandson Wali Allah (regn,
say the number of those dates was twelve or thirteen, and some say 1522-4) would indicate that the spiritual claim was maintained to
more." Cf. the number of dates symbolizing the number of years of the end of the dynasty.
the reign of Far6z Shah Tughluq in the fourth of CAfifs "tidings" 84 Burhan-i macathir, pp. 75, 96, 107. It is perhaps significant that no
above. shaykh from the great family of Ggsiidaraz appears to have assisted
72 Mir'Qat-i Sikandarf, pp. 86-91; Sir E. C. Bailey, The Local Muham- at these enthronements. The descendants of Gsuidaraz and the
madan Dynasties: Gujarat (London, 1886), pp. 153-5. tombs at Gulbarga remained a major focus for the devotions of the
7' Mir~dt-i Sikandarf, p. 389. population of the Deccan down to the present day. By contrast, the
74 This anecdote, like the anecdote in cAfif of the three Sultans of the
unconvincing claims to sanctity of the Bahmani ruling house were
Tughluq dynasty eating from the bowl of Sharaf al-Din Panipati, in later times represented by a Lingayatjangam assuming the garb
emphasizes the point that Kings are suppliants at the court of the and style of a Sufi pfr on the occasion of the annual curs at the tomb
Sufi shaykh. See the verses of Amir Khusraw quoted on p. 72
of Ahmad Shah I; see Yazdani, op. cit., p. 116 and PI. LXXV.

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