Persian Authorship and Canonicity in Late Mughal Delhi Weng in the eighteenth century, the Persian-anguage livérateurs of late Mughal Delhi were aware that they could no longer take for granted the relations bf Persian with Islamic imperial power, relations that had enabled Persian Ii tray life to flourish in India since the tenth century CE. Persian Authorship and Canonicity in Late Mughal Dethi situates the diverse text! projects of “Abd al-Q8dir “BTdil” and his students within the context of potically threatened but poetically prestigious Delhi, exploring the writers’ tse Ph the Perso-Arabic and Hindavi literary canons to fashion their authorship Breaking with the tendency to categorize and characterize Persian [iterature arcording to the dynasty in power, this book argues for the indiectness and complexity of the relations between poetics and polities. Among its orignal on, Shion is an interpretation of BUdil’s Sufi adaptation of a Braj-Avadhi tale of tian Hindu kingship, a novel hypothesis on the hstriism of Siraj AR Khén “Arai"'s oeuvre and a study of how Bindraban Das “Khvushgl! owined the contrasting models of authorship in BYdil and Arca to formulate bis ‘Voice as a Sufi historian of the Persian poetic tradition As the first book-length work in English on “Abd al-Qadir “Brdil” and his, citcle of Persian literati, tis is a valuable resource for students and scholars of ‘beth South Asian and Iranian studies, as wel as Persian literature and Sufism. Prashant Keshavmurthy is Assistant Professor of Persian-Iranian Studies in the Institute of fslamic Studies, McGill University. His research interests include jae Mughal political discourses, Safavid-Mughal commentarial practices, Persian-Urdu poctics, Persian translations of Indie language works and Islamic autobiographical discourses.Tranian Studies Edited by: Homa Katouzian University of Oxford and Mohamad Tavakoli University of Toronto Siac 1967 the nematons Soy fr Iain Sues (1S as an Studs 1 as bec ai lad oe fer te advncenen of nw apposite soit, hson, clad lientue. 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Raffaelli ‘Moritz Deutschmann31 tranian Masic and Popa Entertainment mur From Mote to Losay ren eles and Gd Bree and Sasan Fae 32 Gender and Dance in tran Biopolitics on the twentieth- century stage Ida Mefahi 33. Persian Authorship and Canonicity in Late Mughal Delhi Building an ark Prathant Keshvmurthy. Persian Authorship and Canonicity in Late Mughal Delhi Building an ark Prashant Keshavmurthy I Routledge prove LONDON ANONEW YOREFist ubibed 2016 by Rauledge 2 ask Square, Miton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 ARN nd by Routedge ‘11 Trind Avent, New York, NY 10017 Aosta is. imprint ofthe Taylor & France Group. an ema busier ©2015 Prashant Keshavourty ‘eth of Prashant Keshavmusthy tobe deified as author this work ‘as been sssrted by him i accordance with sections 17 an 8 the (Copyrht, Designs and Peis Act 1988, Al rights reserved. No part of thie back maybe rpied o reproduced or lan in ny form or by any electronic, mechanical, eter nsans, now ‘oomor hereafter invented, including photocopying and recog, or ‘ty Information sorage of eieval sytem, withou permissonin tng ‘rom te publishers Trademark notice: Proto corporat ares maybe tademars or ‘egitrl roma and ae used only for detain nd elation Wwitoutietent to inne, British svar Cataloguing in Publication Daa ‘catalegue eord for this bok is vale im the Beh Lary brary of Congress Cataloging in Publication Daa Names: Keshavuriy, Prashant ator “Tie: Posianauorsip and canine Mughal Det: bling an ‘Ark Prashant Keshav Description: Milton Par, Abingdon, Oxon; New York: Rous, 2016. | Series rnin tates ‘Menfew: LCCN 2015034027 | ISBN 9781138185942 (hardbact) ‘Subjects: LCSH: Poni ieature-Inda-Hisory sr enicens Author, Persian nin. Mogul Empire Histary” 8th conuy.|South as erature istry and erm. Bid “Abd al a, 164s oe 1625-1720 0¢1721-Ceticism and nerpetation, Csaiiction: LOC PK6S27.615 K37 2016, DDC 891/s80995%46-dc25 {EC record valle at ples oe ow 2003400) ISBN; 978.1. 138-185982 (84) ISBN: 978-1-315.6408-0 ehh) “Typeset in Tice New Roman ‘by Wosnct Lid Bold, Tyne and Weer med and bound i the United Sates of America by ‘Edwards Brothers Malloy on ssainahly pred per nd For Padmini Keshavamurthy, T-K. Keshavamurthy a kiran KeshavamurthyContents Acknowledgments Introduction: politcal frailty and poetic powerin late ‘Mughal Dethi 1 Bidil’s portrait: ekphrasis as ascetic sef-transformation 2. Bidil’s tarj'-band: the author’s kenotic chorus 3A Hindu allegory of the Islamic philosopher-king: the tale of Madan and Kamat in Bidil’s masnavi ‘Irfan 4 The local universality of poetic pleasure: Siraj al-Din ‘AIT Khan “Arzii” and the speaking subject 5 Khvushga’s dream of Hafiz: building an ark with Arai and Brdil Index 15 61 90 a7 151 175Acknowledgments Although written over the last three years, this book has had a longer genesis in conversations extending over decades, conversations that have transformed me {fom who I was at their beginning, Among the teachers, fiends and colleagues {should like to thank are Bubla Basu, Pramod Menon, Sheila Menon, Salim Nusufi, Meera Sagar, Sunil Dus, Giti Chandra, Ashish Roy, Udaya Kumar, Meghant Sudan, Nikhil Govind, Arvind Thomas, Shamsur Rahman Farugi, yo, {imaya Sharma, Shireen Ahmed, Frances Pritchett, Muzaffar Alam, Paul Losensky, Sonis Ahsan, Nauman Naqvi, Rebecca Gould, Milind Wakankar, orothea von Micke, Ayesha Irni, Rajiv Chakravart, Arthur Dudney, Sajed Rizvi, Kevin Schwartz, Azarmi-Dukht Safavi, Navina Najat Haidar, Mana Kia, Sonam Kachra, Hajnalka Kovacs, Arijt Sen, Sandeep Banerjee. Elisabetta Benigni, Gijs Krujtzer, Marita Schleyer, Luzi Yang, Julie Billaud, Margrit Permau, Lisa Marchi, Yuthika Sharma, Mudasir Mufti, Leila El-Murr, Fabricio Speziale, Sunil Sharma, Ina Dumitrescu, Owen Comvall, Abhishek Kaicker, furbod Honarpishe, Franklin Lewis, Thomas de Bruin, Imre Banghs, Rober Wisnovsky, Pounch Shabani-Jadidi, Reza Pourjavady, Ali Nadeetn, Lara Khattab, Ajay Rao, Maria Subtelay and Mohamad Tavakoli-Targhi, Much of this book's shape and substance bears the traces of Satyanerayana Hegde’s ‘maverick erudition, generosity and exemplary kindness. I am grateful to Jane Mikkelson who disentangled my dreadiocked prose with resolutely literary focus, wide earning and tutetary editorship. To Hossein Kamaly's generosity and knowledge, 1 owe my frst experience of reading pre-modem Persian in a ‘group. 1 am indebted to my brother Kiran for having indulged me in conversa. tions whose written results form part of this book. For what faults there are in it, 1alone am responsibe. joknowledge the permissions of Philological Encounters (Brill, 2016) ‘hich is about to publish a shorter version of Chapter | titled “Brdil’s Porta Asceticism and Autobiography”; of Brill Publishers which is about to publish a ‘ersion of Chapter 5 titled “Khvushgd’s Dream of Hafiz: Building an Ark with Arai and Bidi” in an edited volume; and of SAGE Publications India Pvt Lid whose Indian Economic and Social History Review (Vol. 50, No. 1, 2013) carried a shorter version of Chapter 4. Aetvovledgents xi sie Universit, Rein, fr the : tuntapisig a te 1 Fiat allay 1¢ the gift of time and converss 0 pam cr mon ar kr ™ vege nh ahaa hob hasteIntroduction Political frailty and poetic power in late Mughal Delhi “Authors who know themselves to be living atthe end ofan old textual eration ‘fat knows iscf to be old find themselves ina strangely enabling and disabling tha jtion at once, The past presents itself to them as a cumulative heritage of congels and interpretations, having gained rather than lost in material and com- exit overtime, Bu the sense of inhabiting the end of suc a tradition makes riewevembrance ofthe past an exercise in anxiety. The Persian-language Titra. tte of late Mughal Delhi of the eighteenth century inhabited a condition resem bling this one. They composed poetry and prose that in is densely alluive vatery of an approximaley eight-centures-old Persian literary tradition, calle ard played on the reader's familiarity wih that aditon. Bu they also knew tha dhey could no longer take for granted Persian’s relations with Istamic imperial ower, lations that had enabled its fourishing literary life in India since the tenth century CE: “The three literati studied in this book belonged to this community and knew and read each other. Yet, each constitutes a distinct instance of how a Persian- Tanguage littrateur responded to the eclipse of Mughal political authority by adapting the literary canons of Persian (and other languages) to fashion Haself as an author. The Sufi poet “Abd al-Q8dir Khan, pen-named “Brgi” (1644-1720), invoked the canons of Persian-Arabie and Avadhi to fashion imeit for his readership in Delhi's threatened ruling elites as # historically transcendent Sufi exemplum of self-governance.’ The philologist and poet Siri} tite "AH Khan “Ara” (1687-1756), tutored in his poetry by Bidil, adapted Siready authoritative Arabc-language philology in Persian to defend the tem poral locality of his teacher and students ghazal syle. In contrast to Bl, who Jestfied the difficulties of his style by claiming o have circled around the backs is poetic predecessor to « primordial and divine source of creativity, Arad Srgued that every authoriatve poetic style had been local to its age. Bindrsban Des “Khvushga” (16678-1757), tutored in his poetry and history-writing by both Bidil and Arai, creatively combined his two main teachers’ disparate Tnerary-historical temporlities, canoniciies, methods and genres to fashion himself asa biographer-hstorian of the Persian poetic past. His textual persona yas historicist on Arzi’s model even as it invoked Brdil’s ahistoricist or time: ‘cancelling and ascetically achieved Sufi intimacy withthe divine,2 Introduction sail etn te a et oh en inhabited a that they beara larger significance for the heriags sco ene co tei ae con oo indebted othe rary synthesizing and systematizing us | the 1 aeniet ‘Hert of the second half of the fifteenth ent. Poe a woven me nee Iture of anthologization, editorialization and textue tres Timur cee von sinning their imperial careers in India a ‘eccrine SSP fen Shae ec an opt a a na eS ee Fees nce ene ot ded is nam mn its predominant trait of playing on the rate amarenes ia ntioned classical canon to evoke. cw tie tual relation and new metaphors and syntax. Pewtoel new legis And yeh le Mughal aot ie Sta prions of mck Bry fem nore knew they wre eng he ast Penge ta aes sizer econ naa inca one in India. It should suffice to observe I Now i intoa iry language; that the Mug rs power heey tnd seeder Me onc a crc acne te pl tice ee ey ion a ian-language lexicog ‘comm: and biographicn! si ce meee coer a 2 ara ater ES oy melee com ae fi ane a Saracen te ry preci ee manifold long-term significance. eal waesoies lets us tg hoe epee tt classical poets, was Arzi’s estranged Persian while Mir’s Persian-language autobiograph ography ‘may well have used Br Til himself was ed Bidil’s as one of its models. Though Bidil himself | | Introduction 3 withthe fading use of Persia there, he came to be canonized foraetionel poet in Afghanistan during the frst half of the twentieth century. fe Se tjet Central Asia uring the same period, his poetry was defended and upheld ovmemplary of “progressive” Soviet poetics. Though - or pethaps because "he as exGiseredited for his siylistic complexities by the Neo-lassicl “Literary enun (Bazgashe- adabi) movement of carly rinetenth-century Iran, he hes wrabe become a model for Iranian poetic modernism and the topic of a currently opiovs sub-feld of Persian language teary scholarship in ran Afghanistan coritajikistan? Khvushg0's three-volume razkrah o biographical dictionary of ersianlanguage poets from all periods of the language's history, was exer play in its eneyelapedic scope of Safavid Mughal tckiras. I remains one Of ir most valuable contemporaneous windows on the literary life of eighteenth~ Cehuuy Delhi, By as-yet unknown routes, its second volume traveled to eatly Glar Tran where the mastetrope by which kened itself to Nodh’s Ark so Spoenled to literati who bad witnessed the fof the Safavids that it was hey sre inst eited the version we possess today. If Bidil, Ard, Khvushgd and their Theles had such long-lasting literary, politeal and historical legacies, it is Jexity oftheir writings. I have only ‘because ofthe aesthetic and conceptual comp) eSambrated this complexity in these introduc‘ory pages. The chapters to follow ‘ill extend these adumbrations through close readings "Thus book aims to intervene in three disciplines: Mughal historiography, reli- ious stodis and literary studies, Muzaffar Alam and Sanjay Subrahmanyam pen their Writing the Mughal World: Studies on Culture and Polite, published 35012, with a entical survey of “What exactly the Mughals represented” in over ‘century and a half of historical scholarship.” They begin this survey with @ beef discussion of the “revolution” in Persian history-writing brought about by ‘ifeenth-century Iranian Timurid and Central Asian historians. This revolution was paredigmatic for subsequent hstory-writing sponsored by the Mughals From the Gxteenth to the eighteenth century. The reason for Alam and Subrahman- Jam's focus on Persian history-writing lie in the British colonial identification, ieginning in the ninetenth century, of the discourse of history as the principle Foumulation of understandings of state. Whether in order to rule India in imita- ion of the Mughals or to later rule it by claiming an enlightened repudiation of the Mughal example, the British tured to Persian language istory-writing tuthored by literati in Mughal cireles to understand the Mughal state. This exclu- ive identification of history with visions of statehood came 10 be shared by Muslim Reformists writing in Urdu in the second half of the nineteenth century. Tr was also shared by a group of Marxist historians associated with Aligarh ‘Muslim University and writing between the 1930s and the present. For this later group the Mughal state, understood as no more than a fiscal mechanism for fpraian revenue extraction, was the only legitimate subject of history-wriing For each of these groups to understand the discourse of history has been to linderstand the state that forms the proper subject of that discourse. This pret Lnderpirding these otherwise politically divergent bodies of scholarship is Tecognizably a legacy of European posiivism. Alam and Subrahmanyam’s forgotten in India4 Inrotction iwodution to thei vol tends and themes of the ch aakes it ppeet at be lM ope Rei ai primary niet 1¢ legacy of positivism has mes nal foreiniad, Teena iary attention to the question of how politcal po wer wa ‘een. Te gina ings now ged ths gustan he ae wetwheer vad iterary, artistic, architectural and ive repre oy, a Petbmate a tions of pow tia Iso constitutive of such yer. mt so f pone ae wo fe ia tein Seo ‘yo a ures : ANE rete on coop hertgecome Marien ofa Sony-writing and the state that underlies Then tigar ui of eh Se py hs are ais nso arent when we recall 's wel oh eso Hoge an eal hath a om philosophy the concey collective subject. However we may asses cept of the collective s tive subject. However we may assess Hegel fey rarity oF explicitly, observing an attention to subject-formation. This else J, observing an attention to re i he genealogy ofthe salience in the contemporary humanities of the work of ne i historian Michel Foucault who, towards the end of his historian Mi teeult who, to ft what Foca eae he called th “het wet eat enero Ings int the vr that Alan and Ssrahmany ea This is the point at which to ro he bet Tn tglemens of sesh wih pice Wg cise studies of Sufism's intricate entwinement Introduction 5 avoid closely reading any one Sufi text! This avoidance conte to offer the advantage of higher-order generalizations on Suflsms re seem o politics. But such generalizations are diminished in value when we ake low ave above, how poiicel power was inscribed into the logics of human SS pject formation? Cental to these Togs were affect and memony, and tS eer that comprises ther most complex formulation. method adequate or iMecomplexity cannot avoid close reading. It is such close reading that the cha ters ofthis book offer. "The thied discipfine in wt contexts. However, they hich this book therefore intervenes i iterary studies. “the persistent problem with the body of literary etal work Persian es Te Pespether oF Mughal India or other pre-colnial contexts has been an inad- aise understanding of how imaginative Kru refers the word itera fave tended to fll on two divergent sides ofthis question regarding the set iteratre’s reference tothe world, and accordingly have adopted two mode ting methods. The first has entailed the choice of texts whose generic ‘eae determines ta they name historically real places, persons and imes rather tea ve once, Hence the choice of raraive over non-native Literature oF se ranavt rather than the ghazal (the most prestigious of Safevid-Mugha) rc) oF gas; and then ofthe histscal magna ralber than tive and meal ones and of fakirahs or biographical dcionares, wavelogs and mompystcal autobiographies. These are all preferences for texts characterized Tp inderical modes of reference. Not ht texts making sich denial rferenes 2 eg Nstoneal world are unworthy of scholarly atention. Rather. ts my con- wearer thet to foreground only such txts isto miss those textual lgies that may rere? Govious tous today but were better known, more prestigious and there~ ree gravely cultivated in pre-colonial-century Persian literary culture, These verestogies of genes that made indirect and ofln allegorical reference to theit wer eelswerid, Tere, Paul Losenksy's Welcoming Fighanl: Imitation and acer ndivuduality in the Safavid- Mughal Ghazal is a pathbreaking exception and this monograph is parly indebted to it srr her method, more characteristic of Persian- and Urdu-language scholar ship hasbeen to dretly address the more presigious Iiterary genres that | Nave se te above but to account for their mode of reference to their historic! srry by now discredited nationalist explanations. The most conspicuous of sone exonaist explanations is the geographical categorization of ghazal styles qpeskea by the carly twentieth-cenury Iranian literary etic, Mubammad Test Ely bere by its trait of diminution and growth. This agerandizing sel ‘hargcterization leads us to ask whether BTdil thinks he is God. 1 will return 10 this possibility ~ the possiblity of theosis ~ later in this chapter. Confining our- sabes to this passage for now, let us note that he characterizes his text ar & gem~ trous disclosure to his reader, But what is being disclosed here? ‘Bidil, speaking in his own name he18 Bidil’s portrait Bidil invokes two senses here: taste and hearing. He does $0 to declare t the text to follow will disclose what he - “the undrunken intoxication from Lavern of nonexistence” “drank from the cup of the heedfulness of being,” Presents himself as caught between non-being and being. By a shift fr Singular (o plural he maps this distinction onto the one between the One and Many. The subsequent clause replicates this double feature by speaking of Passage from “soundless melody from the party of divine Oneness” to “the I rite distinctions of Manyness," This shetorical feature corresponds toa log feature of his selfpresentation, namely his simultaneous presence befine ‘own creation and after it. This dual sef-locaton in time allies him to a red, of Persian-language poets, especially prominent from the sixteenth. cent ‘award, who authorized themselves by an Islamio-Neo-Platonie conception creativity. According to this conception, creation was an emanation from the {Gbersensory One into the sensory Many that yet left the One undiminished, aiming proximity with the One allowed poets to presen thmseves as cizeing around the back, as it were, of poctc predecessors to the primordial source of poetic topoi, But to say this and no more is t where the final syllables ofthese c exch other. Almost all of the pros. internally thymed and arranged {rious uses ofthe Perso-Arbic tradition of such “thymed and rhythmic pro Ge)" nawri musa). Here, te symmetry ofthese clauses in English, rep cating the externally shymed symmetry of Bidil’s clauses in Persian, align hia plindrunken” or undistracted focus on the nothingness from which he came inte being with his preoccupation ~ “soundless” or undivided by representations with the Divine Oneness that brought him into being and that isthe most real, ZT sentence's doubled and rhyming clauses therefore simultaneously inrodkes both the ontological stame of reference within which Bil’ text becomes mene ‘ngful andthe model reader who would ideally interpret this text in terms of sach ‘ontological commitments ‘These details of Bidil’s style invite the following preliminary questions: bat were the rhetorical antecedents for Bidil's prose? What were ils sectal Gieels? Given that autobiographical discourses in pre-nineteenth century Peso. Anbie traditions possessed no generic unity, answering these two questions lets ts better ensWer Our opening question, namely what it means hereto speak of an autobiography. Answering the former question will require a bref eneursus gn he specific genealogy Bidil was invoking ofthe uses of “thymed and rhyth, ‘nie prose.” Answering the latter will require a differentiated account of the pocial world such prose assumed. The following section will undertake the fpllowing tasks: tace the theological antecedents for Bidi's style, sesout ihe politcal crisis of his milieu and thus the politcal effect of his style on hia {iree overlapping cicles of readers; and speak of what the mimetic origins and fims of this sive imply forthe sent in which we may speak of autobiography here, '0 read without an ear for the Persian original lauses of identical syllabic length rhyme with # in The Four Elements is thus extemally ot in symmetrically measured clauses, maki hymed and rhythmic prose is aso the oldest Islamic Bilil’s portrait 19 is of Bs spe ws ft treacle of BS cp yid as the Arabic tong and ths Néer fen relapse te tet a Cee fomicen opens kt Mubanna re ety an oe ere a (9 ah) oy srs who uttered their divinations in suct Pe The ation seein ony oe cea seed yammad, “the seal of ae ta ce Mua ove ape 8 ede te ur tn incl bie hes" H ws Bb ape ec! 2 jroo nao a dete mang na eo A oe icles “ yervasive use of such & hele tive te pleas” Te pease wt fh Sr ra ts sy eps ce ree eases Iso the general clite investment in the a sc i spn ane se a sen rik het and ener een sea ne recent, re erally st reader-disciples, in tum, woul ne at de wer, I will say more on this haste mel sein etc ne lay ee ‘net style later by considering ti ise oc ot these st pow mst pane cm» Gob ca med ween pec HOD Simla drting is cone ening a 2 tec coaiment 0 ‘em i ie gst ea that God cred beings by brewing Cent to bis on their names, William C. Chittick: Let us first vos et pc in a Breaths sted by the etymology of the words kam, “speech Sane toe vot Bi th derive from kalm, which the Arabic fine welt thc means to ctor woud, Jari expainet ee Bee Siete mean thir, ces and marks. Basing himself on wea tations, mAb sys tha ted pee aves es the Aleerii Breab Pach wor saa” “arte ee ae nari) fared ste real ofthe ALM” af _ fri Say ey ch Abn serie Sri ns ge pari, tea at i a Spat they word by whieh be a ey wo wh This breath - Persian Sufi authorship, espe ‘Philosophical and poetic interpretations escribed hhis schoo! triend’s clove-scen fist vere as "ie reat ofthe AIL Mest" But the key won designated the complex of ideas surrounding20. Bidi's portrait breath was suthan, translatable as “poetic utterance. w " atin ‘Though not « new word pied in moni tems cre! litation of the divine ive inthe imperative inthe Qu tht brought exeaon io Jun on “Bel” “Th establishes that sth b and the origin ofthe tue nature of as git of ee sot all humans were m equal t0 this task. Onl rophet Mubammad wit 3k. Only some who were Fron! Mubarnnad wit the divine gif of "baned su elim able of such imitation "But wa it tneant Ws bec ene nlc ft so tg ei 08 tin Sa in he oe pes Se cca ers et Bushy econo sheet of paper with “a dry quill” 4 ee a 29 ressed to the djinns, He asked couple Hesrepriery djinns “of another world” to leave for “ voce ew ih te a en “eh sot toaa i” mane me “Gena coe wi een ste a en IS! emis dn cer fe bw tn a vn ene hoe sey wos eno ancoak he bodied djinns wit “vaio gee tins wih Sry bl invisible ste ied snag a writing. Moreover, the rhythmic and chymed il’s “dry quill” ~ according to con- praise and effects he devotes as But nothing of this episode's ‘invocation of an elemental at the specificity of Bidil’s ‘ulated the Sufi theme of vine Real 10 lienation bei of eight in school, tin Arabic grammar and fin sence of humanity was Quitting [ve., Bid) cultivated t kamal) and the study o [ash'ari arbab-i hal u gal report may Be, of scholarly disputation by Speaks ofthis as continuous with states and words.” joaugurated in Persian rose above the petty egotism of dialectic ‘Bidil’s portrait 21 ialectical or scholarly knowledge. His student and main hagio- ng echoed this apologetics by presenting his teacher's extly ing, Khwushgd writes that it was when, as a boy ‘ed two of his classmates squabbling over a point sing to blows over it that his uncle, who also 's nephew from school. His uncle remarked that: “the "ved" by such scholastic pettifopgery. Khvushet: fhe study ofthe Arabic sciences ['ulim-i‘arabiyyah] from then on, he the company of spiritually adept ascetics [ugard-i sahib- distiches by the lords of spiritual states and words 8 Regardless of how biographically accurate this vat is relevant is that Khvushgd sees as worthy the substitution ascetics” and “the company of spiritually adept the study of distiches by the lords of spiritual in this contribution to the tradition of apologies for poetry bby Nizimt GanjavT (d. 1209), then, sukhan displaced and ical learning by its formulation of itu ied by Sufi masters, ofthe divine Real. for sukhan as the verbal formulation of mystical states of Fhould not be taken to mean a validation of undisci- his autobiography Bdil presents a genealogy arrest apaogia forte formal claborateness or the workliness of sukhon ta is att fo Nighmts. He formulated this genealogy and apologia, as we wil ere, seioetc response to local reiteration in his North indian milieu of 2 wicer 2s ier Su theological dispute. In the ist section or Element of his eutobio= ‘Gephy he recounts a disagreement between two of his Sufl recepons ol nce of Bihar.” One of them, Shih Mulk, ‘ger in his North Indian home provi wares the practices of an extremist (gh) and possibly atinomin tagion weopiam by wandering naked and uttering ecstatic pronouncements (shart) The olher, Shah Karnal, calls for selécontzol as @ distinguishing human wait, cresemning such excesses and such frothing atthe mouth as discourteous 10 the Teeny ofthe prophets, These disputes may seem to some of us today tke wii) ‘Sapbles over ritual minatiae, But they are, in fact, in Kine wit a long flame (ition of Neo-Platonic concer with establishing the psychophysical con Udiuons appropriate to one's recognition of one’s own tre self, Sufism was, it {he cones a tradition of ethical reflection on how embodied persons could best prepare themselves for self-recognition,Hinging therefore on the wo dives recrcs Bil describes amongst his two Sufi teachers, respectively, towards the permisabiity or impermissibly of linguistic and corporeal signs.” the one Trouly permissive and the oer broadly abstemious ~ were two distinct under. Stondings of how ethical conduct yielded metaphysical insight. Shih Mula cot» forms to the position the modern scholar Absun al-Zafar identifies wih. the froponents ofthe doctrine of vahdar a-vjd (Oneness of Being)” And Shah Komal as Ahsan al-Zafar notes, appears to adhere fo the rival group propound- ing valbdat alshuhiel (Oneness of Witnessing). Both postions fundamentally ypher Khvu from scholastic lear ‘Bll witness ssed this, withdrew itive knowledge, guid ‘But this preference being over scholarly debate st plined or formless expression, In22 Bldls poraie 8 mt of serum Bidil’s portrait 23 8 how human subj age distinguished between these two terms that both mean “unity Chick seve Sais ference by observing that whereas abadiya refers tothe uty of of restraint in significa with respec ns with God without eliminating their servanthood, vakid — of which tion as “music mth lga-oral neces s he substantive form _ refers to none fer han Godan one of gh the ssembly of why eclnve names inthe Quran. On thi pont Ibn Arar him sys cferring to himself (az vahdaryaniny| tye Prophet said, “God is (kan) and no thing is with Him.” The meaning is asi, as! will sh Dtotlows: He isnot accompanied by thingnes, nor do we aserbeitto Him. show below, | Syeh is He, and there is no thing with Him, The negation of thingness from Bier one of His essential atributes, just as isthe negation of “witness” etn ete Sul practice, Bie (maya) rom things. He is with the things, bul the things are et Wh i Shh Kans presence | un, since “wie” lls om knoe He knows He with tyming and elaby ys, We donot know Him, so we are not with Him.” ei anjuman-i shubiid) hil cconcem with keeping up an rit mnction forms the basis of BIdil’s interpretation of the word “with” as @ Shah cea ere 'ypocritcal, vain and fanatic sgn of the imeducible and hierarchical distinction between the Creator and bis ‘HE’ favored human creature, between the most Real and its most accomplished human reality. “This was the very position that the founder in Mughal India of the Nagsh- ‘andiyyan Mujaddidiyyah Sufi lineage, Shaykh Abmad SithindT (1564-1624), tad taken in his widely read letters. Explicitly anathematizing “the wicked here- ties” who interpreted the expressions “dying to God” (fan) and “subsisting in God" (bag) as existential stats, he insisted that these were in reality only states Of perception or witnessing (shuhi), not being (vyid).™ What was more real than these states was the abiding distance between God and human, “The servant ie servant forever, and the Lord is Lord eternally.” he wrote. This led him to tphold against the legal-moral laxity with which he charged the proponents of the “oneness of being” (vahdat al-vujid) an insistence on adherence to the ah, For to adhere to the ritual regimen of Islamic lew was to practice the servant's submission to the divine master, bearing witness (shh) to the C1 tors ultimate uanscendence of His creation. This is why Sithindt and his vota- thes were called proponents of the “oneness of witnessing” (vahdat al-shulid) ‘But what, we may ask, has allthis to do with Brdit? "The answer lies in the onto-theological status within this debate of signs ‘By aligning himself in the aforementioned commentary with what would have been recognized as Sirhind’s position, even as he identified himself as a pro- ponent of the “unity of being,” he appropriated both positions as an apologia for sukhan, He accomplished this by arguing that it was fo bear witness to this {priori duality between Creator and creature by signifying it uhat Ibn “Arabt tr his tradition devised the allusion of “general unity” and the expression of “divine unity." On this interpretation, signs ~ both verbal and non-verbal ~ arise in response to the need {o bear witness to a duality that founds ereaturely ity, Brdil concludes that from the perspective ofthis duality Shah Muldk ‘vas insisting by his ecstatic unruliness on “negating the illusions of the Timited entifications of the One” (naft-i awham-i ta ayyundt) while Shih24 Bidi’s portrait at by hint Kal by isis on deco, as “bi the very order of Manyness” (asbate zat: shi ae on Aare) Bots inse pions won enh difference between the One and fe mn ‘subject ~ and so by exiension on the. fed te One. tthe safer eon 50. also ‘were the artifices of clothis i" of Bidil’s apologia for sukhan: the Poetic artifice, is harmoni 7 pe pin s, is he tious with Islamic orthopraxes aoe Practices by which to testify to the mee that ‘oot ens oma eS ee between Creator and creature, formed part fe ing. grers tue self. ° es pulit Din clades two spuation” The ene of of solutycopaton distance that separates ‘one’s preparation for rec taza with de endshyme (goa shyme ( bth ght adres tp ep Wvises against the damage it does to a Sufi e wart ast ba har kj tor th ad ee dd shikvay an halga gs npasandad far chandlanad mah ba ymah donb Jami‘ gah nibh some Bid ba thamishinnakinand ah sa bd 1s means forte ei disputation. ita othe dst ls thearow The heart daappove of Albugh the mr iy The peas guhere Bi speaker dona ed to draw every crooked-natured fellow then dv the ow into dpution compli of tat snl of fas tes wi ihe minor ametos tensity won't suffer waves. mse res he silent with dapuation Noteworty are he een neste santo schol fst hemi wings the cls a he int bya ore sane cath whe dts wth he bow. The ‘exemplification” (tarz-i tamsil) wi a special ae St Tae scare css ced hei as tt Po and 30 one that was evoded by ues by which Brdil demons ivism, The first distich makes tract nouns to make tes the superiority of ih sw genera ni To send misc exemple tat of he aw at flo te 2 of te ee of among Speaking Anew exampes of Arts Chapter 4 tae he comprehension of ig those who sought tenet the pos instead. BIA Joses the relation the verbal witnessing of {jhe most useful ne glet of hae” (hlga-y gs) occurs in near identical form in Hafe’s ghazal ‘02 of Khatmi’s commentary: "My ear and the dust ofthe wine-seller’s door." Khatm glosses In the context of this commentary the te glossed as symbolizing a tuelary gesture, here one that complains of oF reproves the heart. The heart a standard Sufi organ of intuition and convention ally symbolized by a mirror - di the seeond hemistich implies, a mirror conventionally argues with its containing ‘frame. That is, although # mirror seeks t Bull's portrait. 25 s motivation in using it here is to make a poetic argument o nsiperionty of gnosis to scholasie dialectic by this eonerete compound or Bu te metaphor does more tan simply iusate this des de ‘Between gnosis and scholastic dialectic as one in which the suddenly and soltarily gains an advance on the latter. amas key image of te first hemistch of the sesond distich — the ringlet of bait sips. both an image from the ghacals of liz anda tadition of allegorical fig that was well developed by Bicil’s time. “Khatmt” Lihort, Ming around 1617 in the same geographical cegion as Bil, composed what a med modem Hat schola-eitor Bab al-Din Khurrarshabt regards a5 ‘of all commentaries on the Divan of Hafiz, Bidil's phrase fand the friend's ringlet of hair/My fave “ringlet” thus: tn [Sufi] terminology [this] is what they cal “the firm rope” and also "the vi gogest handle.” By “frend” is meant the noble guide whois the keeper Sf the aforementioned tavern who, in the second hemistich, he refers to as c Vineseller” Since, in the preceding distch, he had silenced the Sufi who tad denied love with a conclusive proof in this couplet he inevitably ncourages him to drink the wine of love, saying: since that wine will not creme to hand without the assistance of the lofty guide of the tavem so, Henceforth, it must be my car and holding fast to the firm rope of the friend vino is a means, my face and the expedient of the dust of that wine-seler guide inglet of hair” in BIdil’s verse may now tisapproves of this teacher's reproof although, as 10 slip out of its frame just as the SuB's heart sceks to slip out of its corporeal container, this speaker's heart-mirror is, fntpathetc to argumentation. But Bidil’s arguably privileged meaning tums on {pum on dynah-dan that also wanslates as “miror-knower,” here referring to one ‘who knows the heart or the Sufi preceptor whose ringlet of hair the disciple must fold on to. Such paronomasia was itself a technique called Tham, typically lossed in manuals of rhetoric as the use of a word or phrase with atleast two eanings, one salient (garZb) but less important and the other non-salient (ba 7d) ‘ut privileged by the poet. It had long been a conspicuous poetic technique of Sufi anagogy and Bldil draws on it here to signal the superiority of intuition to intllection “The interlinear semantic connection (rab) between the two hemistiches ofthe third and last distch tums on an implicit visual similarity between, respectively, the pear’s “gathered intensity” and silence, on the one hand, and the images of26 Bidil’s portrait cresting waves and tngus curled in pation tear psn mediation tar eens clamor waves of srg ke foarte ‘mystically silent their disputation, Soothe ation al tit ahaa async of Bs pial eve that he se Jo eet sch uth aa sre of techni materi ompeaeT "se were arguments for the social and epistemic | yo er Knew ty evel un ‘Asi eon wha wt mona Sh ‘AS to whal suthanas uch superiority in the tradition of intuition was formula and women.” Exacerbati acetal this erson of i won ce of Al ator om thet crvar neste pe Marth ns fom te Desi eal Maga srs ad at ess tego of ne by NAdir Sith of rn in 1739 was perbaps only the most euous of eed Mog sovereignty. Iwas sch a Bl that famed shee diate readership and fw Sidsonca. iP and was fo this readership that his prose was immediately this home; an, aly, high ‘one this home an aly highaning oy ade ' ‘ayeor Ata nian his ulmi "hg Wi Rw wa parma ath ad oven (hr of eb an ed a suet by mening hi anf cout” wee In des te sacha scsi ie eit evi SREB was oe sarod by dics whol epee inning ba Sut prs Nor er ahi sy ins Dt wl conventional hve br hte of sch ean‘ we shee he rouge a ae iss oye was ented Hoeve his ee nd egecaly dep cane min Sui opslmapy by saming ean ereecs cone that alowed Cont Asian redeaips son af death to read bi Ghists ofa historically actual diate diate who transmitted played a eographicaly far-flung places. This cre Contributed to in tum, fcross the two cicles. of Bil’ poetry to diverse interpretations and adaptations ‘can be accounted for by re Quil Khin, who visited Mu years after Bi Bidll's portrait 27 s works as those ofa hospice-based Sufi master, But no evidenes readership of this sort in the Mughal Delhi of his torical reality, mostly formed Bidil’s smme- eSfeship included literati like Bindriban Das “Khvushed" (i. 1756), “Makhlig” (@. 1751) and Siraj al-Din “AR Khin “Arai” (d. 1755) Wil's poetry and authority to the third circle who, in tum, (of his works across social groups and to ‘ulation of his writing depended on, and ‘the broad Sufi ethos shared by individuals and groups “rhe second circle which, in his ‘significant part in the dispersal Indo-Islamie Sufi predecessors, the amenability its “polyphony” reference to this social diversity of reception.”* Dargih ighal Delhi from Hyderabad in 1738, that is eighteen rail died, described how Arzi who had been Bidil’s student in ized a reading from BIdil’s Divan at his death anniversary term cogoate with the word ‘arts for “bride” to signal the sratage ofthe saint's soul at death to God) on te third of the month of Safar in The lume calendar, «familiar memorial practice by which the living continued vee Kft rom the grace of dead Sufi. Over 100 of the city’s foremost poet, spatading those who had been Bidl’s students, gathered in a circle around his ‘Fave to read from a manusrit of his collected works (lla) copied in his avn “auspicious hand.” Among the most elite of his readers inthe third circle sins the pious emperor Aurangze who discovered ethico-spititual import in Tral’s poetry, quoting it in his letters to his sons one of whom, Muhammad Rizam Shah, employed Bid as superintendent (darogha) for wenty years.” ‘Aico in this high-ranking circle were Shukrullah Kh&n, magistrate (faw/-dar) of etki and son-in-law to the aforementioned ‘Aqil Khn, and his sons Shakir Khan and Mir Karamullah, all of wom long patronized the poet, bought him the house he lived in for thirty-six years until he died, were tutored by him in their poetry and corresponded extensively with him." ‘Moving in between these two circles was the circle of those who held rela- ively minor Mughal offices but were better known as scholars and poets whose ‘ceuvres were variously informed by Bidil’s teaching. This circle included indi- iduals like his scholar-student Arai who, as 1 will demonstrate at length in Chapter 4, invoked thetorcal disciplines traditionally authoritative in Arabic in his Persian treatises in order to defend and authorize the oft-crticized difficulties of Budil's ghazal style. In addition to Arai were Bidil’s less known students, & Significant number of them Hindus of Brahmin, Kiyastha, Khatri and Vaishya Castes, One of them, the Mughal bureaucrat littéateur Bindrlban Das “Khvushgo,” referred to Bidil with the panoply of reverential formulations characteristic of a Sufi disciple.” Another, Shiv Ram D&s “Hay,” composed a Persian prose description of the Braj region of Mathura and Vindravan whose geography was sacred to the popular Vaishnavite or Krishnate piety of the "As in the case of some of his I poetry annually orga for ‘urs (an Indian Sufi28 Bidlil’s portrait region that was stylistically indebted to Bidil’s The Four Elements. OF this and its author Khvushga weote: Having wained in his poetry under Mirza Bill and received his pen-n from him, he speaks in his [i.e BTdil’s] language, He wrote a prose work, the style [Jar] ofthe late Mirza's Chahair ‘unsur called Gulgushtt ‘nam. It describes the peculiarities of the Braj region that is, the area Mathura and Vrindavan [bindraban} and al the special qualities of that I ‘which i, in the religion of the Hindus [mashrab-i hunt], the birthploce: the home of Krishna the avatar [kvishn-i avai], ‘ost perfect manifestation ofthe infnite’sattribu ‘was delighted to read it: whom they consider es [9t-i ndmuanah, which narrates the life of Krishna, an incamation of the god Vishnu. The thetorie of this masnavi so suggests a debt to Bill's adaptation of Ibn ‘Arabf's emana. tionist ontology in its conception of Krishna as a divine “menifesiation™ ‘These three social circles comprise Bidil’ ships. And yet, in keeping with Sufi prec only the first and imaginary kind of rea Sufi hospice. This is because Sufi com reader who could most radically act Readers with this-worldly commits cism, still discovered an orientation ‘identities also accounts for a trait from The Four Elements, namely 's implicit contemporaneous readen. dent, Bidil's oeuvre explicitly assumes der, that is, the disciple atthe imaginary wention assumed that it was only such a hieve the ascetic aims of Sufi practice, ents, inevitably compromised in their asceti- in such prose. The Sufi ethos shared by these of the rhetoric in the passage quoted earlier ‘the impossibility of distinguishing between the retaphorcity and literalness of his sensory self-characterizalions es a "whiff" an "un-drunken intoxication” and a “soundless melody.” Bid, like all Suis, seeks f0 experience the divine Real rather than only know it conceptally and discursively and so, in keeping with Sufi tradition, formulates such experiences in somatic terms Such somatic formulations refer not only to BIdil's own experiences but are also aimed pedagogically at inducing a self transformation in his ‘who was normatively assumed to belong to the first of the three the Sufi hospice. 1 will discuss the nature and functions of such Sufi reading Practices with reference to specific case in The Four Elements further on in thie chapter. Here, to anticipate my discussion ofthis topic, | note that Sufi cay undertook reading a revered text when, in the course of an apprenticeship to x ‘Sufi receptor, the apprenticeship had psychophysically oriented the disciple to the Real. It was a the end or in the course of such an apprenticeship thatthe Suf undertook to read a text formulating disclosures of the Re 8 reading with the body: the reader of The Four Elements is would, in contemplat- ‘ing BTdil’s many failed attempts at intimacy with the divine Real, read it in the reader-disciple circles, that of Bidil’s portrait. 29 of wide aston an rong edhe ser eS ego te el. Ts eae wu Be ap that charactechophysical self-control and re-consituted {5 00 ore te an Specs mato a a et avnacion We mast eal ° set tour clements of di sre Sore lemons fi, a, weer and earth food what smi xs ag Imani rm th word of enero ad corn” Oe asa This was the world below the sphere of the moon ithe subha Gam fa cn at ye snl oe aso say reand ao he ene wh ne Sen LA ud aayyra) and that beyond i ofthe ni (oe aon (al-kawakib al-thabitha),° Humans, like other cre¢ , re ing atte itations. Yet, certain humans could master this agitation by a ste pice of he asrtealy ceed Paden or oct owed 0 Prarie connecting the twenty-eight leters of the alphabet to the i mi oa naan Ts oop oftumate hs fre pal li wt trea net om Tae Ta an py ha merece pO ee la sy han) advise dered fo eee “nants” (di in rene (raza) on the model ofthe prophel pone of wham aie oul mi 1¢ degree necessary for correcting em teehee te Names art worRemains siding afew dys by wis war nn pe ee sian er ye perfection of Gnostics. reference Baas eater int acpe, wil be eborted Ir Ho eeNtee nk i nono es” orice rs ofis owe dy tough is Kawi of he Names 0 Ga Cc Kiss items es of eg is ach vas pl of Sc samen poe wenger ih dow ae cack ia roe Evidently, Bil imagined hiselt foes member of ethane His er, yimiting BT's prs Sos woul cone eth ris oti lta to shine mu be ty fh wef he ft Seren. Theat ih oe ene ho eas en uwbiogaphy ei se aL eocpce ah sane nny tecive ad mat eo the our element eal rotrs, The logis fi eresetion thse feature epe Toth erst eat presen any nsnoes of his brief me sphere of generation and corruption, he promises Seer enmand eet, Saye a f 5 saa pottealytreatened and socilyssined Inte gh eho ‘nae rospice disciple to storied courtly grandee ~ such Sufi ascetic nw daar nil to power and a veriable metaphysis of sovereignty. same somatic mode’30 Bidil's portrait Surely, too, the rhymed and rhythmic prose of such asceticism was the lingui register ofthe sovereign subject and signaled a mastery of “the world of gen tion and comuption.” Bidil’s stated spiritual-pedagogical aims and his participation — as evide {in the passage quoted earlier - in Sufi rhetoric and practice should alert us to Peculiar sense in which this text constitutes an autobiography. Brdil seeks Benerously offer his Sufi reader an account of his own spiritual travails insofar as these travails are imitative and imitable, It is because Btdil sought, inmate the masters to whom he submitted himself that his disciple-eader mi ‘now hope to imitate Bidil in turn by his intoxicated reading. This mimetic ‘and aim imparts an iterative quality o the anecdotes which this text assembles, quality that confronts most readers today with a particular stylistic diffic Dwelling on the reasons for this difficulty may furnish us with the hermeneuty ‘expectations appropriate to BIdil’s account of his portrait. This is nol a difficul resulting from abstruse vocabulary since most of his lexivon derives Persian literary and, particularly, Sufi traditions of prose ard verse and th ‘assumes the reader to be conversant with this lexicon shared by several Sufi li ‘ages. Indeed, where Bidil introduces a technical term - typically from Ibu whose theophany everywhere informs BIdil's thought — that he supposes this reader may not be familiar with or adequately comprehend, he glosses it a length Rather, the stylistic difficulty in question arises ftom the tension between his commitment, on the one hand, to writing of the particular events, experiences and encounters he underwent and, on the other, hs commitment to simultaneously interpreting them as bearing an archetypal or mythic significance transcending their dateable and nameable particularity, In this tension originates the difficulty Bidil’s modern reader must first com front at the level of the smallest unit of his language-use, the semantic level of the sentence: the mythic or archetypal character of the compound metaphors with which he articulates his references to particular, indexically named and Sometimes dated events and experiences. He secks, by this tse of compound ‘metaphors at this semantic level, to assimilate any particular event or experience narrated at the discursive level of the larger linguistic unit ofthe anecdote ~ to the generality of a myth, I will confine myself to two examples, the first being the simultaneously historical and mythical figure of “Andp Chhatt” himself ‘This proper name bore a historical referent several of whose paintings survive with his inscription. Som Prakash Verma thus notes in his entry on him in his ‘Mughal Painters and their Work: a Biographical Survey and Comprehensive Catalogue: ‘Andp Chhatr seems to have begun his work at Shah Jahin’s court, At some Stage he joined Dara Shukoh's establishment, for minfiature) 6, a portrait of a lady in Dira Shukoh's harem, is ascribed to “Rai Anip Chhatr Darl Shukobi.” He may well have received the ttle Rai ftom his princely master, If so, its absence in later inscriptions is explained, for titles given by thet Prince would not have been used after his fal. “This entry corresponds in nar Bicil descr refers nowhere tee ec aan gebiy signaled by thir endzhyme ‘Chhatr becomes su’ porat 31 é 3.9 ht pore waste fre 1s en mins 1081 re eran nag we cca of wn oft painter os fe ia ecko ad the cent! Bi Jn Povey ina contingent.” I would see se et bei, ae er te eae a ie ‘color of his quill’s dust and Bihz&d’s nature, in honor’s veil, an a itself at his skill.”* These clauses ~ their mythic generality 7 underscore that Anip Sat cr ne aa won founder of Munichacism, who was imagined i w se Oc a hn aes roe i es Pe, shen anti cle othe sats ofa marinate pine by ths ped wae inding the significations of this ckphrastic episode wit subi ap char pr or in what terms ~ the fact that he see Gr pve a al ome to be orld by Bil aioe May meaning To tb queen of te axbiowapia eens irom ei cod ew ae ‘anthology of treatises by Sufi predecessors from his teacher | Hazrat sun ins his permission to copy and thus grow intimate with it, he a . Si a ee aferword to This aferword, quoted tng in this subs sma ing ow pals rnb us an iil becomes epistemially and ethically prepared to ead a aaa ac a sented and flowering garden for its physical proximity to gee a enc Soc en ico ls ne te a Eg en ei a ne ne sre ene of. a a oa iia Booka Ali) which areusted its autor’ theistic monism with &32 Bidil’s portrat symbolism in which the Arabic alphabet’ fist leter, the vertical stroke alif already inscribed into all the letters that followed it as God was already ‘wined in his creaturely manifestations. Bidil offers « condensed iteration of topos in one of his ghazal distiches: “Love's self-praising mouth created uni 4n the quill-point of its mouth did our mim contain an alif The reference is ‘the letter mim in the Perso-Arabic alphabet that is male up of a circle joined to vertically dropped aliflike stroke. Love, Ibn “Araki and Bidil's cosmog: force by which the phenomenal Many issue from the One, retains its unity e ‘in multiplicity just asthe letter mim, appearing near the alphabet’s end, still e tains its beginning alif Those of us today who read this autobiography sé the particularity of Bidil’s individual experience must recognize that none of jis new to any reader familiar with how medieval Muslim, Jewish and Chris ‘mystics read: an attitude towards reading as a confimmation of already kno twuths, a8 ¢ resolution of familiar doubts and as an experience of the traces of divine and absolute Author who generates & text in which, in Borges’s ‘with reference to medieval Jewish Kabbalists, “the collaboration of chang was calculable as zero” and who thus saturates even the alphabet with intentions.* Myths for the Sufi reader By such generalizing assimilations Bidil's purported Sufi reader would read the sisodes in Bidi's life mythically while also leaming to himself apply such 4 Iythicizing hermeneutic to other texts and experiences. Just as there is no int time in myth so oo, is there no firs ime in Bill's lie. Tis is why Bri con Posed in all but two genres of Persian prose - history (1arith) and biographical Gictionary (tazkirah). Our observations on bis mythiezing imperative allow us ‘0 explain these exceptions by arguing that these two genres would have com: mitted him to chronological sequence and thus to temporal particulary, Indeed, this is why his baydz or personal notebook of selected verses, oo, ranks ghazal composed in the same meter and rhyme not by chronology but sesthetie jude ment as 10 which poet he regarded as having composed the best ghazal in thal eter end-rhyme scheme." It is dis persistent ahistorcism that also explaing Why, in The Four Elements to, none of his experience unfold except asa iter: ation ofthe experiences of others famous in Islamic history or named by Brdil as his teachers. They are “his” experiences only inthis provisional sens that his iterations of them arc the latest. Recognizing this trative quality leads the reader to experience a blurring of Bidil's identity with those of his teachers, ‘These teachers include named men he meets face to face in geographical loca. tions still extant on the North Indian map as well a¢ those he eneoumtery in dream-visions after ther deaths or in thir physical absence. Like fbn "Arabl and “Abd al-Rahmén Jimi (2. 1492, Herat), Ton ‘Arabi’s most widely diffised inter- preter in Mughal North India, Bidil becomes an auther by ventiloguizing for teachers. If he is yet distinguishable by a proper name, as his teachers were it is because he strives to become a worthy ventriloquist for their voices Pemusoos and growths.” This is asl Set emo ee a ann tee nee erm ce esos ee Bidlil's portrait 33, 1e discursive levels on which BTdil’s teachers lay We may distng (er peape, authoniatvely reiterate previusly laid on panes. for him (OF eva pater tim a the level ofthe sentence or the semantic level: at down pa level of the anc ments itself, or at formity to patterns is al aie eta ae ee of his uo i stock metaphor of the world as a bride te ern ae le desu he phat aso fot, On confor in pt Mie tacoo under disusion paral eono ta C170 inal refs fo De pated followed by hs sine ay ports mae of i" Laalyze ths incuive level. Some furr instances of pats Chsaion fhe ee sd ono eras waking” conforms inthe opponed somatic ses of sleep Versus ‘in waa rk owe steed eel n ne piste Sema -s on dreaming. An anecdote presenting disputations ove on t ‘over the legal-moral validity of ghulluw or ecstatic Sus Praties fee slcontl chet ani debts neat Su dione ‘Sitio senting the aun races of raving seed on wat sere sik by ren tas and poset ol ve ee ric Sut hagoyapial Retr on marae” Finally, on the arate ve he mst conpievus ate thaf he foucae o “Eenet into which all the anecdotes are gathered, te text sa whole microosmicilly reeling the primordial and Tongfaarmacrocosmic const . ti waterand earth win Sal des evs hse ates fash Bl nd Ns pres ede with myths for speech and action." Reading the ‘ekphrastic crivode unde eer 7S fl Te wr lm no wo wh aeons of b's nd sn seldcerinton st scoot the exane Fran by it conformity to these mi paradigms tht cost ality and self-determination. ‘The portrait nits myhicng vector, se, tht eds lo fame is prs an Se wits dincon mia Gm he Quran eae Pesan ee whereas God alone acts independent and: ceca he i ely o ology ® depend o Him for er acon nd eet wa se Ing aee a masty of techy. And sich aston nd st, sigs mncads humans ino te vanity of taking themselves or34 Bias portcait actors although they are, in truth, only ever mediums for divine action. Here follows the precedent of “Abd al-Rahman J8mf who, inthe third chapter of | ‘masnat Yasuf u zulaykha (1483), cites Qur'an 6:76 on the Prophet Abrahan ‘refusal to persist in his love for stars that set. This Qur’énic exemplum confi that despite the continually “renewed image” (tdzah nagshi) the planets sented to the eye by ther various powers over and effects on the earth, they unworthy of being “creators” (nagshbandl) in and of themselves for ‘command of such powers was derivaive:® This primordial distinction in Four Elements, robably inherited trom lm, that was first formulated in Preface to this Element™ and again in this episode's opening passage, pro cally submits the subsequent account of AnOp Chhatt's portrait of BYdilt ceria interpretation of human action and technology. On this interpreta cosmicized in a ghazal fragment (gita’) of nine distiches, creatures fail to Prehend ther ultimate cause, mistaking their proximate causes forthe ult one: the gardener forgets that tis rain and not his watering that causes a plant row; the mother sannot account by her womb forthe fetus’s miniscule nsf ‘ations; the oyster drs out with astonishment at how a peas! knotted up in without a thread; the ocean wonders why it sweats; andthe sky why it eis ‘This mistake defines the operation of the intellect ‘agl) a8 an entrapment Proximate or secondary causes (ashab). And technology, on this interprettio Prostheticelly extends the intellet’s entrapment in an exploration of sex causality. To this, Bidil opposes an “absorption in a place of bewilderment (mahi hayrat-khinah). To comprehend “alte of this mystery” of the ultimate cause anterior to all technology isto become human, I should add in pessing here that one of the aims of this interpretation of Bil’ ekphrasic episode is understand the sense in which, in Bidil's thought, becoming human entails a comprehension of what traverses but exceeds the huma Already interpreted by this critique of a rational investigation of causality, Bidil’s subsequent account of Andp Chhat's mastery ofthe skils of coloring (rang-dmizd, drawing (siyah-qalami) and design (gardah) implicitly assigns them a morally ambivalent significance. They are positive signs of his miracu: lous stats asa confidant of divine mysteries since his skills, Bil notes, excel all other known miracles (mu zd). But they are also negative ones of his entrapment in a technologically exacerbated intellectual dependence on second ary causality. However, the negative signtiations come tobe borne out only the episode's end. At this point inthe episode, Andip Chhatt’s painted images are simply described in ghazal fragment as supra-real: is candle lights lame an bis moth-wing burs til the Day of Judgment; his drawn tres burgeon an bend with spring fruit; and the singing parot of his magical theater never misses a ote. That is, his visual representations excel their mortal and defective ori ginals in longevity and perfection of form. This, too, has a myth antecedent in the Persian literary ideal of fiction'sdiegetc world as an inorganic and therefore immortal and superior simulation of organic and morial beings.” This genealogy vf fiction as an immortlly famous verbal perfection of defective and moral ets mr, he clr Rivers And {Stats i oi a seen pe lve een weet be ule tac Tow sini the ot Wi perma ner acs ‘thot dw (aor pining aon Bidil’s portrait 35 jar to Persian and may be generalized to several traditional s an wherein at relates to life as models is ar Pe anskrt ad Latin among the ~ feu ee re mioraize bt maker ands model an idealization ‘ad itis in the fr fine acquiniane of BE, paths poralt i oreo aya ba yaidgar parddz ized in po pots Iter sinfcane Pero description remains, i se et tewenng none nga tp Chat, lng Stach nog mmraliy ht Ap Chat 8 10g sero ekeo memorize ekig hs permission © “{o create a bewildering text as a memorial [mush : Ti woud thse eset y big ein Tat he denoninatesis pining a es” (na) is ani ‘when we leam that, of this painting, only | il's ain, this description thus assimilating the painting's char ee ac mln by fn te te icy of ch psi ow mort ah Syed Brena spe wre coun fe qua ie whom aed Twix pare meh deve fon waning ” “The technical references here to painting bear ref ec vo eh men aero paper wh cha! Poe nae art's design or foundational drawing (0 fon juno ten ine wore. 58 st ocd ihe ping ws sre te Sip AS Gregory Moule this po However, be ssion: “Since the frivol _— ven al 9 capi is eed i yn, line, and the relationship of parts 1 in am rll re ch ete stent pee Ce nates ip wtb tn, a te er ae Ti se ens pee ‘merely colorstic charms. usintance permission to paint tn formulating his ret to rant his pine asguintane permission fo Pt his portrait, Brdil calls himself a “colorless tracing, image in his preface to The Four Elements: eet ul is ing of tse ee ofthe lomenia il 6 tte noxtcaon wth he word sly (rt nas i en int nor et ts oe at were ontan wsdom digas by naming i The Fou lent’ Since the purpose of the writ