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 IBN HALDUN UNIVERSITY ALLIANCE OF CIVILIZATIONS INSTITUTE DEPARTMENT OF CIVILIZATION STUDIES

İmza:
iv ABSTRACT CIVILITY IN THE ENCHANTED CITY: THE KHANQAH AND TEACHINGS OF HAZRAT NIZAMUDDIN AWLIYA Shaikh, Saad Razi MA in Civilization Studies
Thesis Advisor: Prof. Dr. Bruce Lawrence Thesis Co-Advisor: Assoc. Prof. Heba Raouf Ezzat
June 2022, 90 Pages Civility has been variously described as a social norm, an attitude, even a virtue. The wide variety of ascriptions attached to it indicate as much its versatility as its indispensability for the construction of a sustainable society. Yet how widespread is civility, across history and societies? This is a question that attempts to wean the concept off its often-Eurocentric conceptualization, wherein civility was tied to the ‘civilizing process’ described and championed by Norbert Elias. The present thesis undertakes a study of civility in a very different social context, by zooming onto the Chishti khanqah of Hazrat Nizamuddin Awliya in early thirteenth century India. The underlying contention is that civility in this milieu was expressed through the key Sufi vocabulary of adab, futuwwa and gharib nawazi, it was not tied to the civilizing process of a Leviathan State. Rather it was the individual moral self, trained and elevated by a charismatic Shaykh, aided by the comradeship of the khanqah, and grounded in a world that was resolutely ‘enchanted’ that made the acquisition and solidification of civility a feasible process. This thesis seeks a sociological examination of that project. Keywords: Adab, Civility, Civilizing process, Chishti, Futuwwa, Sufism
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ÖZ BÜYÜLÜ ŞEHİRDE EDEP: HAZRAT NİZAMÜDDİN EVLİYE'NİN HANKA VE ÖĞRETİMLERİ Shaikh, Saad Razi Medeniyet Araştırmaları Anabilim Dalı Yüksek Lisans Tez Danışmanı: Prof. Dr. Bruce Lawrence İkinci Tez Danışmanı: Doç. Dr.Heba Raouf Ezzat
Haziran 2022, 90 sayfa Edep, çeşitli şekillerde sosyal bir norm, bir tutum, hatta bir erdem olarak tanımlanmıştır. Ona eklenen çok çeşitli atıflar, sürdürülebilir bir toplumun inşası için vazgeçilmez olduğu kadar çok yönlülüğünü de göstermektedir. Yine de edep tarih ve toplumlar arasında ne kadar yaygındır? Bu, kavramı, Norbert Elias tarafından tanımlanan ve savunulan edebın "uygarlık sürecine" bağlı olduğu, genellikle Avrupa merkezli kavramsallaştırmasından uzaklaştırmaya çalışan bir sorudur. Bu tez, Hazreti Nizamuddin Evliya'nın on üçüncü yüzyılın başlarında Hindistan'daki Çişti hanqahını yakınlaştırarak, çok farklı bir sosyal bağlamda bir edeb incelemesi yapmaktadır. Temeldeki çekişme, bu çevredeki edebin, adab, fütüvvet ve gharib nawazi'nin anahtar Sufi kelimeleri aracılığıyla ifade edildiği, bir Leviathan Devletinin medenileşme sürecine bağlı olmadığıdır. Aksine, karizmatik bir Şeyh tarafından yetiştirilen ve yüceltilen, khanqah'ın yoldaşlığının desteklediği ve edebın kazanılmasını ve sağlamlaştırılmasını mümkün bir süreç haline getiren kararlılıkla "büyülenmiş" bir dünyada temellenen bireysel ahlaki benlikti. Bu tez, bu projenin sosyolojik bir incelemesini amaçlamaktadır. Anahtar Kelimeler: Adab, Medeniyet, Medeniyet süreci, Çişti, Fütüvva, Tasavvuf, Vazife-i temeddün
vi TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................ iv
ÖZ ................................................................................................................................. v
TABLE OF CONTENTS ............................................................................................ vi
Introduction .................................................................................................................. 1
Conceptualizing Civility .......................................................................................... 1
A Limited Concept ............................................................................................... 2
Aims and Objectives ................................................................................................ 4
Methodology ............................................................................................................ 5
Limitations ............................................................................................................... 7
Literature Review ..................................................................................................... 8
Outline .................................................................................................................... 14
1. The Social Imaginary of Thirteenth Century Delhi ........................................... 17
1.1 The Early Medieval Period .......................................................................... 18
1.1.1 Mongols, mayhem, migration .............................................................. 19
1.1.2 Delhi as the Qubbat al-Islam ................................................................ 21
1.1.3 Istidraj or Karamat?.............................................................................. 23
1.2 The Chishti Tariqa and Hazrat Nizamuddin Awliya ................................... 25
1.2.1 The Khanqah ........................................................................................ 26
1.3 Locating Hazrat-i-Dilli ................................................................................ 28
1.3.1 A world on the move ............................................................................ 31
1.3.2 Conclusion: The thirteenth century social imaginary .......................... 33
2 Civilization as Disenchantment ......................................................................... 34
2.1 A Civilizing Process? .................................................................................. 34
2.2 The Question of Alienation ......................................................................... 37
2.3 Nature as Brute ............................................................................................ 38
vii 2.4 Alienation, Agency ...................................................................................... 40
2.5 Conclusion ................................................................................................... 41
3 The Teachings of Hazrat Nizamuddin Awliya................................................... 42
3.1 PART ONE .................................................................................................. 43
3.1.1 The Four Enemies ................................................................................ 43
3.1.2 Relation with Others ............................................................................ 47
3.1.3 Relation with Nature ............................................................................ 50
3.2 PART TWO ................................................................................................. 53
3.2.1 Gharib Nawazi ..................................................................................... 53
3.2.2 Futuwwa ............................................................................................... 57
3.2.3 Adab ..................................................................................................... 59
4 Conclusion ......................................................................................................... 65
4.1 Ethics, Habitus ............................................................................................. 68
4.2 The Active Moral Subject ........................................................................... 69
4.3 The Relational Self ...................................................................................... 71
4.4 Re-turning (to) the World ............................................................................ 73
Bibliography ............................................................................................................... 75
APPENDIX A ............................................................................................................ 83
APPENDIX B ............................................................................................................ 84
APPENDIX C ............................................................................................................ 85
APPENDIX D ............................................................................................................ 86
APPENDIX E ............................................................................................................ 88
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Introduction
So the shoemaker went on. He passed in front of the shrine so that he could not see the man. When he had gone some way, he looked back, and saw that the man was no longer leaning against the shrine, but was moving as if looking towards him. The shoemaker felt more frightened than before, and thought, “Shall I go back to him, or shall I go on? If I go near him something dreadful may happen. Who knows who the fellow is? He has not come here for any good. If I go near him he may jump up and throttle me, and there will be no getting away. Or if not, he’d still be a burden on one’s hands. What could I do with a naked man? I couldn’t give him my last clothes. Heaven only help me to get away!” So the shoemaker hurried on, leaving the shrine behind him-when suddenly his conscience smote him, and he stopped in the road. “What are you doing, Simon?” said he to himself. “The man may be dying of want, and you slip past afraid. Have you grown so rich as to be afraid of robbers? Ah, Simon, shame on you!” So he turned back and went up to the man. (Tolstoy 2009) Conceptualizing Civility Civility is a phrase as varied in its definition as it is in its practice. It qualifies as ‘both a social condition and a normative value.’ Although it is useful to see civility as the absence of violence, its range of operation and potential is far greater than that. We’re not immune to its practice or the awareness of its absence. An everyday example is of lining up in queue, waiting for one’s turn, allowing the other to speak without interruption, and so on. More broadly, we may include ‘the tolerance for free speech’ along with ‘the avoidance of hate speech’ as also ‘the acceptance of “deviant” cultural norms and habits as practised by ethnic minorities; and the lending of a helpful hand to those in need’ as examples of civility. Civility is then at the most basic the ‘recognition of the other.’ (Baumgarten, Gosewinkel and Dieter 2011) Civility is a virtue born in or rather borne out of modernity, emerging ‘out of the intermittent, informal and quasi-public interactions between shopkeeper and customer, between merchant and producer, or between fellow customers in the coffeehouse or public house.’ (Boyd 2006) It is higher than ‘the anonymous self-
interest of a Hobbesian world where possessive individuals chase after the next
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economic increment’ and yet it falls short of ‘the intense moral solidarity dictated by ascribed identities of family, kin or tribe.’ (ibid) The two worlds roughly correspond to Tönnies famous classification between Gemeinschaft (community bonds) and Gesellschaft (associational bonds). In the former, ‘all kinds of social co-existence that are familiar, comfortable and exclusive are included’ whereas Gesellschaft refers to ‘life in the public sphere, in the outside world.’ Tönnies writes almost wistfully that ‘in Gemeinschaft we are united from the moment of our birth with our own folk for better or for worse.’ On the other hand, ‘we go out into Gesellschaft as if into a foreign land’. (Tönnies 2001, 18) The virtue of civility then becomes indispensable, in the way we deal with others and the way we run society as a whole. It is a tool that ‘restrains the exercise of power by the powerful and restrains obstruction and violence by those who do not have power but who wish to have it.’ It is a virtue for it allows ‘a variety of substantive interests and ideals or virtues to be cultivated and because it attempts to keep a balance among the parties to the conflicts by an example and an insistence on self-restraint.’ Finally, ‘it is a restraint on the passions with which interests and ideals are pursued.’ (Shils 1980) Richard Boyd summarizes it well when he observes that upholding civility ‘generates a sense of inclusivity and moral equality, both in ourselves and for others’. And a ‘failure to respect these rules by behaviours such as rudeness, condescension, mockery and other forms of incivility serves to locate others outside a common moral community.’ Failure to ‘be civil to someone - to treat them harshly, rudely or condescendingly’ signifies not only a lack of manners, rather, it amounts to ‘disdain or contempt for them as moral beings.’ (Boyd 2006) Incivility therefore functions as a tool of ‘hierarchy, difference and exclusion.’ (Shils 1997, 338-40) A Limited Concept Over the past few years, there has been a recognition for comprehending civility as ‘a normative ideal of social behaviour which varies in content over time and from one cultural context to another.’ (Baumgarten, Gosewinkel and Dieter 2011) This was a
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necessary correction to the Eurocentric concept and trajectory of civility. The work of Armando Salvatore is of crucial significance in widening the study of civility as a concept. Delineating a roadmap for the sociology of Islam, Salvatore proposes that the discipline needs to move over ‘a politically overloaded idea of civil society reflecting Western aspirations and postulates’ in favour of ‘a more malleable, yet historically sound and transculturally plausible, concept of civility.’ To achieve this ‘rather transversal notion of civility and emancipate it from its dependence on a unilateral Western heritage’ it is necessary to consider ‘non-Western experiences and trajectories.’ (Salvatore 2016, 43) In his understanding, civility should be framed ‘as a slippery dimension of social action and of the social bond more than as the integrative code of an autonomous social space.’ (Salvatore 2016, 56) It is seen as based on networks ‘activated and maintained by a variety of individuals across ties of kin and neighbourhood through an iterative, shared, or at least overlapping invocation of some higher goods (often but not necessarily warranted or exacted by a transcendent reference).’ (Rahimi and Salvatore 2016, 258) Salvatore notes that ‘the dimension of contention that is inherent in the complex management of the social and cultural order is not pre-empted or repressed by civility, but, so to speak, policed from the inside out and tamed through codes of self-
restraint’ which in turn ‘typically occurs through the ways a variety of interactants learn similar or comparable patterns of tact and manners which can regulate exchange and even, within certain limits, conflict.’ (Salvatore 2016, 26) From the preceding discussions, it emerges that the concept of civility postulates ‘an articulate, yet not fully coherent (perhaps inherently inchoate) field of intertwined ideas and keywords’ which reflect ‘specific and sometimes competing ways of coming to grips with the relationship among individuals, societies and the governing structures that rule them, both within specific locales and in the “global village”.’ (Salvatore 2011)
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In the case of the Islamicate, (that is, the larger domain of Islamic experiences; see below for definition) Salvatore argues that Sufism as a parallel but largely convergent and increasingly central Islamic tradition, which was never confined to a purely spiritual level or to a mere private sphere. Through its elastic yet formative relation to Islamic normativity, Sufism became a major—if not the principal—
arrow of Islamic civility. (Salvatore 2016, 80) Salvatore’s insights help us bridge the fundamental limitations associated with civility. The first is to broaden its field of enquiry, to examine it not as a set of values and behaviours exclusive to modern Europe, but as a key human attribute, spread across different epochs and diverse societies. The second is Salvatore’s remarkable assertion to see Sufism as the ‘principal arrow of Islamic civility.’ The two insights are crucial in laying the groundwork for this thesis. The next section details its aims and objectives, and the research question it seeks to answer. Aims and Objectives From the preceding discussions, it becomes clear that probing for alternative conceptions of civility carries much merit, both for widening the arc of the concept, as well as in unlocking sociologies of different societies. The aim of this thesis is on the same trajectory: to delineate one possible non-Eurocentric conception of civility. A fruitful endeavour in this direction can be a study of civility in premodern Muslim societies. This is what the present study proposes to do, by taking the case study of the khanqah and teachings of Hazrat Nizamuddin Awliya, the preeminent Sufi Shaykh of the Indian subcontinent during the pre-Mughal period. Born in Badaun in the North Indian plains in 1242 CE, he eventually came to settle in Delhi; his decades-long stewardship of the Chishti Silsila was instrumental in the spread and dominance of the tariqa across the Indian subcontinent till his demise in 1325 CE. The thesis will pursue three objectives. The first is identifying the specific form of civility that was available in thirteenth century Delhi, as demonstrated through both the Shaykh’s teachings and the social life of his khanqah members. A second objective is to study the social imaginary of the thirteenth-century Delhi khanqah, to probe what built and sustained its worldview.
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The second objective is ancillary to the first one, it is only by locating the subjects spatially, and epistemologically, that we can come to terms with their worldviews. In other words, it makes no sense to study a ‘view-out-of-nowhere’, it is crucial to ground it in the background of its subjects. A third objective is to examine how an alternative conception of civility such as the one being probed, can help widen the idea of civility itself, by taking it from a passive to a more active frame. This is a task that proceeds from the understanding ‘to treat our normative concepts less as statements about the world than as tools and weapons of debate.’ And because ‘our moral and social world held in place by the manner in which we choose to apply our inherited normative vocabularies’ the key tool of its reappraisal and change is ‘by changing the ways in which these vocabularies are applied.’ (Skinner 1999) The thrust of the study can be summarized in the following research question: What was the particular form of civility present in thirteenth century Delhi, as exemplified through Hazrat Nizamuddin’s khanqah and teachings? What was the social imaginary of the world that made it possible? Methodology The research question requires a historical study, relying mainly on the primary archival material. The method will be thematic analysis, for as Riessman notes, such analysis ‘is the usual approach to letters, diaries, auto/biographies—documents historians and biographers draw on.’ (Riessman 2007) The primary texts for this thesis are the Fawaid al-Fuad and the Siyar al-Awliya, falling respectively into the two categories of malfuzat and tazkira.
Fawaid al-Fuad serves as the main reference for the life and teachings of Hazrat Nizamuddin. It belongs to the malfuzat genre of Sufi literature. Derived from the Arabic, malfuzat refers to ‘what has been said’, connotating to texts written by the disciple of a Sufi master, recording the shaykh’s daily conversations. The texts chronicle the Sufi master’s activities and teaching alike, it serves as a deep introduction to the disciples who are not physically present in his khanqah. It also
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serves as an introduction to disciples from later generations who wish to learn more about the Shayk’s life. The malfuzat are a genre of literature peculiar to South Asian Muslim culture. The benefits of mining the malfuzat are innumerable for the purpose of historical research. They have been well described by Amina Steinfels. Firstly, because they ‘present a detailed depiction of Sufi life in its social context, malfuzat are an invaluable source of information on social, political, and economic history.’ Secondly, since medieval history usually focuses ‘on the royal courts and military campaigns, malfuzat illuminate whole other segments of Indo-Muslim society.’ They can therefore ‘be used to explore such disparate issues as the culinary habits, economic conditions, vernacular languages, topography, and even pasttimes of particular periods and localities.’ (Steinfels 2004) Unlike the Fawaid, Siyar al-Awliya belongs to the genre of tazkira, or biographical sketches of prominent Sufis. The first tazkira produced in the subcontinent, the Siyar
catalogues the lives and teachings of several Sufi masters. The book draws upon Fawaid, but also other sources. (Gulati 2003) Tazkiras ‘both memorialize individuals and communicate their legacy to a new generation.’ Similar to the malfuzat, the tazkira serves a large goal: ‘the collective display of groups of individuals.’ It is as groups of heroes, sharing a common identity and a convergent legacy, that saints and poets reinforce the value of a Muslim presence in South Asia—not just anywhere in South Asia, but in South Asian urban settings, in premodern cities. It is bards and Sufis together who authorize the cultural symbolism of South Asia as an urban, and also an urbane, Muslim realm. (Hermansen and Lawrence 2000) Through a close reading of the three primary texts, Fawaid al-Fuad, Siyar al-Awliya,
and Nizami Bansari we can identify certain key concepts and recurrent themes regarding both khanqah life, and the teachings of the Shaykh that shaped it. The qualitative nature of thematic analysis provides sufficient room for broad conclusions. The choice of themes is subjective but not unprecedented: both popular memory and academic writings agree on the key humanistic teachings of Hazrat
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Nizamuddin. Further, the key themes and their frequency can be objectively confirmed. Limitations The thesis seeks to investigate a broad gauged conception of civility, taking a pre-
modern South Asian Muslim milieu as its case study. It needs to be clarified however that the aim is not to delineate a theory of ‘Islamic civility’ per se. The thrust of this study is sociological, rather than theological. At the most, we can consider the case study as a case of ‘Islamicate civility.’ The neologism Islamicate ‘suggests a repertoire of language and behaviour, knowledge and power, that define broad cosmologies of human existence.’ Coined by the global historian Marshall Hodgson almost half a century ago, it refers to a structure or frame of moral reference that characterized the span of the Afro-Eurasian world in which Muslims were major agents of exchange and control. Islamicate denoted the moral values and cultural forms that spread through the world system of Muslim trade and power in the centuries following the rise of Islamic polities. Hodgson distinguished Islamicate from that which was strictly Islamic or Muslim, relating to the practice of Islam as a religion, whether through creedal, ritual, or juridical loyalty. Although Muslims did not make this distinction—they had no need to—the distinction between Islamicate and Islamic/Muslim is extremely useful for us—moderns, or perhaps postmoderns, that we be. (Gilmartin and Lawrence 2000) By employing the term ‘Islamicate’, we’re freed from any scriptural exegesis, as also debates of a theological dispensation. The subject matter here is a religious institution (the khanqah), the chief figure is a religious teacher (the Shaykh), yet the two are analysed as variables of a wider sociological phenomenon. It is also worth keeping in mind that the thirteenth-century Delhi was far from a single homogenous unit. The new site of Tughlaqabad was being raised, the previous site of Siri was still inhabited, while new settlements like Ghiyaspur were being set up. Yet to claim that social relations across the city, both in the court palace and the laymen’s quarters followed a single pattern would be both incorrect and lacking evidence. Yet the pattern of civility, to be detailed in the coming chapters, had a large standing in the disciples of the Shaykh, who were spread across the city.
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Further, if we’re to take Tarikh-Firoz-Shahi at its face value, the impact of the Shaykh was such that the entire city of Delhi underwent a spiritual transformation. This thesis doesn’t investigate such a claim, nor takes it at its face value. However, it does assert the transformation the Shaykh had on the members living in and around the khanqah, and in doing so, it takes the urban settlement of Delhi as a representative site for the entire city. More than a few insights can be gleaned by committing to an etymological study of the key concepts in the thesis, namely tasawwuf, futuwwa, and adab. This thesis steers clear of it, for the sake of brevity and to keep the focus on the main research question. In doing so however, we’re left to accept the key concepts as they are, without probing further into perhaps how contested their usage can be. Take the case of futuwwa, for example, or jawanmardi in the case of the Persian tradition. It refers to ‘young-manliness’ or ‘the state of being a young man’, denoting ‘bravery, courage, loyalty and piety.’ Yet the term was also used in some quarters in a less-than-glowing light, referring in one case ‘to describe groups of young Arabs who enjoyed a hedonistic lifestyle, whose parties included singing and wine-drinking’, while in another case, ‘jawanmardi was associated with a bandit (ayyar).’ (Ridgeon 2011, 1) The frequency of such usages, its changing usage in various contexts, the way different social groups perceived it - all are topics ripe for a separate thesis. Literature Review Unlike other periods of pre-modern Indian history, the early medieval era does not suffer from a lack of primary material documenting its political and social life. The malfuzat and tazkira literature mentioned previously are ably complemented by the works of court historians such as Barani, whose Tarikh-i-Firoz Shahi remains a standard reference for early medieval era. Both medieval historians and their modern counterparts have built on these works in reconstructing life in the Delhi Sultanate. The Fawaid al-Fuad remains the starting point for any discussion on the Chishti tariqa in general and Hazrat Nizamuddin in particular. Written by Amir Sijzi, a high-
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ranking officer of the Sultanate, and a devout disciple of the Shaykh, the book records over fifty of the author’s meetings with the Shaykh. Most of these meetings encapsulate detailed public sermons of the Shaykh, while a few chronicle Sijzi’s personal encounters. The sermons encompass both tales of former Sufi masters, as well general sermons of the Shaykh. They provide a window into khanqah life, as also the thoughts, teachings and the presence of the Shaykh. To read them is, to paraphrase Bruce Lawrence, to see the Shaykh ‘laughing and crying and praying.’ (Lawrence 1978, 28) Prof. Bruce has ably rendered the text into English, while the Urdu translation has been done, amongst others, by Khwaja Hasan Nizami. Khwaja Hasan’s translation opens with a dedication to Hazrat Nizamuddin, the one ‘who taught man to recognize man, and God.’ The introduction of the English translation was written by Prof. Khaliq Ahmad Nizami, who summarized its importance. The conversations of a saint with such impact on contemporary life cannot fail to provide a glimpse into medieval society in all its light and shade. Amir Hasan Sijzi, who compiled these conversations, was a disciple of Shaykh NizamuddinAwliya and had direct access to him. His work came to be recognized as a manual of guidance' and a vade mecum for spiritual culture. (Nizami, Introduction 1992) The late Prof. Khaliq Ahmad Nizami was perhaps the foremost authority on the Chishti tariqa in South Asia. Both his works in Urdu and English alike are of a high scholarly nature, focusing on not only the development of the Chishti tariqa, but also the key personalities who underwrote its success in the Indian subcontinent. Along with biographical sketches of both Hazrat Nizamuddin and Baba Ganj-i Shakar, Prof. Nizami also has an expansive Urdu tome, the Tarikh-i Mashayikh-i Chisht on the history of the Chishti tariqa as well as the broader trends in its history, and the ethos underlying its teachings.
For the purpose of this thesis, Prof. Nizami’s insights on the functioning of the khanqah in medieval India are particularly useful. By combing through both historical archives and historically continuous practices at the khanqahs, he was able to provide a detailed picture about the demographics of different khanqahs, the
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various visitors and disciples who would inhabit, the services the khanqah offered, the hierarchy of work, the distribution of food and gifts, the nature of visitor’s grievances, and finally the Shaykh’s own charisma and ‘nafs-i-giraan’, the ‘intuitive intelligence that could understand, comprehend, control and direct the mind of the disciples’, which were required ‘to fulfil the purpose of khanqah organization.’ (Nizami 1957) Such a social history of the khanqah is indispensable for identifying the civility variable present in that timespace. Both the history of the medieval Delhi as well as its ‘sacred geography’ provides us useful clues in understanding its social milieu. The former is covered admirably by the late Sunil Kumar, whose nuanced scholarship broadens our understanding of medieval India, beyond the usual religious binaries. Professor Kumar’s works are useful in understanding the role migration from the Muslim heartlands played in the construction of the Delhi Sultanate, the complicated relationship with the Mongol threat, as well as the patterns of authority exhibited by both Sultanas and Sufis alike. (Kumar 2010) (Kumar 2014) The latter is a particularly important group for piecing together medieval history. A key figure in deconstructing its religious life is Nile Green. His conception of the construction of Sufi spaces in medieval India is particularly useful, in understanding how the twin arches of text and territory combined in ‘marking, claiming, and transforming India’s landscapes and townscapes into homelands that were made by fastening memory onto solid ground.’ (Green 2012, 13) In addition to the Fawaid al-Fuad, two other primary sources are similarly indispensable for identifying the social life of that era. The first is Nizami Bansari1,
written by Hardev Rajkumar (Ayaz Ahmad), a former Hindu royal, who travelled from the Deccan to Delhi for the sole purpose of meeting Hazrat Nizamuddin. The book is not as famous as the Fawaid, it was only discovered in the previous century 1 A caveat is due here. Nizami Bansari is not universally recognized and accepted, there are claims that it is largely apocryphal. Tanvir Anjum points out the inconsistencies present in the book, as also the ‘dubious’ nature of its authorship. The original Persian manuscript titled ‘Chihal Ruzah’ attributed to the Deogir royal Hardev, and from which Hasan Nizami translated it into the Urdu, isn’t present at our disposal for verification. (Anjum 2011, 221) The points taken from the Nizami Bansari should therefore be read in conjunction with the other primary sources detailed above.
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by Khwaja Hasan Nizami, who upon retrieving it recognized its importance and had it translated into Urdu. The book details Hardev’s first impressions of the Delhi Sultanate, his own journey of accepting Islam, becoming a disciple of Hazrat Nizamuddin, and finally marrying the Sultan’s daughter. Hardev’s book provides the most intimate details of the khanqah life, documenting the Shaykh’s behaviour from the closest quarters. Simultaneously, the book documents the public life of Delhi, there are clues scattered throughout the text on trade networks of the Sultanate, demographics of the city, organization of the khanqah, organization of the urban landscape, court rituals and politics, amongst other things. The book neatly complements the Fawaid al-Fuad,
while the latter gives a clear-eyed view of what a typical sermon of the Shaykh would contain, the former goes into the very personal and the very public aspects of the khanqah. The Siyar al-Awliya combines both. Whereas the Nizami Bansari provides a spatial reference point for the khanqah, Siyar al-Awliya performs a temporal one, focusing on not only Hazrat Nizamuddin, but also the teachers and disciples who came both before and after him. Written in the middle of the thirteenth century, the book is the pioneer of the tazkira genre of literature peculiar to the sub-continent, wherein hagiographical sketches of former Sufi masters illustrate both their miraculous lives, as well provide points of references and continuity to future tariqa members. All three of these books, Fawaid al-Fuad, Siyar al-Awliya and Nizami Bansari are the primary material for this thesis, indispensable not only for reconstructing thirteenth century Delhi, but also for giving us a first-hand flavour of what life really was like for its inhabitants. The three books have been resourcefully mined by modern-day scholars, who used the insights it provided to get a better understanding of medieval South Asian Sufism. Of particular relevance to the thesis is the chapter on Hazrat Nizamuddin by Anna Suvorova, whose introductory lines serve well as our segue into civility as it existed in thirteenth century Delhi.
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It is difficult to name a socio-cultural sphere on which Shaikh Nizamuddin Awliya (1242–
1325) might not have exerted ennobling influence, whether it is religion, politics, education, literature, music or, above all, the style of human relations. (Suvorova 2004, 105) In her chapter, tellingly titled ‘The Peacemaker of Delhi’, Professor Suvorova contextualizes Hazrat Nizamuddin’s prescribed approach to social relations and harmony. Shaikh Nizamuddin linked the inclination for violence and revenge with man’s bestial self (nafs), and peaceful disposition and tolerance with his spiritual heart (qalb). If people or nations who happen to be under the influence of nafs run into each other, endless strife is inevitable. However, if the corroding action of nafs is met with the neutralizing counteraction of qalb, then enmity dies out, like acid neutralized by alkali. According to Nizamuddin forgiveness is spiritual sublimation, expulsion of all dark passions and unregulated emotions. (ibid, 109) What this insight provides us is a clue to bridge the modern conception of civility with the medieval life this thesis seeks to investigate. Civility here is seen as the ‘restraint on the passions’ Shils argued for, but the argument isn’t circumscribed by instrumental reason or public order. Rather, civility is raised to a higher ethical benchmark, being constructed primarily as spiritual self-control and being expressed in key Sufi vocabulary. A key figure in understanding both Islamicate civility and medieval Sufism is Prof. Bruce Lawrence. Both his translation of Fawaid al-Fuad, as well as complementary works on the Chishti tariqa in India underscore his sensitive appraisal of Sufi life in medieval India. In his first book on the subject, Lawrence asserted that ‘the genesis of Indian Sufism as a constituent of Indo-Islamic piety is synonymous with the development of the Chishti Silsila.’ (Lawrence 1978, 20) Of Hazrat Nizamuddin, he notes that, although ‘there were several stars which comprised the galaxy of Farid ad-din’s company’, it was Nizamuddinwho ‘outshone them, in humour, in pathos, in love, and in poetry, he was an exemplar whom many reckon as the greatest Indian Sufi saint of all time.’ (ibid, 24) In a recent monograph, Lawrence meditates on the meaning of adab and Islamic civility, as they were understood in the Persianate world. Adab can refer ‘to literature, but it is elevated literature, at once linked to religion by its preferred form (poetry) but also its daily performance (along with prayer, labour and leisure
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activity).’ This ‘performance’ involves ‘a common set of behavioural traits, morally underpinned by a notion of collective good.’ (Lawrence 2021, 62-3) Islamicate civilization is therefore understood as consisting of both ‘implicit ethical norms [adab] as well as ‘explicit juridical codes [shariʿah].’ Recent scholarship, most prominently Armando Salvatore’s, has provided fresh avenues and new theoretical frameworks to investigate premodern Muslim societies. Much of scholarship on medieval India gravitates towards its military history; indeed, the spectre of the warrior-king looms large over most historical accounts. The present thesis follows the pattern set out by Salvatore, by moving away from warriors and rulers, to focus instead on parallel centres of authority, as well as social relations amongst the laity in medieval India. The following excerpt from Salvatore’s article is particularly instructive in informing the theoretical assumptions of this study. (during) the ‘middle periods’ of Islamic history, roughly stretching from the 10th to the 15th centuries), Muslim society appeared to be a society of networks more than states, while the idea of a governance legitimised in Islamic terms was collapsed into more fundamental speculations about issues of general order, particularly through the rising role of organised forms of Sufism (which it is reductive to depict as the ‘mystical’ dimension of Islam, in thought and practice). In other words, governance and its legitimacy happened to be seen as largely divorced from state power and variably related to the manifold dimensions opened by Islam’s steady growth: territorial, social, intellectual and even ‘spiritual’. During this era Sufi turuq (brotherhoods) played a key role in Islam’s global expansion across the Eurasian depths, into the Indian subcontinent and far Southeast Asia, and into sub-
Saharan Africa. Their flexible and semi-formal model of organisation and connectedness, of balancing competition, co-operation and hierarchy, suited the dominance of the network model. Sufis also provided new sources for a fresh wave of reflection on the integration of various dimensions of Islam: juridical like philosophical, exoteric like esoteric. In many ways they filled the legitimacy gap left behind by the collapse of caliphal authority by constructing webs of relations that balanced vertical authority (the role of charismatic sheikhs and living saints) with horizontal cohesiveness (the brotherhood pattern, fitting the Weberian model quite well). (Salvatore 2011) Both Fawaid al-Fuad and Siyar al-awliya can be meaningfully mined in the light of this observation, to see examine Sufism beyond its ‘mystical’ dimension, to instead situate it as a domineering factor informing Muslim social life in the early medieval period. The present thesis is a modest contribution in that direction.
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Outline The thesis is divided into four sections. Following the introduction, the first chapter seeks to delineate an understanding of thirteenth-century Delhi. Here, I’m relying on Charles Taylor’s concept of social imaginary, ‘the ways people imagine their social existence, how they fit together with others, how things go on between them and their fellows, the expectations that are normally met, and the deeper normative expectations and images that underlie their expectations.’ It focuses on ‘the way ordinary people "imagine" their social surroundings, and this is often not expressed in theoretical terms but is carried in images, stories and legends.’ (Taylor 2004) This is a most useful theoretical lens to provide the necessary background information on the khanqah life in thirteenth-century Delhi. At the immediate spatial level, we may map the political life, social milleu and economic patters of medieval Delhi. Simultaneously, we can situate Delhi not as a far-flung region of the Islamicate ecumune, but rather as one of its central node, interacting with Sufi networks in Khorasan, Baghdad and other cities of the Islamicate heartland. At the more conceptual level, in terms of the epistemological makeup of the general population, we can observe a ‘enchanted’ wordlview in place. Yogis levitate, dervishes fly, mountains speak, awliyas predivine events, the world is soundly held in place by the force of both the Shaykh’s charisma and his followers belief in him. The second chapter returns to the moorings of the present, it investigates the civilizing process expounded by Norbert Elias, and briefly mentions the drawbacks associated with it. The civilizing process was neither benign nor spontaneous, it took shape under the shadow of a Leviathan state, it was mediated, perhaps even engineered by the newly-emerging body of secular experts. Its engagement with the natural world, and its wide-ranging effect on the human self and the web of human relations is briefly perused. A key contestation spelt in this chapter is on the nature of disenchantment in the modern world, the alienation of humans from fellow humans, but also alienation from nature. The ramifications of this process are not merely ecological, they relate to the question of morality and agency of the human subject.
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The third chapter is where the heavylifting occurs, so far as providing the evidences for the thesis arguments are concerned. The chapter has three objectives. The first is to conduct a sociological inquiry into the nature of khanqah life, and its relationship with strangers (gharib). The contention is that the stranger is the barometer of civility in any society at any time, the range of attitudes directed at the stranger, the one out of nowhere, the one who doesn’t belong, reveals much about the society. The khanqah of Hazrat Nizamuddin is investigated as the meeting ground of strangers. The bustling urban spaces of medieval Delhi housed people of contrasting classes and temparements, the khanqah was arguably a social experiment, a safe space where interactions could occur in the realm of civility, a training that would well permeate life outside the khanqah as well. Following the Shaykh’s own personal example, the stranger was both honoured and welcomed at the khanqah. The second objective is to document the teachings of Hazrat Nizamuddin, and the clues it holds in reconstructing a different pattern of civility. For the Chishti Shaykh, the service of his fellow beings was an essential part of the faith, his khanqah was therefore the refuge of the gharib, the poor or the stranger. Two themes, arguably two sides of the same coin, can be recognized in Hazrat Nizamuddin’s teachings. The first is ‘recognition of the Other’, in the broadest sense of the term. The second is ‘renunciation of the Self.’ The Shaykh’s discourse frequented harked to the four enemies of humans, dunya, shaitan, nafs, shahwa. It was this renunciation that underlied the civility present in the khanqah. The third objective is to reflect on this expanded conception of civility. Here, I wish to borrow a theme from political philosophy, noting the manner in which Isaiah Berlin conceptualized liberty. Berlin’s conception of liberty is as much positive as negative, refraining the individual from certain actions, but also demanding to do certain ones. Taking Hazrat Nizamuddin’s exemplar, this chapter argues to see civility in a more expansive role, urging us to see both its positive and negative aspects. The fourth and final chapter is the conclusion. This chapter has two objectives. The first is to summarize briefly the arguments stated throughout the thesis. The second is a poring question over the topic of moral choice and responsibility. The previous
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chapter sought to make a case for seeing thirteenth century khanqah life as a viable model of civility. Yet it would be imprudent to assume that the clocks can be turned back and that the modern human subject will behave in a manner identical to their medieval counterparts. ‘Organisational man’, Eaton argues, ‘wants a quiet life, freedom from real responsibility, an artificial world in which nothing is left to chance and, quite particularly, the absence of “difficult” people who create “complications”.’ (G. Eaton 1977, 206) Gai Eaton, himself a Sufi murid in the Alwiyya tariqa for over thirty-five years, worried about ‘the deep-rooted desire—more common than is often realised—
to slough off the burden of one's humanity, with all that it implies in the way of choice and responsibility, and lose oneself in anonymity and indistinction.’ (Eaton 1977, 55) It is perhaps this refusal to shoulder moral responsibility that most threatens any sustainable model of civility. This is where we return to the khanqah Shaykh. The contention is that the tarbiyah as received through the Sufi master is key to the creation of the moral self, who in turn is key to the formation of a society that practices active civility. In other words, it is the moral self who balances society, which in turn must work actively to create the moral self.
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1. The Social Imaginary of Thirteenth Century Delhi Writing on the time immemorial institution of the city, the great chronicler of urban life Lewis Mumford noted, with perhaps a touch of melancholy, that ‘from the beginning, then, the city exhibited an ambivalent character it has never wholly lost: it combined the maximum amount of protection with the greatest incentives to aggression: it offered the widest possible freedom and diversity, yet imposed a drastic system of compulsion and regimentation.’ (Mumford 1961, 46) Mumford’s account of the city’s fortunes was circular, uncharacteristic of the modernism he lived in. The city first began from the Neolithic burial grounds, and in Mumford’s reading, its end was the necropolis, the fate of all cities, in particular the large and splendid ones. Mumford’s sharp, if occasionally cynical narrative is well-suited to explain the rise-
decline-rise pattern of Delhi’s history. Delhi is, as a recent commentator puts it, a ‘city of djinns’, beloved of the transient beings who raise it after each fall. (Dalrymple 2014) A more circumspective reading would identify it as the ‘City of Tombs’, the urban landscape across all four directions is dotted by graves, a few splendid marked ones, and hundreds of unmarked ones. A popular legend recounts that the walls of the ‘Purana Qila’ are built on the skulls of a thousand vanquished Mongols. The Mongols in question came calling in the reign of Alauddin Khilji, one of the landmark rulers from the Delhi Sultanate period. This is the early medieval period which forms the backdrop of the civility we seek to investigate. Both the political developments and military events of this era are important in building the backdrop to the khanqah life. The khanqah was unique, for unlike its provincial counterparts, it lay right in the midst of the Sultan’s capital, it was both able to influence and be influenced by it. This section has three units. The first documents the political history and human geography of the city of Delhi, both its political actors and urban spaces are
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examined in detail. The second objective foreground the khanqah of Hazrat Nizamuddin in this midst, and provides a brief history of the Chishti tariqa. The final section again zooms out of the khanqah, and examines the city of Delhi as part of the wider Islamicate ecumene, host to Sufis and traders alike, and held together by a social imaginary that rendered the world ‘enchanted.’ 1.1 The Early Medieval Period Hazrat Nizamuddin’s long, illustrious life spanned almost a century, beginning in 1238 C.E. and concluding in 1325 C.E. During this period, three separate dynasties sat on the throne of Delhi, and dozens of rulers, stated and unstated ones made the royal palace their home. By any yardstick, the era was eventful, both blood and booty thronged the city gates, intrigue and treason were far from uncommon, and rarely did a year pass without much tumult and disturbance. Reading the malfuzat of the Chishti Shaykh one may well forget the background in which the Shaykh lived and conducted his khanqah. The other books chronicling the Shaykh’s khanqah however help us avoid that folly, both Nizami Bansari and the Tarikh-i-Firoz Shahi paint a vivid history of the late thirteenth and early fourteenth century Delhi. Barani’s Tarikh-i-Firoz Shahi is particularly useful in reconstructing the Delhi Sultanate. A Delhi noble, connected to both the Sultan’s court and the Shaykh’s khanqah, Barani was particularly well-suited to write the history of the Sultanate. Hazrat Nizamuddin was born two years after the end of Iltutmish’s rule, who had ruled for twenty-five years, securing both stability for his regime and prestige for himself in the wider Muslim world. His death however opened the floodgates of chaos, both the territories of the Sultanate and its suzerainty in the subcontinent suffered. In Barani’s reading, order was restored with the ascension of Sultan Balban. When Sultan Ghiyas ud Din Balban, who was a man of great experience and had risen from the status of a malik to that of a khan and from the position of a khan to a king, ascended the throne, and the throne of Delhi was adorned by the kingship of a mature and experienced man like him. he imparted a new lustre to the affairs of the state. Imperial authority again received stability and strength from his accession. The matters that had fallen into disorder and confusion were again brought under control and the prestige of kingship was restored. By means of firm regulations and well-considered opinions, he brought the elite and the masses of the country under his submission, and his awe and terror was firmly ingrained in
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the hearts of the people across his empire. Through means of meticulous justice and kindness he won the sympathies of the people for his government. (ibid, 18-19) Yet turmoil, political or otherwise, would not sever its ties with the city of Delhi so readily. Although there would a procession of Sultans, the reign of some being more stable than the others, none would enjoy uninterrupted peace. There would be occasions when the political slugfest would leak out of the palace corridors and entangle the laity with it. Unlike his predecessor, Baba Farid, who lived in a far-flung country area, Hazrat Nizamuddin lived right next to the Sultan’s citadel. His khanqah therefore became a source of intrigue, even outright suspicion for some Sultans. For others, his presence provided solace and strength to the capital. The Shaykh outlived all but the last Sultan who lived in his time, and in charisma and authority he outshone them all. His life and the wider network he presided over is a gentle reminder that the history of Delhi or any empire for that matter is intrinsically more than the tales and exploits of its rulers. Factors, either outside of the Sultan’s knowledge or control, take part in altering the trajectory of his kingdom. The case of the Delhi Sultanate was no different. The catastrophe that had hit the wider Muslim world in the thirteenth-
century would afflict the Sultanate too. The Mongols had arrived. 1.1.1 Mongols, mayhem, migration Throughout the thirteenth-century, the threat of yet another Mongol invasion lurked over the Delhi Sultanate. Both Iltutmish and Alauddin Khilji had great success in warding off the Mongol threat, yet at no point was it completely obliterated, except perhaps the second half of Alauddin Khilji’s reign. The Mongol invasions played two very contrasting roles, while on hand they provided the Sultanate their greatest adversary, on the other hand they also ended up certifying Delhi’s status as an oasis of peace, in the backdrop of the battering the central Muslim hands had been dealt at the hands of the Mongols. Sunil Kumar contextualizes it well, when he observes that, Perhaps the greatest encouragement for the spread of Sufism in north India was, paradoxically, the destruction of the great centres of Islamic learning and urbanity in the central Islamic lands by the Chinggis Khanid (Chengiz Khan’s) invasions. The holocaust created a great fear: it led to mass immigration into the western Iranian lands and into India, especially but not just of elites. (Kumar 2014)
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Kumar draws our attention to two important observations. Firstly, that the Mongol invasions had sent a flurry of refugees across the Indus to the North Indian plains. The family of Hazrat Nizamuddin too was in fact one of these refugee families. The second observation points towards the greater diversity that began to reflect in Delhi with the onset of the Mongol invasions. Both elites and commoners, merchants and artisans began to throng the cities of Delhi. Hardev Rajkumar also alludes to this in his memoirs. Sometime in the 1290’s, upon his arrival in Delhi, Hardev visited the bazaar, which was situated between the city and the army camp. In the bazaar, Hardev finds both merchant and merchandise from Bukhara, Turkestan, and Iran. (Hardev 2009, 40-1) The Sultanate’s relationship with the Mongols were far from monolithic though. Not all conflicts gave way to largescale battles, some rarely rose above terrain skirmishes, while others ended in stalemate. On one memorable occasion, the captures Mongols were brought before the Sultan, who at that time was the ageing, soft-hearted Firoz Shah Khalji. A meeting was arranged between the Sultan and Abdullah. The Sultan addressed him as son and he addressed the Sultan as father and in this way the possibility of battle was averted. Abdullah returned with the Mughal armies and Alghu, the grandson of the accursed Chengiz Khan, joined the Sultan with some Mughal amiran-i hazarah and amiran-i sadah. All of them recited the Kalimah (confession of faith: "There is no god but Allah and Muhammad is His Prophet') and became Muslims. The Sultan honoured Alghu and gave his daughter in marriage to him. All those Mughals who had come with Alghu came with their women and children to the city and received stipends and favours from the Sultan. They built their houses in the neighbourhood of Kilukheri, Ghayaspur, Inderpat and Bakola and settled there. The area of their habitation came to be known as Mughalpura. Sultan Jalal ud Din gave to these Mughals stipends for one-two years. The climate of India and residence in the neighbourhood of the city did not suit them and most returned with their families to their own country. However, some of the leading Mughals stayed back in this country, received villages and stipends, intermarried with the Muslims and came to known as neo-Muslims. (Barani 2015, 135) The Fawaid and Nizami Bansari both mention Mongols who would visit the khanqah of Hazrat Nizamuddin. They are not referred to as a monolithic adversary, the relationship is far more nuanced than that. This is unlike Barani’s narrative, wherein the Sultan’s troops as the ‘Army of Islam’ are contrasted against the ‘Mongol infidels’. To understand Barani’s binary, it would be useful to see how the rulers themselves posited their position in the wider Muslim world.
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1.1.2 Delhi as the Qubbat al-Islam Beginning ‘from the mid-1220’s, only the domains of the Delhi Sultan were left as the source of sanctuary for the ulama in north India,’ who found it as the ‘final hope for the protection of the community.’ Kumar is perceptive in recognizing that at this juncture, the ‘perceptions of the ulama and Iltutmish coincided concerning Delhi’s role in northern India.’ For the former, ‘the Delhi Sultanate was a haven which could become the axis of the Muslim community, wherein the hitherto disparate and nucleated communities of north India could be integrated into a larger, comprehensive jami'a ummah which abided by the Shari'a.’ For the latter, it was an opportunity ‘to make Delhi the paramount power, the centre haven without which could any rival become.’ These ‘two complementary goals’ helped in establishing Delhi as the Qubbat al-Islam. (Kumar 2010) In its obvious sense qubba meant sanctuary; thus Qubbat al-Islam referred to the role of Delhi as the sanctuary of Islam at a time when the central Islamic lands were feeling the brunt of the Mongol invasions. Qubba, however, also meant, the centre, the axis, and in that sense Qubbat al-Islam referred to the newly gained role of Delhi as the paramount power in north India, the centre of Islam. (ibid) In 1229, the Abbasid Caliph proclaimed Iltutmish as the Nasr-i-Amir al-Mu’minin,
the helper to the Caliph. This raised both the Sultan and the city’s profile. The city would also see hectic additions to its landscape, both mosques and idgahs were constructed by the Sultan. The Sharia-minded ulama were an important pillar of support in the Iltutmish dispensation. In the post-Iltutmish years, they were joined by an equally formidable group. If the Iltutmish years celebrated Delhi as the pivot of Islam primarily for giving sanctuary to fleeing Muslims in general and the ulama in particular, the post-
Iltutmish years may well sport the same title, but for hosting Sufis in the city. The Sufi Shaykhs ‘seemed to offer religious direction in a world that otherwise lacked a moral centre’, providing ‘a spiritual counterpart to the political safe haven that the Delhi sultanate had given uprooted refugees arriving from beyond the Khyber.’ (R. Eaton 2019) The Sufis both complemented and competed with the ulama, as ‘keepers of the public conscience’, and as ‘stewards of the public sphere itself’. (ibid) Arguably, the two groups, representing the two complements of the Sharia and Tariqa, made Delhi the Qubbat al-Islam.
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Delhi, at the crossroads of empires, the burial grounds for a million political dreams, hosted the greatest Sufis of the subcontinent. The four great Shaykhs, beginning from Shaykh Moinuddin Chishti, to Qutub ud-Din Bakhtiyari, Baba Farid, and finally Hazrat Nizamuddin, had either stayed in Delhi or visited it at least once. During its heyday, a hundred khanqahs dotted the Delhi landscape, hosting Sultans and his subjects alike. Sultan Balban in particular was particularly well-disposed to the ulama and Awliya
alike. Upon return from meeting his son in Lakhnauti, he ‘paid visits to all the saints of the western side of the city’, and also ‘went to the houses of all the ulama and presented gifts to every one of them.’ (Barani 2015, 65) To his son, he gave the following counsels: Keep your capital full of Ulama, Mashaikh, Saiyids, Mufassirs (scholars of the exegesis of the Qur'an), Muhaddis (scholars of the traditions of the Prophet), Hafizs (those who have memorized the Qur'an), Qaris (reciters of the Qur'an), Muzakkirs (admonishers), the accomplished and the skilled so that it could attain the distinction of being a great city. (Barani 2015, 62) Mahmud you have not seen or heard those Ulama, Shaykhs and dignitaries whom I have seen in the court of my master, Sultan Shams ud Din (Iltutmish), and heard their admonitions and advices. Now a days such pious and God-fearing Ulama and Shaykhs are not left who could go to the Sultan and say things to him which he may not like and deliver sermons only for the sake of God. I will be in another clime and you will go into the sleep of indolence in your own country, who would awaken you from it or indeed who will dare to awaken you? (ibid, 57) Both Iltutmish and Balban are commented favourably upon in the Fawaid.
Commending the former’s piety, the Shaykh said in the sixty-second assembly, “Every night Sultan Shams ad-Din would wake up and as soon as he woke up, he would perform his ablutions, offer two cycles of prayer, and then go back to sleep ... without ever awakening others!” (Sijzi 1992, 319) Of Balban, the Shaykh said in the eighth assembly, On this occasion he told a story about Sultan Giyas ad-din Balban, about his faithful attendance at Friday prayers, his strict observance of the five daily prayers, and his firm faith. Then he noted that once Balban was talking with the qazi who accompanied his army. “What holy night was last night?” he asked. “It is well known to you,” replied the qazi, “Yes,” said the Sultan. At this point I interjected, “But it must have been the Night of Power (the twenty-
seventh of Ramadan).” “Of course,” rejoined the master, “that was the holy night about
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which they were speaking. Each knew what was transpiring in the mind of the other.” (ibid, 340) 1.1.3 Istidraj or Karamat? Balban, the architect of the Sultanate in the post-Iltutmish years, was worried about his son’s less-than-favourable disposition, he frequently gave him lengthy counsels on statecraft and piety. A recurring theme he favoured was the idea of istidraj.
It should be remembered that whoever acts wrongly but he finds its results to be correct and whoever commits error but its consequences happen to be right, that this kind of situation belongs to the category of divine plot and istidraj (opposite of karamat which are miraculous powers, granted to a sinner so that he may persist in his sins and ultimately, he is doomed). This has happened in the case of some irreligious kings and tyrants and oppressors who throughout their lives adopted wrong stances both in relation to God and men and always acted incorrectly. Despite this, events invariably turned out to be right and whatever wrongs they committed, it consistently led to correct results…Those with insights into the matter of religion and statecraft know it fully well that for such negligent kings the security and safety of the kingdom is also a kind of makr (deception) and istidraj on the part of Almighty God. (Barani 2015, 59-60) In his Tarikh, Barani harks back to the idea of istidraj frequently. The reign of Alauddin Khilji is a particular target, the ageing historian was bewildered at the tyranny he had witnessed, yet he could also not ignore the stability and prosperity that had come upon the kingdom. He lists out the ‘wonders’ that were observed in Alauddin’s reign, which included price control of essential commodities, a continuous stream of military conquests, the ‘elimination of the Mongols’, the safety of roads connecting the capital city, and the construction of a large number of public buildings. In the realm of public behaviour, Barani notes that ‘the hearts of most Muslims had turned towards righteousness, honesty, piety, justice and, religiosity and honesty were visible in the transactions of the people.’ (Barani 2015, 208-9) With regards to the Sufis, Barani observes that, …the carpet of sainthood (Shaikhi), which in fact is the vicegerency of the Prophethood, was adorned by Shaykh ul Islam Nizam ud din, Shaykh ul Islam Ala ud Din and Shaykh ul Islam Rukn ud din and the entire world was illuminated by their blessed existence. A large number of people took their hands in baat (initiation), and with their spiritual help, many who were deeply immersed in various kinds of sins took recourse to repentance and thousands of sinners who had habitually abandoned prayers (namaz) gave up sins and impiety and became very regular in their prayers. They became deeply drawn to religious matters; steadfastly held to their in their prayers. repentance and both 'ibadat-i lazima (devotions whose benefit is confined to the one who
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performs it) and 'ibadat-i mutaddia (devotions whose benefits accrue to others as well) became a matter of habit with them. The love and greed of the world, which cause the undoing of devotions and good acts of human beings, weakened in their hearts due to the observation of noble character, sublime attributes and the attitude of renunciation and rejection of the world on the part of these mashaikh (saints). Due to much nawafil (supererogatory prayers), awrad and assiduous cultivation of the qualities of servitude towards God, the desire for kashf (mystical inspiration) and karamat miracles) began to appear in their inner self. Due to the blessings of the devotions and benedictions of these saintly people, men's dealings acquired honesty and from the observation of the noble character of these pirs, their austerities and abstinence, a change of temperament occurred in the hearts of the seekers of God. (ibid, 209) Although Barani doesn’t negate Alauddin’s ruling acumen, he clearly doesn’t see them as the factor responsible for the Sultan’s successes. The sages and wise men who have an insight both into the affairs of religion and the world and who have the capacity to comprehend the inner significance of the divine fate and destiny given by the Almighty, observing the many victories and accomplishment of the affairs of state that took place during his reign, the important feats achieved among the subjects of his entire kingdom and all the signs of good governance witnessed during his reign, believed that this was in fact due to the benedictions of the great religious personages and grace of Shaikh ul Mashaikh Nizam ud din Ghayaspuri, may Allah sanctify his grave, who is beloved of God (mahbub) and on whom divine benevolence and bounty continuously descend. From the grace of the divine bounty raining on his person, from the incessant outpouring of the blessings of his auspicious existence and from the fact that he is the object of divine love, the undertakings of both the ruler and the ruled of the reign of Ala ud Din were fulfilled according to their hearts' desire and the standard of Islam was raised…All this prosperity, abundance of means of living and security and safety of people from all kinds of calamites and disasters and the peoples' own inclination towards piety are certainly due to the blessings of Shaikh Nizam ud din, which has turned as istidraj for Sultan Ala ud Din. (ibid 198-9) The question of istidraj or karamat tries to answer, who was responsible for Delhi’s fortunes or the lack of it, the Sultan or the Shaykh? But another equally important question may well posit, to whom did authority belong in the early medieval India, the Sultan or the Shaykh? The forerunners of the Sultanate, the Ghaznavid rulers, not only cleared the way for the Mamluks, and later the Khiljis and Tughluqs, but in many ways they also provided them the template to rule. Eaton notes that ‘the Ghaznavids brought to the Punjab the entire gamut of Persianate institutions and practices that would define the political economy of much of India for centuries to come’. These included ‘the elaboration of a ranked and salaried bureaucracy tied to the state’s land revenue and military systems; the institution of elite, or military, slavery; an elaboration of the office of ‘sultan’; the courtly patronage of Persian arts, crafts and literature; and a
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tradition of spiritually powerful holy men, or Sufis, whose relations with royal power were ambivalent, to say the least.’ (R. Eaton 2019, 34) Yet the distribution of power was not necessarily script-bound and certainly not state-centric. Although the Sultan was the possessor of fabulous wealth and power, his authority was often rivalled, even foreshadowed by that of the Sufi Shaykh. Both the institutions of the powerful Sultan, as the de facto political authority, and the powerful Sufi Shaykh, as the popular spiritual authority, had gained ground in the post-Abbasid years. Sultans certainly possessed power, reinforced by all the pomp and glory inherited from pre-
Islamic Persian imperial traditions. But, in a discourse challenging such claims, Sufi texts suggested that rulers were entrusted with only a temporary lease of earthly authority, granted to them through the grace of some spiritually powerful shaikh. Possessing a special nearness to God, it was shaikhs, not princes or kings, who had the better claim to being God’s true representatives on earth. From this perspective, all things in God’s creation were understood as dependent on a hierarchy of spiritually powerful Sufis, or ‘God’s unruly friends’, as they have been characterized. (R. Eaton 2019) 1.2 The Chishti Tariqa and Hazrat Nizamuddin Awliya The beginnings of the Chishti tariqa can be technically traced to the town of Chisht near Herat in Afghanistan. But in practice, the tariqa’s beginning and claim to fame resides in India, where the five great Chishti awliya lived and died. They are Moinuddin Ajmeri, Qutb ad-Din Bakhtiyar Kaki, Farid ad-Din Ganj-i Shakar, NizamuddinAwliya', and Nasiruddin Chiragh-i-Dihli, the ‘five human pillars on whom the Indian extension of the Chishti order was built’. They had ‘all received a protracted, formal education and stressed its benefit for the formation of spiritual values even after they became Sufi masters’, they had also ‘memorized the Qur'an or knew many of its passages by heart’, and finally ‘they also acquired a thorough grounding in Muslim law (fiqh).’ (Ernst and Lawrence 2002) In the case of Hazrat Nizamuddin, we see an added qualification, his mastery and life-long commitment to the sciences of the hadith. In his own lifetime, he ‘was esteemed by the scholars of Delhi as a great muhaddith, and his cogent, clear exposition of Prophetic Traditions was admired by specialists.’ It is said that he had committed ‘more than two thousand traditions of the Prophet’ to memory, both ‘his knowledge of hadith and his anxiety to make people follow the Path of the Prophet
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(sunnah) meticulously in every detail of life’ is evident from the Fawa'id. (Nizami, Introduction 1992) As a young student, Nizamuddin had dreamt of becoming a qadi, which was a well-paying job for a student of the Islamic sciences. He had asked a Shaykh to pray for him, the Shaykh didn’t, prophesizing there would be something better for him instead. The young Nizamuddin soon left for Ajdhodan, where Baba Farid’s khanqah was based. Baba Farid’s company was the transformative moment of Hazrat Nizamuddin, he instructed him ‘in some basic texts; propounded the basic and fundamental principles of the order; illustrated through his own conduct the type of life that a mystic was expected to lead; eliminated all traces of that intellectual arrogance which had quietly entered his mind when he won laurels in the highest academic circles of Delhi; embellished his inner life with all the qualities necessary for a mystic entrusted with the stupendous task of looking after the spiritual well-being of others; and then appointed him, a young man who had hardly attained the age of twenty-three years, his own chief successor.’ (Nizami, Introduction 1992) At the time of parting, in their last meeting, Baba Farid said of Hazrat Nizamuddin, “You will be a tree under whose soothing shadow people will find comfort.” (Khurd 1880, 131-2) A few days later, Baba Farid passed away, but not before instructing that the tabarrukat be passed to Hazrat Nizamuddin when he would return. 1.2.1 The Khanqah The khanqah at Ghiyaspur was not the first in the city, if medieval chronicles are to be believed, the number of Sufi hospices had reached in the hundreds during the thirteenth century. What was unique to the Ghiyaspur khanqah, in addition the towering charisma of its founder, was the influence it held over the city and country, as also the processes by which it gently wove itself into the social landscape. The latter was done through two main processes, the policy of an open door, wherein anyone could enter the khanqah and benefit from the Shaykh’s sermons and hospitality. To this end, opponents and proponents of the Shaykh both had the right to an audience. A second, perhaps more revolutionary step was the Shaykh’s acceptance of disciples from every sphere of society, Muslims and non-Muslims
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alike. The Shaykh also favoured vernacular languages, he in fact urged some of his followers like Amir Khusro to actively create a new combined language which would unite the different groups in Delhi. The Shaykhs’s hospitality, both in the immediate sense of providing food and solace to his visitors, but also the large policy of adapting to the local cultural context, explains the wide-ranging success the Chishti tariqa enjoyed under his tutelage. The Shaykh possessed the ‘nafs-i-gira’, i.e. the ‘intuitive intelligence that could understand, comprehend, control and direct the mind of the disciples’ which was crucial for organizing and running khanqahs. For it was only through identifying ‘themselves with the problems of the people, their worries, their hopes and their aspirations’ that the khanqahs could ‘gain the confidence of the people’. (Nizami 1957) Khaliq Nizami’s description helps us imagine the khanqah. The Khanqah of Shaykh NizamuddinAwliya stood by the side of the river Jamuna, whose cool refreshing breeze added to the serenity of its atmosphere. It comprised a big hall in the center and small rooms on its two sides. An old banyan tree stood in the courtyard, somewhat away from the center, but its branches provided shade to a part of the roof also. A veranda surrounded the courtyard, but its parts adjoining the hall were walled up for providing accommodation to senior inmates. Opposite the main gate was the gate room with a door on either side. A few men could sit there comfortably without obstructing the passage of others. Near it was the kitchen. The Shaykh lived in a small room of wooden walls on the roof of the hall. During the day he had his rest in one of the small rooms in the main building. A low wall ran round the roof, but on the side of the courtyard the wall was raised higher to provide shade for the Shaykh and his visitors when they sat talking in the morning hours. (Nizami, Introduction 1992) The Fawaid helps us construct a typical day in the life of the Ghiyaspur khanqah. The Shaykh would be up before the morning prayers, he would partake in a small meal, for it was his practice to fast throughout the day. From morning onwards, a stream of visitors would flock the khanqah to either listen to the Shaykh’s sermons, or take his counsel in private. While some would be satisfied by a few words of consolation, others would demand an amulet. At sunset, the Shaykh would break his fast, and later have dinner with the khanqah residents and visitors. After retiring to his room, his public hours would conclude. At night, he would sleep little, often busying himself with his books.
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1.3 Locating Hazrat-i-Dilli Barani complains often in his book about people’s lack of interest in history. In particular, he takes offence that people are unaware about ‘the history of the cities where they live and die - how that particular city was conquered, the number of years that have elapsed since its occupation, how the conquerors dealt with the people, how they transacted their affairs, how they lived and went about doing things, in what manner did they die, and how time and society has treated them, their wives, families, followers, and supporters.’ (Barani 2015, 32) Barani’s warning is well taken. This section will explore facets of the urban life in medieval Delhi, in the hope that they’ll provide vital clues in unlocking the social life of that era. Writing about the city in medieval Islam, Jane notes that ‘a city at one point in time is a still photograph of a complex system of building and destroying, of organizing and reorganizing, etc.’ (Abu-Lughod 1987) In other words, at no point is a city still or stagnant, it is a dynamic entity that responds to the social needs of the day. The case of the city of Delhi is perhaps representative of this. Delhi is the fabled metropolis of seven cities, although a more accurate assessment would be at least fourteen medieval citadels. This section probes deeper into the urban landscapes of Delhi, focusing on the ‘what’ and ‘where’ of medieval Delhi. The two questions may seem innocuous, yet they provide the crucial background in understanding the social imaginary of the thirteenth century Delhi. The first question seeks to pinpoint the physical forms of Delhi, the second situates the city in the context of the wider Islamicate world. By any account, and medieval travellers have certainly not shied from providing one, Delhi was a bustling metropolis by the mid-fourteenth century. One traveller marvelled at its ‘twenty-one cities, its expansive gardens, the thousand madrasas, the seventy hospitals, the two thousand khanqahs and sarais, the large bazaars, and the large buildings, among them the Qutub Minar, the tallest brick tower on the planet’. Another informs that the city is vast, having a circumference of over forty miles. (Siddiqui 1992, 116-17) The afore-mentioned ‘twenty-one cities’ were actually
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different citadels and neighbourhoods, each having its name and identity. The sum of them all would however be called Delhi. Even if we’re to factor possible miscalculations or hyperbole, and surely neither can be ruled out, we still have the picture of a large city, consisting of disparate units, thronged both by locals and travellers. During Hazrat Nizamuddin’s lifetime, the Siri citadel had been established, and fortified later by Alauddin Khilji. The suburb of Ghiyaspur had likewise been established, where the Shaykh would eventually come to reside. Close to Ghiyaspur was the Kilokri palace, established by Balban’s grandson, and later favoured by Sultan Jalaluddin Khilji. Around it, the new city, that is the ‘Shahr-I Nau’ developed, distinct from the old city, which was in the Mehrauli region. The old city area was separate from the large army camps, the Lashkar-gah where the chronicler of Hazrat Nizamuddin’s malfuzat, Amir Hasan Sijzi lived. The city of Siri grew out of this army camp. (Athar Ali 1993) In Peter Jackson’s reading however, it was the army camp that overran the city. During the Sultanate, beginning with Alauddin’s reign, ‘a century of Mongol invasions had thrown into relief the city’s function of being not simply an administrative capital and a commercial metropolis, but a vast armed camp.’ (Jackson 1993) The city life is also commented upon by Hazrat Nizamuddin in Fawa’id al-fu’ad
“Are you coming from the army compound or from the city?” he asked. “From the army compound,” I replied, “for it is there that I have my home.” “Do you ever go to the city?” “Once every ten to twelve days. Otherwise, I stay in the army compound and say the congregational prayer at the Kilogarhi mosque.” “That is the right thing to do,” remarked the master, “since the air is better in the army compound than in the city, and the city is also filthy!” (Sijzi 1992, 211) In a different assembly, he again referred to the city, this time highlighting his own stay. He then turned toward me and asked, “Do you still live in the military compound?” “Yes, I do,” I replied. “There's no comfort now in the city, nor has there ever been,” he remarked. In this connection he told a story. “Long ago I had resolved not to stay in the city. One day I came to the edge of the reservoir known as Qatlagh Khan Reservoir. I was memorizing the Qur'an in those days, and I saw a dervish absorbed in God. Approaching him, I asked: ‘Do
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you live in the city?’ ‘Yes, I do,’ he replied. ‘Do you live here by choice?’ ‘No!’ That dervish then began to tell me a story. 'Once I saw a precious dervish. He was living outside the Kamal gate in an enclosure on the bank of the canal that ran near that gate. It was a vast area and, in that enclosure, martyrs were buried. Addressing me, that dervish said: “If you wish to keep your faith intact, leave this city.” I resolved then and there that I would quit this city but obstacles kept cropping up. Now, twenty-five years later, I still have the same resolve yet I have not left the city.' r The master—may God remember him with favour—said: “When I heard what this dervish was saying, I resolved to myself that I would not stay in this city. I pondered many places and for a time considered the town of Patyala, for in those days the Turk lived there. (By Turk he meant Amir Khusrau—may God keep him from sin!)” But then I thought about Basnala, which was a clean and tidy place, and finally I went to Basnala. I stayed there for three days, but during those three days I could find no place to rent or to buy on mortgage or to purchase outright. During those three days I was always someone's guest. When I returned from there, I continued to ponder this matter, till one day I went to the Rani Reservoir located in the Jasrat Garden. I made supplications to God the Almighty and Exalted. It was an auspicious time. ‘O God,’ I prayed, ‘I must leave this city. I will not choose the place to live; the place that You choose, there will I go to live.’ A voice spoke: GHIYASPUR. I had never seen Ghiyaspur; I did not even know where it was. Having heard this voice, I went to see a friend. My friend had a chamberlain whose last name was Nishapuri. When I called on him, my friend said: ‘My chamberlain has gone to Ghiyaspur.’ ‘It must be the same Ghiyaspur,’ I said to myself. “In short, I went to Ghiyaspur and in those days that place was not so inhabited. It was a neglected spot, with few people living there. I went and took up residence there. But then [sometime later] Kaiqubad moved to Kilokhiri and people began to crowd into Ghiyaspur. Kings, princes, and many others, a great throng of people flocked to Ghiyaspur. ‘I must leave this place, too,’ I said to myself. While I was still entertaining this thought, an eminent person who had been my friend died in the city. I resolved to go and pay my respects to him during the ceremony marking three days after a person's demise. I made this resolve even though I did not want to return to the city. That same day, during one of the daily prayers, a handsome and slender youth appeared—and God knows whether he was among the Men of the Unseen or who he was. As soon as he arrived, he delivered this poem: That day that you became the moon you did not know That to behold you throngs and throngs would forward press. Today, when the hearts of all are trapped by your tress, To remain in seclusion is worse than useless. The master—may God remember him with favour—said: “He spoke some other words, to the effect that I should stay in this place, and then he declared: ‘At the outset you should not try to become famous. But if you happen to gain fame, then it should not happen that tomorrow on the Day of Resurrection you will be embarrassed before the Prophet —upon whom be peace.’ Having said this, he asked me: ‘What power, what gain is there in retreating from people and immersing yourself in God?’ The master—may God remember him with favour—said: “When he had finished speaking, I offered him some food but he did not eat. Then I told him that I intended to continue residing in that place. As soon as I had made clear my intention, he took some food and left. I never saw him again.” (ibid, 243-5) By the thirteenth-century, Delhi had well and truly arrived in the Islamicate domain, it was no longer a provincial outpost tied to the north Indian plains, rather, it became the pivot around which the rest of the sub-continent’s history began to shape. In return, it was shaped by the many currents emanating from the wider Islamicate.
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1.3.1 A world on the move If we’re to take a map from the contemporary times and train our eyes over Asia, we’ll be forced to follow the political boundaries that split up the continent into watertight units. Regional maps fare no better, we are left to peruse South Asia, Central Asia and West Asia separately, the assumption being that present-day national borders reflect well the societies that make up the continent. Yet history begs to differ, and none more so than in the case of the sub-continent, a huge landmass whose previous ties to the wider Islamicate ecumene were severed crudely with the advent of first British colonialism and later postcolonial nationalism. A walk through the monuments any Indian city, in the North Indian plains or Deccan, would however train us to look beyond the nationalist historiography that permeates both our understanding of the present, as well as all those who came before us. Alternatively, we may pick up books from the pre-modern era and realize that the subcontinent’s history and society was deeply intertwined with the societies beyond the Indus, connected with the ruling classes and warriors of the Central Asian steppes, the poetry of the wider Persianate world, as well as the Sufi networks spread throughout the ecumene. By the end of the Earlier Middle Period, toward the middle of the 13th century, from villages to cities, Sufism had spread wide across Islamdom, around the Mediterranean as well as the Mesopotamian‐Iranian area into Central and South Asia. Individuals who became part of the Sufi circles received distinct associational identities, whose earlier loose and later organized forms of membership entered practical and imaginary loops both via common rituals and through literary worlds shaped by travelers, merchants, free wanderers, and poets. (Rahimi and Salvatore 2016) Richard Eaton likewise notes the ‘twin circulation of wealth and ideas through Central Asia, the Iranian plateau and north India’. The latter consisted of ‘a growing canon of Persian texts that spread through those same regions’, which ‘by elaborating distinctive norms of kingship, governance, courtly etiquette, social comportment, Sufi piety, poetry, art, architecture and so on, these texts provided the ideological scaffolding that sustained an emerging Persianate world.’ Parallel to it, the ‘royal courts, regional political centres, the lodges or shrines of Sufi shaikhs (venerated religious leaders) and schools (madrasas or maktabs) provided the institutional bases from and through which such texts circulated.’ (R. Eaton 2019)
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Nile Green takes the conversation further, by identifying barakat as a transregional commodity that travelled across the ecumene. Barakat was ‘transported through the living bodies of migrant blessed men and reproduced through their offspring in the blessed men’s places of settlement.’ It was ‘a trans-temporal and trans-spatial form of symbolic capital, ‘a quality fixed across time and space and related to prophetic lineage, learning and piety’. The Sufi blessed men therefore ‘served to embody an Islamic moral and cosmic order amidst the local facts of life in their constituencies.’ (Green 2012, 2) This Islam of saints and blessed men was, then, an Islam intimately concerned with life in the world. Indeed, in its spatial settings, this was Islam as a pool of religious resources, verbal and architectural: that were deployed to make sense of a life between worlds: between places of origin and places of settlement, between places of written memory and places of lived experience. As bountiful inspirers of books and buildings, Sufis were crucial to the processes of settlement, acculturation, and homemaking through their unique roles as social actors who were both mobile and static, mortal and immortal, enjoying careers through actions in their lifetimes and through texts after their deaths. (ibid, 3) The wandering Sufi therefore was instrumental in fashioning a sacred geography serving the nascent Indian Muslim community. Literature, both of the malfuzat and tazkira genre, and architecture, relating to mausoleums, helped to ‘fasten memory onto solid ground’, it marked, claimed and transformed India’s landscapes and townscapes into homelands,’ which through the enterprises of the many Sufi migrants, helped create ‘an interrelated and overlapping Muslim geography that joined India to connective geographies of departure and settlement in the wider Muslim space.’ (ibid) If the world-out-there was identified both by the city and the Shaykh who presided over its safety, the regions just adjutant to the city were demarcated by the ‘wilaya’
of the Shaykh. The examples of both are found throughout the malfuzat. Wilaya
refers to the ‘spiritual domain’, the ‘protective grace’ of the Shaykh who would provide the travellers ‘amulet, ta’wiz, to guard against danger.’ These gained ground in the tumultuous thirteenth-century, when the ‘old order was breaking down’, it was ‘these friends of God, awliya, who introduced stability and provided protection.’ (Kumar 2010)
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1.3.2 Conclusion: The thirteenth century social imaginary In a review of Nizami Bansari on Goodreads, a thoughtful reviewer described the genre of Sufi tazkira literature as India's own version of magical realism (Bakshi 2014), a magical realism that ‘reflects the Sufi narrative style once found in Basra and Baghdad.’ (Rahman, Rehman and Rahman 2009, 86) The comment was rather precise in being able to define the contours of the early medieval world. We previously noticed how the malfuzat makes it clear that the worldview wasn't constrained by modern day notions of borders, both ideas and idea-makers moved freely across the ecumene. A second equally important point is that the recipients of the malfuzat were, in stark contrast to the modern subjects, at home in the enchanted world. The reference to Weberian terminology here should alert us to the sociological investigation we must undertake, if we're to come reasonably close to approximate what the mental landscape was like in early medieval India. Notice that what may seem straight out of the Arabian nights is never refuted or probed further, by the Shaykh's proponents and opponents alike. The magicality is never up for debate, even if an occasional opponent may press for its veracity. We may classify them as ‘coping mechanism’ in the best of Freudian traditions, yet the folly of anachronism looms large over it. The problem of disenchantment is peculiar to the modern subject. We may dispute whether the dervish actually flew, but the problem of medieval levitation is secondary, what concerns us is that the subjects of our inquiry had no issues accepting that the magical could happen, and that the magical could make the world go round. This is a topic that merits greater elaboration, for it reveals yet another crucial facet of the social imaginary. It is towards it, the process of disenchantment that we must now turn to.
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2 Civilization as Disenchantment If you have the heart to feel and the eyes to see, you discover that the world is not flat. The world remains a rich tapestry. It remains a rich topography of the spirit. These myriad voices of humanity are not failed attempts at being new, failed attempts at being modern. They're unique facets of the human imagination. They're unique answers to a fundamental question: what does it mean to be human and alive? And when asked that question, they respond with 6,000 different voices. And collectively, those voices become our human repertoire for dealing with the challenges that will confront us in the ensuing millennia. (Davis, The worldwide web of belief and ritual 2008) Before we thrust ourselves into the khanqah of Hazrat Nizamuddin Awliya, we may do well to reflect on our starting point, our place as resolute subjects of a modern world. This is a project that gains all the more urgency in light of the research objectives this thesis seeks to fulfil, as also the rather grand title it carries. We’ve previously seen the limitations associated with the idea of civility as it is normally understood. This chapter seeks to interrogate it further, specifically the manner in which it was defined by Norbert Elias. A second objective is to detail the idea of disenchantment and the modern self. Both these objectives are replete with key contestations that will help us appreciate the alternative reading of civility the next chapter will present. 2.1 A Civilizing Process? It would naïve, if not downright impossible, to have a discussion on civility without bringing Norbert Elias into the picture. A twentieth-century German thinker, Elias is primarily known for his work ‘The Civilizing Process’, which looks at the development of civility in European history. In this reading, civility first took shape through codes of behaviour emanating from the royal court, which over a period of time, trickled to the rest of the population. What were the intended outcomes of this process? It was ‘stylistic conventions, the forms of social intercourse, affect-
moulding; the high regard for courtesy, the importance of good speech and conversation, articulateness of language and much else - all this was first formed in
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France within court society, then slowly changed, in a continuous diffusion, from a social into a national character.’ (Elias 2000, 32) In Part Two of his magisterial work, Elias devotes considerable attention to the works of Erasmus of Rotterdam, whose early book on manners enjoyed several reprints and wide public acceptance, it was soon to be prescribed as a manual for young school boys. The book details the everyday etiquettes expected of a man of society, it preoccupies itself with table manners, but also goes into the finer details of hygiene and public propriety. Although matters of whether to ponder or not to bother about one’s choice of appearance in public may well come across as mundane, Elias warns us not to overlook their importance. In them, he finds ‘a segment - a very characteristic one - of the totality of socially instilled forms of conduct’, a standard which ‘corresponds to a quite definite social structure’. (ibid, 59) In Elias’s reading, Erasmus’s work on everyday etiquettes and the wide popularity it enjoyed points towards the ‘social need’ it fulfilled, it indicated how central the question of civility was becoming in the early modern European society. As Elias puts it, ‘its success, its rapid dissemination, and its use as an educational manual for boys show how much it met a social need, and how it recorded the models of behaviour for which the time was ripe, which society- or, more exactly, the upper class first of all-demanded.’ (ibid, 61) To be lacking in civility, as expressed through everyday etiquettes, was to be of the category of the ‘uncivilized.’ This is another dimension of the civilizing story, the incessant fascination with the idea of civilization, understood as the counterpart, the opposing pole of ‘barbarism.’ In this reading, society was hierarchical, it proceeded from a stage of barbarism to civilization. And it was to be in the hands of the intellectuals that the masses were to be shepherded, from the lower stages of barbarism they were stuck in, to the higher stages of civilization, as understood and mediated by the intellectuals. The masses were not yet civilized enough, said the men of the courtly/middle-class reform movement. Civilization is not only a state, it is a process which must be taken further. That was the new element expressed in the term civilisation. It absorbed much of what had always made court society believe itself to be, as compared with those living in a simpler, more uncivilized or more barbaric way, a higher kind of society: the idea of a level of morals and
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manners, including social tact, consideration for others and many related complexes. But in the hands of the rising middle class, in the mouth of the reform movement, the idea of what was needed to make a society civilized was extended. The civilizing of the state, the constitution and education, and therefore the liberation of broader sections of the population from all that was still barbaric or irrational in existing conditions, whether it were the legal penalties or the class restrictions on the bourgeoisie or the barriers impeding a freer development of trade, this civilizing muse follow the refinement of manners and the internal pacification of the country by the kings. (ibid, 41-2) Elias notes of Erasmus as a person that he was one who ‘manifested, in a particularly pronounced form, the characteristic self-confidence of the intellectual who has ascended through knowledge and writing, who is legitimized by books, the self-
assurance of a member of the humanistic intellectual class who was able to keep his distance even from ruling strata and their opinions, however bound to them he may have been.’ (ibid, 64) Elias’s observations, on the nature and role of Erasmus the intellectual, act as a useful segue to Zygmunt Bauman’s critique of the intellectual in the modern age. In his book Legislators and Interpreters, Bauman takes Elias’s observation to their logical conclusion, by focussing on the tendency of the intellectual to act as an arbitrator, a ‘legislator’ in modernity. The authority to arbitrate is in this case legitimized by superior (objective) knowledge to which intellectuals have a better access than the non-intellectual part of society. Access to such knowledge is better thanks to procedural rules which assure the attainment of truth, the arrival at valid moral judgement, and the selection of proper artistic taste. Such procedural rules have a universal validity, as do the products of their application. The employment of such procedural rules makes the intellectual professions (scientists , moral philosophers, aesthetes) collective owners of knowledge of direct and crucial relevance to the maintenance and perfection of the social order. The condition of this being so is the work of the ' intellectuals proper' - meta-professionals, so to speak - to be responsible for the formulation of procedural rules and to control their correct application. Like the knowledge they produce, intellectuals are not bound by localized, communal traditions. They are, together with their knowledge, extraterritorial. This gives them the right and the duty to validate (or invalidate) beliefs which may be held in various sections of society. (Bauman, Legislators and Interpreters: On Modernity, Post-modernity and Intellectuals 1989, 4-5) In the same book, Bauman points towards two simultaneous trends that fed off one another, the destruction of premodern, local culture and traditions; and the creation of projects of education, which would hereby remove from people ‘the shoddy vestments of tradition’, and once having reduced them to a tabula rasa, would proceed to mould them, perfect them according to the dictates of Reason. (ibid, 68)
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This was a task to be performed by the intellectuals, the ‘mediators, who interpret the precepts of Reason and act on them’. (ibid) Education therefore came to signify ‘the right and the duty of the state to form (best conveyed in the German concept of Bildung) its citizens and guide their conduct’ (ibid, 69). It sought to fill a void, it was ‘a desperate attempt to regulate the deregulated, to introduce order into social reality which had been first dispossessed of its own self-ordering devices.’ (ibid, 68) The project and the process of civilization needs to be understood in this light, as a concept that ‘entered learned discourse in the West as the name of a conscious proselytizing crusade waged by men of knowledge and aimed at extirpating the vestiges of wild cultures - local, tradition-bound ways of life and patterns of cohabitation’. (ibid, 93) What was left in its wake was a heavy-handed form of alienation, not merely relating to the manner of production and consumption as underlined by Marx, but rather as a full-blown diagnosis of the human condition, which was now untethered from its social origins, its relation with nature, and above all, its relations with itself. 2.2 The Question of Alienation In investigating the process of alienation in the modern world, Akeel Bilgrami zeroes on four inter-related questions. The first two questions bear the greatest relevance vis-à-vis our investigations into the nature of civility. Bilgrami is concerned with two parallel transformations in the modern era, the first being the shift from the idea of nature to the idea of natural resources, the second is the shift from the idea of human beings to the idea of citizens. (Bilgrami 2014, 133) The second question will be touched upon in the final chapter. The first question asks us to examine the ‘extractive political economy’ of the modern era, a period wherein in the blows of the industrial revolution radically transformed the natural landscape, wherein new, unsustainable forms of production and consumption came into picture. What facilitated this process? In the realm of ideas, it was the ‘passage from engagement and subjective agency (“live in”) to detachment and objectification (something to “master and control”).’ (ibid, 132) In the realm of practical action it was enabled by ‘worldly alliances’ which were ‘very
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self-consciously forged between scientific organizations, commercial interests, and the latitudinarian Anglican establishment’ who shaped an ‘explicit agenda that articulated a systematic carte blanche for extractive economies involving deforestation, mining and the setting up of plantation agriculture.’ (ibid, 188-9) The effect was large-scale transformation, of ‘the local, egalitarian, collective agrarian life—the transformation of merely living in nature to its mastery and control for large-scale profit and gain.’ (ibid, 134) To express it in simple parlance, consider the analogy by the anthropologist Wade Davis. A young kid from the Andes who's raised to believe that that mountain is an Apu spirit that will direct his or her destiny will be a profoundly different human being and have a different relationship to that resource or that place than a young kid from Montana raised to believe that a mountain is a pile of rock ready to be mined. Whether it's the abode of a spirit or a pile of ore is irrelevant. What's interesting is the metaphor that defines the relationship between the individual and the natural world. (Davis, Dreams from endangered cultures 2003) The project of disenchantment is more than the loss of spirits, magic and fables. We can understand disenchantment or the desacralization of nature through the triad of the death of God, the decline of magic, and the decline of nature. (Bilgrami 2014, 191-2) God-magic-nature are not water-tight silos, there is considerable interlocking, one may even collapse them into a simple enterprise, that is the loss of meaning, and everything that enabled it. The first component, the ‘death of God’, however holds considerable importance, in so far as it relates to the process of desacralization and plunder of nature in the modern world. 2.3 Nature as Brute If a strand of modern thought sees nature as resolutely ‘brutish’, as a place of risks and omnipresent danger, a significant portion of the blame must lie at the feet of Thomas Hobbes, the British philosopher who saw famously categorized life in the state of nature as ‘short, nasty, brutish.’ Hobbes’ dim view of both humans and nature powered the social contract tradition he was arguably the pioneer of, it has been studied and applied across different disciples. Its long afterlife should not dissuade from investigating a very basic question. Why did the philosopher find life in nature to be brutish in the first place?
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This is a question that ties to our study into the process of desacralization or disenchantment of nature in the early modern period. We previously saw the role of the ‘worldly alliances’, a motley group of scientific and commercial organizations eager to exploit the bounties of nature with no constraint holding them back. The chief constraint was of course the idea of nature as being imbibed with divinity and value. (ibid, 134) And ‘to desacralize nature and matter was to exile God from the world, something essential to the official Newtonianism of the Royal Society in England, where God was responsible for motion, not by being present in nature and thereby providing an inner source of dynamism that made for the motion of the universe, but as a clockwinder, an external source of motion of an otherwise intrinsically brute and inertial universe.’ (ibid, 142) Without relegating the conception of God to ‘a place of exile’, it would not have been possible to convert ‘an ancient and spiritually conceived conception of nature into something brute and desacralized.’ (Bilgrami 2010, 148) In many a social world, such taking (from nature) was accompanied by communitywide rituals of reciprocation, which in general showed an attitude of respect and restoration towards nature – rituals performed before planting, and even hunting. The exile of God to an external place made all these qualms and compensations unnecessary. With no metaphysical obstacles remaining, the scale of taking from nature’s bounty could be pursued with unthinking and unconstrained zeal. Nature, being brute, could not make demands or put constraints on us. Because it was brute, we did not need to respond to it on its terms. All the term-making came from us, and terms we would summon were increasingly the terms of utility and gain, converting the very idea of nature – without remainder – to the idea of natural resources. (ibid, 149) The upshot of this was the creation of what Charles Taylor calls the ‘buffered self’, a new understanding of the self in the cosmos which was ‘not open and porous and vulnerable to a world of spirits and powers’; it was created in part by disenchantment, but also by the newfound confidence to engage in a ‘moral reordering.’ (Taylor 2007, 27) This was a self ‘not open to normative demands from any site external to itself, an inevitable consequence of the fact that a world conceived as brute does not, in any case, contain anything that could make those demands.’ (Bilgrami 2010, 152) And to be ‘the source and makers of all value’ was to make ‘all talk of our moral behaviour as something responsive to callings from source outside ourselves as at best sheer projection and at worst, irrational, an abdication of human agency and the rigours of individual responsibility.’ (ibid)
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There was no other site of value but what resided in our dispositions, and human happiness lay in the satisfaction of these human desires and dispositions. It no longer lay in conception of an unalienated life, by which I mean a life of harmony between the demands of an external source of value and our dispositional response to its demands. To see human flourishing was precisely to leave out the external source. (ibid) Both the ‘buffered self’ and the idea of human agency will be scrutinized in greater detail in the conclusion chapter. For now, it is sufficient to be aware of how the human self was fashioned, from a previously unbuffered (or relational self, as we shall later see) to a buffered one, being the outcome of a long, alienation process, wherein the brutalization of nature went hand in hand with the deracination of the self, with both nature and human reduced to spectacles, perhaps even subjects, as opposed to active agents, present and flourishing in a living world. 2.4 Alienation, Agency Previously, we noted the transformation of the relationship between humans and the natural world, which moved from ‘engagement and subjective agency (“live in”) to detachment and objectification (something to “master and control”).’ (Bilgrami 2014, 132) This is a key motif in the disenchantment process, it speaks of the changes in human attitudes vis-à-vis the natural world, but more importantly, it also points at the changes within the human self. Consider the following example, detailing the differences between first-person agency and third-person agency. Consider my assertion "X is desired by me." That is a report on my desires from a third-
person, detached perspective. Consider by contrast my assertion "X is desirable." That is not a report at all; it is the expression of a desire, made from the first-person point of view of agency. So it is only because the world itself contains desirabilities (or values) that we perceive that our agency really gets triggered or activated. The very possibility of agency, therefore, assumes an evaluatively enchanted world. (Bilgrami 2010, 154) Disenchantment is therefore more than just the loss of magic and fables, it is the enfeeblement of the moral self, the ‘exclusion of all external callings’, the ‘absence of agency, reducing us to mere receptacles for our desires and their satisfaction.’ (ibid, 155) The idea of agency in the disenchanted world is therefore limited to satiating one’s wishes, it is conceived ‘entirely in terms of the pursuit of the gratification of ones desires and moral sentiments.’ (ibid, 153) The latter, as we saw earlier, are not held ransom to any sites outside the human self, there is neither space nor patience for any external calling.
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2.5 Conclusion The ecological turn this chapter has favoured is a key component of the civility debate, it performs two valuable functions. First, it helps us locate the relation between the individual and the world out there, both natural and social. Secondly, it helps us understand the nature of human agency. Finally, it helps us locate the sites of moral action and moral ordering. The aim is not to demarcate a rigid boundary between the haves and the have-nots, the pre-moderns, rooted and enlivened by the enchanted world, as opposed to the moderns, dispossessed and scrambling for cover in a disenchanted world. However, the rupture between the two modes of living, seeing and being in the world do need to be emphasized, they help us imagine better the social imaginary needed to fully explore an alternative model of civility. In this chapter, we’ve been able to pluck out the key ‘loose ends’ associated with the Eliasian civilizing process. The first is its reliance on a body of experts, who would act both as mediators and regulators of individual conduct, there is a policing from outside and above, as opposed to a self-appraisal and self-stocktaking from within. The second is the backdrop of alienation it emerged in, wherein individuals were stripped of both their sense of pre-nation communal identity, as also of their bonds with the natural world. The third loose end is the concept of civilization itself, so far as it was understood as brute taming of both bodies and land, as a homogenizing process that brooked no truths except the one dictated by Reason, understood and interpreted by the new intelligentsia in Western Europe. The list of criticisms isn’t exhaustive, yet it provides us sufficient resolve to look for alternative models of civility, in milieus outside of early modern Europe. The next chapter aims to do precisely that, by perusing the khanqah and teaching of Hazrat Nizamuddin Awliya in thirteenth-century India.
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3 The Teachings of Hazrat Nizamuddin Awliya …the gnostic Shaykh, who is intelligent, insightful into the faults of the soul, and compassionate, who gives one counsel in the affairs of religion, and who, having completed the refinement of his own soul, occupies himself with counselling and refining the souls of other bondsmen of God. Whosoever finds such a man has found his physician, and should stay with him, for it is he who will deliver him from his sickness and from the destruction which lies before him. (Al-Ghazali 2016, 54) In the previous chapter, we’ve had the opportunity to briefly peruse the background of the thirteenth-century khanqah. We saw how the Chishti order not only made a base in India in challenging times, but even flourished, well up to the end of the fourteenth century. Both the open outlook of the tariqa as well as the intuitive intelligence and wide-ranging charisma of the Chishti Shaykhs were instrumental in establishing its footprints firmly across the sub-continent. After the background detour, this chapter seeks to bring the focus back to the khanqah, putting the spotlight on the Shaykh who led it, and the teachings he taught and lived by. This chapter is split into two main sections. Part One quantifies the teachings of Hazrat Nizamuddin into two distinct themes. Each of these themes represent a key motif of the Shaykh's teachings which through both tales and metaphors are repeated throughout the malfuzat. At this stage, the sociological inquiry is kept to a minimum, the idea is to get a first-hand sampling of the Shaykh's sermons. The latter part of the first section goes deeper however into the two themes, probing into its moral kernel, the larger-than-life ethical arch informing each theme. Here, the interconnected melodies of adab and tasawwuf are looked into. The underlying contention is that the matrix of the two formed the crux of the civility observed in thirteenth century Delhi. Part one provides the practical manifestations of civility, part two elaborates upon the theoretical underpinnings that inform its makeup.
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3.1 PART ONE 3.1.1 The Four Enemies Much of Hazrat Nizamuddin’s sermons revolve around the fight against the four main enemies i.e., dunya, shaitan, nafs and shahwa; which may be translated as worldliness, the devil, the lower human self and desires, respectively. We should be careful not to trap ourselves into the limited translations provided. Each of the four terms encapsulate an entire genre of Sufi literature, which sees in them the cause of human failing, and building on it, it sees human redemption in rising above them. These may be called maladies of the soul, and it is but natural that the Sufi Shaykh as the spiritual physician spent a bulk of his attention in warning his disciples against them. The emphasis on refraining from worldliness is especially strong, owing in no small part to the Shaykh’s own penchant for solitude. As we saw earlier however, he was not destined for a solitary life in the woods, he had to be in the world, only to guide his disciples out and away from it. Yet the renunciation of the world did not entail running away from it per se, or sacrificing one’s basic needs or basic social norms. The renunciation espoused by the Shaykh related to a persona disposition, manifested both in speech and deeds. The master then began to speak about what RENOUNCING WORLDLINESS actually entailed. “Renouncing worldliness does not mean, for instance, that one becomes naked, wearing only a loin cloth and sitting (in solitude). Renouncing worldliness means, instead, to wear clothes and to take food while at the same time keeping in continuous use whatever comes to hand, feeling no inclination to hoard and no attachment to material objects. That (disposition alone] is tantamount to renouncing worldliness.” (Sijzi 1992, 88-9) In the same assembly, Hazrat Nizamuddin brought the two topics of dunya and ibadah into sharp relief, explaining how the denial of the former was necessary for the perfection of the latter. After that the master told the following story about a certain chaste saint. Many times, he used to say that all virtuous deeds, such as prayers, fasting, invocations, and saying the rosary are a cauldron, but the basic staple in the cauldron is meat: Without meat you do not experience any of these virtuous deeds. Finally, they asked that pir: “Many times you have used that analogy, but now explain it.” “Meat,” replied the saint, “is RENOUNCING WORLDLINESS, while prayer, fasting, invocation, as well as repetition of the rosary—all such virtuous deeds presuppose that the one who does them has left the world and is no longer attached to any worldly thing. Whether he observes or does not observe prayer,
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invocations, and other practices, there is no cause for fear, but if friendship with the world lingers in his heart, he derives no benefit from supplications, invocations, and the like.” After that the master observed: “If one puts ghee, pepper, garlic, and onion into a cauldron and adds only water, the end result is known as pseudo-stew. The basic staple for stew is meat; there may or may not be other ingredients. Similarly, the basis for spiritual progress is leaving the world; there may or may not be other virtuous practices.” (ibid) This theme, the banishment of the dunya for the betterment of ibadah, reappears throughout the Fawaid.
Brief mention was made of RENOUNCING WORLDLINESS. Observed the master: “Even if someone spends his days in fasting, stays awake at night, and makes the pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina, the basis of his spiritual discipline must still be that he banishes from his heart friendliness with the world.” After that he concluded: “Anyone who claims friendship with God while love of the world continues to dominate his heart, his claim is false; he is a liar!” (ibid, 178) Conversation turned next to THE GREATEST NAME. The master remarked: “Ibrahim Adham—may God have mercy upon him—was once asked: ‘Do you know the Greatest Name? Tell us which it is.’ ‘Yes, I do know it, and I will tell you about it,’ he replied. ‘First, you should cleanse your stomach of unlawful food, then you should empty your heart of love of this world, and after that by whatever name you call upon God that is the Greatest Name!’” (ibid, 193) In a particularly memorable tale, Hazrat Nizamuddin reminded his audience to do actions not for their sake itself or for the pleasure of its performers. Rather, they must be pursued solely for accruing divine pleasure. Conversation next turned to SAINTS SO IMMERSED IN REMEMBERING GOD THAT THEY TAKE NO HEED OF FOOD OR SLEEP, DOING WHAT THEY DO ONLY FOR HIS SAKE. He told the story of a saint who lived by the bank of a river. “One day this saint asked his wife to give food to a darwesh residing on the other side of the river. His wife protested that crossing the water would be difficult. He said: ‘When you go to the bank of the river tell the water to provide a way for you due to respect for your husband who never slept with his wife.’ His wife was perplexed at these words and said to herself: ‘How many children have I borne by this man. Yet how can I challenge this directive from my husband?’ She took the food to the bank of the river, spoke the message to the water, and the water gave way for her passage. Having crossed, she put food before the darwesh, and the darwesh took it in her presence. After he had eaten, the woman asked: ‘How shall I recross the river?’ ‘How did you come?’ asked the darwesh. The woman repeated the words of her husband. On hearing this, the darwesh said: ‘Go to the water and tell it to make way for you out of respect for the darwesh who never ate for thirty years.’ The woman, bewildered at these words, came to the river, repeated the message, and the water again gave way for her passage. On returning home, the woman fell at her husband's feet and implored him; ‘Tell me the secret of those directives which you and the other darwesh uttered. ‘Look,’ said the saint, ‘I never slept with you to satisfy the passions of my lower self. I slept with you only to provide you what was your due. In reality, I never slept with you, and similarly, that other man never ate for thirty years to satisfy his appetite or to fill his stomach. He ate only to have the strength to do God's will.’” (ibid, 151-2)
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The connection between food or rather the denial of satiating one’s stomach, and spiritual realization is a common theme across religious traditions. The malfuzat
recounts a tale that connects the triad of food, Satan and worldliness as a single enterprise. “Worldliness does not consist of gold or silver or possessions or the like, rather, as a saint has observed (in Arabic), ‘Your stomach is your world!’ If you eat less, you are among those who have renounced worldliness. If you eat to your full, you are not among them.” In this connection he began to speak about SATAN. “Satan has said: ‘He who is sated when he says his prayers, I embrace him. Now when such a sated one has finished praying, can you imagine the extent to which my control over him increases? But from the hungry man when he sleeps I flee. Now when that hungry one awakes and says his prayers, can you imagine how terrified I become on account of him?’” Then the master continued to speak about SATAN AND HIS POWER OF TEMPTATION AND HIS CONTROL OVER THE SONS OF ADAM. He specifically warned about Khannas, Satan's son. “Ceaselessly, he has tried to penetrate the heart of Adam's offspring. Only when humankind is absorbed in remembering God can Khannas be deflected from his goal.” Then he referred to Maulana 'Ala ad-din Tirmidhi and his account of Khannas in Nawadir al-usul (Strange Anecdotes about First Principles). “After Adam—upon whom be peace—descended from heaven into this world, Eve was one day sitting by herself. Iblis came and brought Khannas with him. To Eve he said: ‘This is my son. Take care of him.’ Then he left. When Adam returned, he saw Khannas. ‘Who is this?’ he asked Eve. ‘Iblis brought him,’ replied Eve. ‘He told me: “This is my son; take care of him.”’ ‘Why did you accept him?’ rejoined Adam. ‘This is my enemy.’ Then Adam—on whom be peace—cut Khannas up into four pieces and cast him upon mountaintops. When Adam—peace be on him—left, Iblis came back and asked Eve, ‘Where is Khannas?’ ‘Adam cut him up into four pieces and cast him on the mountaintops,’ she replied. Hearing this, Iblis shouted: ‘O Khannas!’ Khannas immediately appeared and in his original form! When Iblis departed, Adam—upon whom be peace—came back. He saw Khannas standing there. ‘What's this?’ he asked. Eve told him what had happened. Adam then killed this Khannas and, having burned him, scattered his ashes in a river. Then he left and as soon as he was gone, Iblis returned, enquiring about Khannas. Eve told him what had transpired. Iblis again shouted: ‘O Khannas!’ and again Khannas at once reappeared. Iblis departed just as Adam was returning. Adam saw Khannas, this time in the form of a sheep. He learned from Eve what had happened, and resolved to kill Khannas yet again. This time, since he was in the form of a sheep, he cooked and ate him. Soon thereafter Iblis returned and shouted: ‘O Khannas!’ Khannas answered from the heart of Adam: ‘At your service! At your service!’ ‘Stay there!’ commanded Iblis. ‘That was my design from the beginning.’” (ibid, 163-4) As riveting as the tales from the malfuzat are, both regarding perfection in faith and abstinence from the world, it is not hard to imagine that for the residents of the khanqah, it was the personal, lived example of Hazrat Nizamuddin that brought his lessons to life. At the khanqah, no food grains were allowed to stay in the storerooms
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for greater than a week, lest the habit of accumulation creep in. At the end of his life, the Shaykh asked that the entire treasury be emptied out. On receiving a huge amount of money from the Sultan, the Shaykh had them immediately distributed. Even before becoming the head of the khanqah, Hazrat Nizamuddin was loath to accumulation, even it be a coin. “Then one day in the evening a passerby gave me a half tanka. I said to myself: ‘Evening has already arrived, and whatever I needed was taken care of earlier. I will keep this and spend it in the morning.’ When night came, I busied myself in prayer and meditation, but that half tanka clung to the skirt of my heart and disrupted my concentration. When I saw what had happened to my spiritual state, I exclaimed: ‘O God, when will morning come so that I may dispense with that coin?’” (ibid, 137) Readers well-versed with the seerah of Prophet Muhammad would realize that the above-mentioned anecdote follows the Prophetic example. An exact story is recounted in the hadith corpus. Once, upon finishing prayers, the Prophet hurried to his house in uncharacteristic haste. The reason, as he explained later, was that there was a coin left at his house, he was anxious to give it away in alms at the first instance. The excessive almsgiving and self-denial exceeds the law, but does not contravene it in any way. In one of the malfuzat, the three levels of almsgiving are mentioned. He next drew a distinction between the generous and the magnanimous person. “The generous person,” he noted, “is he who gives something more than the minimum required for alms, while the magnanimous person gives much more. Of 200 dirams, for example, he might keep 5 and give away the rest.” After that on his blessed lips came a story about Shaykh al-Islam Farid ad-din—may God sanctify his lofty secret. “He used to say that alms are of three kinds: alms of the Law, of the Path, and of Truth. Alms of the Law means that one gives 5 dirams of every 200. Alms of the Path means that one keeps but 5 dirams of every 200, while alms of Truth means that you expend all that you have and keep nothing!” (ibid, 200) True to his own teacher’s example, Hazrat Nizamuddin would give away as quickly and as generously as he possibly could. This was a teaching led by example, as opposed to mere talk, a لسان حال rather than a للسان قا .
I interjected at this point: “If a spiritual master is worldly-minded, can he nonetheless direct his disciples to eschew love of worldliness?” The master—may God remember him with favour—answered: “If he claims to eschew it, his words will have no effect, for there is the message of deeds as well as the message of words (للسان قا .). Counsel and guidance come through the message of deeds. ( لسان حال ) When there is no message of deeds, the message of words is ineffectual.” (ibid, 293)
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Parallel to his injunctions against worldliness, Hazrat Nizamuddin would warn his disciples against losing control of one’s self. In one malfuzat, the merit of rebuking one’s lower selves is emphasized. He told a further story about AN ISRAELITE ASCETIC. “This ascetic was seventy years old. He obeyed God—may He be glorified and exalted—but after seventy years he had a need. He asked God Almighty to meet that need. His need was not satisfied. He then retired to a secluded place and began to contend with his lower self: ‘O self,’ he exclaimed, ‘for seventy years you have obeyed God—may He be glorified and exalted. Yet you were lacking in your profession of sincerity. If you had been fully sincere in your obedience, then that need would have been fulfilled.’ While he was still contending with his lower self, the prophet of that time received a command: ‘Go tell that ascetic: “Your single moment of rebuking your lower self is more precious to me than the seventy years of your obedience!”’” (ibid, 220) However, as we shall see in the next section, the benefits of constraining one’s lower self, the nafs, were not limited to a person’s individual salvation. There were far-
reaching benefits for society at large. The teachings of the Shaykh, while resolutely focussed on the individual, never lost sight of the larger picture i.e., the building of a balanced, more just society, which in turn would be built by a collection of balanced individuals. 3.1.2 Relation with Others If the crux of civility is how the Self balances itself against the Other, the teachings of Hazrat Nizamuddin provide more than enough guidelines as to how one should treat the other. Here, by the ‘other’ we’re referring to the world of Gesellschaft ties peculiar to the city, wherein associational ties give way to instrumental ones. Although the medieval city may not necessarily yield to the sociological makeup peculiar to our own cities, we can nevertheless approximate that the social life in the new bustling urban spaces of Delhi would certainly have elements of both gesellschaft and gemeinschaft. In such a milieu, the teachings of the Shaykh with regard to social relations help us understand both the civility that was present, and was propagated by the Shaykh. Two introductory discourses summarize well the gist of the Shaykh’s teachings on how to treat others.
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A man once presented himself to Khwaja Ajall Shirazi—may God grant him mercy and forgiveness—and the Khwaja conferred discipleship on him. The new disciple expected Khwaja Ajall to instruct him on the invocations and prayers he ought to observe. “Whatever you do not find agreeable for yourself,” declared the Khwaja, “do not wish it to happen to others; wish for yourself (only) what you also wish for others.” In short, that man went away and after a while returned, presenting himself again to Khwaja Ajall Shirazi—may God have mercy upon him. “On such-and-such a day,” he submitted to the Khwaja, “I waited upon you, hoping that you might tell me a prayer or invocation (that I could repeat), but you told me nothing. Today I am also expectant.” “On that day,” replied the Khwaja, “what were your instructions?” The disciple was stupefied; he did not answer. The Khwaja smiled and said, “On that day I told you that whatever was not pleasing to yourself was also not pleasing to another, and (that you ought to) wish for yourself the same thing that you wish for another. You did not remember that instruction. Since you have not learned the first lesson, how can I give you another?” (Sijzi 1992, 88) I obtained the blessing of kissing the master's feet. The topic of discourse was DEVOTION (TO GOD). “There are two forms of devotion,” he explained; “One is mandatory, the other is supererogatory. Mandatory devotion is that from which the benefit is limited to one person, that is, to the performer of that devotion, whether it be canonical prayers, fasting, pilgrimage to Arabia, invocations, repetitions of the rosary, or the like. But supererogatory devotion is that which brings benefit and comfort to others, whether through the expenditure of money or demonstration of compassion or other ways of helping one's fellow man. Such actions are called supererogatory devotion. Their reward is incalculable; it is limitless. In mandatory devotion one must be sincere to merit divine acceptance, but in supererogatory devotion even one's sins become a source of reward! May God grant success!” (ibid, 95) A recurring injunction on the part of the Shaykh is the advice to treat visitors well, to ensure that visitors never left empty-handed or without eating. The khanqah at Ghiyaspur was well-suited to this task, it would cater to hundreds of visitors each day. None left without taking something back. Then, about THE 'IMPORTANCE OF GIVING SOMETHING, he quoted Shaykh al-Islam Farid ad-din—may God sanctify his lofty secret. “He used to say: ‘Whenever someone comes calling on another, the host must see that his caller leaves with something in hand.’”
(ibid, 263) The master then began to talk about SERVING FOOD and offered reflections on the different forms of hospitality that are available. “There is a Tradition,” he noted, “that whoever visits a living person and does not taste something from him it is as if he visited a corpse!” In the same vein the following remark came on the blessed lips of the master—may God be pleased with him. “The companions of the Prophet—on whom be peace—whenever they visited him, would always eat something before leaving—whether a piece of bread or a date or some other thing. Until they had had a bite to eat, they would not leave.” Then he noted about Shaykh Badr ad-din Ghaznavi—may God have mercy upon him: “He followed the practice that if he could not offer food to his visitors, he would at least offer them water.” (ibid, 238)
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I obtained the benefit of kissing his hand. Everyone who came to see the Shaykh, by way of greeting him, would bring something. Yet on this occasion a person came and brought nothing. As he was leaving, the master—may God remember him with favour—said: “Give him something!” And then he added: “Shaykh al Islam Farid ad-din—may God sanctify his lofty secret—used to say: ‘Everyone who comes to see me brings something. But whenever a poor person comes, bringing nothing, it is I who must give him something!’” (ibid, 305) Good behaviour, though, is not exhausted by kindness to others. Rather, characteristic of the Sufi tariqa, is it is tied to the restraint one one’s lower selves (nafs), with social life becoming both the theatre for good character as well as the means to perfect it. I had the good fortune of kissing his hand. Conversation focused on FORBEARANCE AND GUARDING AGAINST ANGER. "There is the lower self and the heart," he explained. “Whoever gives vent to his lower self must be deflected by one motivated from the heart. That is to say, the lower self is the abode of anger, strife, and discord, while the heart nurtures peace, contentment, and gentleness. Hence, if someone displays the urges of his lower self, another must express the feelings of his heart, since the latter will overpower the former. Imagine if a person were to confront another's lower self with his own lower self! What limits would there be to the anger and strife that resulted?” (ibid, 223-4) I obtained the benefit of kissing his feet. Conversation turned to ANGER AND DESIRE. The master observed: “Just as random desire is unlawful, so is random anger.” Then he added: “If someone gets angry at someone else, and the latter shows patience and forbearance, is it not his patience, rather than the anger of the other, which will be praised as something beautiful?” (ibid, 240) “And if someone speaks ill of another, he should go, offer apologies, ask pardon of that person, and be reconciled with him. And if that person who was spoken ill of died [before reconciliation was possible], what to do? One should act as if he were still alive and had been spoken ill of. In other words, one should say such good things about him, even after his death, that he will be well remembered.” …On this point he told a story about the time when he professed allegiance to Shaykh al-
Islam Farid ad-din—may God sanctify his lofty secret—and also repented of his former misdeeds. “Several times on his blessed lips came the remark: ‘One should be reconciled with one's enemies,’ and he kept stressing that ‘one must make restitution to those who have a claim on you.’ (ibid, 241) Yet another consistent theme throughout the Fawaid is the emphasis on forbearance and active forgiveness. I obtained the benefit of kissing his feet. Conversation turned to the MERIT OF EXERCISING RESTRAINT. “There was a saint,” recalled the master. “He was the paragon of forbearance and restraint. ‘Where did you acquire this grace?’ he was asked. Replied that saint: ‘I acquired it from my teacher. His name was Asim (lit., the sinless); he had also mastered the art of Qur'anic recitation.’ ‘Tell us something about his qualities of restraint,’ they asked that saint. ‘Once,’ he replied, ‘’Asim went into the desert, far from civilized life. He encountered a fool who began to talk foolishly, and to utter impertinences to him. Asim kept quiet. He did not respond to that man's provocations. As he was returning to the city, that fool still kept pestering him. When at last they came into the company of others Asim
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turned to that man and announced: ‘Noble sir, we have returned. Here are many of my friends and acquaintances. They should not hear you speak so foully of me, lest they begin to feel contempt for you!’” (ibid, 290) I had the good fortune of kissing his hand. One of those present remarked: “Some persons, when speaking about you, have ascended certain pulpits and gone to certain places and proceeded to say such unseemly things that we cannot repeat them here!” The master—may God remember him with favour—replied: “I pardon them all. What sort of place would it be were men to be constantly engaged in hatred and slander of others! Everyone who speaks ill of me I pardon him. You also must pardon slanderers and not harbour any enmity toward them.” After that he spoke about a certain Chaju of Ind(ra)pat. “Continuously he would speak ill of me and wish me ill. Speaking ill of others is one thing; wishing them ill is something else, still worse. In short, the third day after he died, I went to his grave and offered prayers on his behalf. ‘O God,’ I prayed, ‘whatever bad thing he said about me or bad thought he harboured of me, I forgive him. Would You please not punish him on my account?’” In this connection he said: “If there be trouble between two persons, one of them should seize the initiative and cleanse himself of ill thoughts toward the other. When his inner self is emptied of enmity, inevitably that trouble between him and the other will lessen.” Finally, the master exclaimed: “Why should one be vexed by these slanderous assaults? They have often said that the property of Sufis is claimable, even shedding their blood is permissible. When such are the boundaries of the Law, why bother to speak ill of someone who is a Sufi, or harbour enmity against him?” (ibid, 190-1) On this occasion I asked: “Did they not also perpetrate magic against Shaykh Farid ad-din—
may God sanctify his lofty secret?” “Yes,” he said. “He repelled that magic, and then they apprehended the group who had perpetrated it. The governor of Ajodhan and other officials arrayed that group before Shaykh al-Islam Farid ad-din—may God sanctify his lofty secret. They asked him: ‘What do you order us to do to this group?’ ‘Pardon them all,’ he replied. ‘Set them free!’” (ibid, 281) The final malfuzat summarizes well the Shaykh’s approach to human relations. The gist and justification for an alternative theory of civility is encapsulated in it. I obtained the blessing of kissing the master's feet. Conversation turned to FORBEARANCE. The master observed: “The conduct of human beings with one another is of three kinds. The first kind is that whatever a person does neither benefits nor harms another. Such conduct replicates the order common in the mineral and plant world. The second kind is that whatever a person does brings only benefit to his fellow man, not harm. This is better. But the third kind is still better: that whatever a person does benefits another and even if someone harms him, he does not retaliate but exercises forbearance. This is the conduct of the righteous.” (ibid, 346) 3.1.3 Relation with Nature Both colonial developments and postcolonial additions have starkly transformed the landscape of Delhi, natural and otherwise. The Delhi of today is a concrete jungle, there is a mesh of limitless paved roads, gated housing societies, and bureaucratic enclaves spread across the city. Yet popping in every now and then, disturbing the
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disenchanted capital city, are murmurs from a not-so-distant past, there are traces of eras gone by, there are tombs both marked and unmarked, there are sites of both contestation and veneration that precede the modern capital. Here, there is a chance to peruse the history of the city outside of its modern-day vantage point, here, there is a ‘jinnealogy’ to be read and benefited from. (Taneja 2018) If we’re to check a map of modern Delhi, we’ll be swarmed by roads and rails, indeed the two lord over the topography of the city. There is however more to the city, its long history of human habitation should alert us to its natural characteristics, the very earthly features that gave the city both grounding and standing. Chief of which is the Yamuna River, as also the broader water systems of stepwells, tanks and lakes. Harder to miss are the Aravalli range of mountains, the oldest fold mountains in the world, which form the eastern border of the city. And of course, we’ve animals and birds, trees and soil peculiar to the city. It is in this backdrop that we need to imagine the khanqah of Hazrat Nizamuddin. The khanqah was situated within the urban sprawl of Delhi, yet it wasn’t cut off from the natural landscape. It was built right next to the river Yamuna; we know from the malfuzat that the water of the Yamuna was not only drinkable but also known to be particularly sweet. (Sijzi 1992, 33) The malfuzat is also replete with instances from the natural world, mountains, rivers, springs not only provide the backdrop to many anecdotes, they also feature as the main character in the story. Consider the following anecdote. Conversation turned briefly to THE MIRACLES OF THE PROPHET—peace be upon him. They were such that even animals and inanimate objects obeyed him. In this connection he told still another story: “The Prophet—peace be upon him—when he was commissioned to prophesy, sent Ma'adh ibn Jabal toward Yemen, instructing him that there was a spring there known as 'Ain az-Zu'af, sometimes also known as 'Ain adh-dhu'af. In short, that spring had a special quality: Whoever drank but a drop from it died on the spot. The master of the world— peace be upon him—commanded Ma'adh: ‘When you reach there, tell that spring: “I (Muhammad) have been commissioned to prophesy.”’ When Ma'adh reached that spring, he delivered the command of Muhammad—peace be upon him—telling the spring about the manifestation of his prophecy. That spring at once believed in the apostleship of the Apostle—peace be upon him—and afterward that fearsome quality that had set it apart from other springs was never again detected.” (Sijzi 1992, 193) We understand from the preceding anecdote that the world is neither dead nor distant, that to be human is to be in constant commune with the natural world, which
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is alive and replete with meanings. A sign of being, ‘living in’ the world is to witness its effect on the human, body and soul. Then one of those present interjected: “In the same vein it has been reported that once in the presence of Shaykh Abu Sa'id Abu'l-Khayr— may God have mercy upon him!—a powerful leather maker was beating an animal. Shaykh Abu Sacid said: ‘Ah!’ with such pathos that it seemed as though he had been the one beaten. A sceptic was present. ‘Such a condition is impossible!’ he protested. Shaykh Abu Sa id disrobed and the signs of that leather belt appeared on his blessed back!” After that the teller of this story turned to the master—may God remember him with favour—and said: “This story, like the one you told, implies that a person can feel someone else's condition, but I don't understand how such an empathy works.” In response on the blessed tongue of the master—may God remember him with favour—came this explanation: “When the spirit becomes powerful and is perfected, it attracts the heart and the heart, too, when it becomes powerful and perfected, attracts the body. Then, due to this union of all three, whatever happens to the heart, leaves its outward mark on the body.” (ibid, 170) The natural world also acts as a signalling device, that is beyond being mesmerized and constantly amazed by it, one makes use of its metaphors and symbols to explain aspects of the human life. Then he told a related story about THE MURDER OF 'UMAR KHATTAB—may God be pleased with him. “It was on Friday,” he recalled, “when 'Umar had mounted the pulpit and was in the midst of delivering the Friday sermon. ‘Take note,’ he told his listeners, ‘my death is imminent.’ He knew this on account of his miraculous powers. ‘In a dream I saw a bird approach me,’ he explained, ‘and that bird pecked me twice with its beak. Now a bird in one's dream signifies the angel of death. Due to this sign I am informing you that my death is imminent.’ And the next week Umar did attain martyrdom. (It happened like this.) A disaffected slave named Ibn Lulu struck him with a sword in the mosque.” (ibid, 281-2) Finally, it is not only the natural environment that is enchanted. Both built and natural spaces imbibe something of the people who inhabit them, the space embodies the barakah of the righteous who frequent it. I obtained the benefit of kissing the master's feet. The subject of conversation was THE BLESSING which is CONFERRED BY THE FEET OF SAINTLY MEN. He asserted: “Every spiritless place [where they have trod] has been scented by their feet. Consider the congregational mosque of Delhi—how many feet of saints and holy men have trod upon it and for that very reason how much comfort is to be found there!” (ibid, 93)
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3.2 PART TWO 3.2.1 Gharib Nawazi The beginning of the Chishti tariqa in India, and arguably the role of Sufism as a program of mass reform, begins with the establishment of the khanqah in Ajmer by Shaykh Moinuddin Chishti. A towering giant among the galaxy of Sufi teachers, Moinuddin’s lifelong travels across the Islamicate ecumene concluded in India, where his hospice firmly established and contextualized Islam in the provincial desert town. In time, Moinuddin’s prestige would rise amongst the ulema and laity alike, earning him the title of the Prophet’s representative in India. The title he would be remembered by most would however be Khwaja Gharib Nawaz. The title, as well as its acronym ‘KGN’ is ubiquitous across India, it is found on the rear of trucks, on the boards of shops, as well as a large number of businesses around the country. Gharib Nawazi is a word common to both Urdu and Persian. By gharib, the reference is to both the stranger as well as the destitute, while nawazi means hospitality. Gharib nawazi therefore means ‘kindness or hospitality to the strangers/the poor. The term is apt in understanding not only the khanqah of the Chishti Shaykhs, but also the larger ethos informing their teachings. The question is, who precisely qualifies to be a stranger? Modern sociology has directed considerable energies trying to answer the question. The Stranger is the one who doesn’t belong, the ‘one who is beyond the limits of community’. (Lambert 2003) The stranger is ‘the wanderer who comes today and goes tomorrow…the man who comes today and stays tomorrow.’ He inhabits ‘a certain spatial circle -or within a group whose boundaries are analogous to spatial boundaries-but his position within it is fundamentally affected by the fact that he does not belong in it initially and that he brings qualities into it that are not, and cannot be, indigenous to it.’ (Simmel 1971, 143) Like the ‘poor’, he constitutes the "inner enemies", an ‘element whose membership within the group involves both being outside it and confronting it.’ (ibid, 144) Yet if we gaze outside of our modern sociological imagination, and instead turn towards classical texts, we may find that the subject matter of ‘stranger’ occupies a
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different plane. In an insightful paper, Franz Rosenthal puts the stranger as ‘everybody who left his original place of residence and went abroad.’ In the Middle Ages, this would include pilgrims, merchants, and fortune-seekers, but also students, intellectuals, soldiers and Sufis. The final category is found in abundance throughout the Fawaid, either in the institutional form of khanqah Sufis, or as wandering dervishes. The Sufis, whether in residence or travel, had ‘adopted homelessness as a way of life and were not strangers as ordinarily understood, they were at home everywhere but nowhere in this material world and constituted thus a special type of strangers.’ The metaphor of travel explains well the earthly stay of humans. The ancient use of travel as a metaphor to describe man's sojourn on earth was widely accepted in Islam. Its obvious implication is that human beings are strangers always and everywhere. Believers went a step further and pointed to metaphysics and life after death as man's true and only home. This way of thinking had always been familiar to Muslims. However, inward religiosity as cultivated by ascetics and mystics adopted it not only as a metaphor but also as a lifestyle. If life on earth was a journey, this fact had to be made apparent by constant travel and if, further, this meant being a stranger, its outward manifestation was for Sufis to present themselves as strangers. They should not stay in one place. (Rosenthal 1997) Rosenthal quotes al-Tawhidi that the Gharib is in fact ‘the real qarib, the person unrelated to the outside world and related to the spiritual world, man’s true and only home’. He also quotes Ibn Qayyim (1956), who offers a similar treatment of the subject. Wherever a believer takes up residence in this (worldly) mansion (dar), he is a stranger there, and he is in foreign territory (or exile, dar al-gurba), as the Prophet has said: "Be in this world as if you were a stranger!" It is, however, a gurba that will come to an end, and he will get back to his native land and mansion. The gurba that offers no hope that it will ever end is the one in the vile mansion (that is this world, dar al-hawan) involving separation from the native land that was arranged and prepared for him, and he was commanded to make provisions for the journey back to it-that is the gurba that offers no hope for a return. (As cited in Rosenthal, 1997) Hardev Rajkumar was present in the last few days of Hazrat Nizamuddin. The Shaykh’s health was not beyond remedy, the visiting physician had recommended that if he would start eating again, his illness would ease. The Shaykh observed the physician for a while, before finally saying in a low voice, ‘For the love-stricken ones, there is no medicine save for the sight of the Beloved.’ (Hardev 2009, 355)
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The personality of the Shaykh and the institution of the khanqah therefore performed two functions. They reminded the visitors the necessity of passing through the world as strangers, yet they equally made sure, in deeds and practice, that the true stranger would be well looked after. Shaykh Moinuddin Chishti had once been asked, what is the religious devotion that helps one draw closest to God? The Shaykh had replied “Develop riverlike generosity, sun-like bounty and earth-like hospitality.” His illustrious successor, Hazrat Nizamuddin, certainly followed this principle to the hilt. A man who subsisted on a few morsels per day, he was once prodded by a disciple to eat a little more. The Shaykh said, “So many poor and destitute people are sleeping in the corners of mosques and on the platforms of shops! They have nothing to eat for dinner. How can this food go down my throat?” One another occasion, a visitor said that he had no worries, since everything came to him that he asked for. The Shaykh said, “Nobody in this world has more worries than I. So many people come to me, confiding in me their woes, their worries. All these accounts of misery and sorrow sear my heart and weigh down my soul.” (Nizami 1992) The khanqah was the earthly hospice, catering to earthly needs, yet fundamentally positioned to prepare the believers for the permanent hospice of the hereafter. The khanqah catered to a bustling local community, yet its doors were equally open to the outsiders. Both in times of scarcity and tribulation, disciples would flock its doors, and the Shaykh wouldn’t disappoint. The Shaykh who was the most Gharib and qarib, became the patron of all the gharib who came in his refuge. Hardev’s own experience are instructive in this regard. Fresh from Deogir, he was a stranger both to Delhi in particular, and the larger Islamicate it was part of. Yet his apprehensions vanished upon seeing the khanqah life. Here, he found the people inquiring about him politely. Here, he saw fraternal bonds that resembled those of brothers. To accommodate him, for his dietary choices were different than that of the Muslims, the khanqah members gave up on their practice of eating from a common plate. A visitor raised a furore over this, wondering if Muslims now would be eating
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separately. One of the senior residents of the khanqah assuaged the matter, assuring the visitor with a verse from the Quran. For Hardev, born in a social milieu based on the case system, where inter-dining across caste communities was unimaginable, this must have been a cultural shock. Yet the impact on him was highly positive, both the Shaykh and his disciples accepted him as one of their own, he soon accepted Islam at the hands of the Shaykh. (Hardev 2009) The experience of Hardev Rajkumar was not unique. Rare would be the visitor who would return empty-handed from the khanqah. Khaliq Nizami is perceptive in noticing that the khanqah of Hazrat Nizamuddin functioned as a welfare centre. By welfare, the reference is to the provision of material needs, but also spiritual ones. The former was provided through daily food and gifts and aid, the latter through the public sermons, private counsel and the daily routines observed in the khanqah. The idea behind establishing khanqahs was ‘the conviction that a life of solitary, self-
sufficient contemplation was incompatible with the highest mystic ideals because it made man ego-centric, limited his sympathies and cut him off completely from the energizing currents of social life.’ Further, ‘when men of different temperaments and attitudes assembled in these khanqahs, all tensions, conflicts and complexes in their character were resolved and their personalities were moulded in consonance with the spirit of the silsilah.’ (Nizami 1957) The qutb of the Ghiyaspur khanqah was Hazrat Nizamuddin, ‘a scholar with deep insight into religious sciences—particularly the Qur'an and the hadith; a saint whose vigils and fasts cast an aura of serene spirituality round his face; a humanist who spent all his time attending to the problems of the downtrodden and the destitute; a pacifist who believed in nonviolence and returning evil with good—the Shaykh represented in his person the highest traditions of morality, mysticism, and religion.’ (Nizami 1992)
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3.2.2 Futuwwa The anecdotes and lessons from the malfuzat have been categorized into two sets, ‘The Four Enemies’ and ‘Relation with Others’. An alternative, and more telling caption would be ‘Renunciation of the Self’ and ‘Responsibility of the Other.’ The two may appear as two separate strands, yet on a closer inquiry we may see that the moral kernel is identical to both. In the Sufi world where this present thesis is based at, the ideal of Futuwwa or spiritual chivalry expresses well this attitude. We notice that throughout the malfuzat, the Shaykh’s concerns were either tied to the restraint of the self, or the service of others. The khanqah would be a training ground to both ends, it was where theory would meet praxis, and help build the moral subject, ever ready to be of service to others. Futuwwa is the way of the fata. In Arabic, fata literally means a handsome, brave youth. After the enlightenment of Islam, following the use of the word in the Holy Quran, fata came to mean the ideal, noble and perfect man whose hospitality and generosity would extend until he had nothing left for himself; a man who would give all, including his life, for the sake of his friends. According to the Sufis, Futuwwa is code of honourable conduct that follows the example of the prophets, saints, sages, and the intimate friends and lovers of Allah. (Al-
Halvet 1983) Futuwwa is ‘a code of honour to be observed by the genuine Sufi, which enjoins him to be generous, to give preference to others over his own self, and to help the poor and needy.’ (al-Qushayri 2007) It was key to ‘the integration of earthly conduct and spiritual idealism within key urban settings.’ (Rahimi and Salvatore 2016) It was ‘interiorised within the Sufi world view and denoted selflessness, loyalty to family and friends, and the observance of the rights owed to God.’ (Ridgeon 2011) We know from the Tarikh-i-Firoz Shahi that Al-Qushayri’s Epistle on Sufism had reached Delhi by the time of Hazrat Nizamuddin, that along with others books such as the Ihya, there was a reading population eager to benefit from it. (Barani 2015, 212) The Ihya was translated into Persian in the twelfth century (by Ghazali himself in Kimiya-e Sa’adat), it is mentioned as well by Hazrat Nizamuddin in his sermon. (Siddiqui 1992, 48-9) The Ihya in general and Book 22 in particular is useful in giving shape to the teachings of Hazrat Nizamuddin, which in turn can help us construct an alternative conception of civility.
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1. Active Civility If we’re to approximate a working definition of civility as it existed in the thirteenth century khanqah, we may do no better than by first recognizing how difficult it is to do so in the first place. The place of civility in our collective lives is unquestionably important, the problem is finding a cross-cultural and cross-temporal definition of it. It is, to paraphrase one leading political philosopher of the last century, a value ‘like happiness and goodness, like nature and reality, the meaning of this term is so porous that there is little interpretation that it seems able to resist.’ (Berlin 1969) The philosopher in question was Isaiah Berlin, the quote is taken from his celebrated speech ‘Two Concepts of Liberty.’ Berlin’s division of liberty into two separate realms, the positive and the negative, was valuable in broadening the boundaries and interpretations of liberty. The case of civility can likewise benefit from being phrased in the negative and the positive. In its negative, passive avatar, civility puts a premium on restraint, of one’s passions, one’s lower selves. In a more expansive, positive and active avatar however, civility would demand of us certain duties, pushing us well beyond our comfort zones of doing the bare minimum, to instead engaged in activities that may not yield immediate benefits, but which nonetheless are helpful for personal and societal reasons. The idea of active and passive, positive and negative civility can be gleaned from Hazrat Nizamuddin’s teachings. To repeat, "The conduct of human beings with one another is of three kinds. The first kind is that whatever a person does neither benefits nor harms another. Such conduct replicates the order common in the mineral and plant world. The second kind is that whatever a person does brings only benefit to his fellow man, not harm. This is better. But the third kind is still better: that whatever a person does benefits another and even if someone harms him, he does not retaliate but exercises forbearance. This is the conduct of the righteous." The first type is passive, the variety of civility we’re most accustomed to settling for. The second is a slight improvement over the first. It is the final type, seemingly impossible, closer to the realm of the heavenly kingdom than the earthly one, that
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comes closest to describing Hazrat Nizamuddin’s personal example. We’ve seen through his sermons that it was this type of civility which he encouraged his followers to adopt. The key word here is hilm or forbearance, a powerful theme that expresses well the principles of positive civility. Forbearance is not alien to human life, even if we locate more examples of its absence than its presence. It may not be the first line of response to any situation. But there is no reason to believe that is an impossible trait to acquire and perfect. The final section of this chapter proceeds to discuss exactly how a trait such as hilm can be acquired, and why without its acquisition, the project of civility may well run into rough water. 3.2.3 Adab In a recent monograph, Bruce Lawrence delves into the concept of adab as it was understood in the Persianate world. Adab can refer ‘to literature, but it is elevated literature, at once linked to religion by its preferred form (poetry) but also its daily performance (along with prayer, labour and leisure activity).’ This ‘performance’ involves ‘a common set of behavioural traits, morally underpinned by a notion of collective good.’ (Lawrence 2021, 62-3) Islamicate civilization is therefore understood as consisting of both ‘implicit ethical norms [adab] as well as ‘explicit juridical codes [shariʿah].’ (ibid) This latter, i.e., the ‘type of practices reflected by jurisprudence (fiqh) did not exhaust the pursuit of a righteous life conduct aimed at building a harmonious social bond.’ This is where the Sufi brotherhoods came into picture, led and nurtured by a charismatic Shaykh. that Sufi teachings and practices provided the opportunity to orient one’s life to the sunna of the Prophet via active membership in an organized brotherhood. At the core of this membership were training programs under the guidance of masters who could prove an uninterrupted chain of initiations (and corresponding transmissions of charisma) reaching back to Muhammad himself. This type of training aimed at embracing the essential truth, the haqiqa, through establishing a close relationship not only to Muhammad but also to the “friends” (awliya’, sing. wali) of God, the new Sufi saints, entertaining a particular closeness (walaya) to the Divine. (Rahimi and Salvatore 2016)
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Lapidus’s definition of adab as ‘correct knowledge and behaviour in the total process by which a person is educated, guided, and formed into a good Muslim’ helps him identify it as a ‘part of a system of Muslim ideas, part of an interrelated set of concepts that constitutes the basic vocabulary of Islamic belief and makes up a Muslim anthropology of man.’ Along with other concepts such as ‘ilm, tasdiq, iman, islam — (adab) constitutes the basic vocabulary of Muslim faith.’ They all point to the relationship between knowledge and action—to the inward flux of intellect, judgment, and emotion in relation to outward expression in speech, gesture, ritual, and action—as the key to the very nature of man's being and his relationship to God. Implicit in the study of adab are not only issues about literature and the role of literature in moral, religious, and social life, but also fundamental Muslim ideas about. (Lapidus 1984) A key motif to such an end is to see adab as having two components, one of temporal haal, the other as consisting of a disposition, a habitus that is more permanent. As a tool of sociological inquiry, the term was revived and creatively utilized by the French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu. Bourdieu’s chief concern throughout his academic life was to figure out “how can behaviour be regulated without being the product of obedience to rules?” The concept of habitus was key to unravelling this puzzle. For Bourdieu, habitus implies ‘the result of an organizing action, while also pointing towards it as ‘a way of being, a habitual state (especially of the body) and, in particular, a predisposition, tendency, propensity or inclination.’ (Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice 1977, 214) Elsewhere, he explains why he found it necessary to revive the term. Why did I revive that old word? Because with the notion of habitus you can refer to something that is close to what is suggested by the idea of habit, while differing from it in one important respect. The habitus, as the word implies, is that which one has acquired, but which has become durably incorporated in the body in the form of permanent dispositions. So, the term constantly reminds us that it refers to something historical, linked to individual history, and that it belongs to a genetic mode of thought, as opposed to existentialist modes of thought. (Bourdieu, Sociology in Question 1993, 86) Although the terminology is new, the underlying ideas are not. One reason perhaps why the term has been so frequently relied upon in modern scholarship is the sheer variety it allows the researchers. But yet another, perhaps more pertaining reason, is
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it’s cross-regional and cross-temporal applicability, it has a history of being employed by a string of major thinkers, beginning first with Galen, continuing with Ghazali and Tusi. The framing and the choice of subjects may vary, but the core idea never wavers. That the human subject, unlike their animal kingdom counterparts, has the gift of repetitive actions, which engender certain desire-worthy traits, and refrain from the blameworthy ones. The theatre as well as its backstage is the human body itself, which must internalize, perhaps with instruction, perhaps with discernment, the bounties of perfecting one’s self through constant repetitive action. Al-Ghazali employs the example of learning a skill like carpentry to explain the circular mind-body relationship. A man who wishes his soul to acquire the attribute of skilful calligraphy so that he becomes a calligrapher by nature and disposition must do with the member which is the hand those things which the calligrapher does, and devote himself assiduously to this for a long period, during which he imitates the calligrapher by copying his fine script. He continues to persevere in this until it becomes a firmly-rooted attribute in his soul, and, at last, he comes to write naturally with a beautiful hand, whereas he had earlier done so only artificially. It was fine calligraphy itself which rendered his own calligraphy fine, at first through a difficult simulation, the effect of which nevertheless rose to his heart and then descended again from the heart to the member in question to enable him to write well naturally. (Al-Ghazali 2016, 35-6) The acquiring of good character follows a similar trajectory. It is achieved ‘through self-discipline, by means of imitating, at the outset, the actions which result from such traits so that they may ultimately become part of one's nature.’ Al-Ghazali notes ‘the wonders of the relationship between the heart and the members [jawarih]’ i.e. the soul and the body, ‘the effect of every attribute which appears in the heart must emanate onto the members, so that these move only in conformity to it; similarly, every act performed by the members has an effect which makes its way up to the heart, thereby constituting a form of circular movement.’ (ibid) The actions must be repeated, to be performed by simulation ‘until they become part of his habitual nature.’ And the more one performs the action, ‘the greater will be the
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reward, the purer and clearer the soul, and the stronger and more deeply-rooted the good traits of character.’ (ibid, 33) In reviewing the classical conception of adab, Lapidus examines Al Ghazali, but also Ibn Khaldun’s work on the topic. Similar to Al Ghazali, Ibn Khaldun relies upon the example of a craft to explain formation of a trait, wherein ‘any skilled activity, craft, or profession, such as the scribal profession, and any manual, ritual, or intellectual skill, such as poetic, linguistic, and scientific abilities that are acquired as a result of instruction, practice, and repetition, form a habit.’ Lapidus was perhaps the first to connect the Arabic term malaka with habitus. A habit, "malaka" in Arabic, is more than just a learned semiautomatic activity as in the English sense of the word. It bears the meaning of the Latin, habitus—an acquired faculty, rooted in the soul. Each activity "gives the soul a special coloring that forms it." This mark, imagined as a corporeal trait, is made deeper and more permanent as a result of constant practice and repetition. (Lapidus 1984, 53) The ’special colouring’ is taken from a passage in the Muqaddimah. The soul takes shape by the process of acquiring such habits. An action done once adds an attribute (sifa) to the essence of the soul. With repetition it becomes a “condition” (hal) that is not firmly established. After more repetition it becomes a habit (malaka), that is, a firmly established attribute. (ibid, 53-4) Following Al-Ghazali, Ibn Khaldun too proceeds from his example of carpentry to the weightier issue of moral and spiritual qualities, which are likewise built on malakat. The repeated performance of any good deed generates virtues. Indeed, the whole of a man's life is built on malakat. His inner state, his soul, is shaped by his activities…The possession of a malaka, a rooted disposition, governs the expression of particular skills allowing that natural ease and spontaneity which characterizes a habit in our usual sense. A malaka, then, is that inner quality developed as a result of outer practice which makes the practice a perfect expression of the soul of the actor…Each deed and action leaves a trace in the heart that will influence future actions. Each trait is actualized in outer behaviour. To develop inner virtues, one must do right actions; to do right actions one must possess inner virtues. (Lapidus 1984)
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Of the modern-day commentators, the Malaysian philosopher Syed Muhammad Naquib Al-Attas has gone furthest in articulating the concept of adab. Similar to his medieval counterparts, Al Attas seeks an expansive definition of adab. For Al Attas, adab refers to ‘the discipline of body, mind, and soul; the discipline that assures the recognition and acknowledgement of one's proper place in relation to one's self, society and Community; the recognition and acknowledgement of one's proper place in relation to one's physical, intellectual, and spiritual capacities and potentials; the recognition and acknowledgement of the fact that knowledge and being are ordered hierarchically.’ (Al-Attas 1993) For Al Attas, the chief problem besieging the contemporary Muslim world is primarily the loss of adab, the capacity to imagine oneself in a hierarchical ontology. The individual is a relational subject for al Attas, grounded and held together by the ethos of adab. Al Attas's loss of adab may well be favourably contrasted with Weber's disenchantment in the modern world. However, while the latter was cloaked in a cool secular inquiry of the modern subject, the former is expressively religious, locating in the idea of adab the key motif to revive the Muslim mind. Al Attas’s conception of adab also holds a key idea vis-à-vis formulating an alternative conception of civility. Adab helps us to realize the human subject as the ‘relational self’, related at varying levels, to a cosmic order, as well as to ones’ family and society. Adab towards one’s self starts when one acknowledges one’s dual nature, namely the rational and the animal. When the former subdues the latter and renders it under control, then one has put both of them in their proper places, thereby placing one’s self in the right place. Such a state is justice to one’s self; otherwise, it is injustice (˙ulm al-nafs). When adab is referred to human relationship, it means that ethical norms which are applied to social behaviour would follow certain requirements based on one’s standing in say, the family and society. One’s standing “is not formulated by the human criteria of power, wealth, and lineage, but by the Qur’anic criteria of knowledge, intelligence and virtue.” (Wan Daud 2009) Adab is key to what Lapidus calls the traditional Sunni-Sufi worldview. It deals with the ‘formation of the person’, it is ‘a position that brings together sharia, theology, philosophy, and sufism’ with sharia being ‘the dimension of Islam that exposits the law to be observed’ whereas ‘theology and philosophy deal with the structure of the soul and the rationale for ethical behaviour’. In this mix, ‘sufism appears not as a
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departure from basic Islamic belief, but as an extension and perfection of Muslim practice and Muslim ethics.’ (Lapidus 1984, 59-60) Lapidus notes that ‘sunnl-sufi Islam rejects self-cultivation in detachment from the world’, the ideal to be pursued is instead adab, by which the reference is to ‘a cultivated way of living in the world, without being absorbed by the world or fleeing from it’, it is ‘a life journey toward self-realization and religious salvation that can only be achieved by cultivating clear vision, ethical responsibility, honourable relations with one's fellow man, and sincere worship.’ (ibid, 60) Adab as malaka, as a habitus is crucial to ensuring that civility does not become, what some have characterized as a ‘precarious acquisition.’ It gives specificity and purpose to the rather abstract but worldly crucial ideal of civility, through active self-
discipline it becomes a habitus, as opposed to staying as just a temporary condition. It is the crucible that leads to ‘the integration of all levels of experience, knowledge, character, feeling, and action into a harmonious life that leads to well-being in this world in patient preparation for the world to come.’ (ibid, 60-1) Salvatore notes how ‘the Sufi intervention in the discursive field of adab enriched its intersection with the hadith narrative tradition’, making it ‘the main arrow of civility in the Islamic ecumene.’ This is contrasted against ‘the sharply vertical “trickle-
down” flow that characterized the trajectories delineated by Norbert Elias with regard to Europe.’ (Salvatore 2021) Adab in this reading is resolutely individual-driven and individual-focussed, guided and mediated by a Shaykh or a similar charismatic authority. There is no Leviathan-
like State hovering over society to ‘civilize’ it, rather it is the moral individual, responsible and ready for their own action, who becomes the prime engine of civility. This poses an interesting, if troublesome question: Can there be a model of civility without first having a model of a moral human agent? The final chapter of this thesis closes off on this note.
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4 Conclusion …the Prophetic subtlety of human closeness and empathy, the firasa that is the discernment of spirits…a sense of wonder at the brilliance of creation and the marvel of other souls. The Quran invites us to see the world as wonderful, as a vast display of God’s signs, of which human beings are the most remarkable of all. When we regain the lovely enjoyment of admiring the brilliance of creation in the world and in other people, we will start to reclaim the natural human virtue of empathy and courtesy, which is the foundation of all moral existence. (Murad 2018) It would be imprudent to imagine that we can pull out the model of civility present in the thirteenth century and make use of it set our affairs to order. The anachronism would run large through such a project, made worse by the fact that neither the social circumstances not are its actors alike in their motivations and make-up. However, looking at alternative modes of civility, across societies and across time zones, certainly helps us in critiquing our own present model. The thrust of the thesis has not only been to identify the variables of the civility present in the thirteenth century khanqah life, but also the social imaginary of the world that made it possible. The latter allows us to pin civility into the material, tangible realm, as opposed to an ideal model which may have no bearings to reality, historical or otherwise. Studying the social imaginary of societies separate from ours also helps us to locate their responses in the backdrop of the pulls and pressures present in their environment; we’re therefore saved from having a spiritually gleeful and theoretically naïve ‘view-
out-of-nowhere.’ If we’re to take civility as a universal virtue, albeit present in a wide spectrum of variations, we must be sensitive to the social imaginary they emerge from, for that will offer us the clues to appreciate and contextualize it better. In the case of Hazrat Nizamuddin’s khanqah, the social imaginary was one where religion informed nearly all aspects of life. By religion, we’re limiting ourselves neither to institutions nor laws, rather the term covers the widest range of human expressions, sanctified by a transcendental outlook, operating in an earthly theatre which held both meaning and magic for the believer. The modern institution of the nation-state was absent, and so were its accompanying tools of rigid borders and national identities. The Islamicate ecumene therefore hosted a wide network of merchants and Sufis, a network where both goods and ideas moved across the vast
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geographical landmass of Eurasia. The khanqah in Delhi was one node of this large network, a formidable physical distance separated its members, yet in the plane of ideas and beliefs, the distances were negligible. The latter is what allowed the stranger to feel at home, in the city of Baghdad and Delhi alike. For the weary traveller headed for a destination, and for the wandering dervish refusing to be tied to one, there were broadly two stations on the road to stop for rest. The first were the sarais constructed by the Sultans, we know for example that during Sultan Alauddin’s reign the roads were improved and sarais constructed for the benefit of travellers. (Hardev 2009) A second option were the Sufi lodges which had increased in their numbers from the twelfth century onwards, numbering in the thousands around Delhi alone. (Barani 2015) The Sufi lodge had the added benefit of catering to both the mind and soul, visitors frequented it for no other purpose than to gain from its barakah. At the end, while the sarai visitor would leave only with a rested body, the visitor would leave with both his stomach full and his heart content. The provisions for the journey, i.e the zaad-e-raah provided by the Sufi lodges, would outlast the journey itself. In terms of material sustenance, the Sufi lodges in question were sustained by visitors. But in terms of longevity and practice, it was the normative framework of futuwwa and adab that sustained them. We saw how the Sufi ideal of futuwwa, best exemplified through Hazrat Nizamuddin’s own character, was instrumental in fashioning a civility that put the other before the self, that combined most fruitfully the care of the self with care of the other. A restraint on the self and an attitude of service to others was as much of benefit for the performer, as it was for their peers and the larger society in which they lived. In this crucible, denial of the self becomes precisely the means to elevate it, a disciplining of the self becomes the roadway to liberate it. The theatre to do so is not a forest retreat or a mountain cave, it is the bustling urban landscape, in the thick of testing times and testing compatriots, where the human self is located, refined, and eventually elevated to a station with the siddiqin, the righteous.
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Urban social life has been at the receiving end of barbs and disappointment; it is frequently lamented as the fallen ground, a place of non-existent ties, limited humanity, and general bewilderment. We saw earlier how Hazrat Nizamuddin himself was loathe to spend his life in the city of Delhi; it was a polluted place for him. Yet his greatest works happened in the city itself, it was the training ground for hundreds of his disciples, who in turn spread out across towns and cities spanning across the sub-continent. Delhi became the launching pad on which a whole generation of Sufis were trained and dispatched across the empire. The earthly city, polluted and impersonal, became the means for redemption of the heavenly one, for local residents and far-off cousins alike. The urban khanqah life may well be thought of as a stopgap agreement between the pulls of extreme monasticism and uncontrolled worldliness. For the awliya, the retreat to the woods was not an option, strict monastic life had been frowned upon since the classical period of Islam, buttressed as much by the Prophetic example as by the presence of groups such as the kharijites, who had cut themselves off from society both spatially and mentally. For the early Christians, following Augustine’s extortion, life in the world was to be one of ‘pilgrims through time’, and the city was not a preferred place of residence. Unlike roads and streets, the faithful companions of the pilgrim, ‘houses tempt one to rest and relax, to forget about the destination.’ (Bauman 1996) The suppression of one’s desires was therefore taken to an extreme, and arguably the baby of the world was thrown out with the bathwater of worldliness. The case was markedly different in the khanqah, wherein led by the Shaykh’s own example, the task of passing through the world as a stranger was eased, the lesson being that one had to neither love nor hate the world. Sensitive to the signs of the world which had yet to be robbed of any meaning, the disciple could see in them both their earthly temporality as well as their heavenly promise. The way to emerge above the world was neither by shunning nor by suppressing it, rather the seemingly impossible task of live-in-the-world-but-don’t-love-it was offered to the disciple. The world was to mirror the khanqah, wherein self-discipline had to be actively pursued, poverty welcomed, hoarding shunned, and good social behaviour both at the level of
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surface and dispositions had to be actively sought. The khanqah was to train the world-denying individual precisely by pushing them into it. 4.1 Ethics, Habitus The expansive conception of civility this thesis has favoured presupposes and demands a community of strong moral agents to lead it. The question we may rightfully be afraid of asking is, do we have such a community at hand, and more worryingly, do we have a working mechanism to produce the moral agents that formulate it? In perhaps one of his most inspirational pieces, Zygmunt Bauman, the chief scribe of modernity, meditates on the meaning of moral choices and responsibility towards the other. In a particularly moving passage, Bauman argues that ‘morality has only itself to support it: it is better to care than to wash one’s hands, better to be in solidarity with the unhappiness of the other than indifferent, and altogether better to be moral, even if this does not make people wealthier and the companies more profitable.’ (Bauman 2000, 11) Bauman notes the unlikeliness that ‘the ethical argument will cut much ice in a society in which competitiveness, cost-and-effect calculations, profitability, and other free-market commandments rule supreme.’ (ibid, 9) The solution at hand is a little more slippery than any serious observer would like, it is to hope against hope that even in a situation that doesn’t favour it, the moral agent will step out of the shadows and save the day. The how and why of it are left to the imagination. In the spirit of statistical sportsmanship, we may well accept the scenario that every individual will become a moral agent, with neither incentives (transcendental or mundane) nor training at hand. Bauman’s pleas certainly point to one direction, the idea of ‘ethics without morality’, wherein crudely summarized, the latter is innate to humans, whereas the former is taught by a group of ‘experts’, whether they be religious or secular. (Bauman 1994) We need not concern ourselves with the debate of innatism versus determinism, for as with any extremes, the search for a meaningful, middle ground becomes absent. What is curious, perhaps even alarming to note that morality - by which we may refer to the useful, porous patterns of
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behaviour that are both crucial to sustaining society as well as improving it – is left at the mercy of either instrumental reason or wistful fancy. There’s no concrete program to instrumentalize it in practice, to make it a habitus, a malaka, a disposition that’s well-grounded. It is this disposition that counts when the chips are down, individually or societally, it is precisely in the moments of upheaval and tough choices that morality is asked to stand up. The moral individual cannot be one accustomed to dispensing with the world and tying themselves into far-flung monasteries or the open woods, he or she must be present in the earthly social realm, mediating with both the larger social pulls of the day, as well as the spectrum of available human tendencies they’ll inevitably find in themselves. The early training as received through the institution of the khanqah, with the Shaykh as the guide, the scriptures as both motivation and solace, and the presence of fellow seekers, can help train the moral individual. The setting is the secular city, but the social imaginary is unabashedly religious, a world of magic and meaning which in turn generates purpose and guidance for the believer. 4.2 The Active Moral Subject Writing on the state of the modern world, with a touch of both lyrical angst and rational anxiety, Gai Eaton notes ‘the deep-rooted desire—more common than is often realised—to slough off the burden of one's humanity, with all that it implies in the way of choice and responsibility, and lose oneself in anonymity and indistinction.’ (G. Eaton 1977, 55) Bauman finds that ‘modernity was prominent for the tendency to shift moral responsibilities away from the moral self either towards socially constructed and managed supra-individual agencies, or through floating responsibility inside a bureaucratic “rule of nobody”.’ (Bauman 1996, 32) Simmel echoes a similar concern. we should point out here the already noted tendency to consider assistance to the poor as a matter pertaining to the widest political circle (the State), while initially it was based everywhere in the local community. This ascription of assistance to the smallest circle was, first of all, a consequence of the corporative ties that bound the community. As long as the supraindividual organism around and above the individual had not changed from the municipality to the State and freedom of mobility had not completed this process factually and psychologically, it was the most natural thing in the world for neighbours to assist needy persons. (Simmel 1971, 165)
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This abandonment of responsibility brings about a ‘corroding sense of futility’, wherein ‘people are denied the opportunity to act responsibly; the opportunity to do good and, thereby, to straighten what is crooked in themselves, or to do ill and suffer for it; in short, to save their souls or to damn them.’ (G. Eaton 1977, 56) This manifests itself most clearly in how we treat the Other. ‘Organisational man’, Eaton argues, ‘wants a quiet life, freedom from real responsibility, an artificial world in which nothing is left to chance and, quite particularly, the absence of “difficult” people who create “complications”.’ (G. Eaton 1977, 206) Morality means many things to many people, but it’s hard to argue that outside of polemical hurls and grandiose statements, morality lacks a workable definition today. Robbed of its transcendental sanction, morality moves around like a scared child in the boardroom, too afraid to speak up, too timid to make itself feel present. Likewise, when speaking of civility, it is hard to move beyond its functional worth, to pluck the courage to ground it into something inherently moral, a virtue that may yield nothing but meaning for the sake of meaning, a virtue to be shared and encouraged, even if we may struggle to articulate its ‘why’ and ‘how’. The ambivalence surrounding civility stems from the public denial of its parent virtue of morality, of which it is only one manifestation, perhaps even symptom. To say that ‘there is both a functional as well as an intrinsic value to civility’ is to state the obvious. We chose civility over incivility ‘not simply because to fail to do so would endanger peace and order’ but also because ‘other human beings deserve to be treated with a similar respect out of consideration for the sense in which we are no better than they.’ (Baumgarten, Gosewinkel and Dieter 2011) The question remains: is this possible in the absence of the human being first and foremost as an active moral agent, and being treated as one? The modern human belongs to the class of ‘politically integrated subjects, which is to say that they are not integrated in a metaphysical or cosmic-moral order but instead in the metaphysics of the state and its nation.’ Education, which at once time was tied to the preservation of values and morality, now ‘begins by instilling in the child skills
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and knowledge of utility and efficiency, of love for the homeland and its goodness, proceeding incrementally with the adult student to inculcate state interests, state priorities, state programs, nationalism, and state “problem-solving” ideology.’ What follows is an “iron cage” of ‘law, regulating bureaucracy, mechanization, materialism, and instrumentalism that the morality of the modern subject finds itself.’ There is thus ‘a deep sense of loss, the loss of the sacred, of a state of wholeness, of the spiritual anchoring of the self in the world, in nature, and in…a moral cosmology.’ (W. Hallaq 2013, 104-8) Shils notes that civility is ‘a function of a sense of membership in a national society coterminous with the boundaries of the state.’ Hence, ‘the society which is the object of civility is a national society; the state within which it operates is a national state.’ (Shils 1980, 539) Yet he does not proceed further. If morality is taking care of one’s brother, no variation of the ‘imagined community’ can do justice to the creation of the moral self. And as long as the ‘politically integrated subjects’ have moralities bound to the State and its priorities, the task of formulating the moral subject would be very hard, if not downright impossible. The task then for proponents of civility, is to work towards the creation of a moral subject. He or she alone can do justice to the creation of a community of equal moral standing. But this is easier said than done, for ‘it is not at all clear how the cause of morality, goodness, justice can be seriously promoted in a world which has seemingly come to terms with its own groundlessness, does not seem to mind it anymore.’ (Bauman 1994, 16) This is the plane on which the ‘precarious acquisition’ of civility dangles. 4.3 The Relational Self Previously, we saw the two poles of the buffered self and the nonbuffered self, with the chief distinction between the two on the question of allowing sites outside the self to influence it, to alloy it within some kind of moral order. A more eloquent term for the latter is the relational self, as an entity perfectly aware of its relation within the cosmos, as an aware agent within a hierarchy, as a social being bound and responsible for the other. The relational self is part-dream part-reality, it occupies
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centre stage in the project to imagine a different kind of society, perhaps one that isn’t as brutally scarred as ours, or at the very least, isn’t as blissfully unaware about its state. It is also a project to imagine a different kind of the human self, one which is harmonized into a state of well-being with itself and its social and natural environment. The ecological turn of the third chapter should impress upon us how central the questions of environment are for human society as a whole. If civility is how the self balances itself against the Other, we really to need to get to the bottom of who/what the Other is. Do we limit our humanity to only our own species or do we widen the arc, to see all of creation as symbolizing a cosmic order, that demands something of us? The Other is the benchmark of our humanity. Our relation to people other than the ones we identify with, to entities other than humans therefore a reveal a great deal of our engagement with the world. Eco-restoration practitioner Vijay Dhasmana observes the difference between being in the city and being in the wilderness. The former, that is the city is ‘a result of our aggression, it demands a lot from people – asserting, snatching, seizing, taking’. But to be in the wild one has to be ‘nimble footed, one has to slow down, pause’ one needs to ‘be respectful and mindful’ where they’re walking, and ‘in doing that, it brings them to the “now”.’ The beauty of being in nature is that ‘these places can give you a pause and connect – we seem to have lost the connection with ourselves and nature.’ (Varghese 2022) Dhasmana is the curator of the Aravalli Biodiversity Park, one of the most successful ecological conservation movements in the National Capital Region of Delhi. He is an enthusiastic proponent of regenerating urban ecologies, buoyed by nature’s capacity to heal itself. This is in contrast to the modern tendency to ‘want manicured spaces and everything in order’. This idea of control or ‘sanitisation’ isn’t normal, it ‘emanates from our insecurities’. It does not work in the wilderness, for ‘in the wilderness, you behave as the wild does, you have to tune in.’ Parks which are ‘manicured and feature-driven’ do not ‘create a holistic ecosystem’. The idea of controlled parks therefore needs to be replaced by ‘a new thought, to create habitats for birds, bees, butterflies, and plants.’ As human beings we witness these ecological
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relationships and the immense knowledge they carry. As Dhasmana observes, ‘that sense of wilderness is precious’, they are the sites of learning wherein ‘you can touch, feel, live through your senses.’ (ibid) 4.4 Re-turning (to) the World Disenchantment is a state of not being in the world, a turning away from the world, a state of imbalance separating humans both from their natural and social ecologies. It follows then that to return to the world, to be in a state of enchantment is to undo the processes which brough us to this stage in the first place. This is the project of re-
enchantment, on which this thesis will sign off. Here, I’m departing from Bilgrami, whose project of re-enchantment, while emerging from a critique of secular modernity, does not necessarily proceed to a religion-inspired primordial cosmology. The project of re-enchantment, at least at the level of the individual, may well take roots if we, following the lead of the Sufi, return ourselves to a state of hayra ( ح ي ةر ), of ecstasy, at the presence of being alive and human. (Murad 2022) This is a project wherein we attune ourselves ‘to the life principle to being in the world, seeing it as gulestan (the rose garden), to recognize that although we are part of this, this world bespeaks another garden which is more real, which is in the pre-
past and the future.’ (ibid) It begins in the radical simplicity ‘to intuit in the miracle of living things, and to be in living things, to recognize that you are yourself are a living thing.’ This a state of hayra, ‘the sheer amazingness of stuff, this bewilderment of which the Sufis speak…to be completely amazed by everything.’ This is a component of faith, not in the strict legal sense, but in the sense of perceptions, for faith ‘consists in maximizing the number of situations in which you find yourself amazed, and unbelief is seeing the extraordinariness of everything and thinking that it's kind of ordinary.’ The latter is closer to the idea of kufr which is ‘covering up the beauty and the lovability and the amazingness of things.’ (ibid) We’re faced with the possibility, at once dramatic and delightful, to be ‘like the dervish that takes off his rose petals and dances like a qalandar in the kharabat, the
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tavern of intoxication which is what the world is designed to be, our natural matrix is a beautiful and ecstasy-inducing place,’ And when we are in clear tune with nature and its seasons, the shadows and the light, ‘we really become living things, we don't have dead hearts surrounded by this living universe, we actually start to come alive and give a tasbih and perform that function which human beings for hundred thousand years have always performed, which is to be alert to the sacred in and through nature.’ This is neither unique nor unprecedented, for ‘every primordial people have recognized the sanctity and the indicativity of nature, we need to get into that space and return to it.’ (ibid) This is the possibility and backdrop of the expanded notion of civility that this thesis has favoured. It is ihsan civility, a beautification of the self and its surroundings. To return to it is a tall task, we’re left with scraps of the dreamscape, we’ve textual signposts holding us afloat, but not much by way of living, mass actions. However, if we’re to de-cannibalize our present, we must make a start. If civility is a project of fashioning a sustainable society, we must return to the state of wholesome being, a state of being ‘in the world’, alive to its mysteries and promise, joyful of what it beholds, even more joyful towards what it points. It is this state that can power civility, and uphold it. In the secular madness that we inhabit, this haal is nothing short of a miracle, a karamat. But it is a karamat that is open to the Awliya and laity alike, it is a karamat indispensable for the running of a human society.
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APPENDIX A The Chishti Lineage Muhamad صلى الله عليه وسلم
Ali ibn Abu Talib Al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī Abdul Wāḥid Bin Zaid Abul Faḍl Fuḍayl ibn 'Iyāḍ Bin Mas'ūd Bin Bishr al-Tamīmī Ibrāhīm bin Adham Khwaja Sadid ad-Din Huzaifa al-Marashi Abu Hubayra al-Basri Khwaja Mumshad Uluw Al Dīnawarī Abu Ishaq Shamī Abu Aḥmad Abdal Chishti Abu Muḥammad Chishti Abu Yusuf Nasar-ud-Din Chishtī Qutab-ud-Din Maudood Chishtī Haji Sharif Zindani Usman Harooni Moinuddin Chishti Qutab-ud-Din Bakhtyar Kaki Fariduddin Mas'ūd (Baba Farid) Alauddin Sabir Kaliyari Nizamuddin Awliya Nasiruddin Muhammad Chirag-e-Dehli Muhammad bin Yusuf Al-Hussaini (Banda Nawaz Gaisu Daraz)
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APPENDIX B Key Figures in the Indian Chishti Tariqa Birthplace Time Period Location of Khanqah Moinuddin Chishti Herat (Ghaznavid Empire) 1141-1230 / 1142–1236 Ajmer Qutab-ud-Din Bakhtyar Kaki Osh (Qara Khitai) 1173-1228 Delhi Fariduddin Mas'ūd (Baba Farid) Multan (Ghurid Sultanate) 1173 - 1266 Pakpattan Nizāmuddin Awliya Badayun (Delhi Sultanate) 1238 - 1325 Delhi Nasiruddin Muhammad Chirag-e-Dehli Ayodhya (Delhi Sultanate) 1274 - 1337 Delhi Muhammad bin Yusuf Al-Hussaini (Banda Nawaz Gaisu Daraz) Delhi (Delhi Sultanate) 1321 - 1422 Delhi/ Daulatabad/ Gulbarga
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APPENDIX C The Delhi Sultanate Name of Dynasty Time Period Major Figures Mamluk 1206 – 1290 Qutb al-Din Aibak (1206–1210) Iltutmish (1211–1236) Ghiyas ud din Balban (1266–1287) Khalji 1290 – 1320 Jalaluddin (1290–1296) Alauddin 1296–1316 Tughlaq 1320 – 1413 Ghiyath al-Din Tughluq (1320–1325) Muhammad bin Tughluq (1325–1351) Firuz Shah Tughlaq (1351–1388) Sayyid 1414 – 1451 Khizr Khan (1414–1421) Lodi 1451 – 1526 Bahlul Khan Lodi (1451–1489) Ibrahim Lodi (1517–1526)
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APPENDIX D Maps 1. The Delhi Sultanate under the Khilji Dynasty 2
2 Courtesy: Base map: File:India location map.svg by User:Uwe DederingDerivative map: Utcursch (Utkarsh Atmaram), CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Delhi_Sultanate_under_Khalji_dynasty_-
_based_on_A_Historical_Atlas_of_South_Asia.svg
NOTE: The light green sections indicate the vassal states.
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2. The Chisti Tariqa in the Islamicate3
3 Created using Scribble Maps. https://www.scribblemaps.com/maps/view/Chisti_Sites/9v23yB4O7q
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APPENDIX E The Dargah (mausoleum) of Hazrat Nizamuddin Awliya in Delhi 1. The courtyard of the Dargah. 4
4 Nizamuddin Dargah. Patrick Rasenberg. https://www.flickr.com/photos/prasenberg/5238308612/ This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, PO Box 1866, Mountain View, CA 94042, USA.
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2. View from the mosque.5
5 Dargah from mosque. Varun Shiv Kapur. https://www.flickr.com/photos/varunshiv/3545015079/in/album-72157618382628781/
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3. Decoration on the mihrab. 6
6 Dargah Mihrab Outer Decoration. Varun Shiv Kapur. https://www.flickr.com/photos/varunshiv/3545823568/in/album-72157618382628781/
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, PO Box 1866, Mountain View, CA 94042, USA.