Beyond 'Hindu' and 'Muslim'
- Dara Shikoh's Quest for Spiritual Unity
by
Yoginder Sikand
Dara Shikoh, eldest son of the Mughal Emperor of India, Shah Jahan, and heir
apparent to his throne, was born near Ajmer in 1615 C.E.. It is said that
before Dara's birth, Shah Jahan had paid a visit to the tomb of the great
Chishti Sufi mystic, Hazrat Moinuddin Chishti at Ajmer and there had prayed
for a son to be born to him, since all his earlier children had been
daughters. Thus, when Dara was born great festivities were held in Delhi,
the imperial capital, for the Emperor now had an heir to succeed him to the
throne.
Like any other Mughal prince, Dara's early education was entrusted to
maulvis attached to the royal court, who taught him the Qur'an, Persian
poetry and history. His chief instructor was one Mullah Abdul Latif
Saharanpuri, who developed in the young Dara an unquenchable thirst for
knowledge and the speculative sciences, including Sufism. In his youth, Dara
came into contact with numerous Muslim and Hindu mystics, some of whom
exercised a profound influence on him. The most noted among these was Hazrat
Miyan Mir (d.1635 C.E.), a Qadri Sufi of Lahore whose disciple he later
became. Hazrat Miyan Mir is best remembered for having laid the
foundation-stone of the Golden Temple of the Sikhs at Amritsar.
After Dara was initiated into the Qadri Sufi
order, which he describes in his Risala-i-Haq
Numa as 'the best path of reaching Divinity', he came into contact with
several other accomplished mystics of his day, Muslim as well as Hindu,
including Shah Muhibullah, Shah Dilruba, Shah Muhammad Lisanullah Rostaki,
Baba Lal Das Bairagi and Jagannath Mishra. Dara's close and friendly
interaction with them led him to seek to establish bridges of understanding
between Sufism and Hindu mysticism.
In pursuit of this aim, Dara now set about seeking to learn more about the
religious systems of the Hindus. He studied Sanskrit, and, with the help of
the Pandits of Benaras, made a Persian translation of the Upanishads, which
was later followed by his Persian renderings of the Gita and the Yoga
Vashishta. Throughout this endeavour, his fundamental concern was the quest
for the discovery of the Unity of God (tauhid), seeking to draw out
the commonalities in the scriptures of the Hindus and the Muslims.
Dara expresses this concern in his Persian translation of the Upanishads,
the Sirr ul-Akbar ('The Great Secret') thus:
And whereas I was impressed with a longing to behold the Gnostic doctrines
of every sect and to hear their lofty expressions of monotheism and had cast
my eyes upon many theological books and had been a follower thereof for many
years, my passion for beholding the Unity [of God], which is a boundless
ocean, increased every moment. [...] Thereafter, I began to ponder as to why
the discussion of monotheism is so conspicuous in India and why the Indian
[Hindu] mystics and theologians of ancient India do not disavow the Unity of
God, nor do they find any fault with the Unitarians.
Dara's works are numerous, all in the Persian language, only some of which
are readily available today. His writings fall into two broad categories.
The first consists of books on Sufism and Muslim saints, the most prominent
of these being the Safinat ul- Auliya, the Sakinat ul-Auliya, the Risala-i
Haq Numa, the Tariqat ul-Haqiqat, the Hasanat ul-'Arifin and the Iksir-i
'Azam. The second consists of writings such as the Majma ul-Bahrain, the
Mukalama-i Baba Lal Das wa Dara Shikoh, the Sirr-i Akbar and his Persian
translations of the Yoga Vashishta and the Gita.
Dara on Sufism
The Safinat ul-Auliya, a biography of several leading Sufi saints,
was Dara's first work, composed in 1640 C.E., when he was just 25 years of
age. Here he stresses the importance of the Sufi pirs or guides,
because, he believes, one can attain knowledge of the mystical path only
through the assistance of a spiritual master. In Dara's words, 'God never
leaves his people without saints to guide them. [...] Therefore, next to the
prophets, there are no other persons than the saints nearer in the presence
of God, the Almighty'. The true saint is a 'perfect guide' (pir-i kamil),
for, 'No one is more compassionate and magnanimous, erudite and practical,
humble and polite, heroic and charitable than the members of this hierarchy
of the saints'.
The Safinat ul-Auliya is Dara's second biography of various Sufi saints.
Unlike the Sakinat ul-Auliya, which deals with Sufis of various orders, this
book discusses only the Qadri Sufis of India. Dara himself was a Qadri, and
as he puts it, 'Nothing attracts me more than this Qadri order, which has
fulfilled my spiritual aspirations'. The Qadri order, one of the most
popular and widespread of all the Sufi silsilahs, traces its origins
to
the Prophet through the twelfth century Sufi and Islamic scholar of great
renown, Shaikh Abdul Qadir Jilani of Baghdad. The Sakinat ul-Auliya was
completed in 1642 C.E., when Dara was 28 years old, three years after his
first meeting with the Qadri Sufi Miyan Mir. In the same year, Dara came
into contact with another leading Qadri saint, Mulla Shah Badakshani (d.1642
C.E.), who, like Miyan Mir, exercised a particularly powerful influence on
Dara, which is readily apparent in his description of the practices of the
Qadris in the Sakinat ul-Auliya.
Dara's next book on Islamic Sufism is the Hasanat ul-'Arifin or 'The
Aphorisms of the Gnostics'. It consists of the sayings of 107 Sufis of
various spiritual orders. Explaining the objective behind writing the
book, Dara says in his introduction:
I was enamoured of studying books on the ways of the men of the Path and
had in my mind nothing save the understanding of the Unity of God; and
before this, in a state of ecstasy and enthusiasm, I had uttered some words
pertaining to sublime knowledge, because of which certain bigoted and
narrow-minded people accused me of heresy and apostasy. It was then that I
realised the importance of compiling the aphorisms of great believers in the
Unity of God and the sayings of saints who have, hitherto, acquired
knowledge of Reality, so that these may serve as an argument against those
who are really imposters.
In the Hasanat ul-'Arifin, Dara bitterly criticises those self-styled 'ulama
who, ignoring the inner dimension of the faith, focus simply on external
rituals. His critique is directed against mindless ritualism emptied of
inner spiritual content, and he challenges the claims of the 'ulama who
would readily trade their faith for worldly gain. Thus, he
says:
May the world
be free from the noise of the Mulla
And none
should pay any heed to their fatwas.
As for those 'ulama who claim to be religious authorities but have actually
little or no understanding at all of the true spirit of religion, Dara
writes that, 'As a matter of fact, these are ignoramuses to themselves and
learned to the ignorant', and adds the following couplet:
Every prophet
and saint suffered afflictions and torments,
Due to the
vicious and ignominious conduct of the mulla.
Two short, yet important, works of Dara on the various stages and practices
associated with the Sufi path are the Tariqat ul-Haqiqat and the
Risala-i Haq Numa. The former consists of both prose as well as poetry. It
begins with a prologue containing the praises of God and His Omnipotence and
His All-Pervasiveness. Thus, Dara says, referring to the Divine:
You dwell in
the Ka'aba and in Somnath [a famous Shaivite Hindu temple]
And in the
hearts of the enamoured lovers.
The text goes on to discuss the thirty stages (manazil) on the Sufi
path, the first of which is detachment from the materialistic world and the
last of which is realisation of the Truth. Broadly the same theme is
discussed in the Risala-i Haq Numa, where the seeker (salik) is shown as
starting from the Alam-i Nasut or 'The Physical Plane', and, passing through
various stages, finally reaching the Alam-i Lahut or 'the Plane of Absolute
Truth'. Some of the physical exercises employed by the Sufis that are
described in the Risala-i Haq Numa are shown by Dara to be similar to those
used by the Hindu Tantriks and Yogis. These include astral healing and
concentration on the centres of meditation in the heart and brain. Further,
he suggests that the four planes through which the Sufi seeker's journey
takes him-Nasut , Jabrut, Malakut and Lahut-correspond to the Hindu concept
of the Avasthanam or the four 'states' of Jagrat, Swapna, Shushpati and
Turiya.
One of the most intriguing works of Dara's is his collection of poems, the
Diwan, also known as the Iksir-i 'Azam. Some of the verses from the Diwan,
given below, suggest the train of Dara's mystical thought:
On Monotheism [tauhid]
*
Look where you can, All is He,
God's face is ever face to face.
*
Whatever you behold except Him is the object of your fancy,
Things other than He have an existence like a mirage.
The existence of God is like a boundless ocean,
People are like forms and waves in its water.
*
Though I do not consider myself separate from Him,
Yet I do not consider myself God.
Whatever relation the drop bears with the ocean,
That I hold true in my belief, and nothing beyond.
*
We have not seen an atom separate from the Sun,
Every drop of water is the sea in itself.
With what name should one call the Truth?
Every name that exists is one of God's names.
On Divine Love
*
O Thou, from whose very name rains Love abundant!
And from your message rains Love!
Whoever passes through Your street realises
That indeed from the very door to the terrace of Your house rains l love!
On the Mystical Path
Turn to none except God,
The rosary and the sacred thread are but only a means to an end.
*
All this piety is conceit and hypocrisy,
How can it be worthy of our Beloved?.
*
Kingship is easy, acquaint yourself with poverty,
Why should a drop become a pearl when it can transform itself into
an
ocean?.
*
Hands soiled with gold begin to stink,
How awful is the plight of the soul soiled with gold!
Day and night you hear of people dying,
You, too, have to die. How strange is your behaviour!.
*
The more a traveller is unencumbered,
The less he feels worried on his journey.
You, too, are a traveller in this world,
Take this as certain, if you are wakeful.
Drive egoism away from you,
For, like conceit and arrogance, it is also a burden.
So long as you live in this world, be independent,
The Qadri has warned you!
*
Whoever recognised this, carried the day,
He who lost himself, found Him.
And he who sought Him not within his own self,
Passed away, carrying his quest along with him.
The Qadri found his Beloved within his own self,
Being himself of good disposition, he won the favour of the Good.
*
To whatever object you may turn your face, He is in view,
Are you blind, for why do you assign Him to yourself?
Dara On The Religious Systems of the Hindus
Dara wrote extensively on the religious systems of the Hindus, following in
the tradition of several Muslim mystics and scholars before him. Like
several Sufis before and after him, he saw the possibility of some religious
figures of the Hindus having been actually been prophets of God, and certain
Hindu scriptures as having been of divine origin. Thus, for instance, he
writes in the Sirr-i Akbar that a strong strain of monotheism may be
discerned in the Vedas and opines that the monotheistic philosophy of the
Upanishads may be 'in conformity with the Holy Qur'an and a commentary
thereon'.
In his quest for an empathetic understanding of the Hindu religious systems,
Dara spent many years in the study of Sanskrit, and for this purpose
employed a large number of Pandits from Benaras. Several contemporary
Sanskrit scholars praise him for his liberal patronage of the
language. Prominent among these was Jagannath Mishra, who, it is said,
was once weighed against silver coins at Shah Jahan's command and the money
given to him. He was the author of the Jagatsimha, a work in praise
of Dara, and of the Asif Vilasa, a treatise written in praise of Asif
Khan, brother of Nur Jahan, wife of Shah Jahan. Other Sanskrit scholars who
were patronised by Dara included Pandit Kavindracharya, who was granted a
royal pension of two thousand rupees, and Banwali Das, author of a
historical work on the kings of Delhi from Yudhishtra, a key figure of the
epic Mahabharata, to Shah Jahan, for which he was honoured by Shah Jahan
with the title of Sarvavidyanidhana.
The most well-known of Dara's several works on the religious sciences of the
Hindus is his Majma ul-Bahrain ('The Mingling of the Two Oceans').
Completed when Dara was forty two years old, this book is a pioneering
attempt to build on the similarities between Sufism and certain strands of
Hindu monotheistic thought, and it is these two that the 'two oceans' in the
book's name refer to. He describes this treatise as 'a collection of the
truth and wisdom of two Truth-knowing groups'. It is, in terms of content,
rather technical, focusing on Hindu terminology and their equivalents in
Islamic Sufism. The basic message that this book conveys is summed up in
Dara's own words thus: 'Mysticism is equality', and, he adds, 'If I know
that an infidel, immersed in sin, is, in a way, singing the note of
monotheism, I go to him, hear him and am grateful to him'.
The Majma-ul Bahrain is divided into twenty-two sections, in each of which
Dara seeks to draw out the similarities between Hindu and Sufi concepts and
teachings. Thus, for instance, the Hindu notion of Mukti, he says, is
identical with the Sufi concept of Salvation, denoting the annihilation (fana)
of the self in God. Or, for example, the Sufi concept of 'ishq (Love) is
said to be identical with the maya of the Hindu monotheists. From
Love, says Dara, was born the 'great soul', alternately known as the soul of
Muhammad to the Sufis, and Mahatman or Hiranyagarba to the Hindus.
Dara's translation of certain Hindu scriptures into Persian represents a
landmark in the process of developing bridges of understanding between
people of different faiths in medieval India, in which the Sufis played the
leading role. One of Dara's earliest attempts at translation was his
rendering of the Gita into Persian. Keenly interested as he was in the
philosophy of Yoga, Dara also had the Yoga Vashishta, one of the earliest
Sanskrit texts on Yoga, translated into Persian.
Dara established close and cordial relations with mystics from various
backgrounds. Among these were several jogis and sadhus, about some of whom
Dara also wrote. One such sadhu was Baba Lal, follower of the renowned Sufi-Bhakti
saint Kabir and founder of a small monotheistic order named after him as the
Baba Lalis. Many of the teachings of this sect can be traced to a distinct
Sufi influence. A summary of these teachings is to be found in Dara's
Makalama Baba Lal wa Dara Shikoh, which consists of seven long
conversations between the Baba and Dara held in Lahore in 1653 C.E.
These seven discourses were composed originally in Hindawi, and were later
translated into Persian by Dara's chief secretary, Rai Chandar Bhan. As in
the case of Dara's translation of the Yoga Vasishta, this text focuses
particularly on certain similarities in the teachings of Hindu and Muslim
mystics.
The great interest that Dara had in exploring monotheistic strands in Hindu
philosophy led him, finally, to translate fifty-two Upanishads into Persian.
The text that he prepared, the Sirr ul-Akbar ('The Great Secret') was
completed in 1067 A.H. / 1657 C.E.. Here, he opines that the 'great secret'
of the Upanishads is the monotheistic message, which is identical to that on
which the Qur'an is based.
Dara then proceeds to detail the purpose behind translating
the Upanishads. He writes that in the year 1050 A.H. he visited Kashmir,
where he met Hazrat Mullah Shah, whom he describes as 'the flower of the
Gnostics, the tutor of the tutors, the sage of the sages, the guide of the
guides, the Unitarians accomplished in the Truth'. Thereafter, he
says, he was filled with a longing to 'behold the Gnostics of every sect and
to hear the lofty expressions of monotheism'. Hence, he says, he began his
search for monotheism in other scriptures as well, including the Torah of
the Jews (Taurat), the Gospels of Jesus (Injil) the Psalms of David (Zabur),
and, in addition, the books of the ancient Hindus. He notes with approval
the fact that certain Hindu 'theologians and mystics' ('ulama-i zahiri wa
batini) actually believe in One God, but laments that 'the ignoramuses of
the present age', who claim to be authorities in matters of religion, have
completely distorted this fundamental truth. His search for traces of
monotheism in the religious systems of the Hindus stems, he says, from his
faith in the Qur'an, which states that God has, from time to time, sent
prophets to all peoples to preach the worship of the One.
Accordingly, says Dara, he travelled to Benaras in 1067 A.H., where he
assembled several leading Sanskrit Pandits to translate the Upanishads, in
an effort to draw out from the scriptures of the Hindus the hidden teachings
on monotheism which are, he says, 'in conformity with the Holy Qur'an'.
Having explored the teachings of the Upanishads, he writes that they are 'a
treasure of monotheism', although, he notes, 'very few are conversant with
this, even among the Hindus'. Hence, he says, there is an urgent need to
bring to light this 'Great Secret' so that the Hindus can learn the truth
about monotheism as contained in their own scriptures and, in addition,
Muslims, too, can be made aware of the spiritual treasures that the
Upanishads contain. He goes so far as to accord the Upanishads, in
their original forms, the status of divinely revealed scriptures, claiming
that the Qur'anic verse which speaks about a 'protected book', which 'none
shall touch but the purified ones' [Qur'an:LVI, 77-80] literally applies to
them, because some of the verses of the Qur'an are to be found in their
Sanskrit form therein.
Dara's Death
The Emperor Shah Jahan's serious illness in l657 C.E. was the signal of
a war of succession among his sons. Aurangzeb grabbed the throne in 1658,
and had his father imprisoned in the fort at Agra, where he died eight years
later. He then ordered the execution of Dara, who, as Shah Jahan's eldest
son, was considered to be the rightful heir to the throne. Although the
conflict between the two may actually have been, at root, political, it was
sought to be given a religious garb. Dara was accused by Aurangzeb and some
'ulama attached to the royal court of infidelity and heresy.
Accordingly, he was executed under a royal decree issued by Aurangzeb in
1659 C.E.. He lies buried, a forgotten hero, in a nondescript grave in the
tomb complex of the Emperor Humayun in Delhi.
*****
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