Muntakhab al-tawarikh 79.12
Muntakhabu-t-tawārīkh (Ranking, Lowe, Haig) 79.12
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79.12.1
After this Mulla Sheri and Naqib Khan together accomplished a portion, and another was completed by Sultan Haji of Thanesar by himself. Shaikh Faizi was then directed to convert the rough translation into elegant prose and verse, but he did not complete more than two sections. The Haji aforesaid revised these two sections, and as for the omissions which had taken place in his first edition, those defects he put right, and comparing it word for word with the original, one hundred sheets were written out closely, and the work was brought to such a point of perfection that not a fly-mark of the original was omitted. Eventually for some reason or other he was ordered into banishment, and sent to Bakkar, and now he resides at his own city. Most of the scholars, who were engaged in this work, have now been gathered to the Kurus and Pandus, and to those who still remain may God (He is exalted!) grant deliverance, and grace to repent, and may he hear the excuse of: “Whoso after he hath believed in God denies Him, if he were forced to it and if his heart remains steadfast in the faith [shall be guiltless]”. “Verily he is the merciful Pardoner.”
79.12.2
The translation was called the Razm-namah, and when fairly engrossed, and embellished with pictures, the Amirs had orders to take copies of it, with the blessing and favour of God. Shaikh Abu-l-Fazl, in opposition to the commentary on the Kursi verse, which he had formerly composed, now wrote for it a Khutbah extending to two sheets — we flee to God for refuge from infidelities and unprofitable words ! The author (may God forgive him!) begs leave here to request, that the reader will excuse him if in the account of the events of this year (which have been introduced as a digression, written down by his rapid pen in an abridged form) he has not observed a strictly chronological order, nor preserved the exact sequence of events. When the twenty-eighth year from the accession was completed, the new year’s day of the twenty-ninth, corresponding to the twenty-fifth of the month Çafar of the year nine hundred and ninety-one (991), was celebrated, and according to the old custom, stalls in the fancy Bazar were distributed to the different Amirs, and arranged by them, and all sorts of festivities and amusements were the order of the day. And Shah Fath-ullah in his stall exhibited all sorts of skill, such as the dragging about of weights, and other strange contrivances.
79.12.3
At this time His Majesty promulgated some of his new-fangled decrees. The killing of animals on the first day of the week was strictly prohibited, (P. 322) because this day is sacred to the Sun, also during the first eighteen days of the month of Farwardin ; the whole of the month of Aban (the month in which His Majesty was born) ; and on several other days, to please the Hindus. This order was extended over the whole realm and punishment was inflicted on every one, who acted against the command. Many a family was ruined. During the time of these fasts the Emperor abstained altogether from meat, as a religious penance, gradually extending the several fasts during a year over six months and even more, with a view to eventually discontinuing the use of meat altogether.
79.12.4
A second order was given that the sun should be worshipped four times a day, in the morning and evening, and at noon and midnight. His Majesty had also one thousand and one Sanscrit names for the sun collected, and read them daily, devoutly turning towards the sun ; he then used to get hold of both ears, and turning himself quickly round about, used to strike the lower ends of his ears with his fists. He also adopted several other practices connected with sun-worship. He used to wear the Hindu mark on his forehead, and ordered the band to play at midnight and at break of day. Mosques and prayer-rooms were changed into store-rooms and into Hindu guard-rooms. For the word jama'at His Majesty used jima' and for hayya 'ala he said yala tala! The cemetery within the walls was allowed to run waste. He gave the sum of one lac of rupees in ready money, together with some elephants, and precious stuffs and gold and gilded vessels to his illustrious mother, and in the same way to his aunt Gulbadam Begum, and to the other Begums. He also issued a general order, that every person from the highest to the lowest should bring him a present. In this year A’zam Khan, and other great Amirs were appointed, and went and took possession of Tandah. Khaldi Khan Jabbari, and Mirza Beg Qaqshal deserted Ma'sum Khan Kabuli, and came and had an interview with A’zam Khan. Then Ma'sum Khan took refuge with some zamindars, and the whole province of Bengal became settled and quiet.
79.12.5
In this year in order to gratify the feelings of the rulers of the Dak’hin (P. 323), His Majesty gave the governorship of Bengal to I’timad Khan, and made Shah Abu-Turab Amin, and Khwajah Nizam-ud-din Ahmad Mir bakhshi, and Abu-l-Qasim Tabarizi, brother of Maulana ‘Abd-ul-Qadir, the Emperor’s tutor, he made Diwan ; and a number of people, such as Muhammad Husain, and Mir Abu-l-Muzaffar, son of Ashraf Khān, and Mir Hashim, and Mir ‘Adil, Da’i, and Sayyid Abu-l Ishaq, and he ordered to hold jagīrs in that province. In this year the Emperor who had imprisoned Shahbaz Khan on account of some insolence, having taken a strict account of all his improper and unprofitable behaviour, now set him free from clutch of the Rajah, and through the intervention and patronage of Shaikh Abu-l-Fazl he released him from captivity. On the eighteenth of Jamada’s-sani the Emperor sent him off to Bengal, with instructions to hand over all that district to the jagirdars, and to drive Ma’sum Kabuli (of whose movements news had arrived) from the province of ‘Isa, for “when the river of God comes, the river of ‘Isa is useless”; and if in this context for Nahr-u'-llah you read Shahr-u'-llāh, the saying is not without point and appropriateness. Meanwhile news arrived that Khan-i-A’zam had sent Shaikh Farid Bokhari to Qatlu Afghan Nohani, governor of Orisa with a view to pacification.
79.12.6
Qatlu on account of his confidence in the Shaikh Farid’s holy descent went out to meet him, and assumed the post of servant to him. After this bond of friendship had been tied, Bahadur Kur Faruhi one of the zamindārs of Bengal, coming up very unceremoniously wished to be hale fellow well met with the Shaikh, but the Shaikh assumed zamindār-ish airs. Upon this Shahu, son of Shaikh Ilaju Bokhari, of Sarhind, who was not always just in his behaviour, and some other Bokharis, all showed some ill-temper. Bahadur was so enraged that at the time of the Shaikh’s return, when Qatlu was travelling in his retinue, he seized the road and opposed his progress by force of arms. Shahu, with a number of men was killed, and the Shaikh escaped without injury. In this year Burhan-ul-mulk, brother of Murtaza Nizam-ul-mulk, governor of the Dak’hin, fled from his brother. First he came to Malwah to Qutb-ud-din Khan. From thence, in obedience to the Emperor’s command, he came to Court in the month Rajab, and did homage. Some time before this an unknown vagabond, who falsely called himself Burhan-ul-mulk, had come to the Court, and had received a jagir in Oudh. But since he was unable to bring proofs that he was Burhan, he had fled and hid himself among the Jogis. After the lapse of a week the Emperor detected him from the rest, and had him imprisoned. After these transactions that ignoble fellow was never heard of again, for he lived a donkey, and was a donkey, and died a donkey.
79.12.7
In the same year His Majesty built outside the town two places for feeding poor Hindus and Musalmans, one of them being called Khairpurah, and the other Dharmpurah. Some of Abu-l-Fazl’s people were put in charge of them. They spent His Majesty’s money in feeding the poor. As an immense number of Jogis also flocked to this establishment, a third place was built, which got the name of Jogipurah. His Majesty also called some of the Jogis, and gave them at night private interviews, enquiring into abstract truths; their articles of faith; their occupation; the influence of pensiveness; their several practices and usages; the power of being absent from the body; or into alchemy, physiognomy, and the power of omnipresence of the soul. His Majesty even learned alchemy, and showed in public some of the gold made by him. On a fixed night, which came once a year, a great meeting was held of Jogis from all parts (P. 325). This night they called Sivrat. The Emperor eat and drank with the principal Jogis, who promised him that he should live three or four times as long as ordinary men. His Majesty fully believed it, and connecting their promises with other inferences he had drawn, it became impressed on his mind as indelibly as though it were engraved on a rock.
79.12.8
Fawning court doctors, wisely enough, found proofs of the longevity of the Emperor, and said that the cycle of the moon, during which the lives of men are short, was drawing to its close, and that the cycle of Saturn was at hand, with which a new cycle of ages, and consequently the original longevity of mankind, would again commence. Thus they said, it was mentioned in some holy books that men used to live up to the age of one thousand years; and in Thibet there was even now a class of Lamah, or devotees, and recluses, and hermits of Cathay, who live two hundred years, and more. For this reason His Majesty, in imitation of the usages of these Lamahs, limited the time he spent in the Haram, curtailed his food and drink, but especially abstained from meat. He also shaved the hair of the crown of his head, and let the hair at the sides grow, because he believed that the soul of perfect beings, at the time of death, passes out by the crown (which is the tenth opening of the human body) with a noise resembling thunder, which the dying man may look upon as a proof of his happiness and salvation from sin, and as a sign that his soul by metempsychosis will pass into the body of some grand and mighty king. His Majesty gave his religious system the name of Tauhid-i-Ilahi; — “ You want to have this world at your wish, And also the right Religion. These two are not compatible, Heaven is not your slave.”