Muntakhab al-tawarikh 79.28
Muntakhabu-t-tawārīkh (Ranking, Lowe, Haig) 79.28
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79.28.1
The Emperor appointed Muhammad Qulij Khan, who for some time had been manager-in-general, to be commandant of Kabul, and dismissed him to go to his command. He appointed Shams-ud-din Muhammad Khawafi to the office of superintending the affairs of State and finance, and made him absolute Divan. At this time the Emperor sent Asaf Khan, Bakhshi, to Kashmir to look into the affairs of the military and civilians of that country, In this year God (praise be to Him!), when the successive blows of misfortune, and the scourges of vicissitudes were battering me, graciously granted me repentance from some follies and transgressions with which I had been afflicted, and opened my eyes to the vileness of my actions, and the baseness of my deeds:— “Ah! if I remain so, ah!” And by way of good omen “Rectitude” was found to give the date. And the king of Poets (Faizi) composed this verse;— “My Shaikh has indeed repented of sinning: His date is Excelling in penitence. The thought of wine and beloved has left my head, The sound of lute and tambourine has left my heart.” In the first part of the blessed month of Muharram of the year one thousand and three (1003) Shaikh Farid Bukhari, who was associated with A’saf Khan in the duties of Bakhshi, received orders to repair to the mountain district of the north, and reduce to obedience the rebellious Rajahs of those districts, and having made a settlement of their holdings, to bring back suitable presents to the Emperor.
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In the beginning of the month Çafar of this year the Emperor crossed over the river Rawi, and spent twenty-five days in amusement and hunting in the neighbourhood, and then returned. At this time the king of Poets was ordered by the Emperor to compose the Panj-ganj, and in the short space of five months, more or less, he finished the Nal u Daman (who were a lover and his beloved, the story of whom is famous among the people of India,) and comprised it in 4,200 verses odd, and presented it to the Emperor as a gift together with some ashrafis. It was very much approved by the Emperor, and he ordered it to be transcribed and illuminated read like the translations by Naqib Khan. The first couplet of book is the following : — “ O in the search of Thee from the beginning The ‘Anqa of sight is soaring high.” And verily it is a Masnavi, the like of which for the last 300 years since Mir Khusrou no poet has composed. At this time Mirza Nizam-ud-din Ahmad fell out with Qulij Khan, and was continually in opposition to him, and gained a great ascendancy over the mind (P. 307) of the Emperor, and had entered on affairs with great energy and activity. He became the focus of all sorts of favours from the Emperor, and the recipient of his perfect trust with regard to his ability, good sense, sincerity, honesty and perseverance. And this to such an extent, that the Emperor appointed Qulij Khan and other courtiers, who had always been attendants at Court, to out-lying provinces.
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The Emperor considering this matter as but the forerunner of his patronage, and the beginning of his favour, had all sorts of bounties laid up for him in the treasury of his heart, and wished to bring forward his exalted ability, which was capable of growth, into the arena of notice. Suddenly at the very acme of his eminence, and the height of his activity, to the disappointment of the hopes of friends and strangers a dreadful blow was received from Fate, and at the age of forty-five he succumbed to a burning fever, and left this transitory world taking nothing with him but a good name. A host of friends and companions, who had been witnesses of the excellence of his qualities, and had entertained great hopes of him, and especially the poor author (who cherished for him a kind of religious unanimity, and a sincere friendship free from all worldly motives), poured tears of regret from their eyes, and beat their bosoms with the stone of despair, and in the end had no resource left, but patience and endurance, which is a characteristic of the pure, and a quality of the pious. I looked upon this event as the greatest misfortune, and took therefrom a perfect warning, so that I never afterwards formed a friendship with any human being, but regarded the corner of obscurity as best suited to me : — "The discourse that preaches of thy departure is mere vanity, The death of thy companion is sufficient preacher for thee." This event took place on the twenty-third of Çafar of this year.
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They carried his bier from the camp to Lāhor and buried him in his own garden. There was scarcely any one of high or low degree in the city, who did not weep over his bier, and recall his gracious qualities, and gnaw the back of the hand of regret: — "Death grants perpetuity to no human being, The rigorous King shows no respect of persons. The decree of Death is common to all earth’s habitants, He issues not this decree to me or thee alone." And this qit'ah was composed to give the date: — "Mirza Nizam-ud-din Ahmad is departed, Brisk and beautiful went he towards the other world. His spirit on account of its sublimity Became the protégé of the Lord Most High. A clever man found the year of the date, A pearl without price has left the world." At this time Shaikh Farid Bukhari, who had been sent to reduce the State of the Sawalik mountain-district to order, was sent for to administer the affairs of the office of Bakhshi, which had been committed exclusively to him. The Emperor appointed Qāzi Husain Qazwini to succeed him [in the Sawalik mountains].
79.28.5
At this time A'zam Khan returned from Makkah, where he had suffered much harm at the hands of the Sharifs, and throwing away the blessing which he had derived from the pilgrimage, joined immediately on his return, the Divine Faith, performing the sijdah, and following all other rules of discipleship; he cut off his beard, and was very forward at social meetings, and in conversation. He learnt the rules of the new faith from his reverence ‘Allami, and received Ghazipur and Hajipur as jāgīr: — “ I have spent my life at this learning, And am still learning the Alphabet; I don’t know when I shall become So proficient in the letters as to find my way in his Diwán. And the saying about repressing one’s whims came true. On the ninth of the month of Rajab of this year the entrance of the Sun into Aries took place (p. 399), and the fortieth year from the Accession began. The customary assembly was held in the same manner as in former years. Two days before the entrance of the Sun into Aries, the Emperor called to me to come from the window in the public and private audience-chambers;
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and said to Shaikh Abu-l-Fazl, “We thought that so and so” (meaning the writer of these pages) “was an unworldly individual of Çûfî tendencies, but he appears to be such a bigoted lawyer that no sword can sever the jugular vein of his bigotry.” He enquired, “In what book has the author thus written, that your Majesty says this of him?” He replied, “Why, in the Razm-námah” (which is a name for the Mahábhárata) “and last night I called Naqíb Khán to witness of this matter.” Shaikh Abu-l-Fazl admitted that it was a fault. I was obliged to make my appearance, and humbly stated, that I was a translator, nothing more, and that whatever the sages of India had represented therein, I had translated without alteration, but that if I had written it myself, I should have been to blame, and should have acted wrongly. The Shaikh supported me, and the Emperor was silent. The cause of this contretemps was as follows: I had translated in the Razm-námah a certain story in which it is narrated, that one of the teachers of the people of India, when on the point of death, said by way of advice to those present: “It is right that a man should step out of the limits of ignorance and negligence, and should first of all become acquainted with the peerless Creator, and should pursue the path of knowledge;
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and not be satisfied with mere knowledge without practise, for that yields no fruit, but should choose the path of virtue, and as far as in him lies withdraw his him from evil actions, and should know for a certainty that every action will be enquired into.” And on this passage I wrote this hemistich:— “Every action has its reward, And every deed its recompense.” This passage he considered as referring to Munkir and Nakir, the general Resurrection, and the Last Judgment, &c. things contrary to his own fixed tenets, who never talked of anything but metempsychosis, and so suspected me of theological bias and bigotry:—