The Legacy of Muslim Rule in India c5.s1.7

c5.s1.7

Kingship thus became the most general and permanent of institutions of medieval Muslim world. In theory Islam claims to stand for equality of men, in practice it encourages slavery among Muslims and imposes an inferior status on non-Muslim. In theory Islam does not recognize Kingship; in practice Muslims have been the greatest empire builders. Muhammadans themselves were impressed with the concept of power and glamour associated with monarchy. The idea of despotism, of concentration of power, penetrated medieval mind with facility. Obedience to the ruler was advocated as a religious duty. The ruler was to live and also enable people to live according to the Quranic laws.⁷ In public life, the Muslim monarch was enjoined to discharge a host of civil, military and religious duties. The Sultan was enjoined to do justice, to levy taxes according to the Islamic law, and to appoint honest and efficient officers so that the laws of the *Shariat* might be enforced through them.⁸ At times, he was to enact *Zawabits* (regulations) to suit particular situations, but while doing so, he could not transgress the *Shariat* nor alter the Quranic law!⁹ His military duties were to defend Muslim territories, and to keep his army well equipped for conquest and extension of the territories of Islam.¹⁰ The religious duty of a Muslim monarch consisted in helping the indigent and those learned in the Islamic law. He was to prohibit what was not permitted by the Shara. The duty of propagating Islam and carrying on *Jihad* mainly devolved on him.¹¹ *Jihad* was at once an individual and a general religious duty.¹² According to a contemporary *Alim*, if the Sultan was unable to extirpate infidelity, he must at least keep the enemies of God and His Prophet dishonoured and humiliated.¹³ It must be said to his credit that the Muslim Sultan, by and large, worked according to these injunctions, and sometimes achieved commendable success in his exertions in all these spheres.