History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v3.c38.s2: §2. Emperor's Islamic ordinances.
History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v3.c38.s2
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§2. Emperor's Islamic ordinances.
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Aurangzib had claimed the throne as the champion of pure Islam against the heretical practices and principles of Dara Shukoh. Now that he was undisputed master of the country, he had to carry out the promises made in his manifesto at the commencement of the war. Soon after his second coronation (June, 1659) he issued the following ordinances* to restore the rules of orthodox Islam in the administration and to bring the lives of the people into closer accord with the teaching of the Quran. Every departure from the canonical practices was an innovation (bidat) and a mark of heresy, and therefore the special object of his condemnation.
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(1) The Mughal emperors before him used to stamp the Muhammadan confession of faith (kalima) on their coins. Aurangzib forbade it, lest the holy words should be spitefully trampled under foot or defiled by unbelievers.
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∗ Coronation ordinances.—A. N. 366, 390-392 (Censor); Mirat-i-Ahmadi, 260 (bhang cultivation), 263-264 (Censor); Storia, ii. 5-7 (Censor); Aqil Khan, 88-89; K. K. ii. 79 and Ruqat No. 2 (nauroz). Muraqat-i-Hasan, 196 (Censor). Compare Firuz Shah Tughlaq's ordinances in Afif, 373.
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(2) The ancient kings of Persia, and following them the Muslim rulers of that country as well as the Mughal sovereigns of India, used to observe the day when the Sun enters the Aries as a time of rejoicing, because it was the New Year's Day of the Zoroastrian calendar (1st of Farwardin) and the traditional date of the accession of the mythical king Naushirwan. A sort of carnival was held on the occasion at Court and throughout the empire. But the common people looked upon the day as one of special sanctity and religious significance, like the two Ids of the Muslim calendar. This was an innovation on the orthodox practice of Islam, and Aurangzib therefore forbade the keeping of the day and transferred the customary Nauroz rejoicings of the Court to the coronation festivity in the month of Ramzan.
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(3) A Censor of Morals (muhtasib) was appointed to regulate the lives of the people in strict accordance with the Holy Law. "The innovators, atheists, heretics who had deviated from the straight path of Islam, infidels, hypocrites and the spiritually indifferent who had spread over India,—were chastised and forced to give up their wicked courses, obey the theologians and observe the fasts and prayers regularly." (Aqil Khan, 89.)
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The duty of the Censor was to enforce the Prophet's laws and put down the practices forbidden by him, such as drinking distilled spirits or fermented beer, *bhang* and other liquid intoxicants, gambling, and the illicit commerce of the sexes. Opium and *ganja*, however, were not interdicted. The punishment of heretical opinions blasphemy and omission of prayer and fast by Muslims also lay within the province of this Inquisition. Mulla Auz Wajih, the most noted Turani theologian in India, was appointed Censor with the rank of a Commander of One Thousand Horse. A party of *mansabdars* and *ahadis* was posted under him to enforce his orders and put down the bold sinners who would show fight. The provincial governors were ordered to assist the work of moral reform within their own jurisdictions on pain of imperial displeasure. To the end of his reign Aurangzib continued to urge them to enforce the canonical rules about *amr* and *nahi* (things to be done and things to be avoided).
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(4) An imperial circular, dated 13th May 1659, was sent to all the provinces, forbidding the cultivation of *bhang* in any part of the empire and directing the revenue collectors to induce the peasants to follow this order and to punish them if they disregarded it.
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(5) All the old mosques and monasteries, many of which had become mere ruins through the lapse of time and the neglect of former sovereigns,—were repaired by order of Aurangzib and "made as new.
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Imams, muazzins, khatibs and attendants were appointed in them with regular salaries, and students were granted daily allowances according to their progress in knowledge, that they might engage in the study of theology with composure of mind." This was done in and around old Delhi, with special reference to the many edifices raised by the pious zeal of the orthodox Sultan Firuz Shah Tughlaq and Bahlol Lodi. We read that in the ninth year of Aurangzib's reign it cost the State one lakh of Rupees every year to maintain the 600 mosques at Delhi. (*Akhbarat*, 9-22.) Many of them were small or situated in deserted out-of-the-way places and, therefore, could not have afforded religious accommodation to any people in return for the public money spent on them.
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§3. Puritanical and anti-Hindu regulations.
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The measures that Aurangzib took against the Hindus will be described in a subsequent chapter. His puritanical rigour grew with his age. We may conveniently study here his measures for enforcing his own ideas of the morose seriousness of life and punctilious orthodoxy.
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(6) At the commencement of the 11th year of his reign, he forbade the Court musicians to perform before him, "as he had no liking for pleasure, and his application to business left him no time for amusement. Gradually music was totally forbidden at Court" and the State musicians and singers, who had hitherto enjoyed honour and noble rank, were pensioned off. The royal band (*naubat*) was, however, retained.
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Music was banished from the Court, but it cannot be banished from the human soul. The sons of the Muses took their revenge by turning the public laughter against their crowned foe. "About one thousand [of the musicians of Delhi] assembled on a Friday when Aurangzib was going to the mosque. They came out with over twenty highly ornamented biers, as is the custom of the country, crying aloud with great grief. From afar Aurangzib saw this multitude and heard their great weeping and lamentation, and, wondering, sent to know the cause of so much sorrow. The musicians replied with sobs that the king's orders had killed Music, therefore they were bearing her to the grave. The king calmly remarked that they should see that she was thoroughly well buried! In spite of this, the nobles did not cease to listen to songs in secret. This strictness was enforced in the principal cities" only.* (*Storia*, ii. 8.)
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(7) At the same time the ceremony of weighing the Emperor against gold and silver on his two birthdays (according to the lunar and solar calendars) was stopped. Later in life, he allowed it in the case of his sons, on their recovery from illness, in the belief that as the money was given away in charity, the prayers of the poor would do good to the princes.*
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(8) In the same year, 1668, the two stone elephants placed by Jahangir on the two side-pillars of the Hatipul gate of Agra fort, were removed by the Emperor "in order to carry out the rules of Canon Law and to abolish innovations."†
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(9) About March or April 1670, the courtiers were ordered to give up the Hindu practice of saluting each other by raising the hand to the head and to confine themselves to the cry 'Peace be on you!' (*salam alekum.*) We read of two courtiers being censured for violation of this rule in March 1686. Another regulation, but one intended merely for preserving royal dignity, was issued on 16th April, 1670. By it the courtiers were forbidden even to say *salam alekum* to each other in the imperial presence, as it showed lack of respect for the Crown.‡
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(10) In October 1675 the astrologers all over the empire were bound down and made to furnish securities that they would not draw up almanacs [giving forecasts of events] next year.§ But belief in astral influence was too deeply rooted in the hearts of the Indians,—Hindus and Muslims alike,—to be destroyed by one stroke of the imperial pen, and the stars continued to be studied for various affairs of life, even by the members of the royal family, in spite of the prohibition.
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∗ M. A. 75, 81; Ruqat, No. 78. † M. A. 77; Storia, ii. 11. ‡ M. A. 98, 272; Akhbarat, 13/22. § M. A.
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¹⁴⁶ Bernier (161-162) refers to a different incident. The reason for the order could not have been Dara's "craze of
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(11) In March 1670 he forbade the festivities which used to be held on his birthday; henceforth the royal band was to play for three hours only instead of the whole day. Early in the 21st year of his reign (November, 1677) the customary rejoicings on the anniversary of his coronation were abolished. "Betel leaves and scents were distributed among those present at Court," but the throne-room was henceforth furnished and upholstered in a cheap and simple style; the clerks were to use porcelain ink-pots instead of silver ones, the money for largesses was to be brought in on shields instead of silver trays; and the grandees were forbidden to make the customary presents to the Emperor. As in Muslim
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putting faith in astrologers" mentioned by Manucci (i. 224). The printed text of M.A. has 'next year'; but the prohibition was evidently permanent, and we can get this sense by merely inserting the word 'from' before 'next year,' (az sal-i-nau.) A restriction for a single year can be explained only by supposing that the astrologers had been predicting that the next year portended disasters to the country. A similar prophecy upset the public mind on the eve of the Sepoy Mutiny.
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Holy Law nobody except a warrior in the time of battle is permitted to wear a dress of pure silk, but all must put on either woollen clothing or a mixed stuff (*mashru*) of silk thread crossed by yarn of some other material, the latter dress was now made compulsory on the courtiers. "In the department of robes of honour (*khilat*) cloth of gold embroidery was ordered to be used in the place of *butadar* ornamented with silver filigree." The railings of gold and silver in the Hall of Public Audience were pronounced uncanonical and replaced by railings of lapis lazuli set on gold! The planting of rose-beds in any imperial garden, except the two at Agharabad and Nurbari, was forbidden.*
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(12) It had formerly been the practice of the emperors to apply a spot of paint (*tika*) with their own fingers to the forehead of great Rajahs when investing them. Early in Aurangzib's reign, the prime minister was ordered to do it for his master, but in May 1679 the ceremony was altogether abolished as savouring of Hinduism; the newly created Rajahs had only to make their bow (*taslim*) to the Emperor who returned the salute. (*M.A.* 176.)
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(13) In Kashmir there were many actors or mummers who used to go out of the chief town dressed in their trappings and playing on instruments, to welcome princes and other high persons on the way. Towards the close of his life Aurangzib ordered the local viceroy to put this practice down and take away all their musical instruments wherever found, quoting at the end of his letter the sacred text, "For the sake of God it is binding on us all to order lawful acts and prohibit uncanonical ones." (K.T. 77a.)
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∗ *M. A.* 98, 162; *Dilkasha*, 62 (says that the celebrations were prohibited at the end of the eighth year; incorrect). Muslims and silk dress,—Hamilton's *Hedaya* ed. 1870, p. 597.
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(14) All his predecessors on the throne, and he himself up to the eleventh year of his reign, used to appear every morning at a balcony on the wall of the palace and receive the salute of the people assembled on the ground outside. The ceremony was called *darshan* and was akin to the Hindu practice of having a look at one's tutelary idol before beginning the day's work. A class of servile Hindus, popularly called *darshanias*, like the guilds of Augustales of the early Roman empire, regarded their ruler as their earthly divinity, and did not break their fast before having the beatific vision of His Majesty at the *darshan* window. Aurangzib gave up the practice of publicly showing himself there as un-Islamic. (K.K. ii. 213.)
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(15) He forbade the roofing over of buildings containing tombs, the lime-washing of sepulchres, and the pilgrimage of women to the graveyards of saints,* as opposed to Quranic Law. (K.T. 55b, 148a.)
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§4. Aurangzib's attempts at moral reform.
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Life at the capital must have been intolerable for some time after Aurangzib's accession. But the inevitable result soon followed; the attempt to elevate mankind by one leap failed, and the administration made itself ridiculous by violently enforcing for a time, then relaxing, and finally abandoning a code of puritanical morals opposed to the feelings of the entire population, without first trying to educate them to a higher level of thought. As Manucci noticed, "It was so common to drink spirits when Aurangzib ascended the throne, that one day he said in a passion that in all Hindustan no more than two men could be found who did not drink, namely himself and the Chief Qazi....He directed the kotwal to search out Muhammadans and Hindus who sold spirits, every one of whom was to lose one hand and one foot.... This penal order was in force for a time; whenever the kotwal suspected that spirits were made in any house, he sent his soldiers to plunder everything in it. The regulations were strict at first, but little by little they were relaxed,... there being few who do not drink secretly."
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∗ Firuz Tughlaq's reasons for the prohibition (in Elliot, iii. 380); immorality promoted by these visits (in Storia, iv. 205.)
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Again, with regard to *bhang*, "Not a day passed that on rising in the morning we did not hear the breaking by blows and strokes of the pots and pans in which these beverages are prepared. But, seeing that the ministers themselves also drank and loved to get drunk, the rigour of prohibition was lightened by degrees." So, too, in the case of the order against music: "If in any house or elsewhere he (*i.e.*, the Censor) heard the sound of singing and instruments, he should forthwith hasten there and arrest as many as he could, breaking the instruments. Thus was caused a great destruction of musical instruments.... In spite of this, the nobles did not cease to listen to songs in secret." (*Storia*, ii. 5-8.)
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Some, however, of Aurangzib's regulations were intended to promote general morality without any special reference to Islam. Such, for instance, was his alleged order mentioned by Manucci alone, that the public women and dancing-girls must marry or leave the realm (ii. 9). But the same writer gives an indication elsewhere (ii. 186) that the rule was a dead letter. Notorious instances of gambling were punished by the Emperor. Effeminacy in dress received a summary and practical rebuke when he cut off some inches of cloth from a courtier's cloak which fell below his ankles. The prohibition of holi celebration in the streets, when obscene songs were sung and faggot was extorted from all people for bonfires, was clearly a police regulation. So also was the order putting a stop to Muharram processions in future in all the provinces, after a deadly fight between rival processions had taken place at Burhanpur in January 1669.*
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We have it on the authority of Manucci (ii. 97) that Aurangzib on his return from Kashmir (December 1663) "issued an order that in all lands under Mughal control never again should the officials allow a woman to be burnt. This order endures to this day." This humanitarian rule, though not noticed in the formal histories, is mentioned in the official manuals of the reign. (Dastur-ul-aml, 103a.) But the evidence of contemporary European travellers in India shows that the royal prohibition was seldom observed.
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The Emperor was very attentive to decorum of manners and took care not to violate any social convention. In the light of his general conduct, I cannot accept the story current at the time that when Dara's severed head was brought to him for inspection he struck it with his sword. Manucci (ii. 359) and the even more credulous English traveller J.
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∗ Gambling, Ruqat No. 27; dress, ibid. No. 147; holi festivities, Mirat, 276; Muharram procession, K. K. ii. 214. Castration, M. A. 75; K. T. 44a; Muraqat, 76.
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Cambell mention it. But Bernier who was at Delhi at the time and frequently talked with the imperial secretary Danishmand Khan, says (p. 103) that the Emperor turned his face away from "the shocking sight." Shuja's historian Masum (145b) says that Aurangzib refused to look at the head as that of an infidel. On 5th September, 1669, learning that Dara's tomb was out of repair and had no cloth covering, he ordered some attendants to be constantly kept there and a sheet to be placed over the tomb. The Court news-letters mention his visits to the Taj Mahal, when he made his salam to his parents' graves and gave away alms.*
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Early in his reign he ordered his governor of Kashmir to compel the people of that valley to put on drawers and cover their nakedness (K.T. 48b), which they were evidently too poor or too primitive to do. He censures his eldest son for going to church in a waistcoat (nim-astin) instead of being properly dressed for a serious work like prayer. [Adab, 181b.]
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In the 11th year of his reign he issued orders for the suppression of the practice of castrating children with a view to sell them as slaves.
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∗ For Dara's tomb, Akhbarat, 1/3 (contradicts Storia, ii. 195). Aurangzib at his father's grave, Akhbarat, 1/4, 13/27; M. A. 93.
Linked texts (2)
- Tārīkh-i Shāh Shujāʿī — Muḥammad Maʿṣūm 1659, Persian
- Tārīkh-i Fīrūzshāhī — Shams-i Sirāj ʿAfīf