History of Mediaeval Hindu India (being a History of India from 600 to 1200 A.D.) v3.c33.s4.14

v3.c33.s4.14

Utbi also describes how Mahmud by his zeal for religion had become renowned and "by his intelligence had even come to be considered a guide in expounding the law" and "watched that the ordained statutes should be kept pure from the dust of innovation”. The Sultan commissioned spies to discover heretics and their places of meetings. They were brought from different places and cities to the court and impaled on trees or stoned. And the venerable Abu Bakar, a religious nobleman, coincided in opinion with the Sultan. Utbi further relates how a certain Tahirti who claimed to be a Sayyad and an emissary from the king and Khalifa of Egypt with letters and robes was proceeding to Ghazni but was stopped by order of Mahmud at Herat and conveyed back to Nishapur, capital of Khorasan and there tried for heresy and finally executed with the consent of Kadir Billah the Khalifa of Baghdad. Mahmud sternly suppressed heresy as well as the schism of Khilafat throughout his extensive dominions and thus acquired fame throughout the Mahomedan world (p. 444). It is no wonder that zealous soldiers collected at Ghazni to take part in his religious wars against infidels which by the destruction of idols and the acquisition of plunder secured advantage in the next as well as in this world.