Promotion of Learning in India during Muhammadan Rule (by Muhammadans) c17.29

c17.29

order of precedence. On Fridays and Sundays, as well as on holy nights, the “Ṣūfīs, doctors, preachers, lawyers, Sunnīs, Shī’as, Brāhmanas, Jains, Buddhists, Chārbāks, Christians, Jews, Zoroastrians and learned men of every belief”¹ were invited to the royal assembly, and each fearlessly brought forward his assertions and arguments. “Profound points of science, the curiosities of history, the wonders of nature, were ever spoken of.” Sometimes the discussions grew very hot,² and gave rise to such noise and tumult as exhausted the patience of the royal listener; so that, on one occasion, he proposed to the author of the *Tārīkhi-Badā’ūnī* the adoption of a repressive measure, which, however, was not carried into effect. Though in this meeting-room much serious discussion was done, yet sometimes the Emperor cut practical jokes, to the annoyance of a certain learned man, Maulānā ’Abdullāh Sulṭānpurī, against whom he used to set up Ḥājī Ibrāhīm and Abul Faẓl to argue. Akbar interrupted the Maulānā in the course of his altercation, and hinted to his companions to interfere with interjections and queer observations. But the discussions took a serious turn on such occasions as when *Pādri Radalf*