Sufis, Saints, and Shrine: Piety in the Timurid Period, 1370-1507

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Citation Salikuddin, Rubina Kauser. 2018. Sufis, Saints, and Shrine: Piety in the Timurid Period, 1370-1507. Doctoral dissertation, Harvard University, Graduate School of Arts & Sciences.

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Sufis, Saints, and Shrine: Piety in the Timurid Period, 1370-1507

A thesis presented

by

Rubina Kauser Salikuddin

to

The Department of History and The Committee on Middle Eastern Studies

In partial fulfillment of the requirements For the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy In the Subject of History and Middle Eastern Studies

Harvard University Cambridge, Massachusetts

May 2018

© 2018- Rubina Kauser Salikuddin

All rights reserved.

Dissertation Advisor: Roy P. Mottahedeh Rubina Kauser Salikuddin

Sufis, Saints, and Shrines: Piety in the Timurid Period, 1370-1507

Abstract

This dissertation is a study on piety and religious practice as shaped by the experience of pilgrimage to these numerous saintly shrines in fourteenth- and fifteenth-century Timurid Iran and Central Asia. Shrine visitation, or ziyārat, was one of the most ubiquitous Islamic devotional practices across medieval Iran and Central Asia, at times eliciting more zeal than obligatory rituals such as the Friday congregational prayer. This dissertation makes use of a broad source base including city histories, shrine visitation guides, compendiums of religious sciences, court histories, biographies of Sufis, endowment deeds, ethical or moral (akhlāq) treatises, and material culture in the form of architecture and epigraphical data. This work contributes to a better understanding of how Islam as a discursive tradition informed and was informed by the piety and religious practice of medieval Muslims of all classes. It challenges a vision of a monolithic Islamic orthopraxy by showing how the very fabric of Islam in medieval Iran and

Central Asia represented both continuity with an Islamic past and a catering to local and contemporary needs.

The aim of this study is three-fold. First, it argues that the forms of ritual prescribed in the Timurid shrine manuals largely coalesced into a coherent program in this period and reflect a vernacular understanding of shrine visitation found in the more scholarly Islamic literature. It also demonstrates how the performance of the physical practices and oral litanies of the ziyārat formed part of the habitus of a pilgrim. Second, the hagiographic stories of the holy dead revered at these shrines represent tangible ideals of pious living for society to imitate. They point to the centrality of esotericism, miracle-working and a rigorous adherence to the Sharia in constructing

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Dissertation Advisor: Roy P. Mottahedeh Rubina Kauser Salikuddin this template. For example, a major part of the saintliness of Abū Yūsuf Hamadānī, an important saint buried in Samarkand, stems from his extreme religious observance. He is said to have made the Hajj thirty-three times, finished the Qur’an over a thousand times, memorized over seven hundred books on the religious sciences, received over two hundred and sixteen scholars and spent most of his life fasting. On the other hand, the patron saint of this same city, Shāh-i Zinda, is revered for his supernatural powers and his relation to the Prophet Muḥammad. This amplified reverence for the Prophet Muḥammad and his family demonstrates the increasing precedence of shrines of people genealogically linked to the Prophet Muḥammad as objects of veneration by the largely Sunni populations in the Timurid period.

The third and final aim of this dissertation is to provide a map of the actual places of pilgrimage and establish the importance of the “locality” of saints in creating a shared identity and history using the methods of Geographical Information Systems (GIS). It traces the ways that pilgrims would move through their cities to visit the various shrines scattered across the landscape. The journey to some shrines fell well within the normal daily movements of an inhabitant of a particular city, while other journeys proved more arduous, pointing to the possibility of a varied ziyārat experience. While many shrines were presented as single locations, there are instances when a pilgrim is advised to make a circuit of many important shrines in a certain area or of a certain type of holy person (e.g. prophets). The routes and spaces, along with mosques and madrasas, are embedded in a sacred geography of the city.

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To my parents

Dr. Mohammed Salikuddin and Mrs. Naseem Salikuddin

for their unwavering support and infinite kindness

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgements ...... vii A Note on Transliteration and Dates ...... viii Figures ...... ix

CHAPTER 1: Introduction ...... 1

CHAPTER 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Piety and Ritual ...... 35

CHAPTER 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory ...... 79

CHAPTER 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid shrine ...... 152

CHAPTER 5: The Geography of Sanctity ...... 186

CONCLUSION ...... 234

Bibliography ...... 238

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Acknowledgements

This dissertation comes at the end of a journey that was much longer than imagined. I am thankful and grateful to God to have had the privilege to undertake this journey and to the many people who also made it possible.

I have benefitted greatly from a number of mentors and teachers at Harvard. I owe many thanks to my indefatigable advisor, Prof. Roy P. Mottahedeh, for his continued support, generosity in reading multiple drafts of chapters and offering of wise guidance throughout this process. I thank Prof. David Roxburgh for opening up the beautiful world of Timurid art and architecture. I am also grateful for the kind feedback I received from Prof. Cemal Kafadar and

Prof. Ahmed Ragab.

I am thankful to family. To Asif for his unending patience, encouragement and role as my head cheerleader. To Azher for his humor and expert help in many parts of this work. To

Tamanna for always being my sounding-board. To my parents for allowing me to take this wrong turn into the study of history and supporting me always. To my father-in-law for his positivity and prayers. And most of all to my two babies, Mahrukh and Faiz, who made writing a dissertation very hard but make my life so much brighter.

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A Note on Transliteration and Dates

Transliteration for Persian and Arabic words will follow the IJMES Transliteration System for each respective language with the following changes: the terminal ta-marbuta in Persian words will be represented with the letter “a” and not be followed by an “h.” With the exception of proper names of people and places, Persian and Arabic words that are transliterated will also be italicized. Words and names that have been generally accepted into the English language will not be transliterated according to this system nor will they be italicized. Some examples include: sayyid, Sunni, Shi‘i, masjid, hadith etc.

Dates will be given with the hijrī date coming first followed by the Common Era date. For example, the death date of Timur would be given as d. 807/1405.

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Figures

Figure 1: Wide View of Herat Shrines Map

Figure 2: Shrine Sites Mentioned in Maqṣad al-Iqbāl Chart

Figure 3: Map of Samarkand. From J.M. Bloom and S. Blair, eds. The Grove Encyclopedia of Islamic Art and Architecture, Vol. 3 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009), 170. Figure 4: Hawż at the Shrine of ‘Abdī Darūn, Samarkand. From Harvard Fine Arts Library, Digital Images & Slides Collection 1990.19721, downloaded May 2018.

Figure 5: Close-up View of Herat Shrines Map

Figure 6: List of Major Shrine Sites Chart

Figure 7: Map of Walled City (Herat) and Immediate Environs, from T. Allen, A Catalogue of the Toponyms and Monuments of Timurid Herat (Cambridge, MA: Aga Khan Program for Islamic Art at Harvard University and MIT, 1981).

Figure 8: Elevation Profile Journey to Darb-i Khush & ‘Abdullāh Taqī

Figure 9: Elevation Profile Journey to Khiyābān & Fakhr al-Dīn Rāzī

Figure 10: Mazār of Abū al-Walīd, Qariya-yi Āzādān. From Harvard Fine Arts Library, Digital Images & Slides Collection d2009.02875, downloaded May 2018.

Figure 11: Elevation Profile Journey to Abū al-Walīd

Figure 12: The Shrine Complex of ‘Abdullah al-Anṣārī at Gāzurgāh. From Harvard Fine Arts Library, Digital Images & Slides Collection 1981.24487, downloaded May 2018.

Figure 13: Example of Vaulting in the Jamāt Khāna of the Shrine Complex of ‘Abdullāh al- Anṣārī at Gāzurgāh. From Harvard Fine Arts Library, Digital Images & Slides Collection 1979.12869, downloaded May 2018.

Figure 14: Elevation Profile Journey to Gāzurgāh & ‘Abdullāh Anṣārī

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CHAPTER 1: Introduction

The Iraqi ascetic, ‘Ali ibn Abī Bakr al-Harawī (d. 611/1215), compiled one of the earliest listings of important shrines around the Muslim world. More of a travelogue than a guide to ritual, Harawī’s Kitāb al-Ishārāt ila Ma‘rifat al-Ziyārāt focuses largely on Greater

Syria, but does make mention of lands further eastwards. Harawī apologizes for his brief treatment of Iran and Central Asia saying, “should we have compiled the names of all the righteous and scholars in the eastern provinces of Iraq, Khurasan, Transoxiana, Fars,

Azerbaijan…they would have filled volumes.”1 If this was true in Harawī’s time, the abundance of shrines simply multiplied in the years after his death. The Ilkhanids and the

Timurids both oversaw wide scale building and rebuilding of mazārs (shrines and mausoleums) of important religious figures. These shrines could be found in almost every city and dotted the countryside as well.2

This dissertation is a study on piety and religious practice as shaped by the experience of pilgrimage to these numerous saintly shrines in fourteenth and fifteenth century Timurid Iran and Central Asia. The hagiographic stories found in shrine manuals illuminate important ideals of piety of the time. I argue that they point to the centrality of a seemingly incongruent mix of esotericism, miracle-working, and a rigorous adherence to the Sharia in constructing a template for pious living. The figures and ideas examined here reveal that it took much more than miracles to prove sanctity; lineage, scholarly

1 ‘Alī b. Abī Bakr Harawī, A Lonely Wayfarer’s Guide to Pilgrimage: ‘Alī ibn Abī Bakr Harawī’s Kitāb al- Ishārāt ila Ma‘rifat al-Ziyārāt, trans. J.W. Meri (Princeton: Darwin Press, 2004), 266.

2 See: S. Blair, “Sufi Saints and Shrine Architecture in the Early Fourteenth Century,” Muqarnas, vol. 7 (1990), 35-49; Lisa Golombek, "The Cult of Saints and Shrine Architecture in the Fourteenth Century," in Near Eastern Numismatics, Iconography, Epigraphy and History: Studies in Honor of George C. Miles, D. Kouymjian, ed. (Beirut, 1974), pp. 419-30; Golombek, The Timurid Shrine at Gazur Gah (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1969), 227; R. D. McChesney, Waqf in Central Asia: Four Hundred Years in the History of a Muslim Shrine, 1480-1889 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991), 356.

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Chapter 1: Introduction learning, and issues of collective memory remain the most important issues to medieval

Muslims.3 My work contributes to a better understanding of how Islam as a discursive tradition informed and was informed by the piety and religious practice of medieval

Muslims of all classes. It challenges a vision of a monolithic Islamic orthopraxy by showing how the very fabric of Islam in medieval Iran and Central Asia represented both continuity with an Islamic past and a catering to local and contemporary needs.4

Dynamism of Islamic Piety

In this examination of piety and practice, themes of the discursive construction of ritual and sanctity take center stage. How were people and places imbued with a level of sanctity that elevated them above others? How did the ritual engendered by such sacred people and places develop over time? These questions speak to the aims of historical inquiry that looks at change over time and attempts to explain why things change in the ways that they do. Here there is a focus on the ways that ideas of sanctity and pious ritual changed during the Timurid period and in turn what role these changes played in the way that this belief was enacted and experienced by medieval Muslims.

3 Theories on collective memory and cultural memory propose that a group can hold on to and perpetuate memories of its past across time by use of textual, architectural, and commemorative ritual practice. In the case of shrines, political and religious figures with ties to particular shrines had an incentive to nurture a sanctified narrative of the shrine and its saint for their own financial, religious, or political goals. For example, the family of a saint may try to cultivate a particular collective memory that keeps their relative in the memory of the community through spreading pious anecdotes about the saint and building up his shrine extensively to attract pilgrims. This issue will be further examined in Chapter 3. 4 This work benefits from the frameworks and methodologies in other excellent works on medieval Muslim shrines and on piety in general such as: Christopher Taylor, In the Vicinity of the Righteous: Ziyāra and the Veneration of Muslim Saints in Late Medieval Egypt (Boston: Brill, 1999); Josef W. Meri, The Cult of Saints among Muslims and Jews in Medieval Syria (Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 2002); Richard J.A. McGregor, Sanctity and Mysticism in Medieval Egypt: The Wafa Sufi Order and the Legacy of Ibn ‘Arabi (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2004); Daniella Talmon-Heller, Islamic Piety in Medieval Syria: Mosques, Cemeteries and Sermons under te Zangids and Ayyūbids (1146-1260), Jerusalem Studies in Religion and Culture (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2007); Robert McChesney, Waqf in Central Asia: Four Hundred Years in the History of a Muslim Shrine, 1480-1889 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1991).

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Chapter 1: Introduction

While the Qur’an offers various examples of sanctity and God consciousness, these ideas were continuously open to interpretation by religious scholars and practitioners alike. The language of sanctity has also always been dynamic. In a study of sainthood and sanctity, Michel Chodkiewicz examined the varied vocabulary used in discussing exemplary piety, in addition to the use of terms such as walī (saint) and walāya (sainthood), the Qur’an also makes use of aṣhāb al-yamīn (Companions of the right side of God) and muqarrabūn (those close to God).5 Most importantly the traits and behavior that established one as a saint or especially pious soul changed over time for many complex reasons. In the earliest centuries of Islam as a religion, asceticism and renunciation were held up as the greatest social ethic. Early Muslims, fearful of the punishments of the afterlife, devoted their pious work to strict obedience to God and shunned the comforts and even work of worldly life. Christopher Melchert highlights the centrality of these ideas of piety pointing to “inscriptions from the seventh century such as graffiti and funerary monuments [that] so stress appeal for divine forgiveness and hope of entering Paradise that virtually no other character of the new religion can be discerned.”6 This shift was a result of a several possible causes, including the growing population of Muslims7 and the rise of a new form of mystical piety.8 By the thirteenth

5 Michel Chodkiewicz, “La sainteté et les saints en islam” in Le culte des saints dans le monde musulman, eds. H. Chambert-Loir and Cl. Gillot (Paris, France: École Français d’Extrème Orient, 1995) 15.

6 Christopher Melchert, “Exaggerated fear in the early Islamic Renunciant Tradition,” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 21.1 (July 2011): 285.

7 Melchert points to an early move away from this sort of renunciant piety by the 3rd/9th century when Muslims “ceased to be a small elite at the top of society, living off tribute.” (Melchert, “Exaggerated fear in the early Islamic Renunciant Tradition,” 298) Melchert argues that as the Muslims became the majority in various areas, they were forced to participate in the mundane activities of life that required them to work for a living and had less time to live as aloof ascetics.

8 Melchert, “Exaggerated fear in the early Islamic Renunciant Tradition,” 297-299.

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Chapter 1: Introduction century C.E., mystical trends and Sufism were clearly ascendant in informing ideas of piety.9 Asceticism did remain a part of Islamic piety and conferred a certain level of sanctity to the practitioner. Other forms of piety, however, such as presumed inheritance of familial and spiritual lineage, scholarly achievement, and supernatural and miraculous abilities grow in importance throughout the fifteenth century. These changing aspects of piety and conveyors of sanctity are apparent in the discourse on shrines and the saints interred in these places. The shifts suggested by Melchert and others is vividly illustrated in the vitae of some of the most popular and most visited saints of the Timurid period.

Pilgrimage and the Place of the Shrine

The place where such pilgrimage-related sanctity is experienced and ritual enacted, the mazār (shrine) is also essential in understanding the changing trends of Islamic piety.10

Religious practice and piety in Islam is often linked to the institution of the masjid. It was often the first building erected in cities newly under Islamic rule and from the earliest times served as a central place of religious and ritual life. Communal prayers, official sermons, spiritual exercises such as the practice of i‘tikāf (spiritual retreat usually undertaken in the masjid) and even religious learning all took place at masjids. Many

Muslims would engage in i‘tikāf and spend the last ten days of the month of Ramadan in the masjid. Given the centrality of these activities, especially that of the communal prayer, to Muslim communities, the masjid remained one of the most important religious

9 Richard J.A. McGregor, Sanctity and Mysticism in Medieval Egypt: The Wafa Sufi Order and the Legacy of Ibn ‘Arabi (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2004), 4.

10 While mazār is the most used term for shrine, the shrine guides studied in this dissertation talk about shrines and graves using a variety of different terms in including: marqad, dargāh, madfan, turbat, ḥaẓīra, imāmzāda. There are variances in the meaning between these terms; however, a consistent vocabulary of shrines does not exist in the shrine guides.

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Chapter 1: Introduction spaces. However, over time, other institutions developed that also gave space to Islamic ritual and piety including the madrasa or Islamic college, the khānaqāh which often served as a meeting place and residence for Sufis, and the mazār (shrine). Indeed these edifices were often built and utilized in interconnected complexes. This was a distinct development from the seventh/thirteenth century onwards.11 Peter Gottschalk argues that sacrality was constructed and experienced in various ways in Islamic religious spaces. He characterizes the shrine as an “energized place” which the pilgrim may “recognize as emitting a self-actualizing power, either because of the location itself or some object present there.”12 He further marks off the ritual of these spaces as evidence of “the devotee’s interest in obtaining some result, usually by tapping into the power being discharged.”13 In contrast, the masjid is a “non-energized place” that elicits great reverence but what is sacred about it is its focus on an intangible, supernatural power.14

For the purpose of this work, I argue that the shrine held just the same level of importance and ubiquity as the masjid in the daily lives of Muslims; this is particularly true in the Late Middle period in Iran and Central Asia. The shrine also brings up issues of gender. Much of the writing on shrines focuses on male saints, written by male writers, who may occasionally mention a woman here and there. Often, women only become the focus when they are condemned for improper behavior. These issues will be addressed in a later chapter.

11 See for example: Sheila Blair, The Ilkhanid Shrine Complex at Natanz, Iran (Cambridge, MA: Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Harvard University, 1986); Sheila Blair, “Sufi Saints and Shrine Architecture in the Early Fourteenth Century,” Muqarnas 7 (1990): 35-49.

12 Peter Gottschalk, “Introduction,” in Muslims and Others in Sacred Space, ed. Margaret Cormack (Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 2013), 7.

13 Gottschalk, “Introduction,” 7-8.

14 Gottschalk, “Introduction,” 8-9.

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Chapter 1: Introduction

The visiting of shrines of the holy dead has a long history among Muslims. In the central Islamic lands, Muslims followed traditions of Christians and Jews of the area and built upon this bedrock their own rituals and practices. Arab geographers point to the existence of funerary architecture and shrine visitation in the tenth century. Among Sufis the visiting of the shrines of their masters had become an important form of pious practice. The tenth-century Sufi figure, Abū ‘Abdullāh al-Sijzī, was to have said: “What is most useful for the novice is keeping company (ṣuḥba) with the righteous, imitation of their actions, moral qualities and virtues, visiting the graves of the Friends of God, and performing service on behalf of the companions and comrades.” 15 Daniella Talmon-

Heller, in her work on medieval Syrian piety, shows that there was already a growing popularity of ziyārat to saintly tombs in the twelfth century.16 Ḥamd Allāh Mustawfī in his fourteenth-century text Nuzhat al-Qulūb lists many of the shrines in the cities he surveys. In this work, there is a focus on shrines of Ahl al-bayt (members of the family of the Prophet Muḥammad) and those of the ṣahāba (companions) of the Prophet

Muḥammad, but also includes important religious and political figures.17 Indeed, the architectural record shows that many places in Khurasan and Transoxiana experienced building booms in two distinct periods, the first in the eleventh and twelfth centuries and then again in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. For example, the shrine complex of

15 Abū ‘Abd al-Raḥmān al-Sulamī, Tabaqāt al-ṣūfiyyya ed. Nūr al-Dīn Shurayba (Cairo, 1953), 255, quoted in Fritz Meier, “Khurasan and the End of Classical Sufism,” in Essays on Islamic Piety and Mysticism trans. J. O’Kane (Leiden, Boston, Koln: Brill, 1999), 193.

16 Daniella Talmon-Heller, Islamic Piety in Medieval Syria: Mosques, Cemeteries and Sermons under te Zangids and Ayyūbids (1146-1260), Jerusalem Studies in Religion and Culture (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2007), 4.

17 Ḥamd Allāh Mustawfī, The Geographical Part of the Nuzhat al-Qulūb, trans. G. LeStrange (Leyden: E.J. Brill Imprimerie Orientale, 1919).

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Chapter 1: Introduction the Shāh-i Zinda in Samarqand experienced its largest building projects during these two periods.18

The building and patronage of shrines by the Ilkhanids was continued under the

Timurids and other contemporary rulers in Iran and Central Asia in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. While, like the Mamluks, the Timurids had no concerted religious policy, they did style themselves as Muslim rulers keen on protecting and promoting

Islam.19 This impulse is seen most clearly during the rule of Shāhrukh, the son of Timur.

Shāhrukh tried to find ways of both making use of his father’s charismatic authority and forging his own bases of authority, specifically by using the rhetoric of Islam and the

Sharia. One manner in which this was accomplished was through the patronage of religious buildings by the ruler, his family members, and other members of the government. We find in the Timurid period a great many older shrines being refurbished, new saints’ resting places discovered and built up as shrine cities, and other shrine-related building projects. Does this upsurge in building necessarily indicate a concurrent rise in shrine-centered piety among the general populace? It seems more likely that the building projects rather reflect the trends of piety at the time than vice versa. As Christopher

Taylor argues, rulers often simply followed suit and tailored their projects of piety to reflect the sentiment and actions of their populations.20 While the nature and function of the construction of Timurid religious buildings has been well studied by historians of art

18 Roya Marefat, Beyond the Architecture of Death: The Shrine of the Shah-i Zinda in Samarqand, 86-88.

19 Jonathon Berkey, “Mamluk Religious Policy,” Mamluk Studies Review 8.2 (1999): 7-22.

20 Christopher Taylor, “Reevaluating the Shiʿi Role in the Development of Monumental Islamic Funerary Architecture: The Case of Egypt,” Muqarnas 9 (1992): 5.

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Chapter 1: Introduction and architecture, there is a need to examine the religious and social context of the construction and the subsequent culture of piety and society that flourished there.

There is much scholarly debate as to the origins of this practice and continued interest in how Muslim rulers and religious people came to terms with monumental commemoration of graves in spite of Prophetic and shari‘i injunctions against it. Oleg

Grabar argues that while it would be “easy to assume that Islamic memorial and funerary construction was but a continuation of the numerous traditions of the pre-Islamic or non-

Islamic worlds,” this does not really do justice to the varied practice of shrine visitation and the even more varied forms of funerary architecture.21 Taylor reassesses the long tradition of scholarship that placed the origins of commemorative funerary monuments with Shi‘i inclinations in the mid-ninth-century, and then further with the Fatimid political concerns in Egypt. He leaves open the possibility of multiple points of origin, as the cult of saints and funerary practices are diffuse and complicated issues that simply cannot be explained by political or sectarian interest. 22 While citing examples of commemorative funerary structures contemporary with the life of the Prophet

Muḥammad, Taylor also allows for pre-Islamic and context specific influences to Islamic funerary practices.23

Galina Pugachenkova, while not stressing the Shi‘i origins of funerary architecture, does follow the general consensus of art historians such as K.A.C. Creswell,

21 Oleg Grabar, “The Earliest Islamic Commemorative Structures, Notes and Documents,” Ars Orientalis 6 (1966): 7.

22 Christopher Taylor, “Reevaluating the Shiʿi Role in the Development of Monumental Islamic Funerary Architecture: The Case of Egypt,” Muqarnas 9 (1992): 1-10.

23 Taylor refers al-Waqidi’s anecdote about the burial of a companion of Muḥammad, Abu Basir (d. 628-9), and the subsequent mosque that was constructed over his grave. Taylor, “Reevaluating the Shi‘ī Role in the Development of Monumental Islamic Funerary Architecture: The Case of Egypt,” Muqarnas 9 (1992): 4.

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Chapter 1: Introduction

Oleg Grabar and others that the earliest examples of this sort of architecture began with the Abbasid Caliphate. She argues that Central Asia became one of the first places to adopt “this innovation” and by the tenth century the Samanids began erecting mausoleums for Samanid royalty. From this period on, a tradition of building shrines to both secular royals and holy men developed in the area and two “basic types of composition” grew dominant: “one with a central dome and the other with a portal dome.” 24 Pugachenkova further connects the formal aspects of the building with pre-

Islamic Soghdian traditions. The Arab-Ata mausoleum in the Narpai district of the

Samarkand region, an early Samanid tomb to a holy man who perhaps was a part of the early Arab conquest, combines Soghdian traditions with growing Islamic ones to create a particular type of mausoleum that may have influenced the form of later shrines. The melding of architectural styles from the pre-Islamic period with those of the Islamic period is mirrored in the cultural significance that pre-Islamic entities continued to hold during the Timurid period. This idea will be examined in detail in Chapter 3’s discussion of cultural memory.

Funerary architecture was not the only example of commemorative building by

Muslims. The Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem is an important instance of a religious memorial spot that was not a tomb. The architecture of the Dome of the Rock was influenced by its Byzantine antecedents in the area, particularly tombs of Byzantine martyrs. From the Umayyad period, the Dome of the Rock had been come an important

24 G.A. Pugachenkova, “The Role of Bukhara in the Creation of the Architectural Typology of the Former Mausoleums of Mavarannahr,” in Bukhara: The Myth and the Architecture, ed. by A. Petruccioli (Cambridge: Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture at Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1999), 139-140.

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Chapter 1: Introduction place of visitation. Gülru Necipoğlu characterizes the Dome of the Rock as a “multifocal pilgrimage complex,” in which:

[b]y the conclusion of the Umayyad period (661-750), the commemorative structures of the precinct had become enmeshed within a nexus of memories, bearing witness to the saturated sanctity and redemptive power of the complex and to its special place within the divine plan, extending from the creation to the end of time.25

The Dome of the Rock was distinct in the type of interest it garnered from pilgrims and patrons alike. It was an important pilgrimage site for people of Greater Syria and beyond, connecting them to the greater eschatological narrative and to hopes of divine forgiveness. It also served to give legitimacy to the Umayyad caliphs as they were custodians of a major Islamic religious site, even when their religious standing was contested by others, particularly from Mecca and Medina. This is one of the underlying reasons for the great architectural development of the Dome of the Rock and the surrounding complex. By the twelfth century, there was evidence that the Dome of the

Rock was beginning to be understood as an eschatological site. Pilgrims came to it both to enjoy the beauty of the religious site but also to be connected to the realities of the hereafter. Nerina Rustomji argues that pilgrims visiting the Dome of the Rock and other religious spaces “knew of the Garden promised to them in the Qur’an and may have seen its approximation on the walls and within the religious space of the mosques.”26 The culture that develops later around shrines of the holy dead in many ways recreates the sorts of building projects and devotion first found at the Dome of the Rock.

25 Gülru Necipoğlu, “The Dome of the Rock as Palimpsest: ‘Abd al-Malik’s Grand Narrative and Sultan Süleyman’s Glosses,’ Muqarnas 25 (2008): 17, 19.

26 Nerina Rustomji, “The Garden and the Fire: Materials of Heaven and Hell in Medieval Islamic Culture” (Ph.D. diss., Columbia University, 2003), 255.

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Chapter 1: Introduction

Regardless of the origins of shrine construction and subsequent shrine visitation, it is clear that by the eight-ninth/fourteenth-fifteenth centuries ziyārat had become widespread in the eastern Islamic world. This study demonstrates how the everyday practices of shrine visitation were integral to the Islam and religious practice of Timurid period Muslims. While legal and other religious scholars did weigh in on the practice, and often even participated, they did not as a rule have dominance over it. A great many factors worked together to create a culture of shrine visitation that included shari‘ī concerns, supernatural and miraculous occurrences, elite patronage, and local interest and support of the shrine.

The Timurid Period (ca. 1370-1506 C.E.)

The context of the post-Mongol Islamic East, particularly the time and place of Timurid rule and neighboring Qaraqoyunlu and Aqqoyunlu rule, provides a particularly rich site to explore the contextual world of shrine based piety. The Timurid period follows the turbulent Mongol invasions and largely non-Muslim rule of the former Islamic heartlands.27 The important Khurasanian cities of Balkh, Herat, and Nishapur were leveled to the ground.28 The most lasting legacy of the invasions was the murder of the last Abbasid caliph, Mu‘stasim bi’llāh, and the destruction of his capital city, Baghdad.

The memory of this loss was elegized extensively by religious scholars, historians, and poets.29 Along with the great physical destruction of commercial areas, irrigation,

27 Most of the early Ilkhanid rulers were not Muslim. This changed with the conversion of Ghazan Khān (r. 694-703/1295-1305) to Islam.

28 David Morgan, Medieval Persia, 1040-1797 (London, New York: Longman, 1988), 57.

29 See: Mona Hassan, Longing for the Lost Caliphate: A Transregional History (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2017).

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Chapter 1: Introduction agriculture and loss of life, there was also a sort of psychological and spiritual trauma for

Sunni Muslims. They were now without their caliphate, which had been an important symbol of religious authority and unity. This loss left a void to be filled by new mechanisms of authority and legitimacy which religious and secular leaders alike struggled to create.

Timur’s late fourteenth-century brutal conquests west of Transoxiana rivaled those of the Chingissids a century before him. Timur (d. 807/1405), the great military strategist, conquered as far as western Iran and Iraq, but these lands were not to remain in

Timurid hands long after his death. Rather, in the fifteenth century, these lands were ruled briefly by the Mongol Jalayirids, but mostly by two Turkmen groups: the

Qaraqoyunlu and the Aqqoyunlu. Shāhrukh (d. 851/1447), Timur’s son, had held together much of the lands conquered by his father, but by the rule of Sulṭān Ḥusayn (d.

912/1506), only Khurasan remained in direct Timurid control. In the late fifteenth century, the western part of Iran was largely under Turkmen rule and the areas under

Timurid rule in the east had become increasingly decentralized, with various local sultans related to Sulṭān Ḥusayn.30 The entire late middle period was far from politically stable.

Whether under Ilkhanid rule, local rule (for example the Karts of Herat, Muzaffarids of

Tabriz, etc.), or later Timurid and Turkmen rule, cities and their environs faced a constant parade of changing princes, each of whom felt that their first act should be the levying of new taxes upon the already spent population.

Interestingly; however, this period was also one of great cultural, artistic, and architectural flowering. Maria Subtelny says of the Timurids:

30 Barthold, Four Studies on the History of Central Asia, vol.3 (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1956), 11.

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Chapter 1: Introduction

In the history of medieval Islamic Central Asia, the Timurids represented the embodiment of the synthesis of Turko-Mongol steppe charisma and Persian city culture… The cultural legitimacy of the Timurids stemmed from their city (as opposed to steppe) orientation and above all from their continuation, despite their Turko-Mongol background and Turkic language, of the Islamic Persian literary tradition.31

Subtelny attributes this rise in patronage partially to the expanding use of the soyurghal during this period. From its establishment and rise under Timur, the Timurid state was characterized by a “high degree of fiscal decentralization.”32 One of the main mechanisms of this decentralization was the issuance and use of soyurghals, which were made up of land granted by the central authority to elites and amīrs along with tax immunity for these lands. This was the main way that the Timurids, and the neighboring

Aqqoyunlu, held on to power. While this system created problems, such as an empty royal treasury due to lack of taxes paid, it did spread out a great deal of land and wealth among many elites.33 These elites in turn had the material wealth to patronize a great number of cultural and artistic endeavors, which is evidenced by the increased levels of patronage for the arts and architecture, particularly the patronage of shrines and shrine complexes. Many shrines that are the focus of this study were built, rebuilt or augmented under the auspices of Timurid princes and princesses, viziers and other wealthy patrons.

Similarly, many of the scholars and poets whose writings provide the primary sources of

31 Maria Subtelny, “The Poetic Circle at the Court of the Timurid Sultan Ḥusain Baiqara and its Political Significance” (Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 1979), 149.

32 Maria Eva Subtelny, “The Challenge of Change: Centralizing Reforms and their Opponents,” in Timurids in Transition: Turko-Persian Politics and Acculturation in Medieval Iran (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2007), 100.

33 Subtelny goes into detail on the centralizing reforms that were instituted by Sulṭān Ḥusayn’s deputy, Majd al-Dīn, that were largely aimed at curbing the tax immunities granted to the elite. His efforts were predictably opposed by those elites, particularly ‘Alīshīr Navā‘ī who used these grants and waqfs in the building of many religious edifices in Herat, and ultimately centralizing reforms were not possible. See: Subtelny, “The Challenge of Change: Centralizing Reforms and their Opponents,” 74-100.

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Chapter 1: Introduction this study were patronized by this same Timurid nobility. Even across dynastic lines, we can attribute similar interest in cultural and religious production to the Aqqoyunlu and other Timurid rivals.

Economically, these areas largely depended upon agricultural production.

Pastoralism and commercialism also contributed to a lesser degree. The predominance of agriculture is important because agricultural land and water supplies connected to it made up much of the religious endowments (waqf) that supported religious institutions of the time. Leading religious scholars, Sufis, and members of ahl al-bayt who served as trustees and administrators (mutawallī) of religious endowments were able to become wealthy landowners and increasingly powerful due to changing taxation privileges given to them by the Timurids. Robert McChesney says of this period, while large endowments had existed in the past, the fifteenth century saw the foundation of a number of extremely vast endowments in Samarkand, Bukhara, and Herat in particular:

Waqf grants also provided a durable vehicle for carrying out public policy in several areas. In the most obvious way, the establishment of a large public waqf was a visible expression of support for a certain religious and intellectual tradition. The mosques, madrasahs, and khanaqahs maintained by waqf income and the staffs and users of these institutions whose salaries and stipends were paid from waqf revenue all perpetuated a cultural tradition.34

According to Subtelny, the widespread use of waqf also seemed to “provide a solution to Timurid political and fiscal dilemmas by allowing donors (many of whom were members of the Timurid military elite) a high degree of independence from state interference, not to mention high social prestige, and at the same time it assured the state

34 Robert McChesney, Waqf in Central Asia: Four Hundred Years in the History of a Muslim Shrine, 1480- 1889 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1991), 37.

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Chapter 1: Introduction a steady, albeit not very high, flow of revenue.”35 Traditionally, a charitable waqf would be designated to benefit a madrasa, khānaqāh (Sufi lodge), or a mosque. In the Timurid period, a great number of shrines to either religious or political figures became the object of awqāf (sing. waqf), attesting to the importance of shrines and shrine visitation at the time.36

Matthew Melvin-Koushki characterizes the Timurid religious environment as suspended between two extremes: with the “stultifying conservatism of the scholarly establishment” on one side and the “antinomian decadence of groups such as the

Ḥurūfiyya” on the other.37 While this may be an exaggeration of the situation, what is clear is that there was a wide spectrum of religious belief and practice that was present in this period. Khurasan and Transoxiana had always been home to conservative forms of

Sunni orthodoxy. A. Bausani in a discussion of Abū Hāmid al-Ghazālī of the Seljuk period, characterizes him as representative of “that solid, clear Khurāsānian Sunnism that has been for centuries the religious milieu in which the greatest Iranian geniuses, literary and otherwise, have been bred.”38 By the ninth century, Khurasan had become an important center for Sunni scholarship. Bosworth points out that “there is a large representation of Khurāsānī scholars in such literary biographical worlds as Tha‘ālibī’s

35 Maria Subtelny, Timurids in Transition: Turko-Persian Politics and Acculturation in Medieval Iran (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2007), 154.

36 Subtelny, Timurids in Transition: Turko-Persian Politics and Acculturation in Medieval Iran (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2007), 151.

37 Matthew Melvin-Koushki, “The Quest for a Universal Science: The Occult Philosophy of Ṣā’in al-Dīn Turka Iṣfahānī (1369-1432) and Intellectual Millenarianism in Early Timurid Iran” (PhD. diss., Yale University, 2012), 15.

38 A. Bausani, “Religion in the Seljuk Period,” in The Cambridge History of Iran vol. 5: The Seljuk and Mongol Periods ed. J.A. Boyle (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1968), 286.

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Chapter 1: Introduction

Yatīmat al-dahr and the continuations of Bākharzī and Iṣfahānī.”39 Khurasan was home to the early hadith compilers al-Bukhārī (d. 256/870), Muslim (d. 273/886), al-Tirmidhī

(d. 279/892), as well as important theologians, especially of the Ash‘arī school. Roy

Mottahedeh notes that:

It has been noticed in passing, but nowhere, to my knowledge, discussed in detail, that four of the six ḥadīth books considered ‘canonical’ by the majority of the Sunni tradition are from Khurasan and the immediately neighboring parts of Tansoxiana, namely al-Bukhārī (d. 256 AH) and Tirmidhī (d. 270 or 275 or 279 AH). The other two are from provinces immediately neighboring Khurasan: Abū Dā’ūd al-Sijistānī (d. 275 AH) and Ibn Mājah al-Qāzwīnī (d. 273 Ah.H.) if we understand Qāzwīn/Qāzvīn, as most geographers do, to be part of al-Jibāl.40

Mottahedeh credits the predominance of hadith scholarship in the region to motivations of scholars of jurisprudence to base their interpretations of Islamic law on hadith instead of on reasoning (ra’y).41 Seljuk patronage of religious institutions, particularly madrasas, in the area continued the ascendancy of Khurasanian religious scholarship. The Seljuks also “spread this Khurasanian system, including its preferred hadith books, to the central lands of western Asia.”42 Following the death of Timur, whose legitimacy was largely based on his charisma and military prowess, his successors found their legitimacy in their adherence to Sunni orthodoxy. Timur’s son Shāhrukh paid special attention to bolster Sunni ‘ulamā’ during his reign; one way was through the

39 C.E. Bosworth, Khurāsān,” in Encyclopaedia of Islam Second Edition, eds. P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. vanDonzel, and W.P. Heinrichs (Leiden: Brill, 1960-2009).

40 Roy Mottahedeh, “The Transmission of Learning: The Role of the Islamic North East,” in Madrasa: Le Transmission du Savoir dans le Monde Musulman, ed. by N. Grandin and M. Gabroieau (Paris: ap Éditions Arguments, 1997), 66.

41 Mottahedeh, “The Transmission of Learning: The Role of the Islamic North East,” 71.

42 Mottahedeh, “The Transmission of Learning: The Role of the Islamic North East,” 72.

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Chapter 1: Introduction foundation of Sunni madrasas with particular curricula favoring the Ḥanafī and Shāfi‘ī schools.43

In this period we see institutionalized forms of Sufism rapidly growing in importance, the relationship between religious men and leadership changing, messianic and apocalyptic ideas and groups becoming popular, new conceptions of political legitimacy and social relations, and great demographic change. Among the many reasons behind these widespread changes to the religious milieu was the break down and subsequent dissipation of the Nizārī religious and intellectual tradition in the greater society following the thirteenth century Mongol invasions. Shahzad Bashir argues that this Nizārī legacy and that of other less well known traditions “became the intellectual progenitors of the Ḥurūfiyya and other messianic movements which gained prominence in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries in the Islamic East.”44 Partly fueled by the social and cultural disorder due to the political environment and the rise of popular Sufism, groups such as the Ḥurūfiyya became more representative of the intellectual and religious climate of the time rather than of esotericism.

An important aspect of both popular Sufism and messianic groups was the centrality of a charismatic shaykh or leader. Between the ninth and eleventh centuries

C.E., there was a shift in the way that mystic knowledge was transmitted between the shaykh and his student, with a growing emphasis on the authority of the shaykh. Fritz

43 See: Maria Subtelny and Anas Khalidov, “The Curriculum of Islamic Higher Learning in Timurid Iran in Light of the Sunni Revivial under Shah-Rukh,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 115.2 (April 1, 1995): 210.

44 Shahzad Bashir, “Deciphering the Cosmos from Creation to Apocalypse: The Ḥurūfiyya Movement and Islamic Esotericism,” in Imagining the End: Visions of Apocalypse from the Ancient Middle East to Modern America, ed. A. Amanat and M. Bernhardsson (London, New York: I.B Tauris Publishers, 2002), 171.

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Chapter 1: Introduction

Meier shows the slow change from a shaykh al-ta’līm to a shaykh al-tarbiya to occur in many places, but most strikingly in Khurasan.45 The shaykh’s elevated status only continued to rise over the next few centuries, reaching its pinnacle during the Timurid period. In the fourteenth and fifteenth century, the status and abilities of the shaykh are presented in the most extravagant language in Timurid hagiographical works.

Intercessory and messianic claims were popularly ascribed to many Sufi leaders. Devin

DeWeese shows that these sorts of claims were particular to this period and were extreme in nature because they are cut out of later hagiographical works.46

The period has also been characterized as a time of confessional ambiguity in which the divisions between what was seen as Shi‘i and what was seen as Sunni were not as rigid. Ahl-i Bayt or members of the Prophet Muḥammad’s family, particularly ‘Alids, were accorded great status by Sunnis during this time and their shrines became important pilgrimage centers. Historians have differed as to what this actually meant in terms of sectarian adherence. Did this signify a slow creep towards the Shi‘ism of the Safavids or was it Sunni cooption of the charisma associated with the Ahl-i Bayt? These ideas will be further examined in a later chapter.

This short summary of the religious situation during the Timurid period establishes it as intensely dynamic and positions it as an excellent setting to examine how piety and ritual developed and played out. The popular pious activity of grave visitation illuminates the intersection between the motivations of different sectors of Timurid

45 Fritz Meier, “Khurasan and the End of Classical Sufism,” in Essays on Islamic Piety and Mysticism, ed. & trans. J. O’Kane (Leiden, Boston, Köln: Brill, 1999), 191-2.

46 Devin DeWeese, “Intercessory Claims of Ṣūfī Communities during the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries: Messianic Legitimizing Strategies on the Spectrum of Normativity,” in Unity in Diversity: Mysticism, Messianism and the Construction of Religious Authority in Islam, ed. O. Mir-Kasimov (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2014), 199-200.

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Chapter 1: Introduction society: that of the political rulers, religious elites (the ‘ulamā’), Sufis, and the general population of pilgrims and devotees of various shrines. The groups both shared and negotiated the borders of ritual practice at shrines which resulted in a vibrant religious tradition.

Literature Review

The political and intellectual history of the Timurids has been well charted by many historians over the past few decades.47 Similarly, studies by art historians of the art and architecture of the entire post-Mongol Iranian world are well-developed. Extensive analyses of the shrine structures, layouts, and uses in works by art historians bring to life the shrines only mentioned in written sources. Sheila Blair, in her study on early fourteenth-century shrine complexes of locally important saints and Sufi orders, similar to the type visited and described by Ibn Battuta, demonstrates their importance for the dynamic life of Sufis. Unlike the secluded ribāts of earlier centuries, these Sufi shrine complexes were, as Blair notes, “social establishments in which the place of the dead was commemorated by veneration of the living. They were attractive, lively spots, more popular than scholarly or official foundations.”48

47 For studies on Timurid history: B. Manz, Power, Politics and Religion in Timurid Iran (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007). Manz, The Rise and Rule of Tamerlane (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989).; M.E. Subtelny, Timurids in Transition: Turko-Persian Politics and Acculturation in Medieval Iran (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2007).; H.R. Roemer, “The Successors to Timur, in The Cambridge History of Iran vol. 6, eds. P. Jackson and L. Lockhart (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), 98-145.; J. Woods, “The Rise of Timurid Historiography,” Journal of Near Eastern Studies 46.2 (1987), 81-108.; J. Woods, The Timurid Dynasty, Papers on Inner Asia (Bloomington: Indiana University, 1990).; I.E. Binbaş, Intellectual Networks in Timurid Iran: Sharaf al-Dīn ‘Alī Yazdī and the Islamicate Republic of Letters (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2016).

48 Sheila Blair, “Sufi Saints and Shrine Architecture in the Early Fourteenth Century,” Muqarnas 7 (1990): 46-7.

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Chapter 1: Introduction

Lisa Golombek further elaborates the social space provided by the shrines, calling them “little cities of God” (as opposed to the “great cities of God” represented by the larger shrine towns of Mashhad and Qom, the former of which houses the tomb of an

Imam and the latter of which houses the prominent daughter of an Imam). She shows the multipurpose nature of these sites, in which there were separate living and bathing areas for students, Sufi adepts, and pilgrims; meeting places for Sufis, mosques, madrasas, cisterns from which water was freely distributed, large kitchens to feed all the various visitors and residents of the shrine complex. The large scale building of shrine complexes is a testament to the great wealth of both patrons and Sufis. These religious structures were also built carefully and with good materials that has enabled many of them to last to this day, while other structures such as palaces, markets, baths, and caravanserais have largely disappeared.49 They were also repaired more scrupulously. In crowded cities with little room for new building, refurbishing older religious edifices was just as important to wealthy patrons. This in itself is a testament to the importance of religious building (or at least the cultural capital it engendered) to these patrons.

From the Ilkhanid period there was a renewed interest in building shrines to honor local saints.50 If there existed a contemporary saint who had students, disciples, or family in a city (e.g. Natanz, Pir-i Bakrān), then a mausoleum was built to honor him bringing political benefit and socio-religious prestige to the patron and his family. If a local saint did not exist in the contemporary history, then devotion to one from the past could be renewed (e.g. Bisṭāmī, Aḥmad-i Jām) and new buildings could adorn his shrine

49 Lisa Golombek, The Timurid Shrine at Gāzur Gāh (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1969), 15.

50 In the earlier Seljuk period there had also been great shrine building and rebuilding projects, after which there is less evidence of widespread shrine-building until the Ilkhanid period.

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Chapter 1: Introduction and make it function as the other locally based ones. Golombek concludes that “the phenomenon of the Little Cities of God was therefore due not to the power and influence of individual shaykhs exercising this on their following, but to a climate that fostered the creation of shrine-centers with the attributes described. The tomb of the shaykh was, so to say, more a ‘peg on which to hang the hat’ rather than the source of impetus.”51 This idea that the actual life of the saint was less important than how he was actually remembered and subsequently venerated is central to this dissertation. As mentioned above, there was a particular set of ideals and topoi used to give sanctity to a saint in fourteenth- and fifteenth-century hagiographies. This is addressed at length in Chapter 3.

The religious history of the period has also been studied by many scholars. Older studies, such as the chapter on Timurid period religion in the Cambridge History of Iran by B.S. Amoretti, have read the religious history of the Timurid period as one of a gradual trend towards Shi‘ism, particularly among aberrant currents in society, and that eventually culminated in Safavid Shi‘ism of the sixteenth century. While the theme of a certain ambiguity between Sunni and Shi‘i beliefs and practices in this period is a helpful heuristic device, seeing the period as merely the path to Safavid Shi‘ism obscures the complexity of Timurid religion. Hamid Algar also disagrees with Amoretti’s position, arguing instead that Sunnism generally prevailed in the Timurid period; Timur was clearly a Sunni as were almost all of his successors. Besides areas that had already been centers of Shi‘ism, no new territory came under Shi‘i rule in this time. Similarly, Algar gives a more nuanced approach to the Shi’ism found in the different messianic and Sufi

51 L. Golombek, "The Cult of Saints and Shrine Architecture in the Fourteenth Century," in Near Eastern Numismatics, Iconography, Epigraphy and History: Studies in Honor of George C. Miles, ed. D. Kouymjian (Beirut, 1974), 429.

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Chapter 1: Introduction movements of the period. While many groups had leanings towards various aspects of

Shi‘i belief and practice, the most important and influential order of the time remained the Naqshbandiyya, which was well-known for its adamant claims to Sunni orthodoxy.52

There are a great many works relating to Sufism and messianic movements during this period. From the excellent studies by Shahzad Bashir, Hamid Algar, Devin

DeWeese, Jurgen Paul, JoAnn Gross, Ahmet Karamustafa and others we get a vivid picture of much of the religious landscape, particularly of the institutionalized Sufi

ṭarīqa, messianic and apocalyptic trends, and the diffusion of both “orthodox” and antinomian charismatic figures.53 Scholars such as Jamal Elias and Omid Safi have provided certain theoretical frameworks to study Sufism and religious piety. For example, they have proposed moving beyond an understanding of Sufism based largely

52 H. Algar, “Religions in Iran (2): Islam in Iran (2.2) Mongol and Timurid Periods,” Encyclopedia Iranica; For more on the Naqshbandiyya see: H. Algar, “The Naqshbandī Order: A Preliminary Survey of Its History and Significance,” Studia Islamica, No. 44 (1976), pp. 123-152.; D. DeWeese, “The Eclipse of the Kubravīyah in Central Asia,” Iranian Studies Vol. 21, No. 1/2, Soviet and North American Studies on Central Asia (1988), pp. 45-83.; J. Paul, Doctrine and Organization: the Khwājagān/Naqshbandīya in the First Generation after Bahā’uddīn (Berlin: Das Arabische Buch, 1998).; A.F. Buehler, Sufi Heirs of the Prophet: The Indian Naqshbandiyya and the Rise of the Mediating Sufi Shaykh (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1998).

53 See: S. Bashir, Messianic Hopes and Mystical Visions: The Nūrbakhshīya Between Medieval and Modern Islam (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2003).; S. Bashir, Sufi Bodies: Religion and Society in Medieval Islam (New York: Columbia University Press, 2011).; S. Bashir, “Enshrining Divinity: The Death and Memorialization of Fażlallāh Astarābādī in Ḥurūfī Thought,” The Muslim World 90.3/4 (Fall, 2000): 289-308.; A. Papas, “Soufisme, Pouvoir et Sainteté: Le Cas des Khwâjas de Kashgarie (XVI2- XVIIIe siècles,” Studia Islamica 100/101 (2005): 161-182.; H. Algar, “Some Observations on Religion in Safavid Persia,” Iranian Studies 7.1/2 (Winter-Spring, 1974): 287-293.; H. Algar, “Jāmī ii. And Sufism,” Encyclopedia Iranica, 2008.; J. Paul, Doctrine and Organization: The Khwājagān/Naqshbandīya in the Generation after Bahā’uddīn (Berlin: Abrabische Buch, 1998).; A. Karamustafa, God’s Unruly Friends, Dervish Groups in the Islamic Later Period, 1200-1550 (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1994).; J. Gross, “The Economic Status of Timurid Sufi Shaykh: A Matter of Conflict or Perception?” Iranian Studies 21.1/2 (1988): 84-104.; D. DeWeese, Islamization and Native Religion in the Golden Horde: Baba Tükles Conversion to Islam in Historical and Epic Tradition (University Park, Pa.: Pennyslvania State University, 1994).; D. DeWeese, “Shamanization in Central Asia,” JESHO 57.3 (2014), 326-363.; DeWeese, “Sacred Places and Public Narratives: The Shrine of Aḥmad Yasavī in Hagiographical Traditions of the Yasavī Ṣūfī Order, 16th-17th Centuries,” The Muslim World 90 (Fall, 2000): 353-376.; Yasavī ‘Šayḫs’ in the Timurid Era: Notes on the Social and Political Roels of Communal Sufi Affiliations in the 14th and 15th Centuries,” Oriente Moderno 15.76 (1996): 173-188.

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Chapter 1: Introduction upon the interior world of distinguished mystical scholars and poets and their writings, by focusing rather on the social role of Sufism in particular historical contexts.54 The intellectual history of various Sufi brotherhoods (tarīqāt) as well as on the ‘ulamā’ have been done; however, there has not been as much work on the actual content of “popular” piety and the practice of shrine visitation ritual in this period.

Robert McChesney set the standard for studying the history of an individual shrine with his work on ‘Alī’s tomb in Mazar-i Sharif. His use of narrative histories and documentary sources, and especially awqāf for the tomb, allowed him to present the social and religious importance of this shrine in the midst of political turmoil.55 More recently, May Farhat has offered a comprehensive history of the shrine of ‘Alī al-Riżā in

Mashhad from the tenth to the seventeenth century. She addresses the reasons behind the shrine’s popularity before Safavid rule. The religious complex that housed the saint’s tomb was similar to other Central Asian shrines both typologically and in terms of elite

Timurid patronage.56 Sunni veneration of this ‘Alid shrine was similar to the types of veneration they showed at shrines of Sufis and other saintly figures and speaks again to a widespread culture of shrine piety.

This dissertation brings forward both ideas of popular religion and practice, but also shows how people from all levels of society participated in this arena and had shared experiences. In response to works on piety, such as Marina Tolmacheva’s work on

54 See for example: J. Elias, “The Second Ali: The Making of Sayyid Ali Hamadani in Popular Imagination,” Muslim World 90.3-4 (September, 2000): 395-419.; O. Safi, “Bargaining with Baraka: Persian Sufism, ‘Mysticism’ and Premodern Politics,” Muslim World 90.3-4 (September, 2000): 259-288.

55 R.D. McChesney, Waqf in Central Asia: Four Hundred Years in the History of a Muslim Shrine, 1480- 1889 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1991).

56 May Farhat, “Islamic Piety and Dynastic Legitimacy: The Case of the Shrine of Ali al-Rida in Mashhad, 10th-17th Century,” (Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard University, 2002).

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Chapter 1: Introduction medieval female piety and the Hajj which present Islamic piety as unchanging and remaining constant over many centuries and places, this study will take into account the changing meaning of symbols, beliefs, and ritual with explicit regard for context.

Medieval Khurasan and Transoxiana under Timurid rule created a particular environment that fostered a particular form of piety which forms the subject of this work. This dissertation follows in the line of other similar projects, particularly that of Christopher S.

Taylor’s In the Vicinity of the Righteous: Ziyara and the Veneration of Muslim Saints in

Late Medieval Egypt which focuses on shrines and popular practice in Mamluk Egypt.

Similarly relevant is Josef Meri’s work on Syrian shrine pilgrimage by Jews and Muslims also during the Mamluk period and Daniella Talmon-Heller’s Islamic Piety in Medieval

Syria: Mosques, Cemeteries and Sermon under the Zangids and Ayyubids. Even more extensive is the study of the spread and development of Islamization, ritual practice and shrine visitation in North India; South Asianists have produced a great number of rich studies that provide models for my study.57 Beatrice Manz has made the most comprehensive use of grave visitation guides during Shāhrukh’s rule, presenting two chapters on the subject in her Power, Politics, and Religion in Timurid Iran. However, she agrees that the sources are far from being exhausted, and an in-depth study of the place of shrines in Timurid religious practice needs to be done. Indeed, both Meri and

57 For selected works on Indian Sufis and shrines see: R.M. Eaton, “Sufi Folk Literature and the Expansion of Indian Islam,” History of Religions, Vol. 14, No. 2 (Nov., 1974), 117-127.; C.W. Ernst, Eternal Garden: Mysticism, History, and Politics at a South Asian Sufi Center (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1992).; C.W. Ernst, Early Chishtī Sufism and the Historiography of Conversion to Islam in South Asia (Arizona: Middle East Studies Association of North America, 1991).; S. Digby, “The Sufi Shaykh and the Sultan: A Conflict of Claims to Authority in Medieval India,” Iran 28 (1990), 71-81.

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Chapter 1: Introduction

Grabar have called for more in depth studies of shrines and their associated ritual in particular contexts.58

Many of the questions of religious meaning that this dissertation examines have been raised in a different context by Devin DeWeese in his study on the Islamization and

Native Religion in the Golden Horde. He looks at conversion narratives of the Golden

Horde and how the point of Islamization is later conflated with ethnic origins. By examining how conversion was later interpreted by the Muslim Golden Horde, DeWeese provides a framework for searching for how a medieval Islamic society understood its religion and ritual. Similarly, works by Caroline Walker Bynum on medieval European piety make use of cultural anthropology to understand the symbolic world of the medieval society she studies. In Holy Feast Holy Fast: The Religious Significance of

Food to Medieval Women, Bynum uses sources about European women who were often seen as unique or unusual in their time as well as stories of saints. Both of these types of figures may not at first glance represent the general population; however, their stories and the way they engaged people at the time can provide insight into the sensibilities and aspirations of those who were either listening to or reading these stories. The women who took their fasting to extreme levels correspond to similar, but less intense, practices on the part of ordinary women.59 In a way similar to narratives in the Muslim world, the vitae of saints found in the primary sources tell us far more about the attitudes towards

58 Josef W. Meri, The Cult of Saints among Muslims and Jews in Medieval Syria (Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 2002); 285.; O. Grabar, “The Earliest Islamic Commemorative Structures, Notes and Documents,” Ars Orientalis, Vol. 6 (1966), 12.

59 C.W. Bynum, Holy Feast Holy Fast: The Religious Significance of Food to Medieval Women (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987). and Wonderful Blood : Theology and Practice in Late Medieval Northern Germany and Beyond (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2007).

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Chapter 1: Introduction religion and piety held by the audience of these stories than they do about the actual historical figures presented.

Primary Sources

The main sources used for this dissertation are shrine visitation guides that became widespread during the Timurid period. They grew out of local and regional histories which were usually written in the form of biographical histories of a city, highlighting all the important people of said city. Local histories, usually in the form of biographical dictionaries of a city’s illustrious inhabitants and mostly in Arabic, were well established as a genre in Iran by the fourth and fifth/tenth and eleventh centuries. There was apparently a “boom” in local histories around 1000 C.E.60 Local histories are diverse in their subject matter: local chronicles often focused on local political events and earlier

Arabic city histories highlighted the important ‘ulamā’, particularly hadith scholars, who either lived in the city or had visited at some point in their lives. Gradually in the Seljuk period, these texts were more likely to be in Persian. A new literary genre of shrine manuals or guide books (kitāb al-ziyārat or kitāb al-mazārāt) highlighting the important merits (fażā’il) of a city and deceased saintly men (and occasionally women) whose shrines ennoble the city, developed from this tradition of local histories. Shrine guides follow the same format as earlier biographical works; however, they are usually much more hagiographic in nature and also include detailed descriptions of the saint’s shrine and miracles that occur there long after his death. These guides seem to fall somewhere between a standard local history and hagiographical works such as ‘Abd al-Raḥmān

60 Jurgen Paul, “The Histories of Herat,” Iranian Studies 33.1-2 (Winter/Spring, 2000): 97-98.

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Chapter 1: Introduction

Jāmī’s hagiography on important Sufis, Nafaḥāt al-uns min al-hażrāt al-quds. The expansion of this new genre to facilitate the growing importance of the baraka of deceased saints is a testament to a shrine-centric piety that was also developing.

The shrine manual narrows the focus of biography to covering those of the holy dead of a city and are hagiographical in nature. They vary in the subject matter that they include, some have extensive stories of the life of the deceased saint before his death, others give anecdotes of post-mortem miracles that occur at the shrine of a saint, while most entries give almost no information on the saint and focus rather on the location of the shrine. I use the following seven manuals to provide a comprehensive picture of shrine based piety: Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda on the city of Bukhara, Qandiyya on the city of

Samarkand, Rawżāt al-Jinān wa Jannāt al-Janān on the city of Tabriz, Tārīkh-i Yazd and Tārīkh-i Jadīd-i Yazd on the city of Yazd, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya on the city of Herat, and Tārīkhcha-yi Mazār-i Sharīf on the city of

Mazar-i Sharif and Tārīkh-i Yazd and Tārīkh-i Jadīd-i Yazd are not strictly speaking shrine guides in the same way as the other works. Both of these texts could be considered general local histories and fażā’il works; they start with a history of Yazd under the

Timurids and also includes a listing of all of the important buildings in the city, with particular emphasis on religious buildings. It is in this section that we find a rather lengthy exposition of Yazdī shrines and stories of those buried there.

Most of these shrine guides are from the areas of Khurasan and Transoxiana, however, Tabriz and Yazd are from west of this region. I am including them in this study because alongside the other guides, they comprise the corpus of extant shrine guides of the Timurid period of lands under Timurid control. For this reason, I argue that the broad

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Chapter 1: Introduction similarities in the context of these cities and their relationship with local ziyārat is beneficial to this study. As mentioned above, I use these shrine guides not as sources for the actual lives of the deceased saints, but rather in order to highlight the important ideals of piety and sanctity in the period in which they were written. These guides present trends and patterns of behavior that are specific to the Late Middle Period in Iran and Central

Asia. Alongside the shrines of well-known Muslim scholars and saints, we find local sacred or supernatural sites such healing springs and ancient, pre-Islamic sites.61 As they speak to a somewhat broad audience of pilgrims, often in basic Persian, they inform us of the types of piety and signifiers of sanctity that were readily acceptable to the types of people who would make pilgrimage to the shrines mentioned in the manuals. As Richard

McGregor argues, “there is no body of religious literature equal to it as a window onto

Islamic conceptions of sanctity and devotion,” and this is how Timurid shrine visitation guides are used here.62

In all the cases save one, the author of the manual is known. This allows us to take into account the biases of the author when evaluating a particular manual. For example, Ḥāfiẓ Ḥusayn Karbalā’ī Tabrīzī (d., the author of Rawżāt al-Jinān wa Jannāt al-Janān, a shrine manual for the city of Tabriz, wrote his work during the early Safavid period in exile in Syria. His work is colored both by a deep nostalgia for the city of his birth but also a deep prejudice against the Safavids and Shi‘ism. Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i

Sultāniyya wa Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, the Herati shrine guide and one of the

61 For example both an alleged healing spring and a 4,000 year old sacred site later became the site of an important masjid and mazār in Herat, the Masjid Gunbad-i Khwāja Nūr.Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya wa Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya (Tehran: Bunyād-i Farhang-i Irān, 1973), 51.

62 Richard McGregor, “Intertext and Artworks- Reading Islamic Hagiography,” Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses 43.3. (2014): 426.

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Chapter 1: Introduction earliest examples of this genre, was written by Sayyid Aṣīl al-Dīn ‘Abdullāh Wā‘iẓ

Ḥusaynī for the Timurid ruler Sulṭān Abū Sā‘īd Gurkhānī (r. 863-873 AH/1458-1469

CE). As an official work by a scholar patronized by the Timurid ruler, this shrine guide reflects a somewhat official version of shrines and shrine visitation in Herat. Wā‘iẓ also makes sure to include lengthy praises of the Timurids, interestingly pointing out the many shrines that Timur and Shāhrukh had visited during their reigns.

Therefore, while I argue that the way shrines and saints are described in the manuals tells us of broader religious ideas of the time, it is also important to note that the individuals who wrote them also had their own agendas. The authors are not the only ones with an agenda that colored the hagiographies; shrine caretakers, local rulers, and others had a stake in the pilgrimage game. A well placed ‘Alid shrine could lead to a great uptick in pilgrims and thus revenues for the city and many inhabitants. With all of these issues in mind, these manuals are used carefully to assess the religious mindset of the people of their age as best as possible.

These shrine guides make up the heart of the dissertation; however they are used in conjunction with other types of literature from the period. Dynastic histories such as

Khwāndamīr’s Ḥabīb al-Siyar and local histories such as Isfizārī’s Rawżat al-Jannāt help to add context to the shrine manuals. Other religious texts in the form of akhlāq literature,

Sufi biographical dictionaries, hadith literature, and other theological works provide understandings of shrines and piety from ‘ulamā’ that functioned at a different level than those who penned the shrine manuals. Documentary sources, such as letters and waqf

(endowment) deeds are also used. These sources taken together and supplemented with inscriptions from and maps of various shrines and shrine complexes create a

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Chapter 1: Introduction comprehensive picture of shrines and shrine-based piety. The uses, biases, and limitations of each of these sources will be discussed as they arise.

Methodology

This dissertation examines three central aspects of the pilgrimage experience: ritual, story and place in order to illuminate the religious and cultural life of Muslims of the time. It follows an idea presented by Jonathan Z. Smith that Josef Meri adapts to his study of

Syrian shrine pilgrimage, stating that these three aspects are key to engendering sanctity.63 The physical and psychological nature of ritual is the first part of the experience, its ethical and sacramental components and meanings give context to the practice of shrine visitation. Second, the hagiographic stories of important saints and religious figures highlight the ideals of piety at the time. And last, the spaces of shrine complexes and the routes of pilgrimage undertaken by pilgrims speaks to the concrete experience of moving around and inhabiting space. This experience of space was informed by all of the other aspects of pilgrimage. These aspects, all seen in concert, add to an understanding of the complex social, cultural, and religious lives of medieval

Muslims.

This study also follows the theoretical understanding of Islamic practice and tradition as put forth by Talal Asad. It places the practice of shrine pilgrimage and the discourse surrounding it in the context of a greater Islamic discursive tradition. In terms of the language used, the frames of reference and authority mobilized by authors of

63 Josef Meri, The Cult of Saints among Muslims and Jews in Medieval Syria (Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), 15. See also: J.Z. Smith, To Take Place: Toward Theory in Ritual (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987).

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Chapter 1: Introduction shrine manuals, and even in the very architecture of shrines, it is clear that this practice was understood and simultaneously influenced by the Islamic discursive tradition. In line with Ovamair Anjum’s understanding of the way in which various Islamic traditions are connected to a larger idea of Islam, i.e. by seeing the “emphasis on connectedness by these Islamic subtraditions as a conscious, rational mode of participating in an Islamic discursive tradition rather than as an unthought or unconscious deep structure waiting to be discovered by modern scholars.”64

In the discussion of shrine pilgrimage, this dissertation engages in longstanding debates about the nature and role of ritual, belief, and practice in the lives of Muslims. It looks at ideas of efficacy, embodiment, community and identity building, liminality, and normativity in terms of shrine visitation. Marion Holmes Katz in a study on the Hajj highlights a few different approaches to ritual by religious studies scholars. She argues that while some may use “core theological principles to define Islamic normativity” and then present Islamic ritual practice as corresponding directly to this theology, she sees a more dynamic model of ritual practice and Muslim attitudes towards it. She also finds that pre-modern Muslim scholars struck a balance between a focus on the ethical aspects of ritual and the efficacious.65 Like much of Islamic ritual practice, shrine visitation included a certain schematic of recitations, invocations, and physical practice which developed over time. I argue that shrine visitation guide books by the Timurid period offered an almost codified sequence of ritual practice for the pilgrim to undertake as part of the experience. These actions and recitations are based on Qur’anic verses, hadith

64 Ovamir Anjum, “Islam as a Discursive Tradition: Talal Asad and His Interlocutors,” Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East 27.3 (2007): 662.

65 Marion Holmes Katz, “The Hajj and the Study of Islamic Ritual,” Studia Islamica 98/99 (2004): 127-9.

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Chapter 1: Introduction reports of the Prophet advising Muslims on what to do at graves, hadith of the Shi‘i

Imāms, and on accumulated local practice and tradition. How these actions were interpreted and understood by both pilgrims and the ‘ulamā’, with special emphasis on ritual efficacy and expectations of intercession, will be explored in more detail in Chapter

2.

Chapters

This dissertation is divided into four main chapters which work together to present a comprehensive picture of shrine-based piety and what it meant for Muslims in the Later

Middle Period. Following this introductory chapter is Chapter 2; The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Piety and Ritual. This chapter examines the prescribed ritual and prohibitions of shrine visitation. It makes use of shrine guides and city histories for Bukhara,

Samarqand, Herat, Yazd, Tabriz, and Mazar-i Sharif composed in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Other types of sources such as works of fiqh, hadith, religious science

(e.g. Pārsā’s Faṣl al-khiṭāb), and general histories also make clear the form and history of shrine-based ritual.

The next chapter, Chapter 3; Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective

Memory, follows an idea that was well examined in Taylor’s study of Cairene tombs in

The Vicinity of the Righteous: that the way sanctity is discussed and constructed informs how piety was viewed in a particular period, as well as gives a view to the religious

“thought world” at the time.66 The hagiographic sources and shrine manuals from the

Timurid period are rich with detailed sketches of saintly men and the occasional woman.

66 Christopher Taylor, In the Vicinity of the Righteous: Ziyāra and the Veneration of Muslim Saints in Late Medieval Egypt (Boston: Brill, 1999), 80.

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Chapter 1: Introduction

While often reflecting more of an idealized typology than the real life story of a medieval person, these stories offer much to the historian of society and culture. The qualities and behaviors that the shrine manuals and other biographical literature of the period bring to the forefront, give evidence of the qualities and behaviors that were important to society at the time.

Chapter 4 Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine examines the ways that the

Prophet Muḥammad and his family were regarded in medieval Iran and Central Asia.

Religion in the post-Ilkhanid period has been described in many different ways over the past few decades. Scholarship was largely geared towards discovering how and why the

Shi‘ism of the Safavid period was possible, given a previously largely Sunni population in Iran. Historians and scholars of religion argued for an inherent Shi‘i inclination even among those who identified as Sunni during this interim period (i.e. post-Ilkhanid but pre-Safavid, encompassing the Timurids and Turkmen dynasties among others). Sufism was seen as the conduit through which the Shi‘ification of Sunnis was possible. Shi‘ism so influenced Sufism that the two were seen as interchangeable.

Early on, Hamid Algar wrote against these trends and posed a situation where

Sunnism could exist alongside a special Alid loyalism without espousing Shi‘i theological and doctrinal beliefs. Marshall Hodgson called it “Alid loyalism”, Moojan

Momen called it “tashayyu al-hasan,” and most recently Mathew Melvin-Koushki introduced the helpful term “imamophilism,” and it is through this lens that the religious atmosphere of Timurid Iran and Central Asia can be best understood. Chapter 4 looks at the role of ‘Alid shrines and the importance of Sayyid saints as objects of veneration by the largely Sunni populations in the cities examined in this dissertation. It argues that the

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Chapter 1: Introduction sort of ‘Alidism found in scholarly works, such as that of Muḥammad Pārsā, Rūzbihān

Khunjī and other prominent scholars of the time, is reflected in the more widespread practice of shrine visitation.

Chapter 5; The Geography of Sanctity focuses on the actual places of pilgrimage and the importance of the “locality” of saints in creating a shared identity and history.

The saints, the places that were important in their lives, and their final resting places help to create the history of the area. There is a type of shared view of the past, rooted in these saintly figures and their shrines, that presents an interesting type of regional history.

While many shrines were presented as single locations, there are many instances when a pilgrim is advised to make a circuit of many important shrines in a certain area or of a certain type of holy person (e.g. prophets). The routes and spaces are embedded in a sacred geography of the city. Understanding the medieval experience of journeying along these routes and visiting shrines gives us a better sense of ziyārat. Finally, I will offer some concluding remarks on piety and ritual practice during the Timurid period in Iran and Central Asia.

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CHAPTER 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Piety and Ritual

Josef Meri, in his study of the cult of saints in medieval Syria, argues that sacred space and sacred topography are made by “story, ritual and place.”1 Each of these three aspects works in tandem to imbue a space with sacrality. This chapter is concerned with the place of ritual in making the shrine a sacred space. Ritual provided pilgrims with both a corporeal and a spiritual dimension to the ziyārat and made the body just as important in the practice as the mind or heart. This chapter will interrogate the category of ‘ritual’ and then examine the different methods of ritual practice presented in Timurid shrine visitation guides.

Ritual was first made into a descriptive category and term of analysis by

European scholars in the nineteenth century who thought that an understanding of ritual would lead to the discovery of the origins of religion. They set ritual apart from the mundane activities of daily life by associating ritual practice with sacred myth and saw it as a universal human activity. As is true with most objects of academic study, the ways that ritual has been defined and used have changed over time, but as Catherine Bell argues, most theories of ritual center around the question as to whether “religion and culture were originally rooted in myth or in ritual.”2 In most cases, ritual was understood as a symbolic act and these symbols could be read or decoded for meaning. Émile

Durkheim counted rituals (or rites) among the essential features of religion, they were central in separating the sacred from the profane as well as cultivating religious emotion.

1 Josef W. Meri, The Cult of saints among Muslims and Jews in Medieval Syria (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 2002, 14. Also See: Daphna Ephrat, “The Shaykh, the Physical Setting, and the Holy Site: the diffusion of the Qadiri path in late medieval Palestine,” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland 19.1 (January 2009): 1-20.

2 Catherine Bell, Ritual: Perspectives and Dimension, 3.

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Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety

On this latter point, Durkheim argued that “rites are a manner of acting which take rise in the midst of assembled groups and which are destined to excite, maintain, or recreate certain mental states in these groups.”3 Even as rites were seen as an important part of religion, Durkheim and others privileged belief over ritual, arguing that the latter required the former. A new focus on ritual arose with the work of cultural anthropologists such as

Victor Turner, Clifford Geertz, and others. While their predecessors had been focused on deciphering the origins of religion and decoding the myth behind ritual, the anthropological approach was more concerned with the role and purpose of ritual in the structure of society and culture. Still others, such as Vincent Crapanzano, were more focused on the individual’s understanding and approach to ritual than in larger societal concerns .Crapanzano emphasized the embedded complexities and ambiguities of ritual that did not easily translate into particular meanings.4

Talal Asad moved the discussion of ritual away from a focus on symbolic meanings to an analysis of the practice of ritual. For Asad, ritual “is directed at the apt performance of what is prescribed, something that depends on intellectual and practical disciplines but does not itself require decoding. In other words, apt performance involves not symbols to be interpreted but abilities to be acquired…”5 Asad’s characterization of ritual as embodied practice that disciplines and socializes the body in a particular way is a useful lens through which to understand ziyārat ritual. In a recent interview, Asad elaborates on his idea of ritual:

3 E. Durkheim, The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life quoted in K. Thompson, Emile Durkheim (London, New York: Tavistock Publications, 1982), 125.

4 Catherine Bell, Ritual: Perspectives and Dimensions, 57.

5 Talal Asad, Genealogies of Religion: Discipline and Reasons of Power in Christianity and Islam (Baltimore, London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993), 62.

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It was not meaning that was taught first but just a way of life and a way of inhabiting one’s body, of relating to other people, and of learning certain kinds of ritual. Even when one is taught in words it’s not really the symbolism of ritual that matters…6

The significance of ritual to a devotee is based on the quotidian and natural nature of the ritual. Its effectiveness in being incorporated into the life of the person relies upon this naturalness. Courtney Bender argues that “habit, comportment, language, emotion and so on are naturalized through the ongoing, daily disciplining of the body in specific ritual events and in multiple social interactions. The thoroughly socialized body inhabits a world in which it knows how to move, and does so in such a way that its movements appear thoroughly natural and transparent.”7 Embodiment of ritual practice is also closely related to Bourdieu’s concept of habitus, in that “what is ‘learned by the body’ is not something that one has, like knowledge that can be brandished, but something that one is.”8 A practice-oriented approach to the study of religion centers on this particular understanding of ritual as the individual’s embodied practices and brings forward how these are part of his/her way of being. This approach takes into consideration the discourses that inform and limit the practice of an individual alongside the ways in which actual individual practice and belief informs those same discourses.9

6 Irfan Ahmad, “Talal Asad Interviewed by Irfan Ahmad,” Public Culture 27.2 (2015): 261.

7 Courtney Bender, “Practicing Religions,” in Cambridge Companion to Religious Studies, ed. R.A. Orsi (Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 283-284.

8 Bourdieu, The Logic of Practice, trans. Richard Nice (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1980), 73. Quoted in S. Mahmood, “Rehearsed Spontaneity and Conventionality of Ritual: Disciplines of Ṣalāt,” American Ethnologist 28.4 (Nov. 2001): 837.

9 One current example of an excellent work that utilizes a practice-oriented approach and Bourdieu’s theory of habitus is Helena Kupari, Lifelong Religion as Habitus: Religious Practice among Displaced Karelian Orthodox Women in Finland (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2016).

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With regard to the social dimension of ritual, Bell argues that ritualization is a strategy used to construct specific power arrangements and relationships that are central to certain forms of social organizing. It is important to figure out who has control over the ritual, how it can be used to dominate participants, and how their power is limited and constrained. Expanding upon the importance of ritual with regard to social relations,

Turner argued that ritual worked on an ongoing basis by which a community continually renewed itself.10 While those with power—in the case of ziyārat this would include authors of shrine guides, influential scholars, patrons, and shrine administrators—could and did attempt to dictate practice, they did not hold a monopoly on it. They were constrained by tradition, both of a trans-local and local type, and by practitioners themselves. Those in power could not successfully impose rules and practices that strayed considerably from locally acceptable ideas on what constituted proper ritual.

Some examples below will show how those who did advocate against popular ritual practices were often ignored. As will be apparent in this dissertation, ritual and ideas of piety were shaped by many different agents, including those in power, religious scholars, and the community of lay Muslims.

Central to understanding ritual as an activity that stands apart from daily, mundane activities of life is its association with the sacred. What is sacred has also been categorized and defined in a myriad of ways. Early scholars of religion describe the sacred as a stable category that includes everything positively connected to God, gods, or the supernatural. The early twentieth-century social scientist Arnold Van Gennep argues instead that the sacred is not an absolute attribute, rather it is relative and changes

10 Catherine Bell, Ritual: Perspectives and Dimensions (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009), 39.

-38- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety depending upon the situation; most importantly, he shows how ritual defines the sacred rather than only reacting to it.11 Jonathan Z. Smith has elaborated this idea in a discussion of the sacred as a focusing lens:

The ordinary…becomes significant, becomes sacred, simply by being there. It becomes sacred by having our attention directed to it in a special way…there is nothing that is inherently sacred or profane. These are not substantive categories, but rather situational or relational categories, mobile boundaries which shift according to the map being employed. There is nothing that is in- itself sacred, only things sacred-in-relation-to.12

In another work, his influential To Take Place: Toward Theory in Ritual, J.Z.

Smith further questions traditional ideas of sacred space as an absolute entity. To Smith, ritual is not a response to something that is already sacred; instead “rituals function in much the same fashion as the architecture of sacred places. Just as the built environment performs a focusing activity, ritual also directs and focalizes attention.” 13 This idea of a shifting sacred defined by ritual and other parts of the religious experience is a helpful way to understand how ziyārat ritual contributes to the process of sacralization. Mazār

(shrine) sites could be in almost any location and not necessarily connected to pre- existing narratives on the sacred. That is, a religious site like the Ka‘ba in Mecca was steeped in a sacred history linking the space and its ritual to pre-Islamic prophets as well

11 Catherine Bell, Ritual: Perspectives and Dimensions, 37.

12 Jonathan Z. Smith, “The Bare Facts of Ritual,” History of Religions 20.1/2 (August-Novemner, 1980): 115.

13 Jonathan Z. Smith, To Take Place: Toward Theory in Ritual (Chicago, London: The University of Chicago Press, 1987), 103-104.

-39- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety as to the Prophet Muḥammad.14 In many mazārs, the ritual practices of ziyārat are central in marking the space as sacred and legitimizing narratives about the saint interred there.

For example, in the popular shrine of ‘Alī ibn Abī Ṭālib at Mazār-i Sharīf there is a long period of time when the site is supposedly forgotten, essentially losing its sacred status until its “rediscovery” in the Timurid period. The shrine again becomes sacred partly because of ziyārat rituals that recommence at the site.15

Ritual and Worship in Islam

The category of ‘ritual’ is problematic in the context of pre-modern Islam as well. Roy

Mottahedeh argues that while it can be a useful tool of analysis for historians, it did not exist as an “overt category” in the medieval Islamicate world. He suggests understanding

meaning to serve or worship (a ع- ب- د ritual in terms of ‘ibādat, from the Arabic root god). Mottahedeh translates ‘ibādat as “divine services” that encompass all actions that

“express the relationship and attitude of an individual to God.”16 This issue with ritual as a category is not only a problem in the study of Islam. Catherine Bell contends that the

“idea of ritual is itself a construction, that is, a category or tool of analysis built up from a sampling of ethnographic descriptions and the elevation of many untested assumptions; it

14 See: Marion Katz, “The Hajj and the Study of Islamic Ritual,” Studia Islamica 98/99 (2004): 95-129.; William Graham, “Islam in the Mirror of Ritual,” in Islam’s Understanding of Itself, ed. Richard G. Hovannisian and Speros Vyronis (Malibu, CA: Udena Publications, 1983), 53-71.; Juan Eduardo Campo, “Authority, Ritual and Spatial Order in Islam,” Journal of Ritual Studies 5 (1991): 65-91.

15 See: R.D. McChesney, Waqf in Central Asia: Four Hundred years in the History of a Muslim Shrine, 1480-1889 (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1991).

16 Roy P. Mottahedeh, “Faith and Practice, Muslims in Historic Cairo,” in Living in historic Cairo: past and present in an Islamic city, eds. F. Daftary, E. Fernea, and A. Nanji (London; Seattle, WA: Azimuth Editions in Association with the Institute of Ismaili Studies; University of Washington Press, 2010), 116.

-40- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety has been pressed into service in an attempt to explain the roots of religion in human behavior in ways that are meaningful to Europeans and American of this century.”17

In recent years there has been increasing interest in the study of the nature and meaning of various Islamic rituals, from the Hajj pilgrimage in Mecca to the five daily

ṣalāt (prayers). Questions of ritual efficacy, sacramentality, and mythic commemoration arise in this discussion. Much as other religious studies scholars, early scholars of Islamic ritual and practice framed their work in terms of a search for the origins. There was a great deal of interest in determining how much of Islamic practice had been influenced either directly or in response to Judaism, Zoroastrianism, and the religious traditions of the pre-Islamic Arabs. There was less interest in understanding how ritual actually functioned in the lives of Muslims and in their society. Current scholarship is more attuned to these latter questions and there has been a great deal of literature in the past decade about Islamic piety and the meaning of Muslim ritual. For example, in her study of the Hajj, Marion Holmes Katz shows how medieval Muslim scholars saw no incoherence in defining the rituals of Hajj as ethical necessities requiring no other justification than being a commandment of God while simultaneously discussing the mythic histories of each act and the exact sorts of reward a Muslim could expect if he/she completed them properly.18 In this article, Katz critiques, on one hand, William Graham’s treatment of Hajj ritual as “an exercise in pure obedience to God devoid of any concept of ritual efficacy or mythic reenactment” and on the other, Juan Campo’s characterization of

17 Catherine Bell, Ritual: Perspectives and Dimensions, 21.

18 Marion Holmes Katz, “The Hajj and the Study of Islamic Ritual,” Studia Islamica, No. 98/99 (2004): 95- 129.

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Hajj ritual as ultimately political in nature.19 In another work on the Muslim ṣalāt or prayer, Katz shows the dual nature of the ritual: it encompasses both “the texture of the individual’s relationship with the divine” as well as “the concrete efficacy” of the practice.20

This chapter will use the terms ritual, worship, and ‘ibādat, with all the limitations of this category in mind, in discussing shrine visitation. Ziyārat or ziyārat al-qubūr, the visiting of shrines and the rituals that it entails, was perhaps one of the most important and widespread Islamic, devotional practice or “divine service” performed by Muslims across the medieval Near East and Central Asia, at times eliciting more zeal than obligatory rituals such as the Friday prayer. The veneration of saints and the visiting of shrines played a central role in religion in this time for all segments of society. The shrine

(mazār, lit. place that is visited) can be seen as an arena of culture and religion, alongside other public places such as the mosque or the bazaar. Sultans and nobility showed their reverence to saints living and dead at shrines,21 Sufis gathered in these sacred spaces to

19 Marion Holmes Katz, “The Hajj and the Study of Islamic Ritual,” 98-99.

20 Marion Holmes Katz, Prayer in Islamic Thought and Practice (Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 36-37.

21 Sufis and sultans had a complex relationship at this time; certain Sufi saints had great power and influence among the people and could negotiate on their part with the Sultan and/or his representatives. In one instance we find the Naqshbandī shaykh Khwāja Ahrār almost ruling Samarqand. One of the most interesting and common relationship we find is one of the Sufi giving legitimacy to the Sultan while he in turn gives his patronage, in the form of building and endowing a khānaqāh (Sufi lodge) or a shrine. For more on this reciprocal relationship see: O. Safi, "Bargaining with Baraka: Persian Sufism, 'Mysticism,' and Pre-Modern Politics." Muslim World 90.3 (2000): 259-288.; B. Manz, Power, Politics and Religion in Timurid Iran (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), chapters 6-7, pp. 178-244.; M.E. Subtelny, Timurids in Transition: Turko-Persian Politics and Acculturation in Medieval Iran (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2007), chapters 5-6, pp. 148-228. For Khwāja Ahrār see: J. Paul, “Forming a Faction: The Himayat System of Khwaja Ahrar,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 23, No. 4 (Nov., 1991), pp. 533-548.; J.A. Gross, “The Economic Status of a Timurid Sufi Shaykh: A Matter of Conflict or Perception?” Iranian Studies, Vol. 21, No. 1/2, Soviet and North American Studies on Central Asia (1988), pp. 84-104.; J.A. Gross, “Authority and Miraculous Behavior: Reflections on Karāmat Stories of Khwāja ‘Ubaydallāh Ahrār,” in The Legacy of Persian Sufism, ed. L. Lewisohn (London: Khaniqahi-Nimatullahi Publications, 1992), 159-71.

-42- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety learn from their masters and to undertake spiritual exercises, students gathered to listen to lectures, and common pilgrims came as well to listen to preachers and partake in the baraka of the shrine.

Origins of Ziyārat

There is much scholarly discussion as to the exact origins of this practice and continued interest in how Muslim rulers and religious people came to terms with monumental commemoration of graves, whether secular or religious, in spite of what many scholars saw as Prophetic and shari‘ī injunctions against it. The earliest form of formalized ziyārat was the cult of the Prophet Muḥammad, whose burial place became an important site of prayer by the second/eighth century. The role of the Prophet Muḥammad and the mythic status accorded to him by Muslims grew as time passed. As the person of Muḥammad became more central to the faith of Muslims, so too did reverence for places and even people (see Chapter 4 on the importance of Ahl-i Bayt) connected to him. In light of this, it seems natural that his final resting place, which had also been his home when he was alive, would take on a sacred status and become a place of visitation. Indeed the widely revered Sunni scholar, Abū Hāmid al-Ghazālī (d. 505/1111), reiterates a hadith of the

Prophet Muḥammad saying: “Whoever visits me at Medina, seeking thereby a reward from God, for him shall I intercede and bear witness of the Day of Arising.”22 Similarly, other aspects of the Prophet Muḥammad’s life were amplified, especially that which had supernatural associations. For example, the isrā’ and mi‘rāj (night journey and ascension

22 Al-Ghazālī, The Remembrance of Death and the Afterlife, Book XL, The Revival of the Religious Sciences (Kitāb Dhikr al-mawt wa mā ba‘dahu: Ihyā ‘ulūm al-dīn), trans. T.J Winter (Cambridge: Islamic Texts Society, 1989), 113.

-43- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety to Heaven) of the Prophet became a focus of popular piety and Sufi inspiration.23

Celebrations of the birth of the Prophet (mawlid) and the visiting of ‘Alid tombs soon became common as well.24

Requirements for levelling the grave (taswiya al-qubūr), not building over them, and prohibiting prayer at graves are found in the hadith sources and were actively used to support attacks against ziyārat. The most well-known and strident opponent of visiting graves and shrines was the thirteenth/fourteenth-century Hanbali jurist Taqī al-Dīn

Aḥmad ibn Taymiyya (d. 728/1328). Ibn Taymiyya first and foremost challenged the idea of specific shrines and graves being favored as places of prayer, particularly of du‘ā’

(supplication) which he saw as a central part of ‘ibādat.25 With exception to the holy places mentioned by the Prophet—various sites in Mecca associated with Hajj, the

Prophet’s masjid in Medina, and al-Aqṣā in Jerusalem—no other place should be held up as especially efficacious in having supplications answered. Traveling long distances in order to visit a grave was also brought into question by the late-fifteenth-century scholar,

Fażl Allāh b. Rūzbihān Khunjī and will be discussed below. Ibn Taymiyya vehemently proscribed the practice of praying near graves because it was reminiscent of pre-Islamic

23 Mi‘rāj-nāmas were common in the medieval period and were often used to help teach Islamic norms to newly converted populations. They are quite interesting in that it is often possible to discern which populations they were written for: whether Zoroastrians or Jews, the details and even structure of the story of the Prophet Muḥammad’s mi‘rāj are adapted to speak most convincingly to that particular community. See: eds. C. Gruber and F. Colby, The Prophet's Ascension: Cross-cultural Encounters with the Islamic Mi'rāj Tales (Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 2010). and C. Gruber, The Ilkhanid Book of Ascension: A Persian-Sunni Prayer Manual (London : Tauris Academic Studies, 2009).

24 Interestingly, Shi‘i theologians and jurists never had any sort of problem with either grave visitation, intercession, or the building of large funerary structures. These tensions are found constantly in the discourse of Sunni ‘ulamā’. For more on this see: T. Leisten, "Between Orthodoxy and Exegesis: Some Aspects of Attitudes in the Shariʿa Toward Funerary Architecture," Muqarnas 7 (1990): pp. 12-22.

25 C.S. Taylor, In the Vicinity of the Righteous: Ziyāra and the Veneration of Muslim Saints in Late Medieval Egypt (Leiden, Boston, Koln: Brill, 1999), 174-175.

-44- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety and Christian practices. His final argument against ziyārat stemmed from his rejection of the idea of intercession:

The heart of the problem, he argues, lies in people’s inability to accept that God could or would hear the prayers of anyone as insignificant as themselves without the agency of intermediaries in closer proximity to God…In responding to this widespread perception, Ibn Taymiyya explains that even if a prophet were closer and more important to God than are average individuals, that only means that God would give the prophet or saint a greater reward than He would give others. It does not imply the God would give individuals anything more than they deserved in their own right, simply because they beseeched Him through the agency of a prophet rather than appealing to Him directly.26

Early Western scholarship on ziyārat and shrines often began by confronting this seeming contradiction. For example, K.A.C. Creswell concluded that the practice of erecting shrines or any sort of edifice over a grave to be contrary to Hadith strictures and counted the tomb of al-Muntasir (d. 248/862) by his Greek mother as the first such mausoleum, indicating a non-Islamic source for the practice.27 There is also a long tradition of scholarship that placed the origins of commemorative funerary monuments with Shi‘i inclinations in the mid-ninth-century and with the Fatimid political concerns in

Egypt. Taylor argues that there is no real proof in these claims. The rise of funerary architecture and its associated ziyārat practices across the Muslim world is much more complex than being simply a Fatimid invention; the practice probably had multiple points of origin. Most importantly, the rise of the cult of saints within Sunni Islam played a large

26 Taylor, In the Vicinity of the Righteous: Ziyāra and the Veneration of Muslim Saints in Late Medieval Egypt, 174-175.

27 K.A.C. Creswell, The Muslim Architecture of Egypt, vol. 1 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1952-1959), 138.

-45- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety role in influencing ziyārat.28 The fact that this sort of funerary architecture was so widespread and commonly accepted raises the question as to how much early Muslims were really against tomb construction. Varying accounts persist in the hadith record itself as to the practice of leveling graves and the existence of markers at cemeteries. Yusuf

Raghib tells of a companion of the Prophet, Abū Baṣīr, being buried in 628-9 C.E. and gives an anecdote from al-Wāqidī’s Maghāzī stating that a mosque was constructed over his grave by new converts to Islam who were unaware of the Prophet’s restrictions of funerary architecture. Raghib takes this as one of the first instances of funerary architecture, and this occurred during the life of the Prophet.29 He then tells of the discovery of the sarcophagus of the ancient Prophet Daniel in Khurasan during the caliphate of ‘Umar ibn al-Khaṭṭāb. ‘Umar is said to have ordered the sarcophagus to be buried in a river. Abū Ḥāmid al-Andalūsī claims that a chapel was constructed on the banks of that river commemorating the Prophet Daniel by name. It is unknown, however, what the actual funerary architecture of these figures might have looked like and whether these examples were simply outliers in a long line of leveled graves.

Proponents of ziyārat saw the practice as having roots in the Quran and hadith which mention the Prophet, angels, scholars and holy men as potential intercessors between ordinary Muslims and God.30 It seems a natural progression to give special

28 Christopher Taylor, “Reevaluating the Shiʿi Role in the Development of Monumental Islamic Funerary Architecture:The Case of Egypt,” Muqarnas 9 (1992): 1-10.

29 Y. Rāghib, “Les premiers monuments funeraires de l’Islam,” Annales Islamologiques vol. 9 (1970): 22- 23.

30 S.E. Marmon, “The Quality of Mercy: Intercession in Mamluk Society,” Studia Islamica, No. 87 (1998), 126. While the intercession of the Prophet Muḥammad for believers on the Day of Judgment is a well- established and largely accepted idea in Sunni eschatology, other forms of intercession (particularly that of saints who have passed away) remained a contested issue. Ibn Taymiyya and others went as far to prohibit even requesting intercession at the grave of the Prophet. However, most ‘ulamā’ and general practice during the Middle Periods seems to agree upon that intercessory powers could be accessed at shrines.

-46- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety esteem to these figures after their death. In some cases, there is the belief that their intercessory powers are even stronger after death, leading people to visit graves. It must also be noted, however, that intercession was not the main impetus for grave visitation, at least in normative terms. The shrine guides and other sources propose the primary benefit of visiting graves and shrines goes to the deceased, who is comforted by the visit. The reward to the pilgrim comes from the moral lesson they might learn as well as from rewards for performing a pious action. Numerous hadiths reiterate the importance of visiting the graves of Muslims, both family and others, as a central pious practice for

Muslims. There is an emphasis on remembering death and the fleeting nature of worldly life in these instances as well as praying for the souls of the deceased. Imām Abū Hāmid al-Ghazalī recounts an anecdote about ‘Amr ibn al-‘Āṣ who when seeing a graveyard immediately prayed two rak‘at (sequences) of supererogatory prayer. When questioned on this practice, he replied: “I remembered the people of the graves, and what has come between them and such acts, and wished to draw closer to God by praying thus.”31 In another account in the Ihyā’Ulūm al-dīn, al-Ghazālī quotes Ḥātim al-Aṣamm:

“Whosoever passes by a graveyard and neither thinks about himself nor prays for its occupants has betrayed them, and himself also.”32 Al-Ghazālī does not stop at visiting graves only for reminding one of death and praying for the deceased. He also advises that

“visit[ing] the tombs of the righteous in order to obtain blessings and a lesson is desirable.”33 The idea that the pilgrim could accrue blessings from visiting the dead becomes more and more important as time passes as the belief in intercession by saints

31 al-Ghazālī, The Remembrance of Death and the Afterlife, 102.

32 al-Ghazālī, The Remembrance of Death and the Afterlife, 103.

33 al-Ghazālī, The Remembrance of Death and the Afterlife, 112.

-47- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety becomes more widespread. Timurid shrine guides and other sources of the period reproduce some of the ideas found in al-Ghazālī’s work but also provide their own explanations of the origins and permissibility of ziyārat, which will be discussed in more detail below.

Islam as a practiced and experienced phenomenon is not defined wholly by theology and jurisprudence. Classical Islam as constituted by these jurisprudential texts is not necessarily reflected in the experience of Muslims living in various places and time periods. The law did play an important role in the lives of Muslims in premodern Iran and

Central Asia, but as in other areas, it did not hold a monopoly on religious authority nor did its privileging indicate a dual system of popular and scholarly piety. Marion Katz argues that “legal analysis, affective engagement, and mystical speculation have been complementary components of the piety of vast numbers of individual Muslims, including scholars.”34 Regardless of legal prescriptions against the building of tombs, the reality was that from the early period, they were built and venerated as holy places. Over the centuries, it seems that there was a growing acceptance of the practice; indeed, the visiting of graves for various purposes was never in question. The spiritual and physical apparatus of ziyārat, with its domed buildings, guide books, hagiographies, rituals, votive offerings simply increased over time as a testament to the widespread popularity of the practice. This work argues that it is more interesting to focus on how pilgrims understood the rituals and experiences involved in their pilgrimages and what role this played in their own individual and community’s lives and experience of religion than to dwell on the legal issues involved.

34 Marion Holmes Katz, Prayer in Islamic Thought and Practice (Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 8.

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Timurid Shrine Guides

As mentioned earlier, this period saw a rise in a new literary genre of shrine guides highlighting the important merits (fażā’il) of a city and deceased saints whose shrines ennobled the city. While the bulk of these guides are concerned with presenting the faithful with vitae of saintly men and the locations of their shrines, many of the guides also begin with a justification of ziyārat and an account of the proper methods of ziyārat ritual. This convention was not unique to Persian language shrine guides of post-Mongol

Iran and Central Asia. Rather, Sunni shrine guides existed in Egypt and the Levant as well, developing at roughly the same time as Iranian and Central Asian texts. Shi‘i guides, however, developed much earlier. By the third/ninth century, there was a call for ziyārat to Ḥusayn’s tomb in Karbala, particularly on ‘Ashura and then on the fortieth day after his martyrdom.35 Some of the earliest Shi‘i guides extant date from the tenth century and contain detailed ritual and formulae regarding purification; for example, recommending ghusl (or a ritual bath) in the Euphrates for those going to Karbala. 36

They also discuss the various prayers, prostrations, and votive offerings necessary to complete ziyārat of important Ahl-i Bayt figures.37 These guides attribute the rituals to the

Imams, especially Muḥammad al-Bāqir and Ja‘far al-Ṣādiq.38 While these guides existed at a very early date, the organized visitation of shrines by Shi‘is and the corresponding shrine literature grew exponentially beginning in the Safavid period. The structure and

35 Yitzhak Nakash, “The Visitation of the Shrines of the Imams and the Shi‘i Mujtahids in the Early Twentieth Century,” Studia Islamica 81 (1995): 155.

36 Ibn Qulawayh, Kāmil al-ziyārāt, trans. S.A. Husain Rizvi (Mumbai: As-Serat Publications, 2010), 175.

37 See: Ibn Qulawayh (d. 980-1), Kāmil al-ziyārāt.; Muḥammad b. al-Ḥasan al-Tūsi, Misbah.; Rashīd al- Dīn b. Tāwus, Misbah al-zā’ir.

38 Josef Meri, “A Late Medieval Syrian Pilgrimage Guide: Ibn al-Ḥawrāni’s Al-Ishārāt ilā amākin al- ziyārāt,” Medieval Encounters 7.1 (2001): 4-7.

-49- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety content of these Shi‘i guides differ a great deal from the ones examined for this chapter.

A most telling difference is the incumbency of ziyārat to Husayn’s tomb and the tombs of other Imams. For Shi‘is it was a requirement, much like the Hajj pilgrimage, to travel long distances to make ziyārat to the tombs of the Imams and other members of Ahl-i

Bayt. Because ziyārat then was a required act of worship or divine service (‘ibādat) it makes sense that the guides give a very detailed explanation of the ritual necessary to render the act valid. Another clear difference lies in the types of supplications (du‘ā) that the Shi‘i pilgrims were supposed to recite: these litanies are full of direct requests for the intercession of the deceased and a subsequent cursing of all those who had wronged

Ḥusayn and the Ahl-i Bayt. While there is no call for cursing one’s enemies in the Sunni guides in this study, the question of intercession is a continuing issue for them.

One of the most characteristic features of the Timurid-period shrine guides examined here, and which would continue to be a feature of later guides in both Central

Asia and South Asia, was a special section outlining the proper conduct of a pilgrim, both in terms of ritual actions, litanies, and etiquette. While a certain degree of variation exists between the instruction portions of each manual, the overall schematic of ritual is largely continuous. Besides citing various hadith to prove the validity of certain instructions, the guides have little to say about the origins of these ritual prescriptions. Nor does it seem that their audience expected such citations. By the fourteenth century a general program of pilgrimage to local and regional shrines had developed and become widely accepted. It consisted of a mix of formulae from hadith sources and other anecdotal sources, including the hadith of the Shi‘i imams, but perhaps largely formed from oral traditions which were then finally compiled and written down in this genre of shrine guides.

-50- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety

Because these guides consist of a combination of sources, reflecting the written traditions of the ‘ulamā’ and more “popular,” localized accounts, a vivid picture of religious life from the period comes across. It is clear that the binary divisions of elite and popular piety do not track well onto this context. These categories are not mutually exclusive nor do they stand in opposition to each other; it is hard to even say that either represents some monolithic or even coherent group. They provide different approaches that continually influence each other. As Devin DeWeese argues with regard to the shrine and shrine narratives of Aḥmad Yasavī, the Timurid guides debunk the “common conception that sees popular hagiographical traditions as crude and debased versions of more purely spiritual prototypes,” and show how they were incorporated together and understood in a more holistic way by pilgrims and scholars of the period.39 In the case of shrine ritual, the guides are trying to impose proper conduct on what must have been quite diverse practices of shrine visitation. These guides, like sermons, preachers, storytellers, were involved in the transmission of religion and culture and their discourse had to be relevant and understandable to world view of the community that formed their audience. The guides themselves are influenced both by the practice that is happening at shrines and whatever sort of norms the author is deriving from his own education and the general milieu of the ‘ulamā’ of that time.

The rituals performed during shrine visitation share the language and manners of other rituals in Islam, such as prayer (ṣalāt) and the Hajj pilgrimage. Those embarking on ziyārat must be in a state of ritual purity and make wużū’ (ablution) which is a requirement for almost all Islamic practices, from reading the Quran to entering a masjid.

39 Devin DeWeese, "Sacred Places and 'Public' Narratives: The Shrine of Ahmad Yasavi in Hagiographical Traditions of the Yasavi Sufi Order, 16th-17th Centuries," Muslim World 90.3 (2000): 367.

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The litanies recited at the shrines are those found in the Quran, hadith of the Prophet, hadith of the Imams, and in works of religious scholars. While the method of shrine visitation is not treated in jurisprudential texts in the same way that the hugely important obligatory prayer (ṣalāt) is, the shrine guides present the method of visitation using some similar language. For example, behavior deemed praiseworthy, such as the shrine visitation itself, is called mustaḥabb or recommended. The fiqhī (legal) category mustaḥabb is not a required activity. However, the person performing the action accrues reward for it although neglecting it does not cause harm to his/her record in heaven.

Other mustaḥabb actions include the supererogatory (nafl) prayers and giving sadaqa

(charity beyond the required zakāt). Similarly, behavior that is undesirable, such as kissing the graves and sleeping in cemeteries, is designated makrūh or disliked. By virtue of its use of common language and common symbolic actions, such as holding ones hands up in supplication or circumambulating a shrine, ziyārat is presented in the same way that other ritual behavior in Islam is understood and presented as one among many similar acts of ‘ibādat. This common language both gives it clear legitimacy and a certain normalcy. The prescriptions for recitation and action are readily understandable and implementable by pilgrims because they are not very different from other daily practices and behaviors. In fact there is nothing about them to render them as a special category apart from the other sorts of ‘ibādat that a person may undertake on a regular basis. In this way they are readily incorporated into the habitus of a Muslim devotee. He or she would already have the litanies and physical practices associated with the ziyārat in his or her daily repertoire of personal religious practice. Key parts of ziyārat practice, such as ritual ablutions (ghusl, wuḍū’), prayer, supplications (du‘ā’) and recitation of extremely

-52- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety popular chapters of the Quran, already make up many other forms of regular ‘ibādat. For example, as stated above, the pilgrim had to take the ritual bath and make ablutions in much the same way that he/she might do so for the Friday congregational prayer.

Similarly, the recitation of popular suwar (sing. sura, chapters) from the Quran, such as the Fātiḥa, Ikhlāṣ and Yā Sīn at shrines would not have been considered an extra effort as these verses are recited at various times throughout the day. Making supplications, asking for forgiveness, and even giving greetings to the inhabitants of the grave used language and practices that were part of a Muslim’s daily life.

While there is shared language and even practices in common between ziyārat and obligatory worship such as the ṣalāt and Hajj pilgrimage, it should be made clear that they were separate categories in the legal sense. In many cases the acts prescribed as ritual are called ādāb-i ziyārat and kayfiyāt-i ziyārat-i qubūr (manner or mode of visiting graves).40 Ibn Karbalā’ī in Rawżāt al-Janān wa Jannāt al-Janān titles his section on the ritual of ziyārat: Tarīq va Qā‘ida-yi Ziyārat-i Qubūr (Ways and Rules of Practice in the

Visiting of Graves).41 In this way, the ritual of ziyārat is clearly demarcated from that of

ن- س- ک the Hajj pilgrimage which is referred to as mansik (pl. manāsik). From the root we get words related to devout practice and asceticism, but from an early period it was used to refer to the rites of Hajj. In comparison to the types of ritual practice recommended for pilgrims, the manāsik of Hajj is a more involved process. For men, special garments (iḥrām) must be worn, there are various restrictions on what can be

40 See for example: Aḥmad ibn Mahmūd Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda: Dar Ẕikr-i Mazārat-i Bukhārā, ed. A.G. Maʻānī (Tehran: Kitābkhānah-ʾi Ibn Sīnā, 1960) 10, 12.

41 Ḥusayn Karbalāʹī Tabrīzī, Rawżāt al-Janān va Jannāt al-Janān vol.1, eds. J.S. Qurrāʹī and M.A.S. Qarrāʾī (Tabrīz: Sutūdah, 2004), 5.

-53- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety done during Hajj, the process takes multiple days and involves multiple sites. Ziyārat could be as easy as walking a few meters to a local shrine and reciting a few greetings and supplications. While it is true that certain shrines may have been far away and required more effort on the part of the pilgrim, it is hard to imagine any ziyārat being as arduous and costly as traveling to Mecca and making the Hajj pilgrimage, particularly from as far away as Samarkand.

Ritual and Behavior

Proscribing behavior and establishing proper forms of worship were important to the

‘ulamā’ of this period; this is especially apparent when it comes to the widespread practices of shrine visitation. Evidence of ‘ulamā’ interest in this regulation of ziyārat is found in more places than one would imagine. Not only do many of the shrine visitation guides of the period begin with lengthy introductions on the permissibility and correct manner of ziyārat al-qubūr, other sources from the period also contribute. One interesting example is found in the Mihmān-nāma-yi Bukhāra: Tārīkh-i Pādishāh-i Muḥammad

Shaybānī of Fażl Allāh b. Rūzbihān Khunjī, a late-fifteenth-century Shāfi‘ī jurist, written for the Uzbek leader Shaybānī Khān at the beginning of the sixteenth century. This work is a beautifully written narrative of events during the early Uzbek conquests in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, but as Ulrich Haarmann notes, “this work defies any formal classification.”42 In the midst of discussions of troop deployments and descriptions of the natural landscapes of Central Asia, Khunjī places a lengthy discussion of ziyārat in a section about the army nearing the sacred precincts of Mashhad. He gives

42 U. Haarmann, “Khundjī,” in Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, ed. P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, W.P. Heinrichs (Leiden: Brill, 1960-2009).

-54- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety various hadith supporting the validity of ziyārat and argues that while the practice of visiting graves was wholly in the Prophetic tradition, current ziyārat customs found all over Iran and Central Asia were rife with innovation (bid‘at) and forbidden practices.

Some examples of bid‘at according to Khunjī include: rubbing of dust from the site on ones body, kissing the tomb, and circumambulation or performance of tawāf around the shrine.43 A major reprehensible innovation of the time is the traveling of long distances to visit particular tombs on specified days.44 Khunjī argues that this practice contradicts the

Prophetic hadith promoting travel to the three major mosques, the Ka‘ba in Mecca, the mosque of the Prophet Muḥammad in Medina, and Masjid al-Aqsā’ in Jerusalem.45 In these arguments we find echoes of Ibn Taymiyya’s rejection of ziyārat practice discussed above. While Khunjī does not near Ibn Taymiyya’s wholescale rejection of shrine visitation, he is troubled by many of the same issues. Khunjī’s vision of ziyārat most likely resembled a pared down ritual along the lines of that described by Abū Hāmid al-

Ghazālī who states in his Iḥyā’ ‘Ulūm al-Dīn:

It is the preferred practice when visiting a grave to stand with one’s back to the Direction of Prayer [qibla] and to orient oneself towards the countenance of the deceased before greeting him. The tomb should not be rubbed, touched or kissed, for such are the practices of the Christians.46

43 Fażl Allāh ibn Rūzbihān Khunjī-Isfahanī, Mihmān'Nāmah-ʹi Bukhārā: Tārīkh-i Pādishāhī-i Muḥammad Shaybānī, ed. M. Sutūdah (Tehran: Bungāh-i Tajumah va Nashr-i Kitāb, 1976), 333-4.

44 The special days commemorating either the birth date or more frequently the death date of a saint was has been called many different things in the context of medieval Central Asia and Iran, including mawāsim, mawlid, and ‘urs.

45 Khunjī, Mihmān'Nāmah-ʹi Bukhārā, 335-6.

46 al-Ghazālī, The Remembrance of Death and the Afterlife, 113-114.

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Khunjī says that in his time people have come to prefer ziyārat al-qubūr over the visitation of the aforementioned holy mosques of Islam. The fear that these important places and the central ritual of Hajj would be overshadowed by local pilgrimage sites is a constant issue for many religious scholars in this period. Indeed, many of the condemnations against perceived heretics such as the Ḥurūfiyya (and even of the Shi‘is) include the preference of their shrines over the Ka‘ba and the performance of Hajj-like rituals at these shrines. While this practice was often censured by scholars like Khunjī, even many mainstream sites were described in ways linking them to the Hajj. For example, a shrine in Samarkand, the Mazār-i Juzaniyān was known as the Ka‘ba of

Mawarannahr.47 In Tabriz, there are two shrines to saints from the time of the Prophet

Moses; it is said the ṭawāf (circumambulation) of these shrines is a blessed endeavor.48

Khunjī’s condemnation also gives evidence to the growing establishment of special days to visit the shrines of specific saints to commemorate their lives and receive special baraka and intercession in the later middle period. Up until the mid-thirteenth century, most ziyārats were private affairs in which personal reasons determined the timing. Daniella Talmon-Heller shows that, with exception to the mawlid of the Prophet

Muḥammad, special festival days to visit shrines are mentioned very rarely in sources from the Ayyūbid period, whereas, these abound in later sources.49 The shrine guides do not speak specifically to the idea birth and death days of saints as special times to visit.

47 Muḥammad ibn ʻAbd al-Khalī Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya: Dū Risālah Dar Tārīkh-i Mazārāt Va Jughrāfiyā-Yi Samarqand, ed. I. Afshār (Tehran: Muʾassasah-ʾi Farhangī-i Jahāngīrī, 1989), 31.

48 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Janān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1 27-8.

49 Daniella Talmon-Heller, Islamic Piety in Medieval Syria: Mosques, Cemeteries and Sermons under te Zangids and Ayyūbids (1146-1260), Jerusalem Studies in Religion and Culture (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2007), 207.

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They largely speak of more broadly Islamic special days, such as Fridays, the Day of

Arafat, ‘Āshūrā.50 However, most of the guides are careful to include specific death dates, including the day, for the saints they mention, which may have led people to prefer to visit on those commemorative days. This is likely an early stage in the popular custom of visiting the shrines of saints on the anniversary of their death.

Maqṣad al-iqbāl-i sulṭāniyya wa marṣad al-āmāl al-ḥaqqāniyya , an early

Timurid shrine visitation guide, is a presentation of the holy shrines and places of Herat and is representative of the form later guides take. 51 It was compiled by Sayyid Aṣīl al-

Dīn ‘Abdullāh ibn ʻAbd al-Raḥmān al-Ḥusaynī Wā‘iẓ in 864/1460 for the then Timurid

Amīr Sulṭān Abū Sa‘īd Gurkānī (r. 863-873/1459-1469). Maqṣad al-Iqbāl was based on an earlier History of Herat (Tārīkh-i Harāt, the Tabaqāt al-Sūfiyya of Hazrat Khwāja

‘Abdullāh al-Anṣārī (also called Tabaqāt Mashāyikh-i Harāt in this source) and from other books, as well as the author’s own knowledge of Herat and its history. We find mention of Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ in Khwāndamīr’s general history of the Timurids, Habīb al-Siyār.52 He was a native of Shiraz but came to Herat during Sulṭān Abū Sa‘īd’s reign; he and his family enjoyed close ties with both Sulṭān Abū Sa‘īd and his successor, Sulṭān

Ḥusayn. He was said to be extremely eloquent and preached once a week at

Gawharshād’s Madrasa and during the month of Rabī‘ al-Awwal, he had the privilege of telling the story of the Prophet’s birth. Khwāndamīr notes that he was celebrated for his knowledge of Quran commentary and hadith, though it seems that he did not write any

50 See for example: Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 11.

51 Jurgen Paul, “Histories of Herat,” Iranian Studies, 33.1/2 (Winter-Spring 2000), 102.

52 Though it was begun much earlier, Habīb al-Siyar was completed in 1524 and presented to the Safavid sultan.

-57- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety sort of major works on either. He is known for two works, one on the life of the Prophet

Muḥammad and Maqṣad al-Iqbāl, which Khwāndamīr tells us was “known by all.”53

After a lengthy praise of Sultān Abu Sa‘īd, Wā‘iẓ begins a discussion of the permissibility of visiting graves. Reflective of the Ḥanafī orientation of much of his audience, Wā‘iẓ attributes this permissibility to Imām Abū Ḥanīfa, eponym of the juridical rite most popular in the area, noting that the Imām deemed the practice of ziyārat acceptable and not a sinful activity.

Wā‘iẓ presents a more liberal program than that of Khunjī in that many acts condemned by the latter are not condemned outright in Maqṣad al-Iqbāl. However, he does repeat some of the same issues voiced by both Khunjī and al-Ghazālī. Wā‘iẓ and other authors of shrine guides specifically use the legal term makrūh, meaning disliked or objectionable, when listing all actions that are prohibited during pilgrimage and mustaḥabb for actions that are deemed desirable. For example, Wā‘iẓ and Ibn Karbalā’ī deem kissing the grave objectionable.54 In Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, the Bukharan scholar

Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā’ refers to al-Ghazālī’s Iḥyā’ Ulūm al-dīn in recommending that one stand with his/her back facing the qibla (the direction faced during Muslim prayers) and face towards the grave when greeting the deceased. This is meant to differentiate between the canonical prayer and visiting of shrines in a very clear way, i.e. facing the opposite direction. Like Khunjī and al-Ghazālī, Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā’ also cautions against rubbing, kissing or even touching the grave, asserting that this was a custom of Christians.55

53 Khwandamīr, Ḥabīb al-Siyar Tome 3, Part 2, trans. W.M. Thackston (Cambridge: Harvard University, 1994), 518.

54 Ibn Karbalā’ī, Rawżāt al-Janān va Jannāt al-Janān vol.1, 9.

55 Muīn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 13.; al-Ghazālī, The Remembrance of Death and the Afterlife, 113- 114.

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Avoiding behavior that mimics that of other religions is a concern from many religious scholars, particularly in the case of ziyārat. Because many ziyārat traditions developed in areas where there was a preexisting culture of veneration of saints, shrines, and the holy dead, religious scholars tried to mark Islamic traditions as separate from those of other religions. Shrines that were shrined by other monotheistic religions, particularly in

Greater Syria, were also sometime a concern for those who wanted to maintain strong boundaries between religious traditions.56

Pilgrims are also prohibited from eating, drinking, laughing, and creating a festive atmosphere at cemeteries and shrines. This prohibition is reinforced in almost all of the guides. The emphasis shrine visitation guide authors placed on this prohibition leads one to believe that much behavior to the contrary was likely taking place at shrines. The social and festive aspects of the ziyārat experience often come through in the descriptions of individual shrines. For example, in one description of the normal goings on at the shrine of Taqī al-Dīn Dādā Muḥammad in Yazd, we find an interesting mix of activity. In addition to the typically pious actions of ḥuffāẓ ceaselessly reciting Quran, pilgrims listening to a sermon, and students of religion receiving a lesson, there is also a Sufi samā‘ program (ẕikr or remembrance of God, usually including music and singing) and poetry being enjoyed by the local elites.57

Women were major participants in visiting graves and shrines in Iran and Central

Asia; however, not all religious scholars agreed that this was allowed. Here again, we find Khunjī attempting to limit the scope of ziyārat. While he clearly sanctions ziyārat

56 See: Josef Meri, The Cult of Saints among Muslims and Jews in Medieval Syria (Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 2002). 57 Aḥmad ibn Ḥusayn ibn ‘Alī Kātib, Tarīkh-i Jadīd-i Yazd, ed. I. Afshār (Tehran: Intisharāt-i Ibn Sīnā, 1345/1966), 163.

-59- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety within certain parameters as a wholly Islamic practice, he questions the permissibility of women’s participation in pilgrimages.58 Sound hadith that show both Fāṭima, the daughter of the Prophet Muḥammad, and ‘Ā’isha, a favored wife, visited graves in various contexts prevent Khunjī and others from declaring it harām (impermissible) for women to perform the ziyārat, so most deem it makrūh.59 Wā‘iẓ presents both sides of this argument and leaves final judgment to God. He references the well known hadith of the Prophet Muḥammad forbidding women from visiting of graves followed by the abrogation of this command as the Prophet is reported to have later allowed them to visit graves. Wā‘iẓ concedes to the permissibility of women visiting but says that it is better for them to avoid it, siding with more conservative elements of society.

The place of women at shrines is another major point of interest in all of the guides; the authors, in varying degree, seem worried about the intermixing of men and women during ziyārat and the problems that could arise from such freedom. An anecdote in Tārīkh-i Yazd confirms their worst suspicions, reporting that an unmarried couple was seen fornicating upon a grave.60 Women in the Timurid period were in general more visible than in other Muslim societies. Upper class women could be seen in mixed company in various situations, especially literary gatherings. They also did not necessarily practice strict veiling.61 Some guides of the period do not even mention the permissibility of women attending graves, taking it for granted that they would

58 M.E. Subtelny, Timurids in Transition: Turko-Persian Politics and Acculturation in Medieval Iran (Leiden: Brill, 2007), 192-3.

59 Khunjī, Mihmān-nama, 332-3.

60 Ja‘far ibn Muḥammad al-Ḥusaynī Ja‘farī, Tārīkh-i Yazd, ed. Īraj Afshār (Tehran: Bungāh-i Tarjuma va Nashr—i Kitāb, 1338/1960), 154.

61 Pricilla Soucek, “Interpreting the Ghazals of Hafiz,” RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics 43 (Spring, 2003): 130-131.

-60- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety participate. However, there is often a greater restriction on their behavior, particularly in regulating the manner of female mourning and lamentation. One justification for limiting female mourning was the idea that excessive negative emotions at graves could give discomfort to the deceased. Again the shrine guides refer back to al-Ghazālī’s assessment and instructions on women at public shrine sites:

They [women] frequently utter defamations at the graveside, so that the advantage of their visit does not outweigh the harm it causes. Neither do they shrink from displaying themselves and playing up their charms in the street, and these are serious matters, whereas the visitation of graves is a Precedent [sunna]. How can such things be tolerated for the sake thereof? Certainly there is no harm in a woman going out in chaste garments such as will ward off from her the eyes of men, but on condition that she restrict herself to praying, and avoid any discoursing by the grave.62

While wailing and dramatic exhibitions of grief were frowned upon, a certain level of seriousness and decorum is required of the pilgrim. Wā‘iẓ, for example, stresses the solemn nature of this endeavor. He echoes Imam al-Ghazālī, though not explicitly, in characterizing pilgrimage to graves as a time to be sad and reflect upon death and the afterlife.63 While much of the hagiographical sections of shrine guides center on the material benefits of ziyārat on the pilgrim, the introductory sections provide multiple reasons to undertake ziyārat. They frequently remind the would-be pilgrim that ziyārat is an opportunity to reflect on death and more importantly perform rituals to alleviate the suffering of the deceased, both in the grave and in the afterlife. While this and other

62 Ghazali, The Remembrance of Death and the Afterlife, 112.

63 Ghazali, The Remembrance of Death and the Afterlife, 101.

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Timurid guides give some space to the necessity of reflection, the Timurid ziyārat was not a wholly somber experience. As mentioned above, there is evidence of upbeat behavior, picnicking at shrine sites, and general feelings of lightness. For example, in a

Yazdī shrine the following is said to have occurred on a regular basis:

Every day āsh was distributed to the fuqarā’ and masākin at the shrine (mazār), and the shrine was always filled with people reciting Quran and there was always light and brightness (rawnaq) there…64

This environment is quite different from the ideal presented in a sixteenth-century shrine guide for Damascus. The author of this Damascene shrine guide, Ibn al-Harwānī, devotes much of the work discussing exactly how the pilgrim should reflect and feel in the presence of such virtuous saints:

Then he exhorts himself with that, and he rebukes and scolds himself from falling short and abandoning inner struggle (jihād) for it. He [weeps] (yabkī) and [endeavors to] weep (yatabākā) [sic]. When he sees that from himself, he occupies himself with supplication (du‘ā’) for the state of his faith and his afterlife and asks God to repair his condition [and] soul…65

Here the focus of the pilgrimage ritual is on self-evaluation and self-recrimination in hopes of salvation in the afterlife. The same rituals of Quran recitation, supplications

(du‘ā’), and greetings to the deceased may have been performed in both the Damascene shrines and those in the Timurid realms, however, the general atmosphere and experience of the ziyārat differ greatly. Ibn al-Harwānī’s emphasis on grief and sadness at the state

64 Aḥmad ibn Ḥusayn ibn ‘Alī Kātib, Tarīkh-i Jadīd-i Yazd, ed. I. Afshār (Tehran: Intisharāt-i Ibn Sīnā, 1345/1966), 158.

65 Ibn al-Harwāni, 77.

-62- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety of the believer’s soul is pronounced in ways not present in Timurid shrine guides. In

Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā’ refers to both eschatological themes and the spiritual health of the pilgrim in a more positive way. He cites a hadith where it is mentioned that those who do ziyārat to the graves of others will have angels making ziyārat of them after they die.66 Both Rawżāt al-Janān wa Jannāt al-Janān and Tārīkh-i

Mullāzāda share the advice of the Prophet Muḥammad on the ways to achieve a softer heart. After showing kindness to orphans and visiting the sick, the Prophet Muḥammad says that the heart can be softened through the ziyārat of the dead.67

Many of the guides for the Levant and Egypt, mostly from the Mamluk period, do not give a specific course of action for pilgrimage. They list permissible and prohibited actions, certain litanies, the importance of intention, and how to comport oneself on ziyārat. In contrast, by this period a certain set methodology for shrine visitation had developed in Iran and Transoxiana, somewhat more in line with the ritual presented in earlier Shi‘i guides. To varying degrees, the steps of ziyārat, the duties and prohibitions for a pilgrim, and helpful litanies are outlined in these texts. The following sequence (or some variant) of ritual practice is found in most of the guides under consideration and is taken from a shrine guide for Bukhara completed by Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā’ in the first half of the fifteenth century.

First, while still at home, the pilgrim should make ritual ablutions (wużū’) and perform two cycles of supererogatory (nafl) prayer; in each cycle he/she should recite

Sura Fātiḥa once, Āyat al-Kursī once, and Sura Ikhlāṣ three times. The pilgrim should

66 Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 11.

67 Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 11.; Ibn Karbalā’ī, Rawżāt al-Janān va Jannāt al-Janān vol.1, 5.

-63- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety form the intention that the reward of the prayer go to the deceased. Then in a state of ritual purity, the pilgrim should make his or her way to the grave. Upon arriving at the grave, the pilgrim should always stand facing the deceased with the back towards the qibla and he/she should give a specified greeting to the deceased: “And upon you peace,

O Muslim and believing inhabitants of the grave, May God have mercy on those of you who have gone before us and those of us who will come later on, you are our predecessors and we are your successors, and may we follow you if God wills”.68 Some approximation of this greeting to the inhabitants of the grave is present in all the guides and is found in most of the books of sound hadith. For example, in a hadith found in the

Saḥīḥ Muslim, the Prophet Muḥammad is commanded to seek forgiveness and intercede for the inhabitants of the cemetery of Baqī‘ or Jannat al-Baqī‘. When he questions the

Angel Gabriel as to how to do this, Gabriel supplies him with a greeting much like the one mentioned in Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda.69

During the duration of time spent at the grave or shrine, the pilgrim should praise and glorify God (taṣbīh), make supplications (du‘ā), and utter penitential phrases

(istighfār) for the self and the deceased and then return home. There is a great deal of flexibility to this prescription, depending upon who the deceased is and what sorts of supererogatory worship the pilgrim can and desires to undertake.70 The mid-sixteenth- century Tabrizi guide, Rawżāt al-Janān wa Jannāt al-Janān, repeats these instructions

68 Wa ‘alaykum al-salām ahl al-diyār min al-muslimīn wa’l-mu’minīn raḥima allāhu al-muqaddimīn minkum wa’l-muta’akhkhirīn minnā, antum lana salaf wa nahnu lakum khalaf wa tabi‘’ūnā in shā’ allah bikum.

69 Sahih Muslim, Book 4: Kitab al-Salah, Number 2127.

70 Mū‘īn al-Fuqarā’, Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 10-11.

-64- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety verbatim. As the Tabrizi manual is a much later example of this genre, it seems to indicate that the format above had stabilized and become more normative by that time.

The author of Maqṣad al-Iqbāl recommends that the pilgrim properly greet the deceased with a formulaic greeting similar to the one given in Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda above.

The pilgrim is also enjoined to recite the Quran because this gives ease and happiness to the inhabitants of the grave. The introduction makes no mention of any additional types of ritual worship at the grave, but does emphasize that the deceased’s soul is aware of what transpires near him or her and can sense the state of pilgrims who visit. Wā‘iẓ also indicates that there is the possibility of interaction between the deceased and the pilgrim in the following anecdote: he mentions the story of one Shaykh Abū Isḥāq Murshidī who was teaching his student the Sahīh Bukhārī (an important book of canonical Sunni hadith) but died before instruction could be completed. Because the two were both of mystical inclination (ahl-i dil) this did not pose an impediment. They continued to meet at the time of their lessons, this time the student presented himself at his master’s grave, and soon completed the Sahīh Bukhārī.71 This same anecdote is mentioned in most of the shrine guides examined.

The sequence of ritual outlined above is a generally straight-forward approach to the ziyārat and it is sequencemost commonly found in the shrine guides. However, there are often additons given to this ritual in other places in the shrine guides. Even in the staid Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, the author gives another possible sequence of ritual for a pilgrim visiting the holy shrines of Bukhara which adds a special focus to the act of giving of charity during the pilgrimage: When the pilgrim leaves his house he should

71 Aṣīl al-Dīn ʻAbd Allāh ibn ʻAbd al-Raḥmān al-Ḥusaynī Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqānīyah, ed. R.M. Haravī (Tihrān: Bunyād-i Farhang-i Īrān, 1973), 9.

-65- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety recite: “There is no God but God, He is one and has no partner, He is owner of the world and of all praise, He gives life and He gives death, He is alive and does not die, from His hand comes good, He has power over all things, He is the first and the last, the apparent and the hidden, He is the all-knowing.”72 Along the way to the shrine or cemetery he/she should give charity in the amount that is possible. Finally upon arrival to the gravesite, the pilgrim should recite: “O God, I ask for goodness in my entering and seek refuge in you from evil, O Lord let me enter in truth and let me exit in truth, and grant me from yourself a helping authority, we enter in God’s name and have complete faith in Him.”73

Then the pilgrim should enter the area of the tomb or grave.74 In addition to mentioning the giving of charity, this sequence is less focused on the deceased and includes no particular greeting for him/her. Rather, the focus is on the pilgrim and the seeking of goodness from God for this particular ritual act. In this ritual experience, the shrine and its saint serve as a place where the sacred is amplified, or where it is focalized to paraphrase J.Z. Smith, such that the Divine is present to hear the needs of the pilgrim.75

Because of the fragmentary nature of Qandiyya, there is not a clearly delineated treatment on the ritual process of ziyārat in Samarkand. Instead, there are a couple lines early in the text that direct the pilgrim in his/her ziyārat of Qusam ibn ‘Abbās. The pilgrim should make ghusl and then head towards the Iron Gate of the city (Darvāza-yi

72 Lā illaha illā allāh waḥdahu lā sharīka lah lahū’l-mulku wa lahū’l-ḥamdu yuḥī wa yumītu wa huwa ḥayyun la yamūtu biyadihi al-khair wa huwa ‘ala kulī shayin qadīr huwa’l-awwal wa’l-akhīr wa’l-ẓāhir wa’l-bāṭin wa huwa bi kulli shayin ‘alīm.

73 Allahumma innī as’aluka khayr madkhullī wa a‘ūdhu bika min sharrihi rabb idkhilnī madkhul ṣidq wa ikhrajnī makhraj ṣidq wa aj‘al li min ladunka sulṭānan naṣīran bismillāhi dakhalnā wa ‘ala’llāhi tawakalnā. This prayer derives in part from the Qur’anic ayah 80 in Sura 17.

74 Mū‘īn al-Fuqarā’, Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 12.

75 J.Z. Smith, To Take Place, 103-104.

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Ahānīn). There the pilgrim should enter the monastery of Muḥammad ibn Wāsi’,who was part of the Islamic Conquest of the area under Qutayba ibn Muslim in the second/eighth century. At this monastery, the pilgrim should pray two rak‘at of nafl prayer. Anything he/she asks of God at this point will be granted.76 Throughout Qandiyya, the pilgrim is told about small masjids and monastic cells to pray in during the ziyārat of the saints of the city.77

Deep within the hagiographic sections of the guide for Herat, Wā‘iẓ presents a different prescription for ritual behavior in a narrative about a Herati tomb popularly called Qabr-i Surkh (or the Red Grave) located outside of the walled city in Qariya-yi

Sāq Salmān. The author recommends that anyone that wishes to visit this tomb “should make ghusl (ritual bath) and wear new clothes and then go to the tomb.” He also says to take 1000 small pebbles. At the tomb, after completing two rak‘at nafl (cycles of supererogatory) prayer, sit facing the grave and set your concentration to the Prophet

Muḥammad and send greetings and prayer upon him 1001 times: “Ṣallallāhu ‘alayka yā

Rasūl Allāh (Prayers upon you, O Messenger of God).” After each time you say this, place one pebble next to the grave. When all the pebbles are done, ask what you desire

(murād-i khud) and upon your returning, sweeten the mouths of three dervishes. Your desires shall surely be fulfilled.78 This sequence of practices shares many commonalities with the more general schema advised at the beginning of Maqṣad al-Iqbāl, primarily in terms of maintaining a state of ritual purity and praying two cycles of supererogatory prayer. This particular course of action is recommended at a shrine for which Wā‘iẓ gives

76 Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya, 28.

77 Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya, 29-30.

78 Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya, 68.

-67- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety only a location and no information on the inhabitant of the grave (qabr), indicating perhaps a popular pilgrimage site of unknown provenance. The addition of counted

ṣalawāt upon the Prophet Muḥammad, asking God to fulfill one’s wishes, and the feeding of dervishes pose a telling deviation from the plainer ritual sequences mentioned above.

While the ritual mentioned earlier fulfilled common prescriptions on visiting the dead

(holy or otherwise) that called for a remembrance and focus on death and the plight of the deceased, the ritual mentioned here reflects the socio-historical context of Iran and

Central Asia in this period. There was an increased devotion for the Prophet Muḥammad as well as a more substantial presence of dervishes and antinomian figures; their inclusion in what was probably a common ritual around shrines represents their importance and ubiquity.79 Including the Prophet Muḥammad and dervishes in such a widespread ritual practice as ziyārat shows that focusing on these more tangible figures was probably easier than the more esoteric focus on death and the afterlife that was advised by the Damascene shrine guide author, Ibn al-Harwānī mentioned above.

Similarly, by explicitly referring to the fulfilment of personal needs or desires, the shrine guide is engaging the pilgrim on a more worldly level.

All of the shrine guides in this study share a similar manner of presentation: in the introductory sections usually entitled “Kayfīyāt-i Ziyārat al-Qubūr” or something similar, they outline ritual sequences focused upon praying supererogatory prayers, reciting and reading important passages from the Quran and thinking about the importance of death.

In Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā’ even writes this section in Arabic instead of the

79 Antinomian figures held a popular appeal from their origins in the thirteenth century on to the modern period. The Timurid period was particularly interesting as the Timurid amirs, beginning with Timur himself, patronized various antinomian shaykhs. For more on antinomianism in Islam see: Ahmet T. Karamustafa, God’s Unruly Friends: Dervish Groups in the Islamic Later Middle Period, 1200-1550 (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1994).

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Persian found in the rest of the guide, perhaps to add to its authoritative nature. However, in the hagiographical sections, there is much more attention given to the fulfillment of personal needs and to the idea of intercession. For example in the entry for Shāhzāda Abū al-Qāsim b. Ja‘far al-Ṣādiq, the son of the sixth Shi‘i Imām, Wā‘iẓ mentions that

‘Abdullāh al-Anṣārī recommended visiting the shrine on Friday evening in order to have one’s prayers answered. He advises that a pilgrim should come to the shrine with the intention of ziyārat and recite Surah Fātiḥa and Surah Ikhlāṣ. He or she should then give the blessings of this to blessed soul of Shāhzāda Abū’l-Qāsim and then request from God, the Bestower of Needs, all that he or she desires.80

From these particular rituals, we can get a better sense of why people may have made the pilgrimage, apart from simply following local religious norms as expected of members of this particular community. Throughout the shrine guides we find evidence of benefit to the pilgrim that goes beyond the commonly accepted themes of giving ease to the deceased and raising the spiritual status of the pilgrim. There is tangible and worldly benefit that the pilgrim can access through the ziyārat, he/she has a better chance of having his/her supplications answered in the vicinity of the holy dead and could even find physical and mental cures in sacred spaces. For example, in Samarkand there was said to be a special fountain that was actually a heavenly fountain mentioned by the Prophet

Muḥammad. It is called Jūy-yi Āb-i Raḥmat and making ghusl (ritual bath) in its curative waters would end any sadness you might have and if you were sick, the waters could heal your body.81 In Qandiyya there are various important places linked to the supernatural

80 Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya, 14.

81 Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya, 29.

-69- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety figure of Khizr. The guide advises pilgrims to pray at these sites to ensure success in life.82

After various readings from the Quran and other forms of ẕikr (remembrance of

God through the repetition of various litanies), du‘ā’ is the most prominent practice highlighted in the shrine guides. Du‘ā’ is an “appeal, invocation (addressed to God) either on behalf of another or for oneself.”83 It is one of the most common, daily practices in which a Muslim might engage. It can come at any time: at the conclusion of salāt, before and after meals, when entering or exiting a place, during travel, when in need of something and so forth. Because of the flexibility of this practice, scholars and Sufis alike addressed the proper adab (etiquette) of making du‘ā’. These works aimed to help supplicants ensure that their du‘ā’ had the best chances of being received and granted by

God. The adab of du‘ā’ included proper intention, ritual purity, and finding the right time and place to make du‘ā’. For example, Islamic scholars have recommended making du‘ā’ while in sujūd (prostration) or at the time of the aẕān (call to prayer) during salāt

(canonical prayer).84 Also, special days, such as the Night of Power during Ramadan

(Shab-i Qadr) or the night commemorating the Prophet’s ascension to Heaven (Shab-i

Mi‘rāj) are commonly associated with greater chances of having one’s du‘ā’ answered.

Making du‘ā’ at sacred places, such as the Ka’ba in Mecca or near important places from the life of the Prophet Muḥammad in Medina is said to be particularly efficacious.

82 Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya, 29-30.

83 Gardet, L., “Duʿāʾ,” Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, Edited by: P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, W.P. Heinrichs (Leiden: Brill, 1960-2009).

84 Gardet, L., “Duʿāʾ,”, Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, eds. P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, W.P. Heinrichs (Leiden: Brill, 1960-2009).

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With regard to du‘ā’ in the shrine guides, a similar approach is taken where place and time are important for the efficacy of the du‘ā’. Shrines served as sacred spaces therefore du‘ā’ at these sites is one of the central parts of ziyārat ritual. A great many shrines listed in the guides are described as being places where one’s du‘ā’ would be answered. For example in Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, there is said to be two graves near the shrine of Abū Bakr Ḥāmid, if one were to stand between these two graves and make du‘ā’ (du‘ā’konad) it will surely be answered (mustajāb).85 In Herat, the shrine of

Shāhzāda Abū al-Qāsim b. Ja‘far al-Ṣādiq is promoted as a place where one’s du‘ā’ will be answered, particularly if they are made on Friday nights as recommended by

‘Abdullāh Anṣārī.86 To counteract staunch Hanbali critique of intercession, Wā‘iz makes use of Herat’s patron saint, the 11th C. conservative Hanbalī Anṣārī, as his mouthpiece condoning the practice. Similarly, as mentioned earlier, Wā’iz used a statement of Imam

Abū Hanīfa, again symbolic of Sunni conservatism, to show that it is praiseworthy to embark on such pilgrimage. He also remains ambiguous stating that du‘ā’s are answered and needs are fulfilled without giving the precise wording for the du‘ā’, which could easily include phrases of tawassul. While the guides remain cagey on the subject, other sources speak to the reality of saints as intercessors. In one example, Timur and Amir

Husayn sought intercession and the help of the spirit of the deceased saint Khwaja

Shamsuddin at his shrine in Khuzar.87

Many saints are also described as being mustajāb al-da‘wāt or one whose du‘ā’ are accepted by God. An Indian saint buried in Herat’s famous Gāzurgāh cemetery,

85 Mū‘īn al-Fuqarā’, Tarīkh-i Mullāzāda, 65.

86 Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya, 13-14.

87 Yazdi, Zafarnāma vol.1, 67.

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Khwāja Khayrcha is described as one whose du‘ā’ are accepted by God because of his great spiritual insight.88 These claims about the saint are an important hagiographic tool in creating sanctity around the saint. However, in terms of ritual practice, it suggests to the pilgrim that engaging in du‘ā’ at this particular site is particularly efficacious. As God always answers the du‘ā’ of Khwāja Khayrcha, this special state extends to the pilgrim through the proxy of the deceased saint.

The Naqshbandī shaykh, Muḥammad Pārsā was a well-known Bukharan scholar and Sufi in the fifteenth century. His writings about ziyārat also highlight the importance of getting both this-worldly and otherworldly gain through the practice. Among his works is Faṣl al- Khiṭāb in which he presents proper devotional practice for Sufis and Muslims in general. Faṣl al- Khiṭāb has been described as a compendium of the religious sciences both esoteric and exoteric89; Pārsā explains topics ranging from proper condition for having īmān, tawḥīd, the attributes and characteristics of God to the miracles of saints

(awlīyā’) and the Imams as well as eschatological issues of the mahdi and the messiah.

Pārsā came from a family of religious scholars and was probably known in his time more for his scholarship in hadith than as a central figure of the early Khwājagān/Naqshbandī

Sufī brotherhood. For this reason, much of Faṣl al-Khiṭāb is written as a compilation of

Prophetic hadith and the hadith of the Imams. There are actually lengthy sections on the special status of the Imams and Ahl-i bayt as well as how to best revere them. This latter item is of interest to this chapter as it provides a different source of acceptable practices and motivations of shrine visitation. Muḥammad Pārsā represents the highest level of

88 Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya, 24-5.

89 Beatrice Manz, Power, Politics and Religion in Timurid Iran, 77.

-72- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety religious scholar and Sufi at this time, while many of the writers of shrine guides were of a more middling level. Indeed the style and language used by Pārsā is indicative of a more scholarly audience than that of the shrine guides. Pārsā treats the Imams with the utmost reverence and gives their hadith (at least the hadith selected by Pārsā) equal weight to that of Prophetic hadith. This behavior is not an aberration, but rather is representative of the confessional ambiguity present in the post-Mongol Islam of Iran and

Central Asia, which will be discussed further in the next chapter.

His treatment of ziyārat gives a clearer picture of the transactional nature of the ritual. Much like hadith dealing with other ritual practices, in which a believer is guaranteed reward from God for his/her religious devotions, those who perform ziyārat to the tombs of certain Imams and other members of Ahl-i Bayt are promised various rewards such as the forgiving of sins and fulfillment of worldly need. For example, Pārsā quotes a hadith of the eighth Imam ‘Alī b. Mūsā al-Riḍā: “Whoever sets out for ziyārat of me [Imam al-Riḍa], his du‘ā’ will be answered and his sins forgiven. Whoever makes the ziyārat of Baqī’[where many Companions and Shi‘i Imāms are buried], it is the same as if he made ziyārat of the Prophet [‘s tomb].”90 The promise of reward beyond the basic partaking in the baraka of a shrine is found in all of the shrine literature examined here and seems to indicate that the ritual of ziyārat was understood to have a ritual efficacy in which the pilgrim received more than spiritual elevation. He or she was promised reward in the afterlife for this pious action.

The important issues of tawassul or intercessory powers of saints are not discussed openly in the introductory sections of the shrine guides. The possibility of

90 Khwāja Muḥammad Pārsā, Faṣl al-khiṭāb, ed. J. Misgarnizhād (Tihrān: Markaz-i Nashr-i Dānishgāhī, 1381/2002-3), 626.

-73- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety intercession is alluded to through the intermittent discussion of supplications being answered. The issue of intercession was an important point of debate even in the Later

Middle period. It was one of the main aspects of ziyārat that polemicists such as Ibn

Taymiyya and Ibn al-Ḥājj, and even to some degree Imam al-Ghazālī, found questionable.91 As in many of his objections to ziyārat of saintly shrines, Ibn Taymiyya was worried about too much Christian influence tarnishing Muslim ritual practice and beliefs. He says of intercession:

If one says: ‘I ask [the saint or prophet], on account of his being closer to God than me, to intercede on my behalf in these matters because I implore God through him just like the sultan is implored through his intimate associates and attendants, then this is among the actions of the polytheists and Christians.92

While this objection remains a background issue even in the more broadly permissive Timurid shrine guides, it seems clear that hopes of intercession, having one’s supplications answered, and attaining worldly and other worldly gain was a primary motivation for many pilgrims embarking on ziyārat. Throughout the biographical sections of the Timurid shrine guides, pilgrims are advised that by requesting their needs in the vicinity of a saintly figure, they are more likely to get what they ask for. There is a clear indication that the saints themselves are the intermediary though which these supplications become more effective. In one place, the author of a shrine guide casually mentions that there is a particular shrine that local Heratis visit primarily for intercessory purposes. The entry for Shāhzada Muḥammad ibn Farukhzād Khaqān, who was

“martyred” as he fought alongside Abū Muslim during the Abbasid Revoltion, is one of

91 See Maribel Fierro, “The Treatises against Innovation (kutub al-bidā’),” Islam, 69 (1992): 204-246.

92 Ibn Taymiyya, Majmū‘ fatāwā, quoted in C. Taylor, In the Vicinity of Righteousness, 174-175.

-74- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety the few in which it is mentioned that the people of Herat would come to his shrine in search of intercession (tawassul mī jūyand) and to achieve their goals.93

In addition to the recitation of litanies and making supplications, physical movement is just as significant a ritual in ziyārat. In many cases, the shrine guides call for circumambulation (ṭawāf) of the shrine or multiple shrines. As mentioned above,

Ruzbihan Khunjī and other Islamic scholars objected to this aspect of ziyārat ritual as it impinged upon the holy rites (manāsik) of the Hajj pilgrimage. Regardless of objections, the shrine guides are filled with references to circumambulation. In Tabriz, there are two shrines to saints from the time of the Prophet Moses; it is said the ṭawāf

(circumambulation) of these shrines is a blessed endeavor.94 Similarly in Samarkand it is said that anyone who does ṭawāf of the shrine of ‘Abdī Darūn receives the reward of completing the Hajj pilgrimage seventy times.95 That the visiting of this shrine is held is greater esteem than visiting the Ka‘ba in Mecca would have definitely raised the ire of opponents to the practice of ziyārat, but it is presented in a very matter of fact way in

Qandiyya. This indicates that pilgrims saw no problem in revering their local saints and shrines. Indeed, the reverence for the sites related to the greater history of Islam are not neglected in shrine guides. One of the major pious acts of saints mentioned in the hagiographical sections of the shrine guides is the completion of Hajj. Many saints were deemed saintly for their ability to go on Hajj, often multiple times. To be able to undertake the arduous and expensive journey was seen as a sign of favor by God upon the saints; but, this was a favor not bestowed on the majority of the medieval Muslim

93 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqānīyah, 50.

94 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Janān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, 27-8.

95 Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya, 82-3.

-75- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety population who could not make the trip to Mecca themselves. Instead they could visit and circumambulate local shrines and derive benefit from ziyārat in a much more accessible manner.

According to Wā‘iz, under certain circumstances the canonical prayer (ṣalāt) is allowed near the grave, but one must make sure not to face the grave.96 This is contrary to prescriptions found in all other guides. Critics of ziyārat often pointed to praying at shrines as a sign of shirk and heresy. The authors in the other guides are very careful to repeat that prayer is forbidden at the shrine and should be done at home, in a masjid, or other permissible location. This was another aspect of ziyārat that Ibn Taymiyya found problematic: prayer at shrines could lead down a slippery slope to shirk (associating others with God). Praying in the vicinity of shrines was avoided by the building of small masjids and rectories in graveyards and shrine complexes. These places often became incorporated into the ziyārat ritual. As mentioned above, ritual began at the home where the pilgrim would undertake ritual ablutions and make some supererogatory prayers

(nafl) and then head out in the direction of the shrine. Physically moving across space was part of the ritual process. Along the way there would be stopping points for additional ritual practice. Qandiyya, for example, in many instances directs the pilgrim towards special prayer sites that come before the destination shrine.

The dead were understood hierarchically. The holy dead were at the top of this hierarchy, with Ahl-i Bayt at the very top. Throughout all the works there are hints in the introductory chapters as to the difference between visiting the graves of your parents and visiting the shrine of a companion of the Prophet or a holy saint. In Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda,

96 Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya

-76- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety describing the holy shrines of Bukhara, the author recommends to always begin ziyārat at the tomb of a prophet if there is one to be found in the cemetery.97 In the introductory chapters of Rawżat al-Janān, the Sunni scholar, Ibn Karbalā’ī clearly delineates the importance of the holy dead and asks for a special amount of respect when visiting their resting places. He presents different sorts of greetings and litanies to be used for different categories of saints depending upon their importance.98 As a reader or listener learns of the hagiographic tales about the holy dead in each city, it becomes clear that there are differences in the sanctity of various saints. Some well-known saints, those with particular lineages, those with great scholarly output are singled out and much is written about both their importance in life and their importance in death as sacred sites that can benefit the pilgrim as well. These difference are even more clearly visible in the types of architecture that were built at shrines, the more elaborate funerary architecture is found at sites of saints that were accorded great respect. This idea will be discussed in more detail in Chapter 4.

In conclusion, the ritual found at shrines in the Timurid period varied from place to place, and even shrine to shrine. However, the most common forms of ritual, that of making supplications for oneself and the deceased while being in a state of ritual purity, reciting important parts of the Quran, giving charity, wearing new clothes, performing

ṣalawāt upon the Prophet Muḥammad, and feeding dervishes were not complicated acts.

They were all rituals that were common to Muslims of this time and could be found in other aspects of ‘ibādat in their lives apart from ziyārat. The ease and commonness of

97 Mū‘īn al-Fuqarā’, Tarīkh-i Mullāzāda, 12.

98 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Janān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, 8-9.

-77- Chapter 2: The Shrine as a Center of Timurid Ritual and Piety these rituals, alongside the abundance of shrines on the physical landscape of Timurid cities, illustrates the ubiquity of ziyārat in the lives of medieval Muslims in Khurasan and

Transoxiana. These factors made it a natural part of their day, in which the ritual of ziyārat was an ingrained habitus for these pilgrims. They did not have to prepare greatly when undertaking the ziyārat as they already knew most of the litanies and practices necessary for it. It was as Talal Asad says, “just a way of life and a way of inhabiting one’s body.”99

99 Irfan Ahmad, “Talal Asad Interviewed by Irfan Ahmad,” Public Culture 27.2 (2015): 261.

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Islamic hagiographical literature has a long history in the Middle East and Central Asia.

Stories of the pre-Islamic prophets, the Prophet Muḥammad, and all variety of religious figures were widespread. Early Muslims busied themselves with collecting stories from the life of the Prophet Muḥammad and his companions (ṣaḥāba). With the rise of hadith scholarship, ‘ilm al-rijāl became an important religious science in order to verify the authenticity of chains of narration (sing. isnād). This focus on the biographies of important religious figures formed the template for both future hagiographical studies as well as non-religiously focused works of history. Hagiographies of martyrs, hadith transmitters, jurists, righteous rulers, and mystic miracle workers were common in the

Late Middle Period. As such, they provide the historian with ample source material on the people who were considered important. As John Renard argues, these Islamic hagiographical sources offer a great treasury of “insights into the religious and ethical life of Muslims.”1 Timurid period shrine guides present both well-known and unknown figures as saints worthy of ziyārat and in doing so reflect religious ideals of that time.

Through the descriptions of saints’ lives, their recurring acts of piety and the miracles ascribed to them, we gain a view of what was important to Sunni Muslims in Timurid

Iran and Central Asia.

Richard McGregor points to the problematic nature of hagiographic literature, namely that it “dissimulates the creative gesture at its origin by appearing to be simply a

1 John Renard, Friends of God: Islamic Images of Piety, Commitment, and Servanthood (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008), xiii.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory collection of eyewitness accounts rather than a literary and artistic creation.”2 In using shrine guides not as sources on the actual lives and history of the men and women mentioned in it, but rather, as an exploration of the religious worldview of the author and his time period, these works become more reliable sources. Even when biographies of older figures are recycled, copied from other works, and presented anew, they come filled with representations of what was important for the period at hand. Biographers are also bound by contemporary social conventions, the worldviews of their time, the source material available to them, and other biases that limit all writers. Bringing forth these biases and social conventions can further illuminate religious ideas of the time. Historians who make use of hagiographic material have convincingly argued for the benefit of such sources while understanding the dangers inherent in them. For example, while Patrick

Geary acknowledges that the vitae of saints are largely composed of topoi instead of fact:

they are nonetheless differentiated in the choice and arrangement of topoi; and while little can be learned from vitae in the way of specific factual data, changes in religious devotion and attitudes towards a great variety of activities can be inferred from differences in subject matter, types of miracles, and structure of vitae of different periods.3

The biographies of deceased saints found in shrine guides are particularly interesting because they purport to reflect a more inclusive evaluation of the saints, written for an audience larger than one’s Sufi brethren. The audience of shrine guides includes all those who might want to undertake ziyārat to the shrines of these saints.

2 Richard McGregor, “Intertext and Artworks: Reading Islamic Hagiography,” Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses 43.3 (2014): 426-7.

3 Patrick Geary, Furta Sacra: Thefts of Relics in the Central Middle Ages (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991), 10.

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Because of this more “popular” orientation, the biographies in shrine guides can shed light on how sanctity was constructed and understood in more general terms. In order to do this, this chapter focuses on shrine guides and common trends among them. The hagiographies in the guides will also be contrasted with those found in other types of hagiographical texts of the time, such as Jāmī’s Nafaḥāt al-Uns and Fakhr al-dīn ‘Alī al-

Kāshifī s Rashaḥāt ‘ain al-ḥayāt.

Valāyat or Vilāyat and the associated term valī (plural awlīyā’) are used here to denote sainthood and saint respectively. These are contested and difficult terms. They have roots in the Quran but came to encompass a larger meaning over centuries of religious and mystical scholarship. Many modern scholars have discussed the philological aspects of the term and its applicability to the political, legal and religious spheres of Sunni society.4 It denotes spiritual and/or temporal authority and is applied in different ways in these aforementioned spheres. Still another dimension of this term is found in Shiism in relation to a special loyalty due to the Imams. Valāyat comes from the

which means “to be near, adjacent, contiguous to.”5 In the religious و-ل- ی Arabic root sense it points to the close and intimate relationship a particular religious person has with

God that marks him/her as special; in this case Valāyat is often translated as sainthood.

The oft cited verse in the Quran, “Behold! Verily the Friends of God [Awliyā’ Allāh] are those on whom fear cometh not nor do they grieve,”6 is used by later Sufis to underscore

4 See: Gerald T. Elmore, Islamic Sainthood in the Fullness of Time: In al-‘Arabī’s Book of the Fabulous Gryphon (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 1999), 109-130.; Mawil Y. Izzi Dien and P.E. Walker, “Wilāya,” in Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, ed. P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, W.P. Heinrichs (Leiden: Brill, 1960-2009).

5 Mawil Y. Izzi Dien and P.E. Walker, “Wilāya,” in Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition.

6 Qur’an, 10:62.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory the presence of sainthood in the very fabric of Islam; however, the idea developed over the course of many centuries. By the Late Middle period the valī was understood as the one who has the status of valāyat and is translated either as saint or as a friend of God.

Sainthood and saint are terms taken from Christian theology but are used here in a somewhat different way. The lack of a formalized hierarchy approving the sainthood of a figure marks the Islamic saint apart from the Christian saint. However, the saint’s social function as the pinnacle of piety and his/her proximity to God along with his/her miraculous nature and his/her ability to confer baraka (blessings or grace), whether dead or alive, shares many parallels with a Christian saint and justifies the usage of this terminology in the Islamic context.

While valī and valāyat became commonly used by the Late Middle period, there were many terms used to describe sanctity. Michel Chodkiewicz points to the Quranic usage of terms such as aṣḥāb al-yamīn and muqarrabūn as other indicators of sanctity and nearness to God.7 The shrine guides for Timurid cities do not always make explicit use of the word valāyat or valī, rather they allude the fact that the religious figure is a saint, for example by saying that he/she is among the arbāb-i kashf (masters of the

Unveiling) or that quṭb-i rabbānī (divine pole) or ṣāḥib-i karāmāt (miracle worker). This is not to say; however, that awliyā’ is not used at all. In some instances, such as in Ibn

Karbalā’ī’s Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, there is an extensive use of the term in ways found in most Sufi works on valāyat at the time, particularly that of Jāmī. This similarity makes sense because Ibn Karbalā’ī was a Kubravī Sufi himself. He also devoted the last couple chapters of his shrine guide to the biography of his Sufi master

7 M. Chodkiewicz, “La sainteté et les saints en islam” in Le Culte des Saints dans le Monde Musulman, eds. H. Chambert-Loir and Cl. Gillot (Paris: École Français d’Extrème Orient, 1995), 15.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory and to a short history of the order. Ibn Karbalā’ī speaks highly of the awlīyā’ in Tabriz throughout the introductory sections of his guide as well as in the biographical section.8

He reiterates the centrality of awlīyā’ to humanity by arguing that the world itself is only upright by the order of God because of the existence of the select from among the anbīyā’

(messengers), awṣiyā’ (guardians), awliyā’, urafā’ (gnostics) and ‘ulamā’, counting the saints as important as these other religious figures.9

In other shrine guides, these terms are often largely undefined because valī/awliyā’ had become so widespread by this time and authors could justifiably assume that their audience would understand exactly what they were talking about. The author will often preface sections of their guide by stating that the following section will discuss the most important of awlīyā’ of the particular city.10 The term comes up again in the biographies of the deceased figures, where the designation of valī is one of many epithets used for the figure. For example, in Maqsad al-Iqbāl, Mawlāna Jalāl al-Dīn Zāhid

Marghābī is described as “quṭb (pole) al-awlīyā’ wa’l-awtād (lit. tent pegs, indicates an important category in the Sufi hierarchy of saints)” as well as “the greatest of his time and a scholar of the zāhir and bāṭin (exoteric and esoteric).”11 In another entry in Maqsad al-Iqbāl, Zayn al-Dīn ‘Alī Kulāh is described as undoubtedly (bilā shak) one of the awlīyā’, but no additional information is given to explain why he is considered as such.12

8 Ḥusayn Karbalāʹī Tabrīzī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, eds. J.S. Qurrāʹī and M.A.S. Qarrāʾī (Tabrīz: Sutūdah, 2004), 17-18.

9 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Jinān, vol.1, 18-19.

10 See for example: Aṣīl al-Dīn ʻAbd Allāh ibn ʻAbd al-Raḥmān al-Ḥusaynī Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, ed. R.M. Haravī (Tihrān: Bunyād-i Farhang-i Īrān, 1973), 11.

11 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 45-46.

12 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 76.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory

Again in this case, the author assumes his audience would either readily understand why a figure would be a saint or that the details were unimportant.

One of the earliest presentations of a coherent doctrine of valāya is found in al-

Ḥakīm al-Tirmiẕī’s (d. ca between 318/936-320/938) Kitāb khatm al-awlīya. In it, he discusses the difference between nubuwwa (prophethood) and walāya (sainthood): a prophet receives inspiration (wahy) from God through an intermediary spirit (Gabriel, for example, in the case of the Prophet Muḥammad). It is required for all believers to accept the truth of this. In contrast, a saint, through mystical exertions, receives inspiration

(ilhām) from God that induces a sort of peace in his/her heart. It is not obligatory for

Muslims to accept the valāya of a saint nor is the “authority of sainthood…binding upon the believing community” as is the authority of a Prophet.13 Ḥakīm al-Tirmiẕī also articulates one of the many versions of a special assembly of saints, which is present in the hadith literature. This assembly, with its hierarchy of saints is a recurring theme in the hagiographies of the Timurid shrine guides and will be discussed in more detail below.

Sainthood was most famously explicated by the Andalusian mystical philosopher Ibn

‘Arabī (d. 1240), whose definitions were widely popular and accepted in the Later

Middle Period. He divides up prophecy (nubuwwa) into two aspects, one with a legislative component and one that is more general. The former ended with the death of the Prophet Muḥammad; however, the latter (nubuwwa ‘āmma) is the same as valāya and exists to guide humanity after the Prophet Muḥammad’s death.14

13 Richard J.A. McGregor, Sanctity and Mysticism in Medieval Egypt: The Wafa Sufi Order and the Legacy of Ibn ‘Arabi (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2004), 10-11.

14 McGregor, Sanctity and Mysticism in Medieval Egypt, 23.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory

Nūr al-Dīn Abd al-Raḥmān Jāmī (d. 1492) begins his Nafaḥāt al-uns min al- hażrāt al-quds, a hagiography of Sufis from the eighth century to Jāmī’s present fifteenth century, with a clarification of the terms valāyat and valī that follows the consensus of

Sufis until his time. Hamid Algar has said that Jāmī “represented a summation of the learned and spiritual traditions of the Persian-speaking world, especially Khorasan, on the eve of the transformations wrought by the Safavid conquest.”15 This is very much the case in his explanation of the concept of valāyat. He divides valāyat into two categories: the first is valāyat-i ‘āmma which is accessible to all believers.16 He refers to the Quran to better explain this category: “Allah is the valī of those who believe. He brings them from the darkness into the light.”17 The second category is valāyat-i khāṣṣa and is reserved for those elite among Muslims who achieve mystical union with God. Jāmī presents a long discussion of the intricacies of fanā’ and baqā’ and quotes other important scholars to establish the importance of this union in determining a valī of this category. This definition is akin to one given by Abu’l-Qāsim al-Qushayrī, where a valī is one “who takes care of God’s worship and piety.”18 In much the same language as that employed by Ibn Karbalā’ī, Jāmī too contends that the awlīyā’ are second only to the

Prophet Muḥammad in importance and they are the reason for baraka (divine grace) on earth.19 The valāyat-i khāṣṣa reflects the category of saint found in the shrine guides; however, the shrine guides often define a saint’s sanctity using a combination of his/her

15 Hamid Algar, “Jāmī ii. And Sufism,” in Encyclopedia Iranica, 2008.

16 Nūr al-Dīn ‘Abd al-Raḥmān Jāmī, Nafaḥāt al-Uns min Ḥażarāt al-Quds, ed. Maḥmūd ‘Ābidī (Tihrān: Ītilā‘āt, 1382/2003), 3.

17 Qur’an, 2:157.

18 Abū’l-Qāsim al-Qushayrī, Risala, quoted and trans. McGregor, Sanctity and Mysticism in Medieval, 18.

19 Jāmī, Nafaḥāt al-Uns, 15.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory religious knowledge and the righteous and miraculous life he/she led rather than on the technicalities of his/her mystical journeys.

William Chittick argues that in the mainstream Islamic tradition it is generally thought that “God chooses as his friends those who embody the best qualities of the human race.”20 This chapter will examine the “best qualities” necessary for the construction and understanding of sanctity in the context of Timurid shrines. What sorts of saints were accorded the most veneration and for what reasons? What does this tell us about the ideals of piety and practice in Timurid Iran and Central Asia? This chapter is an attempt to understand more clearly what was considered religiously important by Sunni

Muslims in this period.

Construction of Sanctity: Saints as Exemplars

Saints are generally presented and remembered as the best of their time, either in general terms or for more specific achievements. For example, a saint can be described as the best of scholars, the most ascetic, the most pious and in other superlative forms. For example, Shaykh Abū Ya‘lī ibn Mukhṭār is described as among the “akābir al-dīn”

(grandees of religion) and “afāżil-i ‘ulamā’-yi ahl-i yaqīn (one of the most virtuous of mystical scholars).”21 It seems natural that only the best of the best would find mention in hagiographical works. However, the way their superiority is expressed is important. As discussed above, for many elite Sufis, achieving true union with God and going through the proper stages of this process were central in defining who was a true valī. The shrine

20 Chittick, Ibn ‘Arabi: Heir to the Prophets (Oxford: One World Publications, 2007). 12.

21 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 20.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory guides have a much looser definition and excellence in any number of religiously important areas seems to be sufficient to confer sanctity on a person.

In many instances, particularly when not much else is known about a saint, it is enough to say that he is worthy of ziyāraṭ simply because he is a valī (e.g. “Az asḥāb-i vilāyat būda”).22 The implication is that because he is close to God for whatever undisclosed reason, he is of religious importance. This lack of specificity may be purposeful, as what exactly makes one a valī is contested and often persistently vague.

Michel Chodkiewicz argue that Sufi writers have “an evident desire to be discreet on the subject of what constitutes valāya per se” and may therefore not incline to define their terms.23 The more usual case is that the figure in question will be introduced and discussed in glowing terms specifically praising his/her excellence. This may be due to more information being available to the author regarding the background of the deceased saint or in order to cater to the desires of the author’s audience. When a figure is known as a scholar of one or more religious sciences (fiqh, kalām, tafsīr etc.) or as a Sufi, he/she is most often described as being the best in those things. If it is unknown exactly in which field his/her religious training lay, he/she might be said simply to be superior in the exoteric (‘ilm-i zāhir) and esoteric (‘ilm-i bāṭin) sciences. The author of Tārīkh-i

Mullāzāda puts this in a slightly different way; a scholar-saint is most frequently referred to as an important or greatest “‘ālim wa ‘āmil (scholar and doer of good acts).” Another way that the excellence of a saint is stated is in praising his/her high degree of achievement: Khwāja Abū Ḥafṣ Aḥmad ibn Ḥafṣ (d. 217AH) is said to have the highest

22 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 31.

23 Chodkiewicz, Seal of the Saints: Prophethood and Sainthood in the Doctrine of Ibn ‘Arabī (Cambridge: Islamic Texts Society, 1993), 33.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory rank (daraja-yi a‘lā) in ‘ilm (knowledge, scholarship), ‘amal (good works), quwwat-i mujāhadat (strength of his exertion), ṣafā-yi ḥāl (related to the purity of his mystical state), and zuhd (asceticism).24 In another example, where it is clear that the saint is not a known scholar but rather his pious worship and abstinence is highlighted, he may be described simply as “az akābir-i zaman-i khud (among the grandees of his/her time).”25

These various superlative designations speak to the important categories upon which a saint was judged: knowledge, pious action, importance to the community, and

Sufism. One or more of these categories reoccur throughout all of the shrine guides in justifying the sanctity of a saint. Many of the virtues discussed below, such as excellence in the esoteric (bāṭin) and exoteric (żāhir) sciences, asceticism, and leadership in the community are presented in superlative form to explain the sanctity of particular saints.

The Herati saint, Shaykh Abū Ismā‘īl ibn Ḥamza Ṣufī also known as Shaykh ‘Amawiyya

(d. 444AH), was the “Shaḥna-yi Mashāyikh-i Khurāsān (representative or leader of the

Khurasani shaykhs)” because he had achieved perfection in knowledge, chivalry and trust in God (‘ulūm, futuwwat, tawwakul).26 Another Herati shaykh, Mawlāna Niżām al-dīn

‘Abd al-Raḥīm (d. 738AH) is described as the imam of his time (imām-i asr) and the authoritative jurist of his era (mujtahid-i dahr). He is also called the most reliable

(mu‘tamad) person of his time.27

24 Aḥmad ibn Mahmūd Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda: Dar Ẕikr-i Mazārat-i Bukhārā, ed. A.G. Maʻānī (Tehran: Kitābkhānah-ʾi Ibn Sīnā, 1960), 18.

25 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 22.

26 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 28-29.

27 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 43-44.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory

In the Tabrizi guide, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, we find explicit articulation of the importance of these special figures: the author states that the uprightness of the world (qiyām-i ālam) by order of God is through the existence of the select (bar guzīda) from among the anbiyā’, awṣiyā’ (guardians, executors), awliyā’,

‘urafā’ (gnostics), and the ‘ulamā’ who are in Tabriz.28 Here the inclusion of the word bar guzīda meaning select or chosen is important; it means that only the best or very particular people from among these groups hold this high position that sustains the earth.

In a concrete example of this special status, Ibn Karbalā’ī credits the preservation of

Tabriz in the face of a particularly disastrous earthquake to the presence of so many of these select religious figures.29 This helps to explain why we might find a constant reference to the best or greatest person of a particular group or characteristic. Authors of shrine guides describe the saints interred in their cities as being part of this select group of religious people by extolling their greatness and special nature. The elevated status of a saint contributes to their position as a figure to be admired, emulated, and most obviously visited through ziyārat.

In addition to religious personages, there are a few occasion where secular kings are mentioned. In the case of the Samanid kings buried in Bukhara, their exemplary status comes from their superiority in combining justice and piety in their rule. Those kings and members of the family that were also religious scholars or performed some sort of spectacular public act of piety are specifically mentioned as such, as this aspect simply adds to their importance.30 Sulṭān Ismā‘īl (d. 295/907) was remembered for his strict

28 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, 18.

29 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, 18.

30 Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 25-27.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory adherence to the time of the prayer, in one instance jumping off his horse to pray when he heard the aẕān.31 His father, Aḥmad ibn Sāmān (d. 250/864) was a scholar and was said to have related hadith on the authority of various tābi‘īn (the generation that came after the death of the Prophet Muḥammad but were contemporaries of his Companions) including Sufyān ibn ‘Uyayna, a well-regarded hadith scholar of the second/eighth century.32

Importance of Established Scholarly Networks

Achievement in hadith sciences and jurisprudence was an important indicator of sanctity, particularly given its early importance in Khurasan and Transoxiana. ‘Alī ibn Abī Bakr al-Harawī (d. 611AH/1215CE) said: “[there is] none finer than those of Harat, Balkh and

Sijistan for their dedication to the [religious] sciences and hadith.”33 With the shrine guide for Samarkand serving as the exception, almost all the other guides are dominated with saintly muḥaddiths (scholars of hadith science) and jurists, or saints having at least some connection to the ‘ulamā’ class. When such a pedigree could not be established, it became equally important that the saint was either in contact with such ‘ulamā’, that members of the ‘ulamā’ spoke highly of him/her either during his life or posthumously, or in the very least, that ‘ulamā’ of greater learning were buried in his/her vicinity. All of these points could serve to bolster a saint’s importance with regard to his ziyārat.

31 Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 26.

32 Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 26.

33 ‘Alī ibn Abī Bakr al-Harawī, A Lonely Wayfarers Guide to Pilgrimage: ‘Alī ibn Abī Bakr al-Harawī’s Kitāb al-ishārāt ilā ma‘rifat al-ziyārāt, trans. J.W. Meri (Princeton: Darwin Press, 2004), 32.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory

In Herat we find Imām ‘Abdullāh al-Wāḥid ibn Muslim, the son of Abu ‘l-

Ḥusayn Muslim ibn Ḥajjāj ibn Muslim al-Qushayrī (d. 261/875), compiler of the well- known canonical book of hadith, the Saḥiḥ Muslim. Besides this exalted lineage, he was also known for his own scholarship in the hadith sciences and is mentioned in Shaykh

‘Abdullāh Ansarī’s Tabaqāt for his accomplishments in this field.34 Another Herati scholar with ties to important figures of the early Islamic jurisprudential and hadith tradition is Hażrat Khwāja Abū al-Walīd (d. ca 3rd/9th C.) He was renowned for being among the great scholars of both esoteric and exoteric sciences and most importantly for his ṣoḥbat (companionship) with Imām Aḥmad ibn Hanbal (d. 241/855) and his role as

Imām al-Bukhāri’s (d. 256/870) teacher. Aḥmad ibn Hanbal was the eponymous founder of one of the four Sunni schools of law and Bukhārī was another important Sunni hadith compiler, his Ṣaḥīh Bukhārī is one of the six canonical books of hadith. Abū al-Walīd was considered a great scholar in his time; his popularity is evidenced by the three thousand mourners who attended his funeral prayer. He continued to be a popular figure after his death. Though his grave existed from the time of his death in the third/ninth century in Qariya-yi Āzādān outside of the city of Herat, the shrine and tomb in existence during the Timurid period were built earlier in the fourteenth century by the Kartid rulers of Herat.35 It is said the Shāhrukh visited this tomb every Wednesday evening and that

34 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 14-15.

35 The Karts were a powerful local dynasty that ruled Herat during the Ilkhanid period and preceded the Timurids. Their relatively long reign was from 643-791/1245-1389. For more on the Karts see: Beatrice Manz, “The Rule of the Infidels: The Mongols and he Islamic World,” in The New Cambridge History of Islam, Vol. 3: The Eastern Islamic World, Eleventh to Eighteenth Centuries, ed. D.O Morgan and A. Reid (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011); Lawrence Potter, “The Kart Dynasty of Herat: Religion and Politics in Medieval Iran” (Ph.D. diss., Columbia University, 1992).

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory everyone should go regardless of rain or snow.36 His shrine was an important ziyārat destination for Heratis and a good number of later saints were buried either around his shrine or on the route taken to visit his shine.

Shaykh Abū ‘Abdullāh Mālānī (d. ca. late 4th/10th C.) was considered among the best of the shaykhs of Herat during his life and was esteemed for the fact that he had

ṣoḥbat with the shaykhs of the Hijaz. His tomb in Tilqān-i Mālān was well visited by many Heratis, most famously by Khwāja ‘Abdullāh Ansārī, patron saint of Herat, on

Wednesdays.37 Another important Herati scholar from the fifth/eleventh century is celebrated after his death for his excellence in scholarly pursuits during his life. Shaykh

Yaḥya ibn ‘Umar Sijistānī (d. 433/1042) was said to have known perfectly the exoteric and esoteric sciences. He trained Khwāja ‘Abdullāh Ansarī so well that no one could beat him in any scholarly debate or dispute.38 The great Ash‘arī theologian and exegete, Imām

Fakhr al-dīn Rāzī (d. 606/1210) is said to have been buried in the Khiyābān area near the

Ahl-i Bayt shrines of Herat.39 Because his various disputes with the Mu‘tazalīs, Fakhr al- dīn Rāzī ended up in Herat under the protection of the Ghurid Sultan, Ghiyās al-dīn

Muḥammad. Ghiyās al-dīn was so impressed by Fakhr al-dīn’s learning that he changed the juridical rite of the congregational masjid in Herat to Shāfi‘ī and made it a pulpit from which Fakhr al-dīn could give naṣihat (advice) every Friday to the Muslims of the city.

The position and esteem given to the saint are largely evidenced by the Sultan’s treatment

36 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 15-16.

37 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 23.

38 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 28.

39 As is the case for the shrines of many famous figures, there are multiple sites that purport to be the final resting place of Fakhr al-dīn Rāzī. During the Seljuk period a mausoleum was built in what is present day Kunya-Urgench in Turkmenistan.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory of him and his illustrious burial location. The author of Maqsad al-Iqbāl does not go into detail about Fakhr al-dīn Rāzī’s many scholarly achievements, indeed, his entry is much shorter than some more unknown figures mentioned in the shrine guide. Maqsad al-Iqbāl only mentions that Fakhr al-dīn Rāzī was among the great imāms of his day and a prolific writer.40 While the entry speaks to Fakhr al-dīn’s importance as a preacher and teacher in

Herat, it says nothing of his role as a philosopher or even as a kalām scholar (theologian).

Of course, when speaking of important scholars, Shaykh al-Islām Ḥażrat Khwāja

‘Abdullāh Ansārī (d. 481/1088) must be included. He was one of the most important figures in the Timurid construction of religious identity, particularly in Herat. His shrine at Gāzurgāh outside of Herat had been an important site for Sufis and travelers since the tenth century C.E. However, the real commemorative building programs did not begin until the time of Shāhrukh. Previous dynasties of Herat, such as the Karts, had preferred patronizing Turbat-i Jām over Gāzurgāh. In 1425, Shāhrukh gave the order for the construction of a lavish shrine in the form of the orthodox ḥaẓīra (lit. enclosure, in this case indicates an open air shrine) commemorating the Hanbalī scholar and Sufi.

Shāhrukh’s choice of ‘Abdullāh Ansarī reflected his own project of creating a new religious identity for his rule. In his attempts to present himself as a sharia-minded, orthodox ruler, Shāhrukh took on various overt symbols of orthodox Islam and Sunni religious institutions. He and his wife, Gawhar Shād, patronized a great number of madrasas, masjids, and mausoleums, as well as patronized living orthodox Sunni scholars.41 A sort of cult to Ansārī had already existed in some form in Herat prior to the

40 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 39.

41 A great deal of historical scholarship has examined the religious program of Shāhrukh. See: Maria Eva Subtelny, “The curriculum of Islamic Higher Learning in Timurid Iran in light of the Sunni Revival under

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory building of his haẓīra, however, Shāhrukh’s patronization of the figure simply increased his esteem and importance to Herat.42

Jāmī in his Nafaḥāt al-Uns min ḥaḍarāt al-Quds gives ‘Abdullāh Ansārī’s genealogy and specifically mentions two of his important ancestors. One is Abū Ayyūb al-Ansārī, the companion of the Prophet Muḥammad and host of the Prophet when he first emigrated to Medina. A descendant, or possibly even a son, of Abū Ayyūb, Abū

Manṣūr Mat al-Ansārī came to Khurasan with Aḥnaf Qays during the caliphate of

‘Uthmān and settled in Herat. Jāmī has a long section on ‘Abdullāh Ansārī with a particular focus on the miraculous nature of his birth and life, and most importantly there is a lot of information on the hadith scholarship he undertook.43 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, in his

Herati shrine guide, similarly focuses on ‘Abdullāh Ansārī’s hadith scholarship, quoting the saint saying of himself: “I memorized over three hundred thousand hadith with thousands of isnād (chain of transmission), which no one else in my time cold do.”44 The shrine guide also gives a listing of the important teachers and companions of Ansārī including Abū’l Ḥasan Kharaqānī, and Ḥażrat Khwāja ‘Abdullāh Taqī.45 Again, the centrality of ‘Abdullāh Anṣārī’s religious knowledge and interaction with other important

Shāh-rukh,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 115.2 (Apr.-Jun., 1995): 210-236., Subtelny, Timurids in Transition: Turko-Persian Politics and Acculturation in Medieval Iran (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2007)., Beatrice Manz, Power, Politics and religion in Timurid Iran (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007)., Maria Szuppe, Entre Timouirides, Uzbeks et Safavides: Questions d’histoire Politique et Sociale de Hérat dans la première moitié du XVIe siècle (Paris : Association pour l'avancement des études iraniennes, 1992).

42 Lisa Golombek, The Timurid Shrine at Gazur Gah, Vol. 15 Art and Archaeology Occasional Paper (Toronto: Royal Ontario Museum, 1969), 83.

43 Jāmī, Nafaḥāt al-Uns, 336-7.

44 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 29-30.

45 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 29-30.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory scholars is highlighted throughout his entry in Maqṣad al-Iqbāl. The shrine guide presents ‘Abdullāh Anṣārī as a great but largely generic scholar of hadith and jurisprudence, without any emphasis on the specificities of his scholarship or on his

Hanbalī orientation. In contrast, Jāmī makes evident Anṣārī’s particular prejudices against theologians (mutakallimūn), those who followed the school of Abū al-Ḥasan al-

Ash‘arī (d. 324/936), and the aṣḥāb al-rāy (proponents of independent legal reasoning, usually indicating Ḥanafīs). He would not narrate hadith from anyone thought to belong to any of these categories.46 There was no reason for pilgrims to know of the intricacies of ‘Abdullāh Anṣārī’s scholarship, it is enough to know that he was a learned man and generally considered orthodox.

Throughout Maqṣad al-Iqbāl, there is a constant reminder of the importance of scholars of religion, an importance that was recognized long before the Timurid period.

‘Alī ibn Abī Bakr al-Harawī in the twelfth century CE said there is “none finer than those of Harat, Balkh and Sijistan for their dedication to the [religious] sciences and hadith.”47

In the Herati shrine guide, Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ makes mention of hundreds of saints, many of which are connected to religious scholarship. If the saint’s actual training or work is unclear, it was enough to mention that they were among the muḥaddithūn, fuqahā’ and huffāż of their time. This is the case for saints such as Imām Abū al-Ḥasan Kurdī (d. 255

AH) and Imām Abū ‘Alī Ḥāmid.48 The latter is also described as a great mujtahid

(authoritative jurist) and preacher, speaking to both his high level in jurisprudence as well

46 Jāmī, Nafaḥāt al-Uns, 336-7.

47 al-Harawī, A Lonely Wayfarers Guide to Pilgrimage, 32.

48 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 18, 21.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory as his ability to convey his knowledge to common people and elite alike.49 Utilizing their knowledge in the education and edification of the people adds to the prestige of these saintly scholars. Another example of this phenomenon is Mawlāna Nūr Allāh Khwārazmī

(d. 838 AH), who is described as “‘alāmat al-‘ulamā’ fī al-‘ālam (the sign or emblem of scholars in the world).” He was particularly skilled in “'’ulūm-i usūl va furū' (the sciences of jurisprudence and its applications)” of fiqh and spent a long time teaching these sciences in the Masjid-i Jāmī of Herat. Shāhrukh made him the khaṭīb (preacher) of that masjid. His knowledge was so vast that he never repeated the same Friday khuṭba

(sermon), a feat described by the Aṣīl al-dīn Wā‘iẓ as extremely out of the ordinary.

Perhaps more amazing is that every Friday he would be seen composing that day’s khuṭba on his way to the masjid.50

Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā’ organizes his Bukharan shrine guide in reflection of the importance placed on religious knowledge in constructing sanctity. Bukhara was well- known for its commitment to religious learning. The title of its shrine guide, Tārīkh-i

Mullāzāda (The History of the Son[s] of Mullas), points to the importance of religious scholarship in the lives of the saints presented. The first section of Mullāzāda lists religious scholars before it moves on to those saints who were more mystically inclined.

There were a great number of scholars of jurisprudence and hadith listed in this first section. Among the important Sunni scholars are: Abū ‘Abdullāh al-Bukhārī al-Ghanjār

(d. 412/1021), a hadith scholar and author of many books including Tārīkh-i Bukhāra;

Abū Bakr ibn Ja‘far al-Bukhārī (d. 325/936) was a mujtahid (authoritative jurist) and

49 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 21.

50 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 82-3.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory muḥaddith; Abū Muḥammad ‘Abdullāh bn al-Ḥārith al-Sabẕamūnī (d. 340/951) was the faqīh of the Samanid court and his hadith lessons would attract over four hundred people; and Sayf al-Dīn al-Bākharzī’s (d. 659/1261) work as a faqīh and muḥaddith is presented before further information of his efforts to spread the Kubravī Sufi order is given.51

Another important category of scholar the qāżī or judge can be found in abundance in Timurid cities. In the hazīra of Khwāja ‘Abdullāh Anṣārī in Gāzurgāh there is a section called the Maqbara-yi al-Qużżāt where a great number of Herati judges are buried. For example Qāżī Jalāl al-dīn Maḥmūd, known as Malik al- Qużāt (King of the

Judges), was the Qāżī al- Qużżāt or head judge in Herat in the eighth century AH. He is celebrated for holding this position and being excellent in matters related to giving judgement and upholding the sharia.52 A similar place exists in Bukhara where a number of important judges are buried. The large shrine complex known as the Mazār-i Qużāt-i

Sab‘a is the space where seven great judges are said to be buried. It is said of them:

“every one of them was a sun of his own time and during their lifetimes and tenure as judges they never inclined towards deviation.”53 Interestingly, many of these figures were also accorded with the title “ṣāḥib-i karāmat” in addition to their achievements in the religious sciences; for example Abū Shu‘ayb al-Sajārī (d. 400 AH) is described as “imām muḥadith ṣāḥib al-wilāya wa’l-karāma,” hitting upon three of the most important qualities of sanctity found in this period: hadith scholarship, nearness to God, and enacting miracles. The importance of miracles to saints will be discussed below.

51 Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 27-42.

52 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 46.

53 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 56-7.

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Mufassirs (Quran exegetes) and other religious scholars are also praised for their learning and their written works are sometimes noted; however, they are not given the same level of esteem as jurists and hadith scholars. Similarly the additional scholarly pursuits of Quran memorization and excellence in recitation (qirā‘āt) are also widespread among many of the saints mentioned in the shrine guides. In Gāzurgāh, there is an area where the Khalvatiyān are buried and one saint of this order, Shaykh Żāhir al-dīn

Khalvatī (d. 800 AH), is greatly esteemed as the best reciter of the Quran in his time and the teacher of other important Herati Quran reciters such as Mawlāna ‘Uthmān

Ziyāratgāh. 54 It was said of his greatness that there was none that could match him (in terms of recitation) under the heavens.55

As mentioned above, Qandiyya, the shrine guide for Samarkand, is not as focused on scholarly saints as a guide like Mullāzāda. However, the ubiquity and importance of religious scholars ensures that they make an appearance in Qandiyya as well. One example is at a monastic-type cell across from the Ribāṭ-i Ghāziyān, where many martyrs are buried. This particular cell is said to belong of Khiżr, the mysterious sage mentioned in the Quran who is a mainstay of Sufi lore because of his vast mystical knowledge. If one prays (du‘ā’) at this cell, all hardship will be lifted from him/her. The author gives evidence for this benefit by referring to Abū Mansūr Māturīdī (d. 332/944) and his student Khwāja Abū al-Qāsim (d. 342/953-4), a well-known Ḥanafī jurist. As a

54 The Khalvatī order is Sufi ṭarīqa said to have been founded by ‘Umar al-Khalwatī (d. 800/1397) in Azerbaijan. Early shaykhs of the order, particularly Yūsuf al-Shīrwānī, helped to spread the order through Khurasan and attracted the patronage of the Aqqoyunlū ruler, Uzun Ḥasan in Tabriz. The order got its name from its emphasis on regular retreats (khalvat) from society for contemplation and worship. The order spread throughout the Muslim world, but was most popular in the Ottoman realms. See: A. Knysh, Islamic Mysticism: A Short History (Leiden, Boston, Köln: Brill, 2000), 264-271.; J.M Abun-Nasr, Muslim Communities of Grace: The Sufi Brotherhoods in Islamic Religious Life (London: Hurst & Company, 2007), 119-122.

55 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 47.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory result of praying at this site, these two scholars achieved excellence in their respective fields of kalām (theology) and hikmat (sciences, medicine).56

A good deal of well-placed name dropping finds its way into many of the biographical entries. As shown in some of the cases above, there is often a real connection between the saint being described and the other scholars being used to highlight the greatness of the saint. However, in a case such as that of Khwāja Abū Ḥafṣ

Aḥmad b. Ḥafs b. al-Zabrqān b. ‘Abdallāh b. al-Baḥr al-‘Ajallī al-Bukhārī, Muin al-

Fuqarā’ finds it relevant to mention that he was born in 150 AH, the same date as the birth of Imam Shāfi‘ī and the death of Imam Abū Hanifa, thus bringing up the importance of those two important juridical schools in Bukhara.57 Not all saintly men were part of these scholarly networks. But excellence in these fields remains an important indicator of saintliness, so a pious non-scholar is made more saintly by the fact that scholars are found buried around him. One example of this is the tomb of Khwāja Jundī in the southern part of Bukhara. While Khwāja Jundī was known for being extremely pious and humble, there is no mention of any scholarly learning on his part. Instead, the author notes that a great many members of the ‘ulamā’ and mashāyakh were buried near him.58

Saints and the Hierarchy of Sufism

The idea of an assembly of saints is said to have origins in hadith literature from the early period of Islam. The most in depth early presentation of this assembly can be found in a

56 Muḥammad ibn ʻAbd al-Khalī Samarqandī, Qandīyya va Samarīyya : Dū Risāla dar Tārīkh-i Mazārāt va Jughrāfiyā-yi Samarqand, ed. I. Afshār (Tehran: Muʾassasah-ʾi Farhangī-i Jahāngīrī, 1989), 29-30.

57 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 18.

58 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 38.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory work by Ḥakīm Tirmiẕī, a native of Tirmiẕ (currently Termez in southern Uzbekistan).

Ḥakīm Tirmiẕī made use of a hadith of ‘Abdullāh ibn Mas’ūd which describes an assembly of 356 saints, in which 300 are like the Prophet Adam, 40 are either like the

Prophet Moses or Prophet Noah, 7 are like the Prophet Abraham, 5 are like the Angel

Gabriel, 3 are like the Angel Michael, and 1 is like the Angel Israfil in terms of their nature and role in the hierarchy. Among these saints, the highest position is occupied by the quṭb, the axis around which everything pivots. Other figures in the hierarchy are the abdāl (the replacements), the awtād (tent pegs), ṣiddīqūn (sincere ones) and others. When members of the upper levels die, they are replaced by those below them. Tirmiẕī argued that these saints were necessary to the existence of the earth and the protection of the

Muslims.59 This hierarchy was elaborated by many others after Tirmiẕī, most famously

Muḥyi al-dīn Ibn al-‘Arabī known as al-Shaykh al-Akbar (d. 638/1240), the prolific mystical philosopher from Andalusia. Ibn ‘Arabī’s treatment of the subject became widespread and popular after his death, especially in Iran and Central Asia. William

Chittick says evocatively of Ibn ‘Arabī’s influence that his “doctrines and perspectives did not have the limited, elite audience that one might expect. They also seeped down in the nooks and crannies of Islamic culture.”60 He argues that while most Sufis did not read

Ibn ‘Arabī’s works or necessarily fully understand them, “those with an intellectual calling, who often ended up as guides and teachers, spoke a language that was largely fashioned by him and his immediate followers.”61

59 McGregor, Sanctity and Mysticism in Medieval Egypt, 11-13.

60 Chittick, Ibn ‘Arabi: Heir to the Prophets, 3.

61 Chittick, Ibn ‘Arabi: Heir to the Prophets, 3.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory

In Jāmī’s Nafaḥāt al-Uns he specifically quotes Ibn ‘Arabī with regard to the hierarchy of saints, sometimes referred to as the Assembly or Fellowship of the Circle

(Ahl al-Dā’ira). In an introductory chapter entitled “Al-qawl fī aṣnāf arbāb al-wilāya” on the different types of masters of vilāyat, Jāmī attributes the barakāt (blessings, grace) present on earth to the existence of four thousand saints. The true state of these four thousand saints is concealed from even themselves such that they do not know the beauty or importance of their place in the world. After them, there are three hundred saints called the akhyār (good, religious ones), forty abdāl, seven abrār (righteous, pious ones), four awtād, three nuqabā’ (leaders), and one that is the quṭb or ghaws (the pole). Each of these last types knows his state and that of others in this group.62 When discussing the abḍal,

Jāmī renders Ibn ‘Arabī’s section on them in his Futūḥāt Makiyya into Persian, saying:

“the world is divided into seven climes and there are seven chosen ones called abdāl that take care of each of the seven climes. I [Ibn ‘Arabī] met and greeted them all in the

ḥaram (sanctuary) in Mecca. They returned my greeting and I spoke with them. I have never met anyone like them except for one man in Konya.”63

Ibn Karbalā’ī in his Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān discusses this hierarchy of saints in almost exactly the same way as Jāmī in Nafaḥāt al-Uns. Ibn Karbalā’ī describes the supernatural hierarchy as containing the three hundred akhyār, forty abdāl, seven abrār, four awṭād, three nuqabā’, and one qutb that sits atop the hierarchy. He makes reference to Ibn ‘Arabī and his Futūḥāt Makiyya and quotes the same anecdote that Jāmī quotes above that Ibn ‘Arabī had met one of the abdāl in Mecca. He gives

62 Jāmī, Nafaḥāt al-Uns, 15.

63 Jāmī, Nafaḥāt al-Uns, 15-16.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory further information on the status of the abdāl: There is one badal (pl. abdāl) for each of the seven climes that are chosen by God. They are all known to one another but remain hidden, unseen and unheard by other people. They are said to meet twice a year, once on the Day of Arafat and once during the month of Rajab. Finally, when one dies he is replaced by another one who is appointed by the leader of his time.64

This complicated esoteric hierarchy is fully embraced in the fifteenth and sixteenth century shrine guides. Saints are singled out as the quṭb (pole, axis) of their time or as one of the awtād (tent pegs) upon which the survival of the world depends.

These appellations are peppered throughout the shrine guides without any explanation or definitions. We can assume that readers and listeners of these guides would understand what this terminology meant or at least recognize the importance of them in rendering a person saintly. In Qandiyya, the section on the Manāqib-i Khwāja ‘Abdī Darūn outlines many of the amazing characteristics of this Samarkandi saint. He is quoted recounting meeting forty aqṭāb (sing. quṭb), many abdāl and awtād, as well as Khiżr and the Prophet

Iliyās (whose importance will be further discussed below). Meeting with these secretive and illusive figures is a sign of ‘Abdī Darūn’s great importance and sanctity.65

Many of the saints interred throughout medieval Timurid cities were understood to be part of this mystical hierarchy. For example, Shaykh Abū al-Layth Fushānjī, a

Herati shaykh who died late in the fourth century AH, is described as “Qutb al-waqt va shaykh-i abdāl (the pole of his time and the shaykh of the replacements).” The fact that he was counted as being from among the ‘urufā’ (sing. ‘ārif, gnostic) and sādat (sing.

64 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, 18-20.

65 Samarqandī, Qandīyya va Samarīyya, 81.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory sayyid, from the family of the Prophet Muḥammad) is standard for this particular group.66

Another Herati saint, Khwāja Mukhāfī who lived during the time of Khwāja Ansārī in the fifth century AH, is deemed worthy of ziyārat because he was the qutb and ghaws of his time and place.67 Bābā Khamīr Gūr Abdāl had his position in the hierarchy in his very appellation, he was said to be among abdāl of his time and spent much of his life in contemplation at the Cemetery in Khīyābān north of the Herat’s city center.68

When there is no evidence that a saint had connections to these important figures during their lifetime, they may be seen visiting the site of the shrine after the death of the saint. One example can be found at the Maqbara-yi Satājīya, a family tomb whose inhabitants are described as leaders of the world. Their tombs are described as a gathering place of the awtād and abdāl. One Khāvand Tāj al-Dīn, who was a member of the Satājī family, tells this story: “on Friday, after the prayer, I went to do ziyārat at these tombs. I saw a young man sitting at this mazār crying. The light of friendship upon his clear temple was evident so I asked him about his state but he did not reply. I returned on

Saturday and saw him in the same place, in the same state. I entreated him and he said, ‘I am one of the abdāl that by way of my leaving my manners I have gone far from them

[the other abdāl].’ I asked: ‘what are you doing in this place?’ He said: ‘every Thursday and Monday they gather in this noble place and I am of the hope that I come upon companionship with them again. On Monday morning I went and did not find that young man and I never saw him again.”69

66 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 21-22.

67 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 51.

68 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 86.

69 Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 30.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory

One of the most important members of the Satājī family was Mawlānā Jamāl al-

Dīn Satājī, who was described as “ṣāḥib-i walāyat va karāmat”, scholar of tafsīr and hadith, and also part of the hierarchy of the supernatural hierarchy. During the time of

Chingiz Khan, in the year 618 AH, Jamāl al-Dīn went to Khujand to see Shaykh

Muṣlaḥat al-Dīn, who was the Quṭb al-Awtād. Shaykh Muṣlaḥat al-Dīn was said to have lived much longer than the standard lifespan of a man because he was waiting for the next quṭb to replace him. When Jamāl al-Dīn came to Khujand, Shaykh Muṣlaḥat al-Dīn was free to die because he had met his replacement (i.e. Jamāl al-Dīn).70

Omid Safi and other scholars of Sufism of the past few decades have problematized and challenged older theoretical models “which privilege the mystic’s

‘quest of a personal experience of God’ over their larger social and institutional roles.”71

The recounting in this section of each saint’s place in the Sufi spiritual hierarchy here is less focused on the role of this particular status on their mystical journey, but rather on the importance placed on such appellations by their society. That a figure was accorded the status of pole or even a position lower on the hierarchy (e.g. badal) was more than enough reason to draw pilgrims to their shrine. In many cases, no further information was required or given in the shrine guides. That this confusing terminology and idea of a mystical hierarchy is so prevalent in the shrine guides speaks to the religious worldview of pilgrims in the Timurid empire, who are drawn to mystical lore of an unseen hierarchy of almost magical figures. It is interesting that this lore is based on the scholarly writings

70 Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 31.

71 Safi, Omid. "Bargaining with Baraka: Persian Sufism, 'Mysticism,' and Pre-Modern Politics," Muslim World 90.3 (2000): 260.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory of respectable religious scholars of Islam; this illustrates the interconnected nature of elite and popular religious thinking.

Esoteric

Jāmī’s most important measure of a person’s saintly nature was whether they had achieved a connection with God. As stated above, this connection was not as central in the hagiographies found in the shrine guides. The connection between God and his intimate, the saint, was important in another way. A great many figures are described as mustajāb al-du‘āt, or those who have their supplications answered by God.72 A pilgrim would eagerly visit the shrine of a saint whose prayers were answered by God seeking intercession on his/her behalf. The nature of the saint’s journey to God was less important than knowing that the saint had achieved this nearness in ways that were beneficial to others. In some cases, the relationship of the saint to God is given in ways that outwardly state their benefit to the pilgrim, but in most cases, this relationship is just mentioned.

The reader or listener can infer what benefit will accrue from visiting this particular saint’s shrine. The most general way the spiritual aspect of a saint’s life is given is by stating that he/she was excellent in both the exoteric and esoteric sciences (‘ilm-i ẓāhir va bāṭin). In these cases, no specific information or evidence is given to support these claims; this is also the most ubiquitous statement made about almost all the saints.

Among these saints whose spiritual states are mentioned is Imām ‘Usmān Dārānī

(d. 280/893) was known as a “great Sufi” who was particularly skilled in “the exoteric

72 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 24-5.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory and esoteric sciences (ilm-i ẓāhir va bāṭin) and in the art of Sufism (fann-i taṣawwuf).”73

Khwāja ‘Abd al-Raḥīm, a teacher of Khwāja ‘Abdullāh Anṣārī, is also lauded for his spiritual achievement, it is said that his “states (ahwālāt) and levels (maqāmāt) were beyond limit and description.”74 Another contemporary of Khwāja ‘Abdullāh Anṣārī,

Shaykh Aḥmad Kūhadastānī is simply said to have been among the “aṣhāb-i

(companions of) vilāyat.”75 This characterization occurs frequently as well and points directly to the saintly nature of the figure by highlighting his/her close relationship or

“friendship” with God.

Many of the descriptions of saints utilize categories present in the hierarchy of the spiritual journey. The various levels (or maqām) that a mystic undertakes on his spiritual path can be found in many biographical entries. Of Mawlanā Jalāl al-Dīn of Bukhara, we are told that he had achieved the maqām of mujāhada and riyāżat.76 Darvīsh ‘Abdullāh

(d. 838 AH) is described as a “sālik fayāż bi la shak” and that even though his status as an awlīyā’ was hidden and veiled from people, his maqāmāt (sing. maqām) were still known to those around him.77 Another example of a saint who was extolled largely for his mystical achievement is Ḥażrat Khwāja ‘Alī ibn Muwaffaq Baghdādī (D. 265 AH), who is mentioned in Herat’s shrine guide, ‘Abdullāh Ansārī’s Tabaqāt Ṣūfiyya, and Jāmī’s

Nafaḥāt al-Uns min ḥaḍarāt al-Quds. In other entries on a saint, there have been various differences between the shrine guides’ portrayal of a saint and that presented in Jāmī’s

73 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 19.

74 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 28.

75 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 31.

76 Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 43.

77 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 83.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory more highbrow hagiography. However, in the case of ‘Alī ibn Muwaffaq Baghdādī, the entries match up almost verbatim, perhaps both being influenced by earlier Sufi tabaqāt.

It would be tempting to hypothesize on whether Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ copied this directly from Jāmī’s work, however, the shrine guide was written for for the Timurid ruler Sulṭān

Abū Sā‘īd Gurkhānī (r. 863-873/1458-1469) before the completion of Nafāhat al-Uns.

Both works point to his yearning to be close to God to the eschewal of all else; he is quoted telling God to send him to hell if he worships God in fear of hell and to bar him from heaven if he were to worship in hopes of heavenly reward. He wants instead a mere glimpse of God. The desire to worship God only for closeness to him is common in Sufi circles and this particular statement has been attributed to many early Sufis, including the well-known Rābi‘a al-‘Adawiyya. Alī ibn Muwaffaq Baghdādī’s status was further elevated by his soḥbat (companionship) with Dhu’l Nūn Masrī (d. 245/859), the famous

Sufi and among the most venerated early saints of Islam.78

Ibn Karbalā’ī, the author of Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, was himself a prominent Sufi and member of the growing Kubravī order. This is reflected in his approach to his Tabrizi shrine guide, in which there is a greater emphasis on the Sufism and genealogical lineages of the saints of Tabriz.79 For example, in his biography of

Ḥażrat Khwāja Muḥammad Khūshnām, popularly known as Khwāja Khūshnām, he calls him “ṣāḥib-i kashf (unveiling) va ilhām (divine inspiration),” indicating the high levels of mystic knowledge he has attained. Other shrine guides would generally leave it at that.

78 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 16-17.; Jāmī, Nafaḥāt al-Uns, 120.

79 Devin DeWeese, “Stuck in the throat of Chingiz Khan: Envisioning the Mongol Conquests in some Sufi Accounts from the 14th to 17th Centuries,” in History and Historiography of Post-Mongol Central Asia and the Middle East: Studies in Honor of John E. Woods, eds. J. Pfeiffer and S.A. Quinn (Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz, 2006), 37.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory

However, Ibn Karbalā’ī goes further by tracing Khwāja Khushnām’s spiritual genealogy, though Ḥażrat Akhī Farjzinjānī back to companions of the Prophet Muḥammad.

Farjzinjānī is important because he is credited with being the first person to bring the Sufi way (ṭarīq-i sulūk-i ṣūfiyya) to Azarbaijan.80

In the city of Herat, an interesting trend is discernible as to the types of saints being accorded that honor over the course of time. Saints who died later, in the mid-9th century A.H. are more likely to be described as “majẕūb (drawn to God directly, ecstatic)” than ones that had lived in earlier periods. In Maqsad al-Iqbāl stories of saints such as Zayn al-‘Ābidīn Majẕūb who died sometime in or after 838 AH. He is said to have been a scholar of both fiqh and hadith but at the end of his life he spent much of his days on a mountain in an ecstatic state (majẕūb shuda) and sat with others like him

(majẕūbān).81 This entry is followed by another saint called Bābā Zakariyya Majẕūb, whose death date is not mentioned but was probably around the same time in the mid-9th century AH. There is nothing more on Bābā Zakariyya Majẕūb than a focus on his ecstatic state: he was famous among the majẕūbān and is said to have spent much of his time in this state at the head of Khīyabān Street, which is now the site of his mazār.82

This follows a generally established tradition where saints were buried and venerated at the sites which held importance to them during their lives. Abdī Darūn’s shrine complex is on the site where he is said to have taught students in Samarkand and ‘Abdullāh Anṣārī of Herat is buried at Gāzurgāh near the khānaqāh (Sufi lodge) where he began his spiritual and religious studies as a child. Here it seems that the place where the ecstatic

80 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol. 2, 1.

81 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 84.

82 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 84.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory states of Bābā Zakarīyyā Majẕūb occurred hold the same importance as places of religious and spiritual training, giving evidence to a trend in championing the immediacy of mystical experience to at least the same level as the more common esoteric religious behavior. From the early period of Sufism there had been differences in practitioners’ approaches to taṣawwuf (mysticism). Ahmet Karamustafa describes various early strands of mysticism as follows:

The early mystics of Baghdad and Basra in lower Iraq, for instance, harboured some antisocial and iconoclastic tendencies side by side with socially and legally conformist ones. Celibacy, vegetarianism, avoidance of gainful employment, withdrawal and seclusion, as well as a certain proclivity for outlandish behavior on the part of some mystics, must have raised eyebrows, even though these practices and beliefs—notably samā‘ of the Sufis of Baghdad, which was a blend of music, poetry and dance—may have been legally and theologically suspect in the eyes of some traditionalist Muslims.83

Bābā Ḥasan Abdāl Turk was called “darvīsh-i majẕūb.” Before he was a dervish, he was on officer in the military. However, when he returned to Herat from fighting, he gave his horse, weapons and all that he possessed to the dervishes that resided at Pul-i

Injīl (an area near the bridge on the Injīl canal, north of the old city of Herat). He then put on the rough garment of the dervishes, either made of leather or fur and went to the

Cemetery at Khīyābān to live. It is said that all the residents of Herat, be they Tajik or

Turk, would come out to see him at the cemetery. He is buried in that same area and after his death the pilgrims continued to visit him.84 Bābā Jamāl Majẕūb was considered

“among the honored majānīn (madmen).” He had originally been a schoolmaster, but

83 Ahmet Karamustafa, “Antinomian Sufism,” in The Cambridge Companion to Sufism, ed. L. Ridgeon (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015), 101.

84 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 85-86.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory after he arrived at the state of ecstasy, he spent most of his time between canals of the city. He would recite Quran and du‘ā’s as he cleaned the water in the canals and often people would join him in this work. His shrine was well visited.85 Stories of the strange things that ecstatic saints did in their ecstatic or entranced states are given as evidence that they had indeed achieved these special states. For example, Bābā Majd Dīvāna of

Yazd is described as a “majẕūbī sālik (ecstatic seeker)” and is said to have broken all of his teeth when in a state (ḥāl).86

Miracles

Perhaps one of the most important and visibly discernible signs of sanctity of the time was the miracle (karāmat) of the saint. This miracle could happen during the life of the saint or after his death. Even when not much is known about a saint, the entry for him will often contain the phrase ṣāḥib-i karāmāt, or one endowed with miraculous power, and that suffices to make his tomb worthy of ziyārat.87 Miracles surrounding saints and their shrines are discussed in various religious texts of the time. For example, in Rashaḥāt

‘ain al-ḥayāt (Beads of dew from the source of life), a hagiography of the Naqshbandiyya focusing particularly on ‘Ubaydallāh Aḥrār, many miraculous occurrences are mentioned throughout. It was completed in 909/1503 by the Herati Fakhr al-dīn ‘Alī ibn Ḥusayn al-

Wā‘iẓ al-Kāshifī, also known as al-Ṣāfī. While it focuses largely on issues of lineage and traditions of the order, it also mentions miracles and shrines of various saints.

85 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 86.

86 Ja‘far ibn Muḥammad al-Ḥusaynī Ja‘farī, Tārīkh-i Yazd, ed. Īraj Afshār (Tehran: Bungāh-i Tarjuma va Nashr—i Kitāb, 1338/1960), 163.

87 See for example: Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 20, 28.

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‘Ubaydallāh Aḥrār used to tell people about the cries “Allāh, Allāh!” he heard emanating from the tomb of Zangi Ata.88 In another anecdote, Shaykh ‘Abdullāh Khūjandī recounts the following story: “‘Quite some time before joining the fellowship of the venerable

Shāh Naqshband, I had experienced a powerful attraction. During my visit to the tomb of one of the saints, I heard a voice telling me: ‘Turn back. The object of your quest will be realized twelve years later, in Bukhārā!’” He heeded this advice which culminated in his imitation to the Naqshbandiyya through Isḥāq Khwāja.89 The few miracles mentioned in this work are usually linked to posthumous miracles that occur at the grave of a saint. As seen in the latter anecdote, the miracles often guide a Sufi to his rightful place on the mystical path. The miracles mentioned in the shrine guides are more numerous and varied. They can serve to guide a saint or a novice to the mystical path, but they are more likely supposed to elicit wonder and amazement on the part of the pilgrim.

In post-Mongol local histories we find an increased focus on saintly men and their shrines, however, as discussed above, earlier interest in hadith transmitters and other men of religious learning is retained as well. The inclusion of miracles, regardless of number, is an indication of a shift in religious authority. During the Later Middle Period, the saint is depicted as a miracle worker, as opposed to modern hagiographical works in which the saint is saintly for his charismatic preaching and instructing.90 For this reason the miraculous nature of the saint in life as well as the miracles that have been encountered at

88 ʻAlī ibn Ḥusayn Kāshifī Ṣafī, Rashaḥāt 'Ain al-Ḥayāt, Beads of Dew from the Source of Life: Histories of the Khwājagān, the Masters of Wisdom, ed. & trans. M. Holland (Ft. Lauderdale, FL: Al-Baz Publishing, 2001), 5.

89 Ṣafī, Rashaḥāt 'Ain al-Ḥayāt, 10.

90 Nile Green, “Making a Muslim Saint: Writing Customary Religion in an Indian Princely State,” 18.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory his shrine serve to render the saint as authoritative and legitimate.91 Jāmī’s introduction to

Nafaḥāt al-Uns contains multiple sections dealing with the proof of karāmāt-i awlīyā’

(miracles of saints) as well as the different levels of miracles (i.e. the difference between those of saints and those of prophets). Jāmī begins the section entitled “al-Qawl fī ithbāt al-karāma li’l-awlīyā’” (On Affirming the Miracles of Saints), stating that the karāmāt-i awlīyā’ is true according the Quran and all of Ahl al-sunna wa’l-jamā‘a agree on this point. In addition to other proofs, he uses part of verse 37 of Sura Āl ‘Imrān and the commentary (tafsīr) on the story of Mary receiving miraculous sustenance from God as proof (ḥujjat) of the possibility of miracles. His line of reasoning is based on differentiating between the miracles of prophets, which was a universally agreed upon idea, with the miracles of saints. Jāmī argues that because Mary was not a Prophet and was still a party to a miracle, then special non-prophets, or saints, could receive their own brand of miracle from God.92

Visions of Muḥammad, ‘Alī, and Khiżr are all central to the miraculous nature of these saints. In addition to curing the sick and having lions guarding him, one of the karāmāt of Khwāja ‘Abdī Darūn that is described in great detail (much more so than in the case of more interesting miracles) is the fact that he regularly saw the Prophet

Muḥammad and ‘Alī in visions. He also is said to have spent Friday and Monday evenings in conversation with Khiżr, the Prophet Ilyās, Ghaws-e A‘zam ‘Abd al-Qādir al-

Gīlānī, abdāl, and other men of the Unseen.93 Khiżr, the Prophet Ilyās and Prophet Idrīs

91 This may have more to do with religious legitimacy than with authority, as outward forms of authority can deem seemingly similar miracles as either orthodox or heretical based on their own power alone, the content is not relevant.

92 Jāmī, Nafaḥāt al-Uns, 17.

93 Samarqandī, Qandīyya va Samarīyya, 49.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory come up a few times in the shrine guides, most famously as companions of the

Samarkandi patron saint, Shāh-i Zinda, who is credited with many miraculous qualities.

Khiżr, Ilyās and Idrīs are said to have been raised up to heaven while they were still alive and continue to be alive there.94 They also seem to have the ability to move around to different places and therefore spend time with Shāh-i Zinda at the bottom of his well. He, like them, is understood to be still alive many hundreds of years after their normal earthly life. Most often, the presence of Khiżr at a shrine represents it’s sacred and miraculous nature. For example, the author of Tārikh-i Yazd reported hearing from other awlīyā’ that

Khiżr was seen at a grouping of shrines in Murīyābād outside of Yazd.95 The presence of these figures in the lives of saints is used as miraculous validation of the saints’ special status.

Sometimes a vision of the Prophet Muḥammad in a dream could increase the ziyārat of a particular tomb. This occurs in the well-known dream-based discovery of the shrine of ‘Alī ibn Abī Ṭālib in Balkh, thereafter known as Mazār-i Sharīf. It also frequently occurred around less popular shrines. For example, in Bukhara someone said he saw the Prophet Muḥammad in a dream. The Prophet said to him: “O fulān did you make ziyārat to the tomb of ‘Alī Bukhārī?” When the man replied in the negative, the

Propet Muḥammad said: “Perform ziyārat of him because everyone who makes ziyārat of him, it is as if he has made ziyārat of me.”96

94 Annemarie Schimmel, Mystical Dimensions of Islam, 202.

95 Ja‘farī, Tārīkh-i Yazd, 166.

96 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 61-62.

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Ibn Karbalā’ī mentions a female murīd (disciple) of Sarī Saqaṭī (155-253/772-

867).97 This nameless murid tuned saint had a son who was said to have drowned in a body of water. When Sarī Saqatī brought news of this to her, she said that this is not possible and God would not do such a thing. Sari Saqati repeats the news and she repeats her doubt. Then she asks to be taken to that body of water where she calls out to her son.

She finds him in the water and pulls him out alive. Sarī Saqatī asks Junayd how this is possible to which Junayd replies: “this woman is a favored person (ri‘āyat kunanda)…nothing happens to her except that she knows it is happening; so when she was informed of her son’s death she knew that it had not happened and that she must reject it and say: ‘Khuda-yi Ta’ala nakarda ast!’ (God has not done such a thing!) And

Allah in reality is the knower of all states.” 98 In this story the orthodox position on miracles is reinforced, that these are merely supernatural events that occur through the permission of God. The intermediary or saint does not make them happen of his or her own ability, rather they are granted the miracle by God. In this way the miracle is an especially visible marker of God’s favor and closeness to a saint.

A common trope in the conversion stories of many Sufis and religious figures includes some sort of miraculous happening that irrevocably changes their course in life.

In Herat, there was a cobbler from Egypt known as Darvīsh Dād Bābū or Darvīsh Ḥājī

Muḥammad Maṣrī. He was practicing his trade when one night he put the skins he needed to work on in a bin. The next day, when he woke up the skins had already been trimmed

97 Sarī Saqaṭī was an important ninth century Baghdadi Sufi who was known to an excellent teacher and spiritual master. He attracted many students particularly from Iraq and Khurasan, including both Sufi adepts and laypersons. See: B. Reinert, “Sarī al-Saḳaṭī,” in Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, ed. by P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E.

98 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol. 2, 2.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory and prepared. This miraculous occurrence changed his life: he experienced a special state

(ḥāl), repented, and turned towards the path of Truth (rāh-i ḥaq).99 Other saints’ destinies were preordained from their birth or at a young age. Shaykh al-Islām Ḥażrat

Khwāja ‘Abdullāh Anṣārī, renowned for his sacred lineage, scholarship, ascetic ways, and spirituality, had his greatness miraculously foretold on the day of his birth. A wise woman in Fūshanj near Herat said that on the night that Anṣārī was born, she met with

Khiżr. He told her that tonight in Herat a child is being born who will fill the east and west with his virtue (fażl).100

Special communion or control over animals is another miraculous power of many saints. Shaykh Abū Bishr Guvashānī, a contemporary of Anṣārī, was said to have a pigeon that would descend from his cage to speak with this saint.101 ‘Abdī Darūn, in one anecdote the saint’s special connection to the hawż at the shrine. It was at this location that ‘Abdī Darūn would give lessons; however, it was sometimes hard to hear him over the noise of the frogs that lived in the pond. The blessed saint in an unusual burst of anger shouted at the frogs that this space was either for him or for them. From that point on, they left his pool and never returned.102 Abdī Darūn was also said to be protected by doting lions, both during his life and after his death. Similarly, a sayyid in Yazd had a special connection with lions. Imāmzāda Muḥammad ibn ‘Alī, a descendent of Imām

Ja‘far al-Ṣādiq, lived under Abbasid rule. In the place where he is now buried there was a thicket (bīsha) in which lived a lion who caused much disturbance and scared away

99 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 42.

100 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 29-30.

101 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 31.

102 Samarqandī, Qandīyya va Samarīyya, 78-9.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory people who needed to pass. One day the imāmzāda passed by this thicket and the normally ferocious lion came near to him and kissed his foot. The imāmzāda petted the lion’s back and the lion placed his head on the imāmzāda’s hand. From this point, the area became passable for the townspeople once again. After some time the lion came to the imāmzāda, put his head down at the feet of the saint and died. The imāmzāda buried the lion in that very spot and asked to eventually be buried in front of the resting place of the lion.103

Saints are often able to travel great distances in an instant. This ability is reminiscent of the Prophet Muḥammad’s night journey and ascension to heaven (Isrā’ va mirāj). He was said to have travelled first to Jerusalem in an instant then ascend to heaven from there. The Prophet Muḥammad returned back to his bed from his supernatural trip to find that it was still warm. We see this sort of miraculous travel in the lives of many saints. Shaykh Abū Naṣr Khamcha Ābādī (d. 500 AH) had been living as a hermit in a thorny tree for twenty years when a young man came to him and said, “O

Shaykh, today is the Day of ‘Arafat, go make Hajj!” The shaykh replied, “I am so far from ‘Arafat.” The young man replied, “This is ‘Arafat.” At that moment, ‘Arafat appeared before them and the shaykh went towards it and met with the other pilgrims there. When he turned to return to his tree, neither the young man nor his tree was there.

Shaykh Khamcha completed the rituals of Hajj and then lived near the Kaba for ten years.

After ten years, he performed ziyārat of the Prophet Muḥammad in Medina and stood facing the tomb to greet the Prophet. He received an answer back from the tomb,

“’Alayka al-salām yā Abū Naṣr (and peace on you O Abū Naṣr or I call out to Abū

103 Ja‘farī, Tārīkh-i Yazd, 131-2.

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Nasr).”104 Later, this saint also met with the Prophe Muḥammad who encouraged him to go to Herat and marry a particular believing woman. The Prophet promised him three sons even though the shaykh was already one hundred years old. However, it is said that all of the Prophet’s predictions came true and he lived for another twenty-four years in

Herat with his wife and three sons.105 In this saint, we see a great variety of miraculous occurrences throughout his life: from the ability to travel great distances in an instant, to the ability to speak with the Prophet Muḥammad, and the miracle of long, fertile life.

Another saint, Shaykh Abū Naṣr Harawī (d. ca. 4th /10th C.) could send his voice and power ahead of him in order to punish his students. Once he had a group of students whom he forbade from going on Hajj one year and they went anyways. While they were travelling to Mecca, the shaykh sent a hindrance upon them to stop their journey. Then he sent his voice to call them back home. Those that heeded this call and returned home were forgiven and those who disobeyed were devastated by a destructive wind

(samūm).106 This story could have varying effects of members of the audience, for those

Sufi novices, this would serve as a warming to always obey their murshid (guide). For the lay pilgrim, it was another tale that reinforced the miraculous nature of the saint to which he/she made ziyārat.

Miraculous healing was also the domain of saints and their shrines. Indeed finding a cure for some ailment or for infertility often motivated pilgrims to make ziyārat. The shrine guides reinforce these beliefs by introducing saints with healing powers. Imām

104 Grammatically speaking, after the yā, Abū would be written as Abā as it would need to be in the accusative case. However, in spoken language it would still be pronounced Abū. I would argue that the slightly informal and conversational nature of the shrine guides lends to more informal language use than a text like Jāmī’s Nafāhat al-Uns. This might explain why the text retains the ū instead of ā. 105 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 34-37.

106 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 24.

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Abū Bakr Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad ibn Ismā‘īl’s shrine was said to have cure those who came to it. The saint during his life was also a well-known ‘ālim and faqīh. Mawlana

Jamāl al-Dīn Maḥbūbī, also called Ṣadr al-Sharī‘a, was of an elite ‘ulamā’ family of

Bukhara, who also served in leadership positions in the city. He tells a story of a young man in Samarkand who was blind and the doctors could not figure out how to cure him.

One day he had a dream in which he was told to go to Bukhara. He heeded this, went to

Bukhara and performed ziyārat of Imām Abū Bakr Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad ibn Ismā‘īl.

Thereafter, he regained sight in both his eyes.107 The soul (rūḥ) of Imām ‘Abdullāh al-

Wāhid ibn Muslim, son of the famous hadith complier, was said to elicit sharm

(bashfulness) in birds, while his shrine was a place of healing. It was reported that a dog with a broken foot was healed there.108

However, a saint is more often presented as a miracle worker with no evidence of his actual miracles. It seems to be a default appellation added on to many saints’ biographies. When an actual miracle is articulated, it is usually a posthumous one perhaps more clearly demonstrating the sanctity of the grave site rather than the saint himself. In this vein we find special lights being seen over the grave or animals either protecting the grave or keeping clear of it in respect. The fact that some indication of karāmāt was necessary even when none could be reasonably found or substantiated points to how important the mere presence of something miraculous was to the religious sensibilities of the time. The shrine guides are replete with these references and represent a moderate perspective on religion of the time. In contrast, the miracles of Aḥmad Yasavī given in

107 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 35.

108 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 14-15.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory the writings of his followers are much more fantastic. Devin DeWeese describes his miracles as “grand, spectacular miracles of conjuring storms, turning men into dogs, miraculous flight, and calming fires.”109

Good Works and Asceticism

Abstinent practice and asceticism were early markers of piety for Muslims of the first few centuries of Islam or the late seventh and eight centuries C.E. Christopher Melchert says of these formative years:

The dominant mood here is plainly ascetical; that is, it has to do with the piety of obedience to a transcendent God, not communion with an immanent God. Far from rejoicing in communion with God, these pious Muslims are depicted as finding so little comfort in the thought of God’s presence that they would rather vanish and never be judged than go to the Last Judgement and be saved.110

This fear articulated by Melchert manifested in extreme renunicant and ascetical behavior on the part of early Muslims. They were pessimistic about both this world and their other-worldly prospects and channeled this pessimism into rigorous pious activity such as self-mortification through limiting sleep and food intake. Melchert notes a change in the ninth century CE when a new mystical piety based in an optimistic outlook gradually developed.111 This period saw a waning in the emphasis placed on self- mortification and asceticism as markers of piety.

109 DeWeese, “"Sacred Places and 'Public' Narratives: The Shrine of Ahmad Yasavi in Hagiographical Traditions of the Yasavi Sufi Order, 16th-17th Centuries." Muslim World 90.3 (2000): 356.

110 Christopher Melchert, “Exaggerated fear in the early Islamic Renunciant Tradition,” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 21.1 (July 2011): 294.

111 Melchert, “Exaggerated fear in the early Islamic Renunciant Tradition,” 299.

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The shrine guides of the Timurid period reflect this shift in piety as well. As stated above, Tārikh-i Mullāzāda refers to many saints as “‘ālim wa ‘āmil (scholar and doer of good acts).” However, what makes up the good acts goes beyond earlier ideas of asceticism. Zuhd or asceticism is not as central to a saint’s sanctity as one may imagine.

There are many cases of figures being renowned for their abstinent ways; however, it is usually a secondary quality, with excellence in the Islamic sciences of hadith and law or achievement in spiritual states being more prominent. Often the details of a saint’s ascetic behavior is not described, the guide may just mention the existence of asceticism in his or her life. For example, Shaykh ‘Abdullāh ibn ‘Arwa (d. 311 AH) spent eighty years in zuhd and warā‘.112 Another saint buried in Herat who lived more almost five hundred years after Ibn ‘Arwa, Pīr Qavām al-dīn Tabrīzī (d. 828) was described as being one of a kind in solitude, asceticism and trust in God” with no further illustration of these qualities in action.113 The cases of asceticism found in the shrine guides reflect more moderate ascetic tendencies than those found in other hagiographical literature. Saints are usually described as being rigorous in the practice of Islamic ritual obligations, such as congregational prayer, the Hajj pilgrimage, and earning a living from halāl means. A few anecdotes speak of disciplining the body by limiting sleep and food, but there is a clear preference for moderation in terms of asceticism.

Abū Bakr ‘Abd Allāh ibn Muḥammad ibn ‘Alī ibn Tarkhān al-Balkhī (d. 333 AH) was said to have been the most ascetic during his time (zāhidtarīn), everyday his nourishment was something small and nobody could match his exertions (mujāhada).

112 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 20.

113 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 77.

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Khwāja Imam Abū Bakr Tarkhān said that for thirty years his one wish was to know the taste of a grape. One of his followers had a garden and in the service of his shaykh wanted to give him some. The Khwāja refused the offer, saying he would feel great shame (sharm) in front of God if for such an indulgence after thirty years. The halāl quality of food was of central importance to many saints: Pīr Surkh was a disabled man who would sit outside a shop on a major Herati street in summer and winter. He would pray and ask nothing from anyone. People would still give him food all the time, however, if he was doubtful of the provenance of the food or the giver he would not eat it even though he had no other sources of nourishment.114 The concern in only consuming that which was wholly halāl was an important issue for holy figures during the Timurid period. It was an easily discernible but not ostentatious (as in the manner of qalandars and antinomian dervishes of the time) manner of expressing piety. Timur was said to have used this concern as a test for true saints. Michael Paul Cornell in his study of the

Ni‘matullāhī Sufi order in Taft recounts one such occurrence: Tīmūr wanted to disprove the sanctity of Shāh Ni‘matullāh and use this as cause to banish him from the kingdom.

Part of this plan consisted to serving the Sufi shaykh food that was ḥarām (illicit). Shāh

Ni‘matullāh was able to sense that the food was not halāl and rejected it. This anecdote is taken from a hagiographical work on Shāh Ni‘matullāh and uses this as further proof of the saint’s truly blessed nature.115

Abū Yusuf Hamadānī, the prominent Naqshbandī Sufi leader, is also said to have been a great ascetic of his time because he never went against the sharia and lived

114 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 86-87.

115 Michael Paul Cornell, “The Nimatullahi Sayyids of Taft: A Study of the Evolution of a Late Medieval Iranian Sufi Tariqah” (Ph.D. diss. Harvard University, 2004), 61.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory according to the example of the ṣaḥāba of the Prophet Muḥammad and those who followed them. He went on Hajj thirty-six times and completed the Qur’an one thousand times, in the 107 steps it took to get from his home to the masjid, he would complete the

Qur’an. He spent most of his time fasting and when he did eat, he would prepare a simple meal of bread, vinegar and salt by himself. He would only eat meat every forty days and would never eat food prepared in the bazaar.116 His focus on wearing and consuming only that which was halāl became a cornerstone of Naqshbandī teaching.

Sleep was another bodily comfort that had to be overcome by some saints. The

Bukharan saint, Shaykh Shab-i Bīdār did not sleep for forty years and used all that extra time in ‘ibādat.117 Shaykh ‘Abd al-Raḥmān Muḥammad ibn ‘Alī Tahmānī (d. ca late 200s

AH) combined both of these forms of disciplining the body and spent seventy years fasting by day and staying awake by night. He lived off the earnings of his wife’s spinning.118

Hospitality and generosity were also important signifiers of a pious person and did not require any renunciant behavior. Al-Imām al-Shahīd ‘Umar b. ‘Abd al-Azīz was known to treat others with great hospitality and had such exemplary behaviors such as praying all of his five obligatory prayers in congregation, freeing six or seven slaves during Ramadan, and completing the entire Quran each day of Ramadan. On Eid-i

Qurbān, he was said to have sacrificed 100 sheep for himself and for the family of the

Prophet, slaughtered 10 bulls by his own hand, and then sent 900 more sheep to the

116 Samarqandī, Qandīyya va Samarīyya, 38-40. 117 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 20.

118 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 19.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory homes of all of the ‘ulamā’, fuqahā’, fuqarā’, and ṣulhā’.119 Imām ‘Alī ibn Isḥāq, a

Samarkandi saint, is buried in the famous cemetery of the ‘Azīzān. His shrine is celebrated as one of the most important in the city: the anonymous author of Qandiyya makes it clear that ziyārat of the shrine of ‘Alī ibn Isḥāq is particularly efficacious for those who have needs to be fulfilled. The author reiterates that all of the akābir

(grandees), salāṭīn ( sing. sulṭān), ‘ulamā’ and ḥājatmandān (those in need) come to this location for have their needs fulfilled. While much information is given on the benefit of the shrine, very little biographical information is given for ‘Alī ibn Isḥāq. His sanctity is largely based on the fact that he gave most of his wealth for the pleasure of God.120 The emphasis of his piety is in his generosity in giving in the name of God and religion.

Others were similarly generous but often gave in order to help those in their community who were in need. These instances will be discussed below.

Worldly needs and pleasures were not the only things to reject in order to become an ascetic. Given the great prestige and even wealth that came with Islamic scholarship and Sufi leadership in the medieval period, it too became an object of renunciation. Abū

‘Abdullāh Ḥāshid ibn ‘Abdullāh al-Ṣufi al-‘Ābid al-Bukhārī (d. 246 AH) was said to have achieved great knowledge and fame along with it. When he was going to

Transoxiana, he stopped at the Oxus and threw all his books in. From this point on he turned his back on scholarship and became an ascetic.121

Many of the hagiographical anecdotes that comprise the shrine guides present saints partaking in customary Islamic practices. For example, the completion of the Hajj

119 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 47.

120 Samarqandī, Qandīyya va Samarīyya, 30-31.

121 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 34.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory pilgrimage to Mecca was seen as an extremely important signifier of piety. At the time, the journey to Mecca from as far east as Bukhara would have been a long, arduous and expensive endeavor. That anyone could complete it once or more amazingly multiple times was seen as a great achievement and dedication to pious practice. Ḥażrat Khwāja

‘Alī ibn Muwaffaq Baghdādī (d. 265) was said to have completed the Hajj pilgrimage seventy-four times.122 The great ḥāfiẓ (memorizer of the Quran) and trainer of most of the

ḥuffāẓ (sing. ḥāfiẓ) of Khurasan, Mawlāna Ẓahīr al-dīn Ghūrī (d. 733 AH), had a great many accomplishments. However, the shrine guide gives equal space to his completion of

Hajj seven times with his work as a ḥāfiẓ.123 Another figure who showed excellence in various scholarly fields, Imām Abū Bakr Muḥammad ibn al-Fażl ibn Ja‘far al-Bukhārī, as mentioned above, was a hadith scholar and an authoritative jurist, but Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā’ places almost as much importance in the fact that this saint came back from Hajj alive and well.124

Other practices that the saints would have had in common with their fellow

Muslims include praying the obligatory prayers, maintaining a state of ritual purity, and fasting. Darvīsh Musāfir Khīyabānī, who name literally means the traveling dervish, is clearly a figure of some importance because he is buried in the revered ḥazīra of the descendents of Ḥażrat Ḥamza ibn ‘Abd al-Muttalib, across from the madrasa of Gawhar

Shād in the Khīyabān area of Herat. He is lauded for his mystical achievements as a “pīr-i kāmil” and “ṣāḥib-i ḥāl.” In terms of his asceticism, it is said the Darvīsh Musāfir prayed

122 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 16-17.

123 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 44.

124 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 28-30.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory all of his obligatory prayers for forty years in a state of ghusl (ritual purity).125 This indicates that he probably abstained from sexual relations and any other activities that would require ghusl. Much of ascetic practice by this period can be considered under the umbrella of Sufi or mystical practice. The striving, spiritual exercises, and seclusion undertaken by Sufis is given as signs of their ascetic piety. For example, Sayyid ‘Alī

Shabarghanī (d. 838 AH) was considered among the zuhhād (ascetics) of his time because of his “mujāhadāt va riyāżāt” and that he would often sit in the ‘abā’īn, a forty day period of spiritual practice and worship.126

Protecting the Interests of Society

The Timurid period sources are full of stories of Sufi shaykhs and other religious figures standing up to the powerful in defense of the needs and interests of members of their communities. The letters of the well-known Samarkandi Naqshbandī shaykh Khwāja

‘Ubayd Allāh Aḥrār demonstrate this behavior in a few different ways. Firstly, Aḥrār, like other religious figures of the time, believed that it was incumbent on him to use his power to ensure that rulers followed the norms and practices set forth in Islamic law as well as create a peaceful environment. In a letter addressing Sulṭān Ḥusayn Bāyqarā (r.

1469-1506), Aḥrār writes:

After the statement of supplication, the petition of this faqīr is this: it is not hidden from the radiant, informed mind of his Majesty that this faqīr’s only thought is for the princes to attain felicity in the two worlds, in the fullest and most perfect manner, through conformity to the Sharī‘a. Accordingly, the request is always for nothing but conformity and obedience to the Sharī‘a

125 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 48.

126 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 83-84.

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of [the Prophet] Muḥammad, the Messenger of God, (May the blessing of God be upon him and his family). Especially at this time when the Muslims are experiencing difficulties on both sides [Khurāsān and Mawarannahr], nothing other than requesting peace comes to mind. Therefore, the bearer of this letter of petition [ruq‘a-yi niyāz] was sent so the servitors of [his Majesty’s] court would turn attention to the business of peace so the Muslims on both sides [Mawarannahr and Khurāsān] are freed from suffering. We trust that this request will not be denied. Peace!127

This was a standard request by people of religion to the ruling class. In the midst of constant fighting within the Timurid ruling family and against other groups such as the

Aqqoyunlu, there were lots of instances where this type of intervention was warranted. N some examples, Aḥrār is shown to beseech and even threaten the Timurid ruler in

Samarkand to stay and defend the city from encroaching armies in order to prevent the inhabitants of the city from being enslaved.128 Jurgen Paul expounds upon the nature of this protective relationship between Aḥrār and those who were part of his “faction.”

Because of the spiritual and financial privileges that Aḥrār enjoyed, he was able to confer various types of intervention between those under his protection and the royal court or the dīvān. This often came in the form of tax relief.129 In other interactions with the court,

Aḥrār and those in positions similar to him were likely to make particular requests for individual people to be protected after the death of their father, secure passage for them, or even for them to receive a book.130

127 Khwāja Ubaydallāh Ahrār, Letter No. 19, in The Letters of Khwāja ‘Ubayd Allāh Aḥrār and his Associates, ed. & trans. J.A. Gross and A. Urunbaev (Leiden, Boston, Köln: Brill, 2002), 100-101.

128 Jurgen Paul, “Forming a Faction: The Himāyat System of Khwāja Aḥrār,” International Journal of Middle East Studies 23.4 (Nov., 1991): 539-540.

129 Paul, “Forming a Faction,” 537-543.

130 See for example: Ahrār, Letter Nos. 332, 389, 194, 216.

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A similar sort of interest in helping out the people of one’s community is found in the shrine guides; indeed this quality was an important component of sanctity. The saints mentioned in shrine guides helped their communities in various ways, from saving their cities from destruction, making sure their neighbors were fed, and spreading proper religious advice among the elite and common people. As stated earlier, it some ways these saints’ very existence is seen as the reason for good on earth, their being furthers the interests of the community. In a specific example, Ibn Karbalā‘ī credits the saints of

Tabriz with preserving the city from great destruction during a particularly severe earthquake.131 Another example of the saint saving their city from destruction occurs in

Herat where Khwaja ‘Abdullah Ansārī’s teacher Ḥażrat Khwāja Abū ‘Abdullāh Taqī al-

Sijistānī al-Harawī (d. 460AH) served his fellow Heratis in an almost supernatural way.

A man who was considered one of the abdāl (from the supernatural hierarchy discussed above) came to the city and an act of injustice was committed upon him. This member of the abdāl made a negative prayer against the whole city before leaving it. Thereafter, there was a terrible fire in Herat that could not be put out. It took the tears of Khwāja

Taqī to finally quench the fire and save the city.132

Khwāja Ḥalīm al-dīn Daymūnī (d. 416) of Daymūn, a village near Bukhara, was involved in a situation common in the dry environment of the area. It was said for six years Daymūn did not receive water, instead the water from Jūy-i Naw flowed directly to

Jūy-i Mūliyān, the brook made famous by Rudakī. After much anger on the part of the residents it was redirected to their town and the first land it was sent to was that of

131 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, 17-20.

132 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 25-27.

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Khwāja Ḥalīm. When the Khwāja was informed of this he said that it was a mistake and that there were many other people ahead of him who had a right to the water and perhaps these people had remained silent out of shyness. He did not farm his land for the three years that it was watered in this way in favor those more in need of it.133 Throughout the guides there are many examples of saints giving away their wealth in order to feed the needy in their communities. Mawlāna Jalāl al-dīn Maḥmūd Zāhid Marghābī (d. 772) who lived in the town of Marghāb-i Herat, outside of Herat, was said to distribute five donkey loads of grain, sometimes up to 100 mann (medieval unit of measurement), each year during the time of harvest. He continued this practice until his death and there was never a shortage of grain to feed the poor.134

The most widespread way that saints mentioned in these shrine guides helped their communities was through the dissemination of proper Islamic knowledge and advice. They are said to have spent their time giving proper naṣīḥat (advice, counsel) to all the people of the city. The authors of the guides repeat that these saints were important in giving counsel to both the elite (khāṣṣ) and common people (‘āmm). For example,

Mawlāna Jalāl al-dīn al-Qāyānī (d. 838 AH) is said to have “helped Muslims by giving advice (naṣīhat) at the Congregational Masjid of Herat.”135 Shārukh was so impressed by his work that he gave him the position of muḥtasib, an important role that entailed enforcing public morality and inspecting the commercial dealings of the marketplace. He was also revered because he was said to have worked hard to “further the way of the

133 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 70-71.

134 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 45-46.

135 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 82.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory sharī‘a” and reduce the influence of the “bad mazhabān,” meaning the Shī‘īs.136 Another

Heratī similarly helped protect the interests of his fellow Sunnis , Shaykh Zayn al-dīn al-

Khwāfī (d. 838 AH) was said to have tried to “suppress unbelievers and bad mazhabān.”137 A perhaps more spiritually uplifting legacy of Zayn al-dīn al-Khwāfī is the awrād (sing. wird, supererogatory litanies performed on a regular basis) he composed to be recited at the time of the pre-dawn prayer (Fajr) and the late afternoon prayer (Asr). It was said that these were widely recited by both the elite and common people of Herat.

Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ says that these awrād were very auspicious for those who recited them and purified so many hearts.138

Lineage, Localization of Sanctity and Cultural Memory

Daphna Ephrat in her study of Qādirīs in late medieval Palestine introduces the idea of

“localization of sanctity,” which is an articulation of the way that hagiographic narratives embed a saint within a particular “local community of believers and render his elevated figure concrete.”139 Some saints are saintly precisely in terms of their importance or service to the city in which they are buried. These saints are distinctly connected to their particular city and are central in that city’s conception of itself and its history. Shrine guides from the Timurid period very much follow this idea of “localization” and present saints as representative of what is good in their particular cities. Here there is a tendency

136 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 82.

137 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 80-81.

138 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 81.

139 Daphna Ephrat, “The Shaykh, the Physical Setting, and the Holy Site: the diffusion of the Qadiri path in late medieval Palestine,” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland 19.1 (January 2009): 1-2.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory to seek out special people, places, and objects as distinctively sacred precisely because of its local nature. This section will look at the ways that the saintly narrative embeds the saint firmly in the city where he or she is buried and helps create a sense of local identity and cultural memory around his person and shrine. Because the lineage, whether based on blood relation, spiritual ties, or shared knowledge, is an important and recurring theme in the shrine guides’ creation of saintly figures, it will be further discussed in this section as well.

The idea of collective or cultural memory as a tool to understanding group identity has been widespread in the past few decades, particularly with respect to the study of modern nationalism. However, it can prove equally helpful when interrogating medieval understandings of collective identity, albeit making use of different interpretive strategies. Theories on collective memory and cultural memory propose that a group can hold on to and perpetuate memories of its past across time by use of textual, architectural, and commemorative ritual practice. This memory of the past is a mediated memory, where remembering, forgetting, and recasting of the past for various reasons is constant.

In this regard, cultural memory, while tied to the past, has a very presentist orientation. It can help us understand how communities living in these Timurid cities conceptualized the relationships between their own spaces and that of the outside world and to get a sense of what and how local ideals were linked to a sense of belonging to their particular places.

The shrines, the hagiographical stories found in shrine guides, and the practice of shrine visitation all work to establish and perpetuate a particular collective memory. The shrine as a physical monument to a certain ideal or historical event represents a concrete

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory point of memory. As James Young argues, “a monument necessarily transforms an otherwise benign site into part of its content, even as it is absorbed into the site and made part of a larger locale. In this way, a monument becomes a point of reference amid other parts of the landscape, one node among others in a topographical matrix that orients the rememberer and creates symbolic meaning in both the land and our recollections.”140

While the building of the monument, or in our case the shrine, likely involves official governmental or religious backing, which seek to create a particular cultural narrative and memory, the reception of the monument is not fully directed by their authority. The shrine especially caters to personal forms of ritual and is open to reinterpretation by the people who visit it.141 The mythical narratives attached to the shrine and to life of the shrine’s saintly inhabitants serve to reinforce the importance of the monument within the history of place it is in. The retelling of these stories, the continued visitation of shrines, new miracles at these holy places all signal of ongoing presence of the saints and their baraka in the city, and by analog, of God’s goodwill towards the city and its inhabitants.

This all works to increase the importance of holy shrines in the everyday life of people.

This schema fits with Jan Assman’s perspective on cultural memory being made up of fixed points in time that reflect important events and people of the past that remain relevant through ritual and texts:

These fixed points are fateful events of the past, whose memory is maintained through cultural formation (texts, rites, monuments) and institutional communication (recitation, practice, observance). We call these ‘figures of memory.’ In the

140 James E. Young, “Memory and Counter-Memory: Towards a Social Aesthetic of Holocaust Memorials,” in After Auschwitz: Responses to the Holocaust in Contemporary Art, ed. Monica Bohm- Cuchen (Sunderland: Lund Humphries, 1995), 84.

141 Christine Allison, “Addressivity and the Monument: Memorials, Publics and the Yezidis of Armenia,” History & Memory 25.1 (Spring/Summer 2013): 146.

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flow of everyday communications such festivals, rites, epics, poems, images, etc., form ‘islands of time,’ islands of a completely different temporality suspended from time. In cultural memory, such islands of time expand into memory spaces of ‘retrospective contemplativeness.142

Aleida Assmann spells out the processes necessary to create lasting cultural memory that works to bind a community together. Among the processes that are pertinent this study are: the “employment of events in an affectively charged and mobilizing narrative,” which is apparent in the hagiographical anecdotes presented in the shrine guides. These “affective” narratives must also be accompanied by “visual and verbal signs that serve as aids of memory,” sites and monuments that present palpable relics”, and “commemoration rites that periodically reactivate the memory and enhance collective participation.”143 The popular practice of ziyārat kept the memory of the saints and their respective histories alive in the lives and minds of pilgrims. Further, the miracles such as holy lights, communion with the dead, healing, that occurred at these shrines continued to make this history present in the ongoing memory of the community.144

The normative as well as instructional nature of shrine guides must be emphasized here. These guides inform and shape people’s memory of the city’s past greatness, its place in a greater narrative of Islam and the Arab Conquest, development of Sunni legal theory, flourishing of Sufi groups. Because the guides explicitly and implicitly delineate the acceptable parameters of sanctity, they only deal with a particular set of shrines and

142 Jan Assmann and John Czaplicka, “Collective Memory and Cultural Identity,” New German Critique 65 (Spring/Summer, 1995): 129.

143 Aleida Assmann, “Transformations between History and Memory,” Social Research 75.1 (Spring, 2008): 55-56.

144 Another example of this can be found here: Eric Nelson, “Remembering the Martyrdom of Saint Francis of Paola: History, Memory and Minim Identity in Seventeenth Century France,” History and Memory 26.2 (Fall/Winter 2014): 76-105.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory holy locations, the ones that fit or can be made to fit into their vision of sanctity. Often locally revered sites such as healing streams or other natural phenomena are left out of these guides. Other aspects of local cultural memory are effectively excised in these sources, and while glimpses of this are present in other places, they are difficult to recreate.

In some places in the shrine guides, however, it is possible to see the interaction between textual sources and local knowledge in informing the guides’ author. When a very popular shrine’s provenance is unknown, the shrine guide author will often defer to local narratives on the shrine. In Tabriz is a shrine attributed to either Usāma ibn Sharīk, who was martyred at Kūh-i Sahand or to Zayd ibn Fārqid. The author’s teacher told him a story of a local hadith scholar, Mawlānā Ibrahīm Salmāsī said that one night he saw the man who was buried in this area in a dream and asked him his name. The man replied that he was indeed Usāma ibn Sharīk. The author’s teacher double checked this information in other textual sources (the Masābih and Tārīkh-i Guzīda) to confirm the identity of the saint buried at Kūh-i Sahand.145 This sort of narrative occurs in many places throughout all of the shrine guides and speaks to the discursive methods used by the authors. When they had textual sources proving the identity of a saint, they would make use of them. However, if confronted with a popular shrine that had no textual support, they would make use of local narratives by stating the “grandees say that such and such saint is buried here.” This sort of interplay between “official” sources and local sources is part of what makes up cultural memory. As Patrick Geary has argued:

Written and oral memory blend together, as oral traditions are incorporated into a written text, which is then circulated among

145 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, 22-23.

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those responsible for oral memory. These elders then corrected and revised, but probably also incorporated into their oral memory the essential content…which itself underwent subsequent revisions based on criticisms advanced by these memory experts.146

In the retelling of the biographies of saintly figures, the shrine guides create a history of place for their respective cities. They feature the best and the brightest that the city had to offer and remind their audience that they too partake in this greatness because the baraka of these figures continue to bless their shrines and the city at large. One of the main ways that a legacy of local sanctity is created in the shrine guides is through a reliance on ideas of lineage. Lineage, or nasab in Arabic, had long been an important factor in determining the worth of a person, including religious figures. In his work on social order and society in Buyid Iran and Iraq, Roy Mottahedeh explains the importance of heredity and its relation to a person’s worth:

Virtually everyone agreed that heredity had some influence on a man’s capacity, and most men believed that it had a great influence. Groups of people presumed to have a common ancestry were believed to have special talents through the influence of their heredity.147

Mottahedeh further shows that simply having a particular lineage did not aid a person in their societal worth. A person was also the inheritor of all the good works accomplished by their ancestors. People had to build up their own cache of good deeds

(ḥasab) but their individual deeds were augmented by those inherited from their forefathers. The ideas of nasab and hasab contributed to a societal assumption that

146 Patrick Geary, Phantoms of Remembrance: Memory and Oblivion at the End of the First Millennium (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994), 11-12.

147 Mottahedeh, Loyalty and Leadership in an Early Islamic Society (London, New York, I.B. Tauris Publishers, 2001), 98.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory greatness was a hereditary quality and those of noble or holy pedigree were born with a special skill set. This did not mean that social mobility was impossible, there are many stories of those of less than noble birth achieving great heights by their own work.148 But often those stories are told in a way to show that a particular saint achieved his station in spite of an inauspicious pedigree.

The importance of genealogy is not unique to the Buyid period or even to Muslim societies. Many societies all over the globe and across time have used forms of genealogy to make sense of their pasts and presents. In the case of Muslim societies, the focus on lineage is often traced back to pre-Islamic Arab interest in genealogy and kinship ties.

This interest continues in the early Islamic period and spreads with the advance of

Muslim empire. The new administration of Muslim territories required registries to record those related to the Prophet Muḥammad, those who fought in the conquests, etc. in order to pay out pensions.149 Important families that existed in Iran and Central Asia prior to the conquest retained their importance as well, for example dihqāns or notable landowners continued to play an important role in society following the conquest.

The shrine guides often provide genealogical information on the saints they present. Almost always listed at the beginning are the descendants of the Prophet

Muḥammad, the Ahl-i Bayt. They hold the highest and most holy place for Muslims at this time and will be discussed in more detail in the following chapter. While the most reverence and honor is reserved for the Ahl-i Bayt, differing levels of importance is given to those whose lineage can be traced back to a companion of the Prophet, a member of

148 Mottahedeh, Loyalty and Leadership, 99-101.

149 Sarah Bowen Savant, “Introduction,” in Genealogy and Knowledge in Muslim Societies: Understanding the Past, ed. by S.B. Savant and H. de Felipe (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2014), 3.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory the armies of the Islamic conquest, Abū Muslim and his army during the time of the

Abbasid revolution, religious and spiritual figures of earlier periods, pre-Islamic Iranian nobility, and even important local families. By linking a saint’s importance to prominent figures from the past and from other historical narratives, the shrine guides participate in creating a shared cultural memory that link all of these narratives in a new way to represent their particular cities and regions.

Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda works to link the city of Bukhara with the larger history of

Islam by trying to find descendants of the Prophet Muḥammad or his companions among

Bukhara’s holy dead. For example in an account of Khwāja Abū Ḥafṣ al-Kabīr, there is an aside stating the some people believe that a son of ‘Uthmān b. Affān and/or a son of

Abdullāh b. ‘Abbās are also buried in that area. For this latter claim, the author relies upon uncited popular Bukharan accounts, rather than epigraphical and historical accounts he uses for Khwāja Abū Ḥafṣ and others.150 Here we see again how popular stories about the shrine informed the shrine guides just as much as the guides informed the stories about the shrines. Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā’ is aware that some of the saints in his work may not actually be buried in Bukhara; however, he quotes Khwāja Muḥammad Pārsā in saying that whether or not a saint is actually buried at the shrine, the pilgrim must proceed as if they are actually there in order to partake in the baraka and rewards of ziyārat.151 Here we see how different types of sources, those scholarly and those popular, are intertwined in the narrative presented in shrine guides. The use of locally held knowledge with that of locally-based ‘ulamā’ reflects the complexity of pious belief and religious experience at

150 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 19-20.

151 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 17.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory this time and how they inform ideas of cultural memory. Because this transmission of knowledge was not a one-sided endeavor, its effectiveness in speaking to large segments of society was greater.

Samarkand’s patron saint, Shāh-i Zinda Qusam ibn ‘Abbās has a special position largely based on his relation to the Prophet Muḥammad. The significance of this will be further explored in the following chapter, however, the connection to the Prophet

Muḥammad though blood serves by proxy to connect Samarkand to the greater history of

Islam. Sayyids, of course hold, a great deal of religious authority and legitimacy in medieval Islam. It has been argued that in post-Mongol period, particularly during the

Timurid period, there was an increased political legitimacy and importance accorded to sayyids.152 But more importantly, Qusam ibn ‘Abbās was a Sayyid with great local importance in Samarkand. He was part of the early Islamic conquest and the subsequent governing of the city. His supposed martyrdom at the hands of infidels serves to bolster his status as a great Samarkandi and Islamic hero.

As mentioned above, the first part of Qandiyya may be an adaptation of an earlier

12th C. Arabic Qandiyya compiled by Muḥammad ibn ‘Abd al-Jalīl Samarkandī. There is a difference as to how Qusam ibn ‘Abbās is presented in the beginning and how he is presented later in the Persian text. At the beginning, presumably reflecting its 11th and

12th C. context, the author is content to present Qusam ibn ‘Abbās as the Prophet

Muḥammad’s cousin and a participant in the early conquest. 153 The theme of the Islamic conquest as a foundation myth is found in many early local and city histories of Iran and

152 Shahzad Bashir, Messianic Hopes and Mystical Visions: The Nūrbakhshīya between Medieval and Modern Islam (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2003), 34-6.

153 Jurgen Paul, “Histories of Samarkand,” Studia Iranica 22 (1993), 77-81.

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Central Asia. So important was this event that cities competed on the basis of which city was conquered first.154 The later tales of the Shāh-i Zinda and its associated lore of seeming martyrdom at the hands of the infidel king of Samarkand are not found in the

Arabic manuscript fragments studied by Jurgen Paul, but do make up a large part of the

Persian Qandiyya. The story of how Qusam ibn ‘Abbās became the Shāh-i Zinda by jumping in a well and remaining hidden but alive, waiting for the return of Christ to make his own similar return is explicated in detail in Qandiyya. This focus on the messianic is found in various places in Timurid shrine guides, but is almost always coupled with a more orthodox characterization. In this case, not only will Shāh-i Zinda come back when

Christ returns and rule Samarkand for forty prosperous years, he is also important to

Samarkandis because he is the first to have taught them about the Islamic prayer, fasting, paying of alms, and the canonical Hajj pilgrimage.155

One of the longest segments of Qandiyya is an exciting tale of the discovery of

Shāh-i Zinda’s supernatural dwelling at the bottom of a well at the time of Timur. By including this nearly contemporaneous account of the Shāh-i Zinda tale, Qandiyya brings the memory of the early Islamic saint much closer to the realities of the Timurid audiences. In this tale, Timur sends a member of his army, Hudā, down the well to find

Shāh-i Zinda. Hudā encounters a magical lair of beautiful gardens, sumptuous fruits, and legions of souls from the Unseen. At the end of his journey he encounters Shāh-i Zinda enthroned between Khiżr and the Prophet Ilyās. Shāh-i Zinda is upset by this intrusion and makes Hudā promise never to speak of the wonders he has seen. If he does divulge

154 Ann K.S. Lambton, “Persian Local Histories: The Tradition behind them and the Assumptions of their Authors,” in Yād-Nāma: In Memoria di Alessandro Bausani, vol. 1, eds. B. S. Amoretti and L. Rostagno (Roma: Bardi Editore, 1991), 229.

155 Samarqandī, Qandīyya va Samarīyya, 52.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory the secret of Shāh-i Zinda, he and all of his subsequent progeny till the Day of Judgment will be blinded. Hudā is shocked by such a tragic curse and tries to convince Shāh-i

Zinda that if he doesn’t tell Amir Timur what he wants to hear, he will be killed and his progeny will be killed. Shāh-i Zinda is unmoved by these arguments but does give Hudā some solace by telling him that the positive side of blindness is that the angels Munkir and Nakir will not question the blind in their graves. Hudā is not particularly appeased, but makes his way out of the magical well with a difficult decision to make. He avoids telling Timur the truth of what he had seen in the well for many years until finally he is convinced to speak of it. He thinks that because so many years have passed, Shāh-i

Zinda’s curse will no longer be in effect. However, as he completes the fantastic tale, two drops of water fall from the sky blinding him and his progeny till the end of earthly time, establishing Shāh-i Zinda’s miraculous power and messianic authority.156 This shrine was one of the most popular sites of visitation for all levels of Samarkandi society. Timurid elites built heavily in this area, creating a winding and intricate maze of shrines and other adorned buildings to the north of the city. Timur is said to have visited the shrine every time he returned to his capital.

‘Abdī Darūn is another well-known Samarkandi saint whose shrine was a frequent place of ziyārat during the Timurid period. Qandiyya makes use of the well- known faqīh and theologian, Abū al-Manṣūr Māturīdī to explain the saint’s importance with respect to Islam and Samarkand. Māturīdī states that one of among the successors

(tābi‘īn) is buried in Samarkand and his name is Sayyid Amīr ‘Abdī b. Muḥammad ‘Abdī b. ‘Uthmān b. ‘Affān, thereby establishing ‘Abdī Darūn’s relationship to the third caliph

156 Samarqandī, Qandīyya va Samarīyya, 64-77.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory and important companion of the Prophet Muḥammad, ‘Uthmān b. ‘Affān.157 It is said that his predecessors came to Samarkand during the second round of conquest after the defeat of Shāh-i Zinda. Conflicting accounts of ‘Abdī Darūn’s genealogy develop throughout Qandiyya and it is difficult to be certain of exactly which account is most reliable. However, it is clear that the saint’s importance is linked to his association with figures from the early history of Islam in Arabia and with the Islamic conquests.

Genealogy and connection to the Islamic conquest is not enough to sanctify ‘Abdī Darūn, his orthodox role as a qāżi and his miraculous nature are also important.

Ibn Karbalā’ī in Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān begins his work on Tabriz with a chapter on all of the ṣaḥāba of the Prophet Muḥammad that were buried in and around the city. Most of these people were also part of the Islamic conquest of Tabriz and many were martyred in the wars to take the city. He prefaces this section with a long meditation on the etymology of the word ṣaḥāba and why these people were important figures in the transmission of religion. The latter part of this discussion alludes to the bringing of Islam to Tabriz by the ṣaḥāba, an act for which they especially are revered.158

The first ṣaḥāba mentioned in this chapter is Usāma ibn Sharīk al-Tha‘labī al-Zabīyānī, whose mazār was the “most illuminated of mazārs in Tabriz.”159 He was a well-known transmitter of hadith and his riwāyat (transmission) is found in many of the important books of hadith. Ibn Karbalā’ī goes as far to list a few of the hadith transmitted by Usāma ibn Sharīk. Hadith scholarship was an important indicator of sanctity and the closeness of this figure to the Prophet, the original source of hadith, establishes his high position in

157 Samarqandī, Qandīyya va Samarīyya, 46.

158 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, 20-21.

159 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, 20.

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Tabriz. With that in mind, it is interesting that Ibn Karbalā’ī spends much of the entry on the military aspects of Usāma ibn Sharīk’s career. He was a soldier with the first Muslim army that came to Azerbaijan but failed to conquer it, Ibn Karbalā’ī maintains that “there are few places in Azerbaijan that do not have some traces (nishān) of these grandees of religion (buzurgvārān-i dīn).”160 Usāma ibn Sharīk and all those martyred with him are buried at the place of their martyrdom, Kūh-i Sahand. After their failed attempt to subdue the area, another army was sent allegedly led by Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥanafiyya and

‘Abdullāh ibn ‘Umar. Much of their force was martyred and now their resting place is a shrine to which local Tabrizis make ziyārat regularly. This expedition, however, was successful and Tabriz was conquered (fatḥ shudan) for Islam and “the days of sharī‘a rule.”161 Ibn Karbalā’ī continues to list the various companions of the Prophet

Muḥammad in the area, including Amīr Maẓar ibn ‘Ajīl, Qays, and Farqad ibn Zayd. One of the ṣaḥāba is Abū Dujāna Anṣārī, buried in the Khalījān village at a fortification known as Ḥirz-i Abū Dujāna. The author says that he is not sure about the burial of Abū

Durjāna at this site because there is no reliable sources nor books that attest to it. Instead he relies on oral reports and traditions (afwāh wa’l sunna) of the peasants who live in this region. While Ibn Karbalā’ī is not certain of who is buried in this important shrine, he is sure that some ṣaḥaba or tābi‘īn (successor, the generation that followed that of the

Prophet Muḥammad and his companions) is buried here because it is clear that this is “a place of quiet and purity (rawḥ o ṣafā’), where people’s du‘ā’ are answered and where

160 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, 22.

161 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, 24.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory they seek their claims from this purified shrine (turbat-i mazkī). Wa Allāhu a‘lam (And

God knows best).”162

After a long listing of ṣaḥaba and tābi‘īn buried in and around Tabriz comes an interesting entry. Burkh Aswad was among the saintly figures from the time of the

Prophet Moses. Ibn Karbalā’ī says that he was from among the awlīyā’ of his time and mentions an anecdote about him: there is a drought facing the Banū Israel and no amount of prayer is bringing forth rain until Burkh Aswad makes a particular du‘ā’ three times and the situation is resolved. Ibn Karbalā’ī says that there is another unnamed saint from the time of Moses buried here as well. The tawāf (circumambulation) of these shrines is said to be a blessed endeavor.163 Burkh Aswad is an interesting historical and religious figure from the pre-Islamic period. He serves to anchor Tabriz more securely in the history of Islam; the city did not just join the fold of Islam at the time of the Islamic conquest, rather, it is a site in the greater origin myths of Islam going back to the Prophet

Abraham, a forefather of Moses. Also hearkening back to the time of Abrahamic prophets, Bukhara was home to an important shrine area, called Mazārāt-i Chasma-yi

Ayyūb. Instead of commemorating the resting place of the Prophet Ayyūb, who corresponds to the Biblical Job, there is a special fountain to which he gives his name and the area surrounding it. Similar to Tabriz, this area that connects the city to an Abrahamic prophetic history is also the resting place of many saints who are important to the local history of the city. Mazārāt-i Chasma-yi Ayyūb is the resting place for some of the great families of Bukhara, such as the family of Jamāl al-dīn Maḥbūbī (d. 747/1346).

162 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, 26.

163 Ibn Karbalāʹī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1 27-8.

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Jamāl al-dīn Maḥbūbī was also known as Ṣadr al-Sharī‘a. He and his family held the position of ṣadr and rā’is (official leadership positions) for the city for many generations.164 They were well respected scholars of furū‘ (branches of jurisprudence).

Jamāl al-dīn for example was author of many works on Ḥanafī fiqh such as a sharh

(explanation) on the Hidāya of al-Marghinānī, a twelfth century compendia on Ḥanafī fiqh that became an authoritative and widely accepted source in Central Asia. He was said to be the descendant of Ubada ibn al-Ṣāmit, a companion of the Prophet Muḥammad and one of twelve men appointed as nāqib of the inhabitants of Medina during the time of the second conquest of Aqaba. Ubada ibn al-Ṣāmit was also a military commander in

Egypt during the caliphates of Abū Bakr and ‘Umar.165 Many members of this family are buried in Mazārāt-i Chasma-yi Ayyūb, held up as important religious exemplars for both their distinguished lineage and their religious scholarship.166

Much of the significance of the Islamic conquest and the settlement of Muslims in formerly Zoroastrian areas comes from the long religious shift that took place in the area.

In one Herati example, the victory of Islam over Zoroastrianism is celebrated. A saint whose death date is not mentioned, Khwāja Kātib, was a religious scholar and wrote works on the circumstances that led to the revelation of specific Quranic verses (asbāb al-nuzūl). He came to Herat to proselytize among the Zoroastrians who lived there and from his hard work, Islam flourished in Herat. His shrine was not a minor one; it was right outside the important city gate of Darb-i ‘Irāq and it was said that light emanated

164 R.D. McChesney, “Central Asia’s place in the Middle East: Some Historical Consideration,” in Central Asia meets the Middle East, ed. by D. Menashri (London: Frank Cass Publishers, 1998), 46.

165 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 24, EI2,

166 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 23-25.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory from his grave on Friday evenings. Shāhrukh visited the shrine of Khwāja Kātib every year, perhaps as a symbol of his devotion, whether politically or sincerely motivated, to establishing proper Islam in Herat.167

A celebration of pre-Islamic local notables and even royalty also informs the local cultural memory. In one case, the pre-Islamic and Islamic can exist together with the figure of Dihqān-i Soghdī. His name indicates his elite descent from landowners from the ancient Iranian area of Sogdia. However, he is also said to have been buried with a hair of the Prophet Muḥammad, adding great Islamic relevance to his shrine.168 In another example, Sulṭān Ismā’īl, the Samanid king, was a client of the Amir al-Mu’minīn and also a descendant of the Kayani king Bahrām Chūbīn.169 Sulṭān Ismā‘īl in particular is singled out for his righteous devotion to God. The story goes that Sulṭān Ismail was hunting with his retinue when the call to prayer rang out from the mosque. The Sultan stopped and ashamed of the fact that he was astride a horse as the muezzin remembered

God, quickly came down and answered the call to prayer. After his death, the Sultan was seen in a dream where he was questioned about his status in the afterlife. Sultan Ismail replied that it was for that one good act of answering the call to prayer, that his other misdeeds had been forgiven.170 The Samanids and their extensive shrine complex are a significant aspect of Bukharan memory, so they are adorned with religious epithets as well. Many are described as scholars and righteous men and leaders.

167 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 55.

168 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 60.

169 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 25.

170 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 25-27.

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Similarly important were those figures connected to the Abbasid Revolution, another decisive point in the history of Islamic civilization. For example, Khwāja Abū al-

Qāsim was the imam of his time and connected to Abū Muslim Marvazi.171 More is known about Shāhzada Muḥammad ibn Farukhzād Khaqān, who was among the assistants of Abū Muslim and was martyred in this role. He is buried close to the well- traveled gate Darb-i Khush and his entry in Maqṣad al-Iqbāl is one of the few in which it is mentioned that the people of Herat would come to his shrine in search of intercession

(tawassul mī jūyand) and to achieve their goals.172

With regard to the connectivity of the regions under Timurid rule, it is clear that these areas share a long history and experienced many similar events such that it makes sense to group them together. The geographer al-Muqaddasī (d. 990 CE) defines the areas of Khurasan, Sistan, and Transoxania as al-mashriq (eastern lands), linking these areas together as a connected region.173 While this definition leaves out western parts of Iran that may have shared a cultural history with the mashriq, it is still a helpful category.

Elton L. Daniel says of the idea of regionalism and of Khurasan and Transoxania in the

“classical period” in particular:

‘regionalism; in the strict sense should be understood as a concept implying a high degree of political, economic and cultural autonomy. One can detect a great many examples of provincialism or localism or nativism in the Islamic east…but

171 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 53.

172 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 50, Another example where this phrase “tawassul mī jūyand” is used is for the great Sayyid shaykh Abū ‘Abdullāh al- Mukhtār, who will be discussed further in the next chapter. See: Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqqāniyya, 18-19.

173 Elton L. Daniel, “The Islamic East,” in The New Cambridge History of Islam vol. 1: The Formation of the Islamic World Sixth to Eleventh Centuries, ed. By C.F. Robinson (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 448.

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there are far fewer areas that can be said to have a truly regional culture and history in this way. Of these, the region par excellence of the Islamic east was al-mashriq as understood by al-Muqaddasī, i.e. Khurāsān and its adjacent territories. Tremendously important both as a critical frontier province and an avenue for trade, it developed into a centre of political and cultural development that rivalled the centre of the caliphate itself.174 Taking into account the idea of regionalism, we can trace similarities in how the

Timurid cities presented in this study came to understand their respective histories.

However, based on distinctions between the cities and taking into account the biases and perspective of shrine guide authors, there are various differences in content and emphasis in this understanding as well. For example, Bukhara was long a center of Sunni hadith sciences and Ḥanafī jurisprudence and theology, which is reflected in the hagiographies presented in Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda.

Elton Daniel argues that the cultural accomplishments of the Islamic east, particularly the influential work of religious figures such as Abū Ḥanīfa and al-Māturīdī, must be understood as part of the greater culture of Islam. He further contends that “it would seem pointless to try to distinguish their work as representative of regional rather than metropolitan culture.”175 Perhaps this was the case at the time in which these figures were flourishing; however, as time went on, there is a divergence in their place in regional memory as opposed to a greater Islamic memory. It is true that Abū Ḥanīfa and other religious scholars held an esteemed place in the history of Islam outside of the

Khurasan and Transoxania; however their place in in the cultural memories of the cities that claim them reflects a more personal attachment and importance. Even by the twelfth

174 Daniel, “The Islamic East,” 449.

175 Daniel, “The Islamic East,” 501.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory century, there is evidence of a “reification of the regional Sunni scholarly tradition of

Khurasan-Transoxania at its broadest and most inclusive, disregarding divisions between madhhabs within the region.”176 Shahab Ahmed, in a study of a bibliography for a text that would have probably been used to prepare sermons, shows a reliance on authors primarily from Khurasan and Transoxania. Similarly the shrine guides of the Timurid period rely on important regional figures, such as Abū Mansūr Māturīdī, Abdullah al-

Ansārī, al-Bukhārī and others, in various ways throughout the texts. They are present as sources for ritual, for the biographies of saints, and as proof to the sanctity and at times miraculous nature of certain shrines. An anecdote mentioned above about the miraculous power present in an old monastery of Khiżr uses Māturīdī as proof of its efficacy.177

Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, which focuses on the saintly tombs in and around Bukhāra, is one of the earliest extant Timurid shrine guides. One would expect this guide to mirror many of the themes and ideas found in Qandiyya, as Samarkand and Bukhara are relatively close geographically and share much in common historically, and it does, particularly in terms of reverence for the family of the Prophet Muḥammad and those connected to the early history of Islam. However, for various reasons, it is much less exciting. Perhaps because of its author’s background as a religious scholar, the stars of this work are all involved in hadith compilation and the development of Sunni jurisprudence, particularly Ḥanafī jurisprudence. Mullāzāda refers to a few tombs of important Shāfi‘ī jurists and followers of that school; however, it so happens that there is

176 Shahab Ahmed, “Mapping the World of a Scholar in Sixth/Twelfth Century Bukhara,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 120.1 (2000): 43.

177 Samarqandī, Qandīyya va Samarīyya, 29-30.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory no longer any remnant of these tombs left behind.178 This speaks to the very Ḥanafī centered nature of Bukhara. In the extensive introductory chapters where the legality and praiseworthiness of ziyārat is outlined, Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā’ relies upon and refers to important Ḥanafī texts such as Shaybānī’s al-Jāmi‘ al-Saghīr and a Khwarazmian text

Qunyat al-munya ‘alā madhhab Abī Hanifa by Abū Rajā Najm al-dīn Mukhtār b.

Maḥmūd al Zāhidī al-Chazmīnī (d. 658AH/1260 CE) among others.179 Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā’ also quotes Khwāja Pārsā in support of claims that it is wājib (obligatory) to maintain proper behavior at shrines.180 Itzchak Weismann characterizes Khwāja Pārsā as a “scion of a renowned family of Ḥanafī ‘ulamā’ of Bukhara,” following the same model as many of the sources used by Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā’.181 Throughout the work, as evidenced in the section on Scholarly Networks above, there is also a focus on the tombs of important legal theorists and qāżis of the Ḥanafī rite. In these cases, the actual scholarship is less important than establishing a connection with authoritative and elite scholars. Bukharans could take pride in the scholarship of their city and how it influenced the entire Islamic world.

The shrine guides of Timurid cities are replete with saints whose importance goes beyond the piety they model for society. Their very being, as a companion of the Prophet, a descendant of the soldiers of Islamic conquest, or even as the son of Persian nobility, holds great consequence to the cultural memory of the city of their death and burial. As

178 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 58.

179 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 12-13.

180 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 17.

181 Itzchak Weismann, The Naqshbandiyya: Orthodoxy and Activism in a Worldwide Sufi Tradition, (London, New York: Routledge, 2007), 18

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory their shrines and their residual baraka decorate the city, pilgrims come to these spaces and remember, relive the event commemorated by the saint. They can partake in the connection the saint provides to greater narratives of pre-Islamic and Islamic history, and they continue to renew the cultural memory by visiting and practicing the rituals of ziyārat.

Conclusions

The most common description given to saints for whom no other information is known is that said person was perfect in knowledge, action and asceticism. ‘Ilm, ‘amal, and zuhd form a much used trope throughout the Timurid shrine guides. Occasionally there is some added information about a saint’s karāmat and/or aḥwāl. The order of this trope is not accidental; it reflects the hierarchy of sanctity as understood by the shrine guides, knowledge of the religious sciences is largely presented as the most important signifier of piety. This is explicit in Tārīkh-ī Mullāzāda and is true to differing levels in the other shrine guides. It is also perhaps representative of the place of asceticism in the religious culture of this time. Clearly, it held importance but was not the central focus of pious practice as had been the case in other time periods.

In the earliest period, the saintly were companions of the Prophet Muḥammad and then those involved in the Arab conquests of the seventh and eighth-centuries. Later, particularly between 1200-1500, there was an increased focus on scholarly figures and mystical Sufis. This shift, as Christopher Taylor argues, “mirrored the increasingly important role of both the ‘ulamā’ generally and the popularization of Sufi ṭarīqas

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory specifically.”182 The shrines that were important to pilgrims in these important Timurid cities reflect their devotion to the saints interred there. The sanctity of these saints are an almost incongruent mix of scholarly achievement, mystical acumen, miracle-working, and coveted genealogies. By understanding which aspects of the life and religious practice established their sanctity, we get a better idea of what these pilgrims valued as examples of piety. It also reveals the religious “thought world” of these medieval

Muslims. Their understanding of religion was deeply rooted in these ideas of orthodox

Sunni scholarship, a reverence for the family of the Prophet Muḥammad and those connected to the family, and to the ability to see the work of God in the miracles and mystical states of his favored friends, the saints. This picture also lends itself to a certain flexibility, where pre-Islamic successes could still be celebrated, local magic could be incorporated into one’s religious worldview, and local knowledge was as important as scholarly authority.

What is most interesting is that there is a sense conveyed in the shrine guides that the history and traditions linked to the shrines were experienced in a very personal and intimate way. Figures that are part of the larger Islamic narrative are localized and made pertinent to the situation of the city in which they are buried. And though the manuals prohibit pilgrims from rubbing the dust of the shrines upon themselves, the repetition of this prohibition makes it clear that this was an oft occurring activity. The act of rubbing the dust, which represents what is left of the corporeal aspect of the saint, upon one’s own body is an extremely intimate act. The hagiographical narratives of the guides are not

182 Christopher Taylor, In the Vicinity of the Righteous: Ziyāra and the Veneration of Muslim Saints in Late Medieval Egypt (Boston: Brill, 1999), 89.

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Chapter 3: Stories of Saints: Pious Exemplars and Collective Memory merely scholarly studies of saints, but a tool that assisted pilgrims in establishing a particularly close relationship with the saints and shrines of their cities.

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CHAPTER 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine

The religious atmosphere in the post-Ilkhanid period has been described in many different ways over the past few decades. Much scholarship has been geared towards discovering how and why the Shi‘ism of the Safavid period was possible given a largely

Sunni population in Iran prior to the sixteenth century. Historians and scholars of religion have argued for an inherent Shi‘i inclination even among those who identified as Sunni during this interim period, especially among those who also espoused Sufi beliefs and practices. Hamid Algar has argued against the idea that Iran was already trending towards

Shi‘ism well before the rise of the Safavids. He poses instead a situation where Sunnism could exist alongside a special ‘Alid loyalism without embracing Shi‘i theological and doctrinal beliefs.1 Marshall Hodgson called it “‘Alid loyalism,” Moojan Momen called it

“al-tashayyu al-ḥasan” (a good or moderate towards Shi‘ism)” and most recently

Matthew Melvin-Koushki introduced the helpful term “imamophilism” which accords the

Imams a special place in Sunni devotion.2 All of these characterizations speak to the contested nature of Sunni orthodoxy in the Middle Period and reveal a spectrum of beliefs and practices that do not necessarily fit with modern sectarian delineations.

This chapter examines the role of ‘Alid shrines and the importance of sayyid saints as objects of veneration by the largely Sunni populations in major fifteenth-century

Timurid cities. It argues that the sort of imamophilism found in scholarly works, such as

1 Hamid Algar, “Sunni Claims to Imam Ja‘far al-Sadiq,” in Fortresses of the Intellect: Isma‘ili and Other Islamic Studies in Honour of Farhad Daftary, ed. Omar Ali-de-Unzaga (London and New York: I.B. Tauris Publishers, 2011), 87-9.

2 Marshall Hodgson, Venture of Islam: Conscience and History in a World Civilization, vol. 1 (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1974), 372; Moojan Momen, An Introduction to Shi‘i Islam: The History and Doctrines of Twelver Shi‘ism (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1985), 96; Matthew Melvin-Koushki, “The Quest for a Universal Science: The Occult Philosophy of Ṣā’in al-dīn Turka Iṣfahānī (1369-1432) and Intellectual Millenarianism in Early Timurid Iran” (Ph.D. diss., Yale University, 2012), 8.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine that of Rūzbihān Khunjī and prominent Sufis such as Muḥammad Pārsā and Nūr al-Dīn

‘Abd al-Raḥmān Jāmī, is reflected in the more widespread practice of shrine visitation and its associated hagiographic literature. As John Renard argues, Islamic hagiographical sources offer a great treasury of “insights into the religious and ethical life of Muslims.”3

Timurid period shrine manuals present both well-known and unknown figures as saints worthy of ziyārat and in doing so reflect religious ideals of that time. In the descriptions of saints’ lives, their progress on the mystical path, recurring acts of piety and miracles ascribed to them, a view of what was important to the Sufi writers of the manuals and their lay audiences becomes clear. In this chapter I will explore shrine guides not as sources on the actual lives and history of the men and women mentioned in them, but instead as a window to the religious worldview of the authors and their time period.

In the last chapter, I outlined the many different reasons saints and their shrines were considered holy. Shrine guides present saintly biographies in order to demonstrate the walāya of these figures and therefore prove that they are worthy of ziyārat. Important qualities of a saint include his/her mystical and miraculous accomplishments as well as ascetic practice. However, even these qualities are overshadowed by a recurring theme of devotion to the family of the Prophet. Many of the narratives try to link the saint in question to the Prophet Muḥammad and his family in various ways: from presenting the saint as a sayyid and member of the Ahl-i Bayt to merely being buried in the vicinity of a supposed distant relative of the Prophet Muḥammad, from having the honor of seeing the blessed face of the Prophet to being buried with a few strands of his hair. Whether the

3 John Renard, Friends of God: Islamic Images of Piety, Commitment, and Servanthood (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008), xiii.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine genealogies and stories are true or not, it is helpful to see the different ways that a special devotion to the family of the Prophet is framed for a popular audience.

The shrine guides for the cities of Herat, Samarkand, Bukhara, Yazd, Tabriz and

Mazār-i Sharīf are replete with many more narratives linking saintly men to the Prophet

Muḥammad, ‘Ali, and other members of Ahl-i bayt in a variety of both straightforward and inventive ways. These narratives are informed by many types of sources and speak to the different ways that veneration of Ahl-i bayt was constructed and understood. This chapter explores the traditions and sources of this veneration and draws conclusions as to what extent and why this became popular way to express religious sentiment in the medieval Islamic East.

Devotion to the Prophet Muḥammad and Ahl-i Bayt

Among Muslims in general, regardless of sectarian variation, there has always been some sort of devotion to the person of Muḥammad. From the earliest oaths of fealty to his leadership to the development of a great legend about his prophecy, he is the central figure of Muslim devotional life. The Qur’an firstly points to Muḥammad’s exceptional nature, reiterating the importance of the Prophet as a mercy for the worlds upon whom

God and his angels send blessings.4 As Annemarie Schimmel notes, alongside the command to obey God, there is the adjacent call for Muslims to obey their Prophet.5

While the Qur’an provides the basis for obedience and veneration of the Prophet, the entire science of hadith compilation is proof of the centrality of the Prophet Muḥammad’s

4 Qur’an, 21:107 and 33:56.

5 Annemarie Schimmel, And Muhammad is His Messenger: The Veneration of the Prophet in Islamic Piety, (Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 1985), 25.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine words and actions to early Muslims. Not only did the huge task of collecting and verifying hadith become an honorable undertaking for the nascent ‘ulamā’, but great crowds would gather to hear these prophetic traditions.6 Schimmel argues that traditions of reverence for the Prophet Muḥammad that developed over the first few centuries of

Islam were central to Islamic piety.7

All aspects of the Prophet Muḥammad’s life became foci of veneration. For example, in the late eighth century, the Abbasid caliph Harun al-Rashīd’s mother turned the Meccan home in which the Prophet Muḥammad was born into a sort of oratory.

Those who came to Mecca for the Hajj would also go and visit this home in reverence.8

David Roxburgh’s study of medieval pilgrimage certificate scrolls gives evidence for a shrift in these scrolls that reflect the a new importance in the visitation of the Prophet

Muḥammad’s tomb. While scrolls from the Seljuk and Ayyubid periods depicted the

Prophet Muḥammad’s masjid in order to signify Medina, by the ninth/fifteenth century,

Medina was illustrated by the tomb of the Prophet Muḥammad.9 This indicates a growing interest in the person of Muḥammad in addition to the foundational edifices and institutions of Islam as a religion. As time went by, the mawlid of the Prophet, or the celebration of his birth, grew larger and more festive across the entire Muslim world. The

Fatimids of Egypt are known to have celebrated the Prophet Muḥammad’s birthday as a state holiday; moreover, it was celebrated both formally and informally all over the

6 Ahmed El-Shamsy, “The social construction of orthodoxy,” in The Cambridge Companion to Classical Islamic Theology, ed. by Tim Winter, 2008, 110.

7 Schimmel, And Muhammad is His Messenger: The Veneration of the Prophet in Islamic Piety, 25.

8 Schimmel, And Muhammad is His Messenger: The Veneration of the Prophet in Islamic Piety, 145.

9 David Roxburgh, “The Pilgrimage City,” in The City in the Islamic World vol. 2, ed. by S.K. Jayyusi, R. Holod, A. Petruccioli, and A. Raymond (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2008), 764-770.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine medieval Islamic world. The Fatimid celebration of mawlid was probably predated by

Imami Shi‘i mawlids and it is unclear as to when exactly Sunni practices of mawlid began. Marion Holmes Katz speculates that they probably stemmed from early Imami influence.10 The author of the Herati shrine guide, Sayyid Aṣīl al-dīn ‘Abdullāh Wā‘iẓ, played a role in Herat’s mawlid celebrations. His importance as a sayyid and eloquent speaker is evidenced by the fact that during the month of Rabi‘ al-Awwal, the month of the Prophet’s birth and death, Wā‘iẓ would tell the story of the Prophet’s birth to the people of Herat as part of the mawlid celebrations in that city.11

Similarly the Prophet’s grave also became an important site of reverence and visitation as well as the grave sites of members of his family. In the early years after the death of the Prophet Muḥammad the important spaces of his life and death were not necessarily viewed as sacred by Muslims. The need to commemorate and celebrate his life and his final resting place developed over the course of more than three centuries until the city of the Prophet (Madinat al-Nabī) became one of the foremost sacred spaces in the Islamic imagination.12 Particularly during the early ‘Abbasid period, the caliphs pushed forward the importance of the person of Muḥammad and his family in a bid to secure their own importance over the jurist and ‘ulamā’ classes. Because their claims to descent from the family of the Prophet Muḥammad was foremost in their assertions of legitimacy and religious authority, a more energetic devotion to the Prophet and his

10 Marion Holmes Katz, The Birth of the Prophet Muḥammad: Devotional Piety in Sunni Islam (London and New York: Routledge, 2007), 4-5.

11 Khwāndamīr, Habīb al-Siyār Tome 3, Part 2, trans. W.M. Thackston, (Cambridge: Harvard University, 1994), 518.

12 See: Harry Munt, The Holy City of Medina: Sacred Space in Early Islamic Arabia, Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014).

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine family was necessary.13 Visiting the resting place of the Prophet Muḥammad eventually became recommended as a part of the Hajj pilgrimage, clearly establishing the central place of Muḥammad as one of the main foci of religious devotion.

The Prophet’s family proved an equally compelling focus of veneration across time as well. In an oft-cited Ḥadīth al-Thaqalayn (the hadith of the two weighty things), the Prophet Muḥammad tells his community that after his death, he leaves for them the

Qur’an and his Family as guidance and salvation. The second weighty thing, the family of the Prophet Muḥammad, becomes increasingly important in the lives of ordinary

Muslims throughout the medieval period. In addition to this hadith, there are many instances in the Qur’an and hadith speaking to the importance of Ahl-i Bayt to the

Muslim community. Indeed the early schisms among the community were centered on whether rule should fall to the family of the Prophet or to others. While the nascent Shi‘is clearly emphasized the centrality of the ‘Alid branch of the Ahl-i Bayt, the Sunnis as well cultivated a special connection to the family of the Prophet. Even as they downplayed the political importance of Ahl-i Bayt, Sunni leaders and scholars still respected many members of the family as religious and sacred figures. Timurid historical chronicles even endeavor to show that the ruthless Timur was a good Muslim in part for his efforts to

“honor sayyids.”14

13 Munt, The Holy City of Medina: Sacred Space in Early Islamic Arabia, 161.

14 Khwāndamīr, Habīb al-Siyār, 106.

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Sunni Islam and ‘Alid loyalism

Marshall Hodgson wrote early of the phenomenon of “‘Alid loyalism” which he defined as

the varied complex of special religious attitudes associated with loyalty to the ‘Alids—not only reverence for the ‘Alids themselves, but certain exalted ideas about Muḥammad’s person and the supposition of a secret teaching he transmitted specially to ‘Ali, and so on—whether these attitudes appear among Jama’ī- Sunnīs or among those who, by explicitly rejecting the jamā‘ah, identified themselves as Shī‘īs in the proper sense.15

Hodgson’s characterization of ‘Alid loyalism pays heed to the esoteric component central to the importance of Ahl-i Bayt, particularly the person of ‘Alī. There is a special esoteric charisma attached to these figures that translates to intercessory and other sacred powers. While this may have been a problematic issue for Sunni rulers who wanted to deny the Imams political leadership, the stakes are much lower after the death of such figures. In death, the Sunni leader, administrators of Ahl-i Bayt shrines, and pilgrims are free to make use of the deceased’s baraka, intercession and other powers without changing the status quo political situation. The Family of the Prophet Muḥammad could be understood and revered in purely spiritual terms in this construction.

What Hodgson labeled ‘Alid loyalism, Robert McChesney calls “’ahl al- baytism,” giving a succinct explanation of it:

For people who in times of political confrontation could identify themselves as defenders of the caliphal rights of Abū Bakr, ‘Umar, and ‘Uthmān and the reputation of ‘A’ishah, there was no contradiction in pilgrimage to the shrines of the eighth imam at Mashhad or of ‘Alī at Balkh. Political issues required political responses, spiritual questions spiritual responses. The Family of the Prophet represented intercession, hope of salvation, a rallying

15 Marshall Hodgson, Venture of Islam: Conscience and History in a World Civilization, vol. 1, 372.

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point for public opinion, and consistently the most visible icon in the daily religion of the great bulk of the population.16

Ahmad Moussavi in an article on Sunni-Shi‘i rapprochement argues that in the fourteenth and fifteenth century the idea of “al-tashayyu‘ al-ḥasan or moderate Shī‘ism and the practice of exalting the virtues of ‘Alī ibn Abī Ṭālib somewhat in the Shī‘ī manner gained momentum among Sunnīs.”17 Moojan Momen further connects this trend with the proliferation and success of the Sufi orders in this same period. Sufi leaders were able to draw analogies between their own authority and the personal charismatic authority of the imams and other members of Ahl-i Bayt.18 Moreover, to support their authority they often asserted the ‘Alī was their founder. This authority was further bolstered by real, imagined, or spiritual heirship to the Prophet Muḥammad and members of his family. They also could not claim vilāyat for themselves if they did not firstly attribute vilāyat to members of the Prophet’s family.

While this ahl al-baytism or al-tashayyu’ al-ḥasan was strongest in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, devotion to the Prophet and all things connected to him has a long history as discussed above. More specifically, local and regional histories from tenth- to thirteenth-century Iran, from which the later Timurid shrine manuals developed, also work to connect Iran to the larger Islamic narrative through the figures of the Prophet and his family. In a study of local histories of Qum, Mimi Hanaoka shows how the authors of

16 R. D. McChesney, Waqf in Central Asia: Four Hundred Years in the History of a Muslim Shrine, 1480- 1889 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991), 34.

17 Ahmad Kazemi Moussavi, “Sunnī-Shī‘ī Rapprochement (Taqrīb),” in Shi‘ite Heritage: Essays on Classical and Modern Traditions, ed. Lynda Clarke, Binghamton, NY: Global Publications, 2001, 305.

18 Momen, An Introduction to Shi‘i Islam: The History and Doctrines of Twelver Shi‘ism, 96.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine these texts worked to forge a local identity that was also legitimated by its ties to

Prophetic authority through his hadith and through his family and companions.

[Local histories] reflect this impetus to preserve this nominal idealized identity of a united Muslim umma. By focusing to a large extent on the Sahaba and Tabi‘un, pious notables, saints and pious exemplars and their tombs, and sacred etymologies and dramas, local Persian histories articulate a local identity that is closely tied with the Companions who were embodiments of authority and reflected the early Islamic community untied around Muḥammad.19

The thirteenth century marked a turning point for much of the Islamic lands. The

Mongol invasions served a fatal blow to the ‘Abbasid caliphate and left the idea of a universally recognized Sunni caliph greatly diminished. However, both the conquest and subsequent Il-Khanid rule had varying effects on Shi‘i areas. Some cities, such as Ḥilla, a main Shi‘i center, submitted to the Mongols and were not destroyed. Momen argues that the weakening of Sunnism, through its loss of its caliph, religious leaders, and scholarship, led indirectly to a relatively more strengthened Shi‘ism.20 At the very least,

Shi‘ism could now work on a more level playing field because Il-Khanid rulers favored neither sect over the other and were generally tolerant of divergent religious beliefs.

Various Il-Khanid rulers showed different religious inclinations, some holding to Mongol religious beliefs, some to Buddhism; Ghazān showed Shi‘i leanings while Oljeitu is said to have converted openly to Shi‘ism and Abū Sā‘īd was a Sunni.

The change in the religious climate in terms of sectarianism was also apparent in the scholarly writing of the time. While scholarly disputes between Sunnis and Shi‘is continued, the polemical tone decreased. This allowed more borrowing and discourse

19 Mimi Hanaoka, “Umma and Identity in Early Islamic Persia” (Ph.D. diss., Columbia University, 2011), 22.

20 Momen, An Introduction to Shi‘i Islam: The History and Doctrines of Twelver Shi‘ism, 91-2.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine between the sects. For example, Shi‘i ‘ulamā’ such as Allama al-Hillī borrowed from

Sunni methodology with regard to hadith literature.21 Sufis also were able to engage more openly in the incorporation of Shi‘i esoteric themes into their own worldviews, particularly making use of Ahl-i Bayt figures and notions of charismatic religious authority.

The cooption of Ahl-i Bayt by patently Sunni Sufis is quite clear in Muḥammad

Pārsā’s writings on the Imams and Companions of the Prophet. As a hadith scholar and member of the Khwājagān, the precursors of the Naqshabandiyya Sufi brotherhood,

Pārsā was an influential member of the Bukharan ‘ulamā’. In his encyclopedic Faṣl al-

Khiṭāb there is a section titled “Fażāil-i Khulafā’ va Ahl-i Bayt.” It is telling that the two groups are discussed together and makes it clear to readers where Pārsā’s loyalties lie. He first clarifies that Abū Bakr al-Ṣiddīq was “the best person (afżal al-nās) after the

Messenger of God” and while the Ahl al-Sunna wa’l Jamā‘a united under him, others such as the Shi‘is and the Mu’tazilites (rawāfiż va akthar al-mu‘tazila) did not.22

Throughout the following section, Pārsā reiterates the great position of Abū Bakr, which is in line with his Naqshbandī affiliation which claims spiritual descent from the Prophet though Abū Bakr. He does not go into detail on the fażā’il of either ‘Umar or ‘Uthman but jumps to ‘Alī, calling him the “seal of the Rightly Guided Caliphs (khātim al-khulafā’ al-rāshidīn)” and crediting him with the completion (or perfection) of the caliphate

(khilāfa) just as the Prophet Muḥammad completed the prophecy (nubuwwa).23 By

21 Momen, An Introduction to Shi‘i Islam: The History and Doctrines of Twelver Shi‘ism, 95.

22 Khwāja Muḥammad Pārsā, Faṣl al-khiṭāb, ed. J. Misgarnizhād (Tihrān: Markaz-i Nashr-i Dānishgāhī, 1381/2002-3), 459.

23 Pārsā, Faṣl al-khiṭāb, 459-60.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine mirroring language used to describe the Prophet Muḥammad (khātim), ‘Ali’s importance is shown as clearly stemming from his connection to the Prophet.

Throughout this section (faṣl), the merits of Ahl-i Bayt are interspersed with the merits of other companions of the Prophet Muḥammad (ṣaḥāba), indicating that Pārsā is trying to show that fealty to both parties is important and there is no difference in it. To him, all the early Muslims, particularly the companions of the Prophet Muḥammad, must be accorded the same sort of respect and reverence. This sentiment is undercut by special, longer sections on the merits of ‘Alī and the need for a distinct love for the Ahl-i Bayt.

While cautioning believers to not favor one group over another, he reiterates that the love for Ahl-i Bayt is compulsory (wājib) and should be as overflowing as the love one has for one’s own family.24 These ideas are followed by a later section discussing the merits and methods of making ziyārat to the tombs of the Imams as well as special notes on the manāqib (virtues) and other details on the Imams (see Chapter 2). Much of his section on the method of making ziyārat is based on hadiths of al-Riżā, ‘Alī ibn Muḥammad al-

Hādī, and Ja‘far al-Ṣādiq.

More so than any other Imam, Ja‘far al-Ṣādiq, the sixth Imam, has been credited with being central in the consolidation of Imami Shi‘ism because of his contribution to important concepts such as the need for taqiyya and the idea of naṣṣ to establish a successor, and his copious narration of hadith. However, Hamid Algar argues that he was just as important a figure to non-Shi‘i groups from the early Islamic period:

[N]early all the early intellectual factions of Islam (with the exception perhaps of the Khārijīs) wished to incorporate Ja‘far al-

24 Pārsā, Faṣl al-khiṭāb, 462. In some manuscripts of this work, this discussion of love for Ahl-i Bayt is followed by some lines of poetry by Sa‘dī on the importance of sayyids and the cultivation of love for them.

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Ṣādiq into their history in order to bolster their schools’ positions. This is hardly surprising, for he enjoyed widespread prestige and respect in an age when neither Sunni nor Shi‘i Islam had fully crystallised and he had significant dealing with many beyond the circle of followers for whom he was imam in the distinctively Shi‘i sense of the terms.25

Abū Ḥanīfa (d. 150/767), whose school of law dominated the Timurid lands, in particular was associated with Ja‘far and transmitted hadith from him. Many Sufi groups in the Mongol and Timurid period continued to revere Imam Ja‘far as well as other

Imams because of their direct genealogical links to the Prophet Muḥammad. Algar cautions that these groups and people were not proto-Shi‘is, rather their aim “was to detach the imams from Shi‘ism entirely and claim them instead for the Sunni tradition.”26

Algar points particularly to the work of Naqshbandīs such as Pārsā and ‘Abd al-Raḥmān

Jāmī as key to this process, in which they simultaneously celebrate the twelve Imams and denigrate Shi‘ism as a false religion.27

The Timurid Elite and ‘Alid Loyalism

The Timurids, as other Turco-Mongol rulers before and following them, had a deep preoccupation with genealogy. Given the nature of their rule and the populations they ruled over, their accounts of their own genealogy is complex and incorporates many seemingly conflicting threads. Most interesting is an origin myth which combines

Mongol religious symbols with Islamic ones. While in one telling found in

Khwāndamīr’s Ḥabīb al-Siyar, Timur is said to have descended from Alanqoa, who in

25 Hamid Algar, “Sunni Claims to Imam Ja‘far al-Ṣādiq,” 77-8.

26 Hamid Algar, “Sunni Claims to Imam Ja‘far al- Ṣādiq,” 87.

27 Hamid Algar, “Sunni Claims to Imam Ja‘far al- Ṣādiq,” 89-90.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine turn was a descendant of Japheth, a son of Noah.28 However, in The Secret History of the

Mongols and on an inscription that Ulugh Beg had made for his grandfather Timur’s tomb, we find a more fantastical rendition of Timur’s genealogy. Here, Alanqoa was impregnated by a supernatural light and gave birth to three sons.29 In the account on

Timur’s sepulcher this light is identified as being one of the sons of ‘Alī ibn Abī Ṭālib, inextricably tying the Timurids to the Ahl-i Bayt, explicitly through the line of ‘Alī.30

Because of the fragile nature of tribal groupings, tribes like Timur’s Barlas were made more cohesive by these special genealogical myths.31 This conflation of supernatural forces, Mongolian history, and Islamic religious figures tracked well on what Thomas

Lentz and Glenn Lowry call the “heterodox frontier milieu” from which the Timurids arose.32 In another genealogy studied by Kazuo Morimoto, the Timurids are shown as descendants of Muḥammad ibn al-Ḥanafiyya.33

Beyond symbolic reverence to the family of the Prophet, the Timurids actively built and renovated ‘Alid shrines in their lands. Shāhrukh and Gawhar Shād’s extensive building projects in Mashhad were carried out to demonstrate their participation in the general piety of al-tashayyu‘ al-ḥasan that was widespread in their domains. Whether a

28 Khwāndamīr, Ḥabīb al-Siyar, vol. 3

29 The Secret History of the Mongols is a thirteenth century narrative epic that tells the origins on the Mongols, beginning from mythical times to the age of Chingis Khan. It was written for Mongolian nobility.

30 Oleg Grabar, Islamic Visual Culture, 1100-1800: Constructing the Study of Islamic Art Vol. 2 (Aldershot, England; Burlington, VT: Ashgate/Variorum, c. 2006), 78-9.

31 Beatrice Forbes Manz, The Rise and Rule of Tamerlane (Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1989), 33-35.

32 Thomas W. Lentz and Glenn D. Lowry, Timur and the Princely Vision: Persian Art and Culture in the Fifteenth Century, 28.

33 Kazuo Morimoto, “An Enigmatic Genealogical Chart of the Timurids: A Testimony to the Dynasty’s Claim to Yasavi-‘Alid Legitimacy?” Oriens 44.1-2 (2016): 145-178.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine calculated political move, an expression of true pious feeling, or both, the building of a lavish Friday mosque next to the shrine was, as May Farhat argues, “a signpost for

Timurid power as legitimate rulers of the Islamic world.”34 Mashhad is of course the site of the great shrine complex of ‘Alī al-Riżā who was buried in the small town of Tus in

203/818. Revered by Shi‘is as the eighth Imam, he was an interesting figure for Sunnis as well. The ‘Abbasid caliph, al-Ma’mūn, designated him as his own heir, suggesting that this would bring an end to sectarian differences. However, shortly after this nomination,

Imām ‘Alī al-Riżā suddenly died and was buried in Tus next to the grave of the ‘Abbasid caliph Harūn al-Rashīd. The Timurids were not the first Sunni dynasty to build at the holy site: there is textual and architectural evidence of various Ghaznavid, Seljuq,

Khwārazmshāhid, and Ghurid patrons. And while some scholars have argued that

Shāhrukhid patronage of the shrine in Mashhad was to mollify Shi‘is in his realm, Farhat instead convincingly argues that the shrine was seen by the Timurids not as a site but rather as an Islamic one in general terms. Her theory follows that of Algar in presenting a case of an appropriation of a Shi‘i figure for a largely Sunni audience. Making use of

Ḥāfiz-i Abrū’s account of Imam al-Riżā and his use of a popular title for the Imam (the

Sultan of Khurasan), she states:

In short, Ḥāfiz-i Abrū’s presentation of Mashhad inscribes the Timurid patronage of the shrine within a normative Islamic narrative that underscores continuity between Shāhrukh’s reign and his predecessors, furthering his legitimacy as the rightful ruler of the Muslims world. Shi‘i claims to Mashhad are expunged, but following Il-Khanid practice, the spiritual authority of the descendants of the Prophet as intercessors, and

34 May Farhat, “Islamic Piety and Dynastic Legitimacy: The Case of the Shrine of ‘Alī b. Mūsā al-Riḍā in Mashhad (10th-17th Century)” (Ph.D. Diss., Harvard University, 2002), 7.

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the charismatic power of sayyids as carriers of baraka, are recognized and held in reverence.35

Another important patronage project undertaken by the Timurids was that of

‘Ali’s tomb in Balkh. While the historical evidence for this tomb is much more circumspect than that of Imam ‘Alī al-Riżā in Mashhad, Timurid focus on it follows the same logic outlined above. The discovery and development of the shrine in Mazār-i

Sharīf is examined in detail by McChesney in his Waqf in Central Asia: Four Hundred

Years in the History of a Muslim Shrine, 1480-1889. The earliest extant account of ‘Alī’s burial there is attributed to Abū Hāmid al-Gharnātī’s Tuhfat al-Albāb, a mid-sixth/twelfth century work. It says that village elders saw a vision of the Prophet Muḥammad leading them to the sacred tomb of his cousin and son-in-law. Aside from a few references to the shrine in later works, the site is largely forgotten until the Timurid period. Mention of the shrine of ‘Alī is found in many Timurid sources, including Jāmī, Isfizārī’s Rawżāt al-

Jannāt fī Awṣāf Madīnat-i Harāt, Lāri’s Tārīkhchah-i Mazār-i Sharīf, and later in

Khwāndamīr’s Ḥabīb al-Siyar.36 Each basically reiterates the twelfth-century story, blames the Mongol invasions for the disappearance of the tomb, and gives an account of the rediscovery of the tomb in 885/1480-81. According to Lārī37 and Khwāndamīr, a descendent of Abū Yazīd Bisṭāmī showed the local Timurid governor a text about the shrine, whereupon the governor gathered his notables and found the actual tomb of ‘Alī with an epitaph, presumably from the time of Sanjar, giving his name and relation to the

35 Farhat, “Islamic Piety and Dynastic Legitimacy: The Case of the Shrine of ‘Alī b. Mūsā al-Riḍā in Mashhad (10th-17th Century),” 75.

36 McChesney, Waqf in Central Asia: Four Hundred Years in the History of a Muslim Shrine, 1480-1889, 30.

37 ‘Abdul Ghafūr Lārī, Tārikhcha-yi Mazār-i Sharīf (A Short History of Mazār-i Sharīf), ed. Mayel-i Haravi (Kabul: The Historical and Literary Society of Afghanistan Academy, 1970), 25-29.

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Prophet Muḥammad. Right away the site became a place of ziyārat, votive offerings, and healing of the sick. The Timurid ruler, Sulṭān Husayn Bayqara is informed and has a domed shrine built around it and endowed it with various properties.38 It became an important pilgrimage site during the Timurid period and differed from local pilgrimages, in that, as was the case for the shrines of Mashhad and that of Khwāja Anṣārī in

Gāzurgāh, people began to travel long distances to visit it. Lodging, markets, and other buildings necessary to accommodate this sort of pilgrimage grew up around the shrine and proved financially lucrative for both the Timurid elites and the shrine administrators.39 A further discussion of the importance of this shrine and Lārī’s work on it is presented below.

It was not unusual at this time to base the location of a holy shrine upon a dream or even on hearsay. But it is interesting that the Timurids would find perhaps the most important shrine after that of the Prophet Muḥammad in their own lands, especially when

Najaf as the resting place of ‘Alī had been established long before. Again, this rediscovery and building up of a shrine of the most premier member of the Ahl-i Bayt illustrates Timurid appropriation and recasting of someone central to the Shi‘i narrative.

It catered to the strong pro-‘Alid feelings present in the area but again translated those feelings through a Sunni prism of practice. Farhat categorizes this ahl al-baytism as a form of piety “under the rubric of structures mentales of very long durée” and not

38 Robert D. McChesney, Waqf in Central Asia: Four Hundred Years in the History of a Muslim Shrine, 1480-1889 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991), 27-34.

39 Maria Eva Subtelny, Timurids in Transition: Turko-Persian Politics and Acculturation in Medieval Iran (Leiden: Brill, 2007), 213-19.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine stemming from any particular religious or political system.40 While Algar is correct in reading Pārsā’s and Jāmī’s appropriation of the Imams and the Ahl-i Bayt in ways that consciously exclude Shi‘i claims, the general populace was probably less conscious of these facts. The figures of Ahl-i Bayt for them present another way to connect to the greater Islamic narrative in palpable ways that were discussed in the last chapter. That these holy figures were interred in their hometowns connected them directly to both their sacred baraka and to the history of Islam and its Prophet Muḥammad.

Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine

The sections above have demonstrated the different ways that Ahl al-Baytism and a sort of ‘Alid loyalism among Sunnis had permeated various levels of medieval society. For the purpose of this dissertation, the most important space of the diffusion and performance of Ahl al-Baytism is the site of the Timurid shrine (mazār). The mazār transcended all class, tribal, and even linguistic differences and served as a place of worship for all members of a particular city or region. In parsing the ways that attachment to the Family of the Prophet was articulated and practiced at this inclusive site, we get a broader sense of this sort of pious devotion.

In the hierarchy of holy dead, being of the House of the Prophet was a sure way to catapult the deceased to the highest position. In fact, many of the shrine guides under study here are composed in such a way as to place Ahl-i Bayt graves at the beginning, and then further categorize them based upon the closeness of the relation to the Prophet and how sure the author was to the authenticity of these claims. For example, Maqṣad al-

40 May Farhat, “Islamic Piety and Dynastic Legitimacy: The Case of the Shrine of ‘Alī b. Mūsā al-Riḍā in Mashhad (10th-17th Century),” 76.

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Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya opens with ‘Abdallāh b. Mu‘āwiyya b. ‘Abdallah b. Ja‘far al-Ṭayyār

(d. 134 AH), the great-grandson of Ja‘far al-Ṭayyār, and “Shāhzāda” Abū al-Qāsim b.

Ja‘far al-Ṣādiq, a son of Ja‘far al-Ṣādiq. Both will be discussed in detail below.

Tārīkh-i Yazd opens with a long narrative of what seems to be the only named imāmzāda to be interred in the city: Imāmzāda Muḥammad b. ‘Ali b. ‘Ubaydallāh b.

Aḥmad al-Shi‘rī b. ‘Alī al-‘Arīḍī b. Ja‘far Ṣādiq (d. 424/1032). The designation

“imāmzāda” has a different meaning than “sayyid,” the former refers to both a descendant of a Shi‘i Imam and the shrine of that person. A sayyid is someone who can trace their lineage to the Prophet’s family through a various genealogical lines.41 Ja‘far b.

Muḥammad b. Ḥasan Ja‘farī prefaces his discussion of this imāmzāda by saying during the Abbasid times, when there was a lot of religious extremism (ghuluww) and members of the family of ‘Alī were being killed, this particular imāmzāda left Baghdad for

Khurasan covertly in the manner of wandering dervishes. Upon arriving in Yazd, he took up work at a blacksmith shop. One night the, probably Buyid, governor of Yazd saw the

Prophet Muḥammad in a dream. The Prophet said to him that a son of mine has come to

Yazd, treat him kindly such that many sayyids (sādāt) of his line will be found in Yazd.

The next day the governor looked for the imāmzāda but didn’t find him. So the next night he again saw the Prophet Muḥammad in a dream and was given the location of the imāmzāda. The governor had trouble convincing the imāmzāda to see him until he told him about his dream of the Prophet Muḥammad. Eventually, they met and the governor gave his daughter to the imāmzāda in marriage, along with a house in what is now known as Kūcha-yi Husaynīyān and two tracts of land in rural areas. Imāmzāda Muḥammad b.

41 A.K.S. Lambton, “Imāmzāda,” in Encyclopedia of Islam, Second Edition, ed. P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, E. van Donzel, W.P. Heinriches, Brill Online, 2016.

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‘Ali b. ‘Ubaydallāh b. Aḥmad al-Shi‘rī b. ‘Alī al-‘Arīżī b. Ja‘far Ṣādiq and the unnamed daughter of the governor had lots of sons and flourished in Yazd.42

In another anecdote about the imāmzāda, we learn of his miraculous taming of a fierce lion. The lion is a recurring motif in discussions of members of the Ahl-i Bayt,

Abdī Darūn a sayyid buried in Samarkand was protected by a lion both in life and death.

Lions are common in Shi‘i literature where they are accorded a special status for their size and power, which can be used to command obedience to the Imam or in protection of the Imam. The lion sometimes also has occult powers which help the Imam to converse and command the beast.43 Sunni writers, as evidenced here, also made use of lions when speaking about Imams and imāmzādas. In the place where he is now buried there was a grove or thicket (bīsha) in which lived a lion who caused much disturbance. Fearing the lion, people would avoid going that way. The imāmzāda went to investigate one day, and as he neared the grove, the lion came close to him and kissed his foot. Whereupon, the imāmzāda petted the lion’s back and the lion placed his head on the imāmzāda’s hand.

Thereafter, people were able to pass through the area and collect wood and reeds from there. After some time this lion came and put his face at the feet of the imāmzāda and died. The imāmzāda buried him in that spot and asked that when he passed away that he should be buried in front of the resting place of the lion, which he was at his death in 424

AH. Now there are said to be over one thousand descendants of this imāmzāda adding their baraka to Yazd, fulfilling the promise made by the Prophet Muḥammad in the dream of the Būyid governor. From the thirteenth to the fifteenth centuries, the tomb

42 Ja‘far ibn Muḥammad al-Ḥusaynī Ja‘farī, Tārīkh-i Yazd, ed. Īraj Afshār (Tehran: Bungāh-i Tarjuma va Nashr—i Kitāb, 1338/1960), 130.

43 See: Khalid Sindawi, “The Role of the Lion in Miracles Associated with Shī‘ite Imāms,” Der Islam 84.2 (2007), 356-390.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine structure was built up, tiled and retiled, and additions were added. It became a premier site to be buried for religious and political elites of Yazd. The author of Tārīkh-i Yazd supplies his own personal testament that out of the many shrines in the vicinity in which he has prayed, a special light was only visible from the tomb of the imāmzāda.44

Yazd’s burial sites were not filled with many imamzadas, as the one mentioned above was the only one that the author of Tārīkh-i Yazd writes about. The story of his escape from Baghdad, attempts at obscurity in Yazd, discovery via a Prophetic dream and connection to Yazd’s leaders follows well established tropes about holy men. His lineage is all that is needed to secure his holy status; this lineage is so important and apparent that even a wild animal, the lion, bowed to his sanctity. It is also important to note that the governor of Yazd honors this member of Ahl-i Bayt and gives him gifts, land, and his daughter’s hand, but there is no inclusion of the imāmzāda in the governance of Yazd. He remains a figure to be revered by the pious but separate from the political realm.

Samarkand’s best saint is Shāh-i Zinda (The Living King) Qusam ibn ‘Abbās, who is honored and given importance first and foremost for his connection to the Prophet

Muḥammad. He is described as a cousin of the Prophet Muḥammad, the son of

Muḥammad’s beloved uncle ‘Abbas. Furthermore, Qandiyya accords him an even greater honor, as the last person to see the face of the Prophet Muḥammad before he died. This makes Qusam ibn ‘Abbas, the sayyid par excellence of Samarqand, even before the terrific Shāh-i Zinda tale can be developed. While other sayyids are mentioned throughout Qandiyya, Shāh-i Zinda’s shrine remains one of the most important and most visited. The shrine complex around the mazār of Shāh-i Zinda was built and lavishly

44 al-Ḥusaynī Ja‘farī, Tārīkh-i Yazd, 130-132.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine decorated by the royal women and other members of Timur’s family, endowing many family shrines in the vicinity of the saint. The striking complex at the edge of the city draws the pilgrim’s eye up the winding maze of shrines and small masjids. 45

Another important member of the House of the Prophet Muḥammad in

Samarkand is ‘Abdī Darūn, who is mentioned at three different points in Qandiyya. The earliest mention, at the very beginning of the text, may reflect a Persian paraphrase of the earlier Arabic work. Thus, it can serve as a point of reference to see how the story of this man grew and developed over the centuries. In his first appearance in Qandiyya we only hear that his shrine is one of the four most important shrines to visit in Samarkand after one has made ziyārat of the blessed tomb of Qusam b. ‘Abbās: “in the traditions it has come down that anyone who makes pilgrimage to the four Muḥammads will attain all his hopes.”46 ‘Abdī Darūn is the first of these illustrious four Muḥammads. This short notice on ‘Abdī Darūn indicates that while he was understood to be an extremely important saint, not much of his history and relation to the city was known.

Subsequently in Qandiyya; however, a more detailed legend of his origins and miracles is developed. In the second mention of ‘Abdī Darūn, Qandiyya makes use of the well-known faqīḥ and theologian, Abū al-Manṣūr Māturīdī to explain the saint’s importance with respect to Islam and Samarqand. Māturīdī states that one of among the successors (tābi‘īn) is buried in Samarqand and his name is Sayyid Amīr ‘Abdī b.

Muḥammad ‘Abdī b. ‘Uthmān b. ‘Affān, thereby establishing ‘Abdī Darūn’s relationship

45 Roya Marefat, “Beyond the Architecture of Death: The Shrine of the Shah-i Zinda in Samarqand” (Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 1991), 75-6.

46 46 Muḥammad ibn ʻAbd al-Khalī Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya: Dū Risālah Dar Tārīkh-i Mazārāt Va Jughrāfiyā-Yi Samarqand, ed. I. Afshār (Tehran: Muʾassasah-ʾi Farhangī-i Jahāngīrī, 1989), 30.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine to the third caliph and important companion of the Prophet Muḥammad, ‘Uthmān b.

‘Affān.47

After Qusam b. ‘Abbās was said to have been defeated, 48 it was necessary to launch another expedition on the part of the Arabs to subdue Samarqand. According to

Qandiyya, the “chahār yār” decided to send a large force to the area under the leadership of someone by the name of Shāhzāda Sa‘īd b. ‘Uthmān or Muḥammad ‘Abdī or Mālik

Azhdar or Ḥazīma, there are many reports citing different names for this leader.49 The first name given, Sa‘īd b. ‘Uthmān, was a son of ‘Uthman, the third caliph based in

Medina.50 The narrative continues and the unknown author of Qandiyya seems to find the account naming Sa‘īd b. ‘Uthmān as the leader of the Arab force to Samarqand as the most reliable. Sa‘īd b. ‘Uthmān, in the narrative, defeats the infidels of Samarqand and becomes the “khalīfa” of the city. His pedigree is given later in the story, he is said to be the first son of ‘Uthman b. ‘Affān and Ruqayya, the daughter of the Prophet Muḥammad.

If Muḥammad ‘Abdī is a nickname for Sa‘īd b. ‘Uthmān, then according to the earlier mention of ‘Abdī Darūn’s full name (Sayyid Amīr ‘Abdī b. Muḥammad ‘Abdī b.

‘Uthmān b. ‘Affān), ‘Abdī Darūn is the grandson of ‘Uthmān b. ‘Affan and Ruqayya and the great-grandson of the Prophet Muḥammad.

47 Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya, 46.

48 This story of the conquest of Samarqand may also be spurious. There was never a real Muslim presence in Samarqand during the life of the Prophet Muhammad. A Muslim presence in Samarqand is more certain by the time of the governorship of Qutayba b. Muslim, who was an Arab commander under the Umayyads, and achieved success in Transoxania during the caliphate of al-Walīd (r. 705-715). See “Samarkand,” Encyclopedia of Islam, Second Edition (Brill Online, 2012); C.E. Bosworth, “Kutayba b. Muslim,” Encyclopedia of Islam, Second Edition (Brill Online, 2012); Hugh Kennedy, The Great Arab Conquests: How the Spread of Islam Changed the World We Live In (New York, Boston: Da Capo, 2007), 448.

49 The name of a person would not necessarily indicate their status as a sayyid or not because one’s standing as a sayyid could be passed through the mother and not be present in one’s name.

50 “Uthmān b. ‘Affān,” Encyclopedia of Islam, Second Edition (Brill Online, 2012)

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However, as Qandiyya continues trying to explain the genealogy of ‘Abdī Darūn, we get conflicting accounts. He is also said to be the nephew of Sa‘īd b. ‘Uthmān, the son of his sister and a Qurayshī nobleman, which could still make him a great-grandson of the Prophet Muḥammad;51 however, Qandiyya never explicitly refers to him as the great- grandson of the Prophet Muḥammad, perhaps because the accounts are confusing or because they are untrue.52 As having a lineage directly linking to the Prophet of Islam became increasingly cherished, it may not have been enough for a saint to have been of the tābi‘īn, especially only through the controversial figure of ‘Uthmān; adding a possible link to the Prophet Muḥammad increased the saint’s holiness and made him somewhat more amenable to pro-‘Alid sensibilities. In the last section that mentions ‘Abdī Darūn, he is reported to be the cousin of Sa‘īd b. ‘Uthmān, so it is clear that some sort of familial relationship needed to exist between this early Arab Qurayshī conqueror and ‘Abdī

Darūn, but the exact relation between the two is lost in history.53

Herat, Shāhrukh’s capital, was blessed to provide the final resting places for many members of Ahl-i Bayt. Maqsad al-Iqbāl al-Ṣultāniyya follows the general schema of other shrine manuals and opens with its strongest members of Ahl-i Bayt. First is

‘Abdallāh b. Mu‘āwiyya b. ‘Abdallah b. Ja‘far al-Ṭayyār (d. 134/751), the great-grandson of Ja‘far al-Ṭayyār, an elder brother of ‘Alī b. Abī Ṭālib. This ‘Abdallāh was declared the

Shi‘i Imam shortly after the death of Abū Hāshim around the time of the ‘Abbasid

51 Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya, 47.

52 Ruqayya’s only son is said to have not lived past childhood, making it impossible for her to be the mother of Sa‘īd b. ‘Uthmān and his unnamed sister. Sa‘īd b. ‘Uthmān is most probably the son of ‘Uthmān from a different wife. See W.M. Watt, “Rukayya,” in Encyclopedia of Islam, Second Edition (Brill Online, 2012).

53 Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya, 83.

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Revolution by a faction that did not end up winning. He rebelled against the ‘Abbasids successfully for some time, but eventually Abū Muslim had the governor of Herat kill and decapitate him. Ṣultān Muḥammad Kart had a dome built over his tomb in 706/1306.

Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ assures pilgrims that this site is exceedingly sacred and is visited every

Friday evening by the souls of the almost supernatural aqṭāb and awtād. The second great imāmzāda is a son of Ja‘far al-Ṣādiq, Shāhzāda Abū al-Qāsim b. Ja‘far al-Ṣādiq. His shrine is one of the few shrines to be singled out with special instructions for ziyārat of it:

The way to make ziyārat here is as follows: come to the fixed dome and with the intention of ziyārat, recite Sura Fātiha and Sura Ikhlās. Then give [the blessings of this recitation] to the soul, full of grace. And from this ask for your desires and aims (murādāt va maqāṣid) from God, the Bestower of Needs.54

If one completes this simple practice, Herat’s patron saint, ‘Abdallāh al-Ansarī promises that the pilgrim’s prayers and needs will be fulfilled. A similar reward is promised to those who visit the shrine of Sayyid Abū ‘Abdullāh al-Mukhtār (d. 277/890). He had all the qualifications necessary of a saint in this period: he was of the great mashāyikh of

Herat, he had perfected his knowledge, his miracles (karāmāt) and transcending of the customary norms of the world (khawāriq-i ‘ādāt) were well known. However, most importantly he was a Ḥusaynī sayyid, counted as a descendent of the Prophet

Muḥammad’s grandson and great martyr of Karbala, Ḥusayn. This fact, along with his achievements, made his shrine a place of intercession (tawassul), where the inhabitants of

Herat would go to attain their wants and needs.55 While many shrines are said to be

54 Aṣīl al-Dīn ʻAbd Allāh ibn ʻAbd al-Raḥmān al-Ḥusaynī Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqānīyah, ed. R.M. Haravī (Tihrān: Bunyād-i Farhang-i Īrān, 1973), 14.

55 Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya, 18-19.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine special places where a pilgrim could attain his/her desires, a very few use the term tawassul; it indicates the saint’s high level of closeness to God and accords them an intercessory power close to that of the Prophet Muḥammad. Abū ‘Abdullāh al-Mukhtār’s biography is followed soon after by that of his son, Sayyid Abū Y‘alā ibn Mukhtār.

Sayyid Abū Y‘alā was considered among the greatest religious scholars of Herat. He was a zāhid, ‘abid and “ṣāḥib-i karāmat.” However, Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ begins his biography with and focuses on Sayyid Abū Y‘alā’s genealogy. He comes from a “pure and good family,” descendants of the Prophet Muḥammad. His grave is at the foot of his famous father’s shrine, again reminding the pilgrim of the importance of this saint’s illustrious family.56 Another son of Abū ‘Abdullāh al-Mukhtār is found in Herat, Faqīh ‘Usmān

Marghazī. Presumably he had some sort of religious and juridical training given his name, faqīh (jurist), but, there is no mention of his scholarly endeavors in his biography.

Instead, the shrine guide focuses on his family and the fact that he was most famous for never spitting in Herat because it was the resting place of so many pirs.57

It was common for families to be buried in the same place, particularly local families of importance. Local families who rose to prominence did so based on their connections to the ruling class, their excellence in religious scholarship, or by their genealogical ties to the Prophet Muḥammad. Their importance in life followed them in determining how their shrines were later received after their deaths. As mentioned in the last chapter, families such as the Satājī family in Bukhara were revered in life and death for their excellence as jurists as well as their esoteric achievements. Many of the main

56 Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya, 20.

57 Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya, 20.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine members of the family are buried in the same location in Bukhara, the Maqbara-yi

Satājiyya. Similarly, families of ‘Alid descent are often buried together and celebrated for their genealogical significance. Teresa Bernheimer, in her study of 4th-5th/10th-11th century ‘Alid families in Nishapur and elsewhere, argues that at that time, simply having genealogical ties to the Prophet Muḥammad was not enough to garner esteem. ‘Alids cultivated prestige by excelling as scholars of religion, as this sort of scholarship was one of the main modes to gain prestige.58 This remains partially true in the case of ziyārat in the Timurid period. Many of the Ahl-i Bayt shrines featured in the shrine guides include saints who also had scholarly leanings or saints who had participated in the Islamic conquests, but, the focus of the biographies is on their descent from the Prophet, or ‘Alī, or from an Imām.

In other cases, all that is known of a saint is that he/she was a descendent of the

Prophet Muḥammad. For example, in Herat there was a dome in the Tiflikān area around which there were three unnamed graves. Nothing is known of who exactly is buried there, but the author of Herat’s shrine guide assures us that they must be from among the great mashāyikh and sādāt of Herat. Proof of the greatness of these saints is the well-known fact that a continuous light falls upon pilgrims who visit the shrines on Friday nights.59

And while Qandiyya gives detailed accounts of its most famous members of Ahl-i Bayt,

Shāh-i Zinda and ‘Abdī Darūn, other figures receive much less attention. For example, there is mention of the “sons of Amīr al-Mu‘minīn Ḥusayn” in the Gurestān-i Jākardīza

58 Teresa Bernheimer, The ‘Alids: The First Family of Islam, 750-1200 (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2011), 83-84.

59 Wā‘iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya, 55.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine in Samarkand.60 Only their resting places are mentioned, their names and their virtues in life are forgotten, but they remain important sources of baraka and intercession because of their noble lineage. This particular cemetery, which is also the resting place of the famous jurist and theologian, Abū Manṣūr Māturīdī and well-known Ḥanafī jurist and scholar, Burhān al-dīn al-Marghinānī (d. 593/1197),61 was said to be the greatest of cemeteries after that of Baqī‘ in Medina and Mu‘allā in Mecca.62

Ibn Karbalā’ī opens his work directly tying the practice of ziyārat to a physical imitation of the Prophetic practice of seclusion (khalwat) in the Cave of Hira while awaiting revelation.63 His first section pointedly begins with the mention of the shrines of

“Aṣḥāb-i Sayyid al-Mursalīn” or the Companions of the Prophet. In many texts, both shrine manuals and religious compendiums such as that of Muḥammad Pārsā discussed above, the Companions and the Family of the Prophet are discussed together, implying that they are equal in their sanctity and closeness to the Prophet Muḥammad. Ibn

Karbalā’ī on the other hand had reason to be set himself and his city away from anything too Shi‘i. He wrote his work, Rawẓāt al-Jinān, in exile, driven away from Tabriz by the

Safavids. By the time he was writing in the early 1500s, the Safavid attempts towards the

Shi‘ification of Iran had limited the previously existing ambiguity and changed the way that Ahl-i Bayt was talked about.

60 Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya, 32.

61 The great legal scholar Burhān al-dīn al-Marghinānī was from a very important and influential scholarly family in Samarkand. He is most well-known for authoring Al-Hidāya, which was a shortened version of his Kitāb Bidāyat al-mubtadī. Al-Hidāya became the central authoritative compendia of Ḥanafī law and was an important part of the madrasa curriculum in Iran and Central Asia and later in South Asia.

62 Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya, 33.

63 Ḥusayn Karbalāʹī Tabrīzī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, eds. J.S. Qurrāʹī and M.A.S. Qarrāʾī (Tabrīz: Sutūdah, 2004), 14.

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That being said, Ibn Karbalā’ī’s work does, however, include figures related to the Prophet Muḥammad. In the first section on the Companions of the Prophet who had come to Tabriz as part of the Islamic conquest is a saint named Amīr Maẓar ibn ‘Ajīl who is said to have been a descendent of Abū Muttalib, the grandfather of the Prophet.64 He shared a bloodline with the Prophet but was not an ‘Alid or an imāmzāda. Nevertheless, his lineage is still closely connected to that of the Prophet. This is similar to the way that the ‘Abbasids justified their rule by their descent from the Prophet Muḥammad’s beloved uncle and son of Abū Muttalib, ‘Abbās.65 ‘Abbās also helped raise and protect the young orphaned Muḥammad for some time. Samarkand’s Qusam ibn ‘Abbās is similarly related to Muḥammad via his father ‘Abbās. Amīr Maẓar ibn ‘Ajīl is revered for his participation and eventual martyrdom during the Islamic conquest; Ibn Karbalā’ī writes at length on the importance of martyrdom to Tabriz and most of the saints in the long first chapter were martyrs. This particular mazār is among the select shrines singled out as especially a place of ziyārat for the local people of the area who always made it a focus of their supplications, hopes, and requests. The author and presumably the local pilgrims compare this site to that of the Ka‘ba and make ṭawāf of it in hopes of attaining their desires.66

The shrine guide for Bukhara, Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, also follows a different format than the three other manuals. Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā’ does not front end his work with all the possible imamzādas and sayyids of Bukhara, but rather includes them in discussions of the neighborhoods in which they are interred. They are not set apart from other awlīyā’

64 Ibn Karbalā’ī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, 25.

65 See: Hugh Kennedy, The Prophet and the Age of the Caliphates: The Islamic Near East from the Sixth to the Eleventh Century, Second Edition (Harlow, England; New York: Pearson/Longman, 2004).

66 Ibn Karbalā’ī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va Jannāt al-Janān, vol.1, 25.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine but for their merit and the interest in their narrative. However, in the introductory section, sandwiched between a discussion on the kayfiyāt (manner) of ziyārat and the ādāb

(courtesies) of ziyārat, the most important shrines are mentioned. Bukharan tombs of prophets, such as the Prophet Ayyūb, should be visited first if they are present in the area of ziyārat. Similarly, Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā’ notes that it is said that a few blessed hairs of the

Prophet Muḥammad can be found in a few graves in the city: that of Qāżī Imām Sha‘bī,

Khwāja ‘Abdullāh Barqī, Dihqān Sughdī, Sayyid Imām Zarangar, and Sadr Shahīd

Husām al-Dīn.67 It is implied that these two should be visited first and that they have a special status as holders of the relics of the Prophet Muḥammad. Various relics of the

Prophet Muḥammad, and other prophets, such as hairs, nail clippings, body parts, clothing, and footprints were and remain important vessels of baraka. These relics provided yet another connection to the Prophet Muḥammad and speaks again to his person as the focus of medieval Muslim devotion.

Buried somewhere near the end of the book comes one Sayyid Abū al-Ḥaṣan

Hamadānī, who was popularly known as Sayyid Pāband (d. 895 AH). His lineage links him as a descendent of ‘Alī b. Abī Ṭālib; however, the discussion of his importance does not linger on this genealogical fact. Rather, the author of Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, lauds this saint for his excellence in matters of sharia, tarīqat, and haqīqat. His Sufi credentials show his spiritual lineage connecting him to the great Junayd al-Baghdādī. He is further renowned in Bukhara for his asceticism and finally for his martyrdom.68 His scholarly merit, strong Sufi lineage, and pious asceticism are deemed more important to his walāya

67 Aḥmad ibn Mahmūd Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda: Dar Ẕikr-i Mazārat-i Bukhārā, ed. A.G. Maʻānī (Tehran: Kitābkhānah-ʾi Ibn Sīnā, 1960), 12.

68 Mu'īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, 72-3.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine than his descent from ‘Alī. This is in line with the presentation of the respected holy dead of Bukhara, in which these aspects of a saint’s narrative are emphasized.

The Timurids were not simply content with patronizing their local Ahl-i Bayt shrines and the great shrine city of Mashhad. As mentioned above, during the rule of

Sulṭān Ḥusayn (r. 1469-1506), the long-hidden tomb of ‘Alī ibn Abī Ṭālib in Balkh was re-discovered, turning the formerly unknown village of al-Khayr or Khwāja Khayrān into the famous pilgrimage city Mazār-i Sharīf. One of the many contemporary sources on this discovery and the subsequent ziyārat that arose is that of ‘Abd al-Raḥmān Jāmī’s student, ‘Abd al-Ghafūr Lārī’s Tarīkhcha-yi Mazār-i Sharīf. While this work is focused on an important Timurid period shrine, it differs in many ways from the shrine guides used in this study. Lārī’s manner of presentation and the language he uses is evidence that his audience was not as wide and inclusive as that of the shrine guides. He uses the flowery, and at times convoluted, poetic prose found in many Timurid works, that would not have been easily accessible to large audiences as a work like Qandiyya may have been. Like the shrine guides, Tārīkhcha-yi Mazār-i Sharīf gives an account of the importance of the saint—in this case ‘Alī ibn Abī Ṭālib—Lārī’s work, however, gives a longer and more detailed account of both the hagiography of ‘Alī and the development of the shrine itself. He begins his work on Mazār-i Sharīf with a long praise of ‘Alī and reminds readers of the high esteem the Prophet Muḥammad had for his cousin. Lārī foregrounds his discussion of the importance of ‘Ali in Islam with the mention of hadiths such as “I am the city of knowledge and ‘Alī is its gate (anā madīnat al-‘ilm wa ‘Alī bābuhā)” and the Prophet Muḥammad speech at Ghadīr Khumm: “For whoever I am his

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine master, then ‘Alī is his master (man kuntu mawlāhu fa-‘Alī mawlāhu).”69 These were well-known hadith and pervaded Sufi literature, for example, man kuntu mawlāhu is found in a famous poem praising ‘Alī by the Indo-Persian poet Amīr Khusraw Dihlavī (d.

725/1325).70

The praise of ‘Alī for his relation to the Prophet and for his own virtues is central to Lārī’s explanation of the importance of the shrine at Mazār-i Sharīf, but, he also shows the power of Ahl-i Bayt in general. Lārī recounts the story of the discovery of the tomb of

‘Alī in this small town near Balkh based on a dream local elites had of the Prophet

Muḥammad. Everyone is ready to accept the dream as definitive proof that the tomb is indeed the final resting place of the Prophet’s cousin. However, one jurist (faqīḥ) remains recalcitrant. That night, this faqīḥ has a dream in which he is beaten by many sayyids with ‘Alī looking on. Following this experience, he too comes to accept the validity of the initial dream of the Prophet Muḥammad.71 In this anecdote, Lārī conveys the importance of the members of the family of the Prophet Muḥammad in protecting the legacy of one of their most important ancestors and in turn their own importance. Indeed, one of the major factors in the continuing relevance of Ahl-i Bayt shrines in the Timurid period was through the proper administration of these sites, usually under the management of Ahl-i Bayt families and descendants of the saint. In this task, they had a vested interest, one that overlapped with the interests of Timurid elites who wished to

69 Lārī, Tārikhcha-yi Mazār-i Sharīf, 21.

70 In contemporary South Asia there is a popular qawwalī or devotional song that uses this phrase. The qawwalī is usually attributed to a poem by Amīr Khusraw. See for example: Amy Catlin-Jairazbhoy, “Sacred Songs of Khoja Muslims: Sounded and Embodied Liturgy and Devotion,” Ethnomusicology 48.2 (Spring/Summer, 2004), 266.

71 Lārī, Tārikhcha-yi Mazār-i Sharīf, 27.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine establish their legitimacy as Muslim rulers in creating a flourishing ziyārat program to their shrines.72

Much like the shrine guides and city histories of the medieval period, Tarīkhcha- yi Mazār-i Sharīf centers the city and the shrine within the Islamic narrative. Balkh becomes “Qubbat al-Islām”73 and shrine is the “qibla-yi ‘arab va ka‘ba-yi ‘ajam.”74

Pilgrims are encouraged to visit and take from the healing baraka of the site and feel the presence of one of the most esteemed figures of Ahl-i Bayt, regardless of whether the body of ‘Alī actually lies in that tomb. Shahzad Bashir argues that this particular Ahl-i

Bayt shrine goes beyond just connecting pilgrims to Islam and its saintly figures, but also represents a “piece of Heaven on earth because of the special character of the person buried in it.”75

Conclusions

To follow the trajectory of early Islamic sources, i.e. hadith, sīra, etc., and their interpretations by the ‘ulamā’, it seems that a focus on the person of the Prophet

Muḥammad and subsequently on those related to him would be a natural outgrowth of the charisma of the Prophet and the development of such literature. The form and substance

72 There is much excellent work on the financial, infrastructural, and agricultural importance of ziyārat and shrines in the Timurid period. See: Maria Eva Subtelny, Timurids in Transition: Turko-Persian Politics and Acculturation in Medieval Iran (Leiden: Brill, 2007); Robert McChesney, Waqf in Central Asia: Four Hundred Years in the History of a Muslim Shrine, 1480-1889 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991); Beatrice Manz, Power, Politics and Religion in Timurid Iran (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007).

73 Lārī, Tārikhcha-yi Mazār-i Sharīf, 23.

74 Lārī, Tārikhcha-yi Mazār-i Sharīf, 34.

75 Shahzad Bashir, Sufi Bodies: Religion and Society in Medieval Islam (New York: Columbia University Press, 2011). 210.

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine of such reverence, however, is tied to the context of the Muslim community in question.

While earlier periods may have shown their reverence to Ahl-i Bayt through respect for their work as hadith scholars and the like, the post-Mongol Timurid and later periods were instead poised to show reverence through an emphasis on ziyārat and honoring the dead. Similarly, in the context of tashayyu al-ḥasan, the recasting of ‘Alid shrines as places worthy of Sunni ziyārat simply concretizes the appropriation of Ahl-i Bayt for

Sunni narratives of legitimation and piety.

In the last chapter the theme of collective or cultural memory was discussed, demonstrating the need for cities far from Islam’s origins in the Hijaz to connect to a global sacred history. This was done by celebrating those people who brought Islam to places such as Khurasan in the early conquest period, the figures of Abū Muslim and the participants of the ‘Abbasid Revolution, and most importantly through the relics of the

Prophet and the bodies of Ahl-i Bayt. Any connection to the Prophet and his family would impart their sacred nature to the ground and community of the city that claimed their shrines. The piety shown at these shrines united the citizenry of Bukhara, Samarkand, and

Herat with the larger Muslim community across time and space. This communal identity was particularly important following the social and political ruptures of the Mongol conquest and rule. The Timurids, with their particular brand of Turco-Mongolian and

Perso-Islamic identity politics, played an active role in cultivating this Islamic element of their own identity. It served as another mode of legitimation for their often precarious rule.

The way that these different manuals present sayyid saints reflects the breadth of belief and practice in medieval Islamic societies. The authors of these texts also show

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Chapter 4: Ahl al-Baytism and the Timurid Shrine their own biases and affiliations in their discussions of members of the Ahl-i Bayt. Both of these issues play a role in the different ways that Ahl-i Bayt shrines are approached in the shrine guides; whether they are centered based largely on their lineage or if their lineage is secondary evidence of their sanctity, after their prowess in battle or their achievements as scholars. However, in all cases the importance of this noble lineage is clearly one of the main indicators of sanctity in all of these Timurid cities.

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CHAPTER 5: The Geography of Sanctity

This chapter will examine issues of geography with relation to sanctity and shrines in the

Later Middle Period. It considers the comprehensive role of place in the Timurid ziyārat experience. The goal is to understand how scholars, rulers, government officials, and pilgrims imagined and inscribed a sacred geography upon their cities and suburbs. My approach is similar to that of Ethel Sara Wolper’s consideration of “how the placement, orientation, and structure” of dervish lodges in pre-Ottoman Anatolia changed the spatial hierarchy and religious culture of the region.1 Wolper argues that the location of dervish lodges and their increased accessibility changed their function and meaning for local residents. Here, the location and accessibility of shrines in Timurid cities, particularly those of Herat, will be examined to better understand their position in Timurid piety and religious practice. Timurid shrines share a similar orientation with the dervish lodges studied by Wolper in that a number of shrines that were maintained by large Sufi orders, such as the Naqshbandiyya, also served as lodging for travelers, particularly Sufis.2 When place is taken into consideration along with ritual and story, which were the focus of earlier chapters, a comprehensive idea of the ziyārat experience becomes clearer.

Before getting into the value of geography for this study, a short note on the concept of sacred space or place is in order as these are terms that will be used extensively in this chapter. Jonathan Z. Smith categorizes a sacred place as any place that serves to focus a particular type of attention upon it. Through this focused attention and

1 Ethel Sara Wolper, Cities and Saints: Sufism and the Transformation of Urban Space in Medieval Anatolia (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2003), 3.

2 See, for example, a discussion of Ibn Battuta’s use of lodging near shrines during his travels: Ian Richard Netton, “Arabia and the Pilgrim Paradigm of Ibn Battuta: A Braudelian Approach,” in Seek Knowledge: Thought and Travel in the House of Islam (Richmond, Surrey: Curzon Press, 1996).

-186- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity specialized rituals, the particular place becomes sacred.3 Smith’s theory of sacred space runs counter to traditional ideas that held that a space’s sacrality was a pre-existing and absolute characteristic inherent to the place itself. In the course of this chapter, it will become clear that shrines or mazārs in the Timurid period reflect Smith’s understanding of sacred space. Shrines and other religious spaces were made sacred through forms of commemorative architecture, hagiographical texts, the waqfs and other indemnities granted to saintly families by the political elite, and the continued visitation and practice of ritual at these shrines by local and non-local populations. Their physical location in and around cities had less to do with their sacred nature; rather the ziyārat of it imbued the space with sacredness and in turn gave the city something to hang its identity and importance upon.

The study of geography in the humanities, and in history in particular, has been finding new applications. This project makes use of some basic Geographical Information

Systems (hereafter GIS) mapping tools through ArcGIS software that has been made available by Harvard University’s Center for Geographic Analysis in order to better see the data presented in Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya,

Herat’s shrine guide. GIS mapping technology makes it easier to spatially analyze complex data. For example, it can bring forward connections between buildings, terrain, urban layout, narrative sources, movement, politics, and religious ideas in new ways. By mapping important shrine sites in relation to other important medieval buildings, city walls, and the natural topography of Herat certain spatial patterns become visible. A map when layered with the memory and historical narrative of the text gives almost a material

3 J.Z. Smith, To Take Place: Toward Theory in Religion (Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1987), 104-113.

-187- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity sense of the movement and experience of Herat’s inhabitants’ interactions with local shrines.

In utilizing GIS tools with the generalized data that can be extracted from medieval shrine guides, various problems and limitations must be considered. Even before getting to the limitations of the sources, problems of granularity are central. For security reasons detailed maps and satellite images of present-day Afghan cities are not available for unclassified use. Therefore, I had to use maps with more general contours with the GIS software in this study. This lack of precision in the maps is compounded by the often very general location information of shrines and other edifices presented in the sources. For example, sometimes a partial or vague location is given or the guide will say a shrine is located in a very large garden but with no specific location. In terms of data collection, I combined the data from primary sources, especially Maqsad al-Iqbāl, with

Terry Allen’s very useful A Catalogue of the Toponyms and Monuments of Timurid

Herat and currently existing buildings and proximity to easily identifiable features found on modern maps to plot out many important sites. The digitizing was done in ArcMap with two feature classes in a geodatabase: the walled city (shahristān) boundary is a polygon and shrines are presented as points. As will be evident below, I also calculated various elevations and distances in order to comment on the type of journey that a pilgrimage might have entailed. Elevation profiles were created using GTED 7.5 arc density with 3D Analyst Extension. Distances were calculated using projected data from

WGS 1984 World Mercator- EPSG:3395.

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Place and Collective Memory

The interconnectedness of place, memory and ritual has been the focus of many works on medieval ziyārat: including the previously cited Josef Meri’s The Cult of Saints among Muslims and Jews in Medieval Syria and the more recent Making Space: Sufis and Settlers in Early Modern India by Nile Green. In this latter work, Green brings texts and geography together in something he calls “spatializing texts and textualizing space.”4

In recognizing the centrality of space in creating history and memory, there is an added dimension to the traditional temporal framework of history. Green looks at the physical and imaginary places and routes created by Sufis moving to India in the early modern period in order to understand how these places, along with texts and holy men (both living and deceased) worked to influence “identity, memory, and belonging.”5

Specifically, he argues that a celebrated deceased saint:

[t]ransformed into an eternal saint in this way, as miraculous patron or even genealogical ancestor of his client community, through this spatial process of enshrinement the blessed man became a ritualized and textualized fastener of fragile collective memory to the enduring stability of the landscape.6

While the Timurid empire proved much more hospitable to Islam and Sufism as opposed to the foreign status it held in many parts of India in the early modern period,

Green’s assessment of the importance of saints and their shrines to identity and collective

4 Nile Green, Making Space: Sufis and Settlers in Early Modern India (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2012), 5.

5 Green, Making Space: Sufis and Settlers in Early Modern India, xiv.

6 Green, Making Space: Sufis and Settlers in Early Modern India, 4.

-189- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity memory is still relevant. Shrine guides and other literary sources from the Timurid period are important in the historical production of space and of geographical knowledge.

The study of geography has a long history in the Muslim world and the subject was an important one to early Muslims. This interest in geography has been attributed to a variety of factors, including Quranic motivations, the early Islamic conquest, and expansion, and the needs of pilgrims undertaking the Hajj pilgrimage.7 Indeed travel and mobility across geographic space is one of the defining characteristics of early Islamic history, where even the calendar begins with the migration of the Prophet Muḥammad from Mecca to Medina.8 Travelers and explorers, such as Muqaddasī (d.) and Ibn Battuta

(d. 1377), used their own travels as great source material for the geographical works they composed. Medieval Muslim geographic works were influenced by the idea that the world was created by God in the most orderly fashion in which the divisions of land and water into seven climes was part of the divine wisdom. Pourahmad and Tavallai argue that for medieval Muslim geographers “the religion, culture, and even the race of inhabitants of each realm were in harmony with its natural conditions, and reflected the particular status and nature of its ‘partner’ planet,” linking each space with the cosmos.9

Zayde Antrim argues that the faḍā’il literature and topographical histories of the ninth to eleventh centuries provide another insight into early Muslim “discourse of place.”10 This

7 Ahmad Pourahmad and Simin Tavallai, “The Contribution of Muslim Geographers to the Development of the Subject,” Geography 89.2 (April, 2004): 140.

8 Finbarr B. Flood, Objects of Translation: Material Culture and Medieval “Hindu-Muslim” Encounter (Princeton, Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2009), 1.

9 Ahmad Pourahmad and Simin Tavallai, “The Contribution of Muslim Geographers to the Development of the Subject,” Geography 89.2 (April, 2004): 143.

10 Zayde Antrim, Routes and Realms: The Power of Place in the Early Islamic World (Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 34.

-190- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity discourse was made up of practices that allowed for writers, and presumably their audiences, to make concrete a geographical imagination that located the important

Muslim cities of the period amidst its physical and cosmological location as well as in its place in the sacred history of Islam. The importance of physical centrality and connectivity is evidenced by the geographer Ibn al-Faqīh’s contention that Baghdad was a more suitable capital for the caliphate than Damascus because of its central location and connectivity with the eastern lands of Islam. While understanding the clearly ‘Abbasid partisanship in this argument, it also shows how the discourse of space could be used in political ways.11 Centrality was also important in the sacred sense, such that Mecca and

Jerusalem continue to occupy a central place even with the political capital moving to

Baghdad because of their cosmological and sacred importance.12 Finally, Antrim characterizes the geographical worldview of Muslims in the ninth to eleventh centuries as rooted in notions of salvation. Cities are described and envisaged “spatial manifestations of prophethood, bearing witness to the divine will and revealing signs of its fulfillment, or lack thereof, in their stones, just as prophets did in their words and deeds.”13

Timurid geographies can also offer similar insight into the geographic imagination of that period. Mu‘īn al-dīn Muḥammad Zamchī Isfizārī’s long history of

Herat is similar to the hybrid topographical and faḍā’il literature of the third to fifth/ninth to eleventh centuries studied by Antrim. This work, Rawżāt al-Jannāt fī Awṣāf-i Madīnat- i Harāt , begins with topographical discussion of the city and its environs. Isfizārī

11 Antrim, Routes and Realms: The Power of Place in the Early Islamic World, 41.

12 Antrim, Routes and Realms: The Power of Place in the Early Islamic World, 41.

13 Antrim, Routes and Realms: The Power of Place in the Early Islamic World, 61.

-191- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity establishes Herat’s sacred nature by first naming it: “Balada-yi Ṭayyiba-yi Harāt.”14

Right away, Tayyiba invokes connections to the holy city of the Prophet Muḥammad,

Medina, which is often simply referred to as Tayyiba. Combined with the continual references to Herat as a part of heaven, the terms jannāt and bihisht are used throughout,

Isfizārī’s focus on the sacred nature of the city is clear. He continues with evocative analogies comparing the city to all that is sacred and great, for example, the heavenly scents permeate the city, the great ‘ulamā’ and virtuous people congregate there, and it remains the goal of all famous rulers to reign from Herat.15 After praising the city, he establishes the importance of religious figures and religious buildings to the city. The entire second chapter of Rawżāt al-Jannāt fī Awṣāf-i Madīnat-i Harāt is a tribute to Jāmī for his excellence in religion. Christine Noelle-Karimi argues that Jāmī “personifies the spiritual excellence fostered by the religious environment of Herat and in turn enhanced its importance.”16 Following this, is a third chapter on the greatness of Herat’s Friday congregational masjid. After some greatly exaggerated praise of the masjid, Isfizārī explains the various architectural details of the structure itself, particularly focusing on the arches of the masjid that allow the praises of God and the call to prayer be heard clearly throughout the building.17 Even as he talks about the seemingly boring architectural design elements, his prose throughout the work evokes the sounds and

14 Muḥammad Isfizārī, Rawżāt al-Jannāt fī Awṣāf-i Madīnat-i Harāt vol. 1, ed. M.K. Imam (Tehran: Danishgāh-i Tihrān, 1959), 19.

15 Isfizārī, Rawżāt al-Jannāt fī Awṣāf-i Madīnat-i Harāt vol. 1, 19.

16 Christine Noelle-Karimi, The Pearl in its Midst: Herat and the Mapping of Khurasan (15th-19th Centuries) (Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2014), 18.

17 Isfizārī, Rawżāt al-Jannāt fī Awṣāf-i Madīnat-i Harāt vol. 1, 33.

-192- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity smells of each place he describes, such as other important masjids,18 the bazaars, and the gates of the city. While there is a sacred orientation to Isfizārī’s work, he also gives as much weight to the non-religious edifices of the city. Noelle-Karimi ranks the top three spaces of Herat according to Isfizārī as first, the Masjid-i Jāmi‘, then the Citadel of

Ikhtiyār al-Dīn which represents an important defensive structure, and lastly the city walls and bazaar.19 These three types of structures represent the important elements of the

Timurid city: the religious, the military, and the economic. In addition to these elements, a discussion of the various garden pavilions where Timurid royalty and elite preferred to live, like the Bāgh-i Jahānāra and the Bāgh-i Zaghān, adds to the unique character of this important Timurid city. It represents a continuation of forms that were present prior to

Turko-Mongol and then specifically Timurid rule, in terms of mosques and bazaars, but adds the element of suburban circles of garden pavilions unique to Turko-Mongolian elites.

Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū was commissioned by Shāhrukh in 1414 to write a geography of

Khurasan, which centered Herat as the political and religious capital of the Timurid empire.20 Because of the rules of patronage, Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū’s work is clearly written to praise the actions of his patron, Shāhrukh, while also trying to present an accurate geographical representation of the area Shāhrukh ruled. His work, Jughrāfiyya-yi Ḥāfiẓ-i

Abrū, is more focused on the commercial and agricultural aspects of Khurasan, with less emphasis on religious edifices. His geography begins with a long description of the

18 Isfizārī, Rawżāt al-Jannāt fī Awṣāf-i Madīnat-i Harāt vol. 1, 34-5.

19 Noelle-Karimi, The Pearl in its Midst: Herat and the Mapping of Khurasan (15th-19th Centuries), 20-21.

20 Noelle-Karimi, The Pearl in its Midst: Herat and the Mapping of Khurasan (15th-19th Centuries), 15.

-193- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity topography, including the borders, mountains, and plains of Khurasan.21 He then moves on to a discussion of the importance of Herat within the region of Khurasan, stating that in previous times, for example during the reign of the Seljuk Sanjar (r. 512-552/1118-

1157), Nishapur had great importance and Herat was not given as much notice. However,

Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū in clear praise of the capital of his patron, argues that in the current period

(i.e. Timurid), Herat has become superior in every way.22 In his discussion of Herat,

Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū focuses on its suburbs and hinterlands (tawāb‘i va navāḥī) districts

(bulūkāt), villages (qarīya), provinces (wilāyāt), rivers, canals and all the important features of the area.23 In his discussion of each district and the villages located within them and Herat’s neighboring provinces, Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū puts emphasis on the farmland and its viability in each area as well as on the good repair of bridges and canals.24 He also presents points of history he deems relevant to the place. For example in a discussion of

Bādghīs, he mentions that the area used to be very populated but the armies of Chingīz

Khān killed scores of people and destroyed property. Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū writes of his hopes that the current ruler will restore the population and buildings to their former glory.25

While Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū’s work was concerned with the aspects of Herat’s geography that could provide material sustenance to the region’s inhabitants, the shrine guides had a different focus. By their very nature, the guides established which religio-historical anecdotes, which sorts of saintly people and which sacred places held importance to the

21 Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū, Jughrāfiyya-yi Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū: Qismat-i rub-‘i Khurāsān, Harāt, ed. Mayil Haravi (Tehran: Bunyād-i Farhang-i Īrān, 1349/1970), 3-4.

22 Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū, Jughrāfiyya-yi Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū, 7.

23 Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū, Jughrāfiyya-yi Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū, 15.

24 See for example: Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū, Jughrāfiyya-yi Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū, 16-17.

25 Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū, Jughrāfiyya-yi Ḥāfiẓ-i Abrū, 33.

-194- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity inhabitants of a city. All of these aspects, but most tangibly the creation of sacred spaces, contributed to the collective memory of a city or region, or what Nile Green calls

“memory space.”26 Each city described in the shrine guides under study in this work is presented as excellent and unique. As discussed in Chapter 3, part of the identity of the inhabitants of each city was rooted in a collective memory and history of their city’s greatness, often going back to pre-Islamic times. A good deal of a city’s virtue lies in its physical topography and its great buildings. For example, a stream in Samarkand called

Juy-i Āb-i Raḥmat about which many interesting stories are told. It is said that from this

Juy-i Āb-i Raḥmat is connected to a spring of heaven (bihisht) finds its source from that heavenly spring. Another narration places this heavenly spring under the grave of the

Prophet Daniel who is said to be buried in Samarkand.27 These two tales demonstrate how the physical topography, the built architecture (Daniel’s grave), and eschatological ideas all play a role in the collective identity and memory of Samarkandis.

Tabriz is deemed to have become a real city when it was built up during the reign of Harūn al-Rashīd in 170AH, this building program attracted many people to this

“illuminated city.”28 Various earthquakes destroyed the city, one in 244/858 during the reign of al-Mutawakkil (r. 232-247/847-861) the Abbasid caliph and another in 433/1041 during the reign of the Abbasid al-Qā’im (r. 422-467/1031-1075).29 Each time, the city

26 Green, Making Space: Sufis and Settlers in Early Modern India, xii.

27 Muḥammad ibn ʻAbd al-Khalī Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya: Dū Risālah Dar Tārīkh-i Mazārāt va Jughrāfiyya-yi Samarqand, ed. I. Afshār (Tehran: Muʾassasah-ʾi Farhangī-i Jahāngīrī, 1989), 29.

28 Ḥusayn Karbalāʹī Tabrīzī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va-Jannāt al-Janān vol.1, eds. J.S. Qurrāʹī and M.A.S. Qarrāʾī (Tabrīz: Sutūdah, 2004), 16.

29 Al-Qā’im, though he held the title of caliph, remained largely irrelevant to the rule of the empire. By his ascension to the seat of the caliphate, all real power was held and wielded by the Buyids who were in control of Baghdad.

-195- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity recovered only when the buildings were rebuilt. After another destructive earthquake for which a date is not given, one Amīr Wahasūdān ibn Muḥammad30 was again rebuilding the city and one of the most important parts of his rebuilding projects was that of rebuilding the Masjid Jami of Tabriz. In an act mirroring a story from the life of the

Prophet Muḥammad, the last stone was ceremoniously placed in a corner completing the

Masjid-i Jāmi‘. This act was celebrated with the sacrificing of 300 cows, goats, and sheep.31 Yazd too did not find much patronage, and therefore not much building activity, during the Umayyad and Abbasid periods. From the Saljuq period to its zenith under the

Timurids, Yazd came into its own architecturally when it had princely patronage.32

Aḥmad ibn Ḥusayn ibn ‘Alī Kātib notes very early on that there was not a ruler of Yazd that did not build extensively there, clearly taking pride in his city’s great buildings.33

Tārīkh-i Jadīd-i Yazd and the slightly earlier Tārīkh-i Yazd both have chapters focused on all the different buildings of Yazd and speak in a way that reflects the importance of these buildings to the identity and memory of what Yazd was.34 The longest chapters are devoted to religious buildings, particularly funerary structures, attesting to their central importance in the built landscape of the city.

30 Wahsūdān ibn Muḥammad, erroneously mentioned as Hasūdān in Rawżāt al-Jinān va-Jannāt al-Janān, was of the Sallarid or Musafirid dynasty and ruled Azerbaijan until 356/967.

31 Tabrīzī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va-Jannāt al-Janān vol.1, 16-17.

32 Isabel Miller, “Local History in Ninth/Fifteenth Century Yazd: The Tārīkh-i Jadīd-i Yazd,” Iran vol. 26 (1989): 75-76.

33 Aḥmad ibn Ḥusayn ibn ‘Alī Kātib, Tārīkh-i Jadīd-i Yazd, ed. Īrāj Afshar (Tehran: Intishārāt-i Ibn Sīnā, 1966), 7.

34 Renata Holod-Tretiak, “The Monuments of Yazd, 1300-1450: Architecture, Patronage and Setting” (Ph.D. Diss., Harvard University, 1973).

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Bukhara’s importance is in some part attributed to the shrine of Prophet Ayyūb or

Job consecrating Bukhara’s very soil, which was discussed in an earlier chapter.

However, here I would add that the architecture of the shrine itself was an important component to Bukhara’s local identity and memory of itself. A story of a prophet is one thing; a shrine to a prophet is a much more concrete manifestation of God’s grace upon the city through making it the resting place of one of his prophets. Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda boasts of both a naturally occurring spring connected to the Prophet Ayyūb and his man- made tomb, both of which attracted local pilgrims.35 The site also became a coveted place to be buried for the city’s elite, thus, we find members of the Maḥbūbī family buried closest to Ayyūb.36 The Maḥbūbīs were a well-known and important family of Ḥanafī scholars who held the role of ṣadr and rā‘īs of Bukhara for many generations.37 The ritual of ziyārat occurring over and over again established and perpetuated a particular cultural and collective memory.

Herat was considered the center and heart of Khurasan at least as early as Kartid times. Herat’s centrality and importance was largely due to its favorable location and climate. These geographical characteristics made up a portion of the local pride inhabitants had for their city and its blessings. Similarly, religious buildings, as a central part of the city’s landscape, fed into local pride and its collective memory. The historical narratives of the period recount the glory of rulers partially based on their great building

35 Aḥmad ibn Mahmūd Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda: Dar Ẕikr-i Mazārat-i Bukhārā, ed. A.G. Maʻānī (Tehran: Kitābkhānah-ʾi Ibn Sīnā, 1960), 23.

36 Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda: Dar Ẕikr-i Mazārat-i Bukhārā, 24-25.

37 For more on the Maḥbūbī family and other powerful ‘ulamā’ families of Bukhara see: R.D. McChesney, “Central Asia’s Place in the Middle East: Some Historical Considerations,” in Central Asia Meets the Middle East, ed. D. Menashri (London: Frank Cass & Co. Ltd., 1998), 43-48.

-197- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity programs, particularly of religious buildings. Christine Noelle-Karimi, in her work on

Herat, argues that many authors of local histories focused on religious buildings as symbols of Herat’s greatness. Isfizārī, for example, places Herat’s masjids, particularly the Friday Masjid, in a central position for its nurturing of religion and spirituality of the city’s inhabitants.38 Other contemporary historians placed importance on the city’s khānaqāhs and madrasas. Herat’s mazārs were even more plentiful and widespread than its masjids, khānaqāhs, and madrasas. They played an extremely important role in continually connecting local inhabitants to Herat’s long history.

Ubiquity and Significance of Shrine Locations

In much of the literature on shrines, they are spoken of as being ubiquitous across urban and rural landscapes. The cataloguing and mapping of the shrines mentioned in Maqṣad al-Iqbāl, a shrine guide for the city of Herat, give support to these claims. Indeed, shrines are found in almost every corner of the city and in almost each of the villages and gardens around the city. The fact that shrines were to be found everywhere indicates that they were easily accessible to inhabitants of the city, regardless of where they were residing. The following map (fig. 1) shows the distribution of some shrines mentioned in

Maqṣad al-Iqbāl and reflects the fact that shrines in general were widespread across

Herat and its surrounding areas.

38 Noelle-Karimi, The Pearl in its Midst: Herat and the Mapping of Khurasan (15th-19th Centuries), 18.

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Figure 1: Wide View of Herat Shrines Map

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In the map above, I have divided the shrines represented into three categories based on my assessment of their relative importance: primary, secondary, and tertiary shrines. Shrines that had lots of information about who visited, the importance of visitors, numerous burials in the vicinity, or that belonged to well-known figures, particularly Ahl- i bayt were given primary status. While primary shrines did exist in other locales, for example Gāzurgāh and Ziyāratgāh, the majority of them are clustered in and around the walled city of Herat. As can be seen in this map, certain areas had a greater concentration of shrines mentioned in the shrine guide. The author of this shrine guide commissioned by a royal patron might well have decided to focus on certain shrines favored by his patron and omit others. Shrines may have existed that were not included in specific guides for this reason and based upon other biases or inclinations of shrine guide authors.

Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ may have simply left out various shrines that he did not know about or that did not fall in line with the official religious line of the Timurids. The guide does, however, attempt to be comprehensive. In the 209 entries, only seven shrine locations are listed as unknown or simply not mentioned. The 202 remaining entries present over 70 discrete shrine locations. The following table (fig. 2) shows the many different sites where shrines could be found in Herat and the surrounding areas.

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Bāgh-i Āhū 1 Fīrūzābād St. 1 Bāgh-i Akhī Zargar 1 Pul-i Dil Qarār 1 Bāgh-i Safīd- 1 1 Pul-i Mālān 1 Bāgh-i Zāghān 4 Pul-i Nigār 1 Bāgh-i Zubayda 3 Qariya-yi Ashkavān (or Asfaghān) 3 Bāzār-i Khush 1 Qariya-yi Āzādān 2 Between Darb-i Iraq and Darb-i 1 Qariya-yi Bashurān 1 Firuzabad Buluk Gozareh 7 Qariya-yi Buzdān-i Injīl 1

Burj Sam’ānī 1 Qariya-yi Dādishān 1 Burj-i Kharligh 2 Qariya-yi Dastjird 1 Chahār Sūq 1 Qariya-yi Ghūrān 1 Chashma-yi Mālān 1 Qariya-yi Gavāshān 2 Darb-i Fīrūzābād 3 Qariya-yi Jaghartān (or Jaqartān) 2 Darb-i ‘Irāq 3 Qariya-yi Kahedistan 2 Darb-i Khush 18 Qariya-yi Kamāl al-Dīn 1 Darb-i Malik 2 Qariya-yi Kasul 1 ‘Īdgāh 6 Qariya-yi Khwāja Surmaq 2 Fīrūzābād Bāzār 1 Qariya-yi Kūfān 1 Gāzurgāh 23 Qariya-yi Kūrt 1 Ghāzān Neighborhood 1 Qariya-yi Mālān 2 Hawż-i Māhiyān 1 Qariya-yi Murghāb-i Harāt 1 Herat (in the walled city, exact location 3 Qariya-yi Nabāẕān (or Nawbādān) 1 unknown) Kalār Girān 1 Qariya-yi Pūrān 1 Khiyābān 32 Qariya-yi Salīmī 1 Khwānchābād 6 Qariya-yi Saq Salmān 1 Kucha-yi Saq Salmān 1 Qariya-yi Sarvistān 1 Kuhandiz-i Masrikh 4 Qariya-yi Shakībān Suflā 1 Kūh-i Sayyid ‘Abdullāh Mukhtār 4 Qariya-yi Sham‘ān 4 Mahalla-yi Qużat 1 Qariya-yi Tīzān 1 Maqbara-yi Darb-i Khush 3 Qariya-yi Ziyāratgāh 5 Maqbara-yi Khiyābān 4 Sham’a Rīzān 1 Masjid-i Jāmi‘ 4 Ṭiflikān Neighborhood 4 Masjid-i Gunbad-i Nūr 1 Til-i Qutbiyān 1 Masjid-i Shuhadā’ 1 Tilqān-i Mālān 1

Maydān-i Abd al-Raheem Mālānī 1 Village between Buluk Ghurwān and Bāshān 1 Mirān Neighborhood 1 (Total) 202

Figure 2: Shrine Sites Mentioned in Maqṣad al-Iqbāl Chart

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What all of this detail makes clear is the ubiquity of shrines. Depending upon where one lived, worked, or spent time, a locally placed shrine could be visited with little additional travel. Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ lists many outlying villages and their shrines; however, he does not list all of the villages found in Allen’s A Catalogue of the

Toponyms and Monuments of Timurid Herat. Allen lists 260 villages around Herat. He derives this number through a reading of many Timurid period sources but cannot actually locate a good number of them. The discrepancy between this large number and the 26 villages mentioned in Maqṣad al-Iqbāl can be attributed to a number of possibilities. It is most likely that names of villages have changed over time and that other villages simply have disappeared. Another possibility is that many of the villages listed by Allen but not Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ are very far from Herat. They either may not have been counted as being part of Herat’s environs by Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā‘iẓ or he may have been unaware of the local shrines in these villages. The practice of ziyārat to local shrines was so widespread at this time, it seems likely that most villages of any real size would have had a local shrine or would have been close enough to a shrine in a nearby village.

With regard to the villages mentioned in Maqṣad al-Iqbāl, the saints and their shrines range in level of importance according to the shrine guide. For example Qariya-yi

Purān has a shrine for a very important saint named Mawlana Jalāl al-dīn Abū Yazīd

Purānī (d. 862/1457) who was known as one of the aqṭāb, or poles, of the community and

Abd al-Raḥmān Jāmī was said to have served him during his life and visited his shrine often after his death.39 The majority of entries on shrines in these outlying areas, however, portray less important saints. For example, Imām Muḥammad ibn Isḥāq Sughdī

39 Aṣīl al-Dīn ʻAbd Allāh ibn ʻAbd al-Raḥmān al-Ḥusaynī Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, ed. R.M. Haravī (Tehran: Bunyād-i Farhang-i Īrān, 1973), 90-91.

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(d. 305/917), buried in Qariya-yi Buzdān-i Injīl, is described only as an important renunciant (zāhid) with no other biographical details, though his shrine was known as

“Qibla-yi Ḥājāt” or the “direction to turn for one’s needs”.40 Qariya Sham’an is home to the shrine of Khwāja Shād Gham for whom no biographical information nor death date is known. However, his shrine is considered locally important and called “Ka‘ba -yi

Murād” or the “Ka‘ba of one’s wishes.”41 One of the few women mentioned in Maqsad al-Iqbāl, Bībī Jaghartānī has a shrine in Qariya-yi Jaghartān and is only known as being among the servants or worshippers of God of her time (‘abidān-i zamān-i khud) and her shrine attracted many seekers (ṭālibān) of her grace (fayż).42

This particular distribution of shrines across Herat and the outlying areas was not entirely intentional. Generally shrines developed in an organic manner and for a multitude of reasons. The most cited reason for the building of a shrine in a particular place is that the place was important to the life of the saint that is buried at the shrine. It could be the home of the saint, his/her place of seclusion, or the location of a miracle.

Because holy figures might be found almost anywhere during their life, it makes sense that their shrines too were scattered throughout the city and its environs. One particular saint in Herat, Bābā Zakariyya Majẕūb (d. ca. 9th C. A.H), is buried at the head of

Khīyabān Street where he spent most of his days in an ecstatic state.43

Abdī Darūn’s shrine in Samarkand provides an example that is very common in determining the location of a shrine. Samarkand had experienced a great flurry of

40 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, 20.

41 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, 65.

42 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, 65.

43 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, 84.

-203- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity building activity from the moment that Timur made it his capital until his death in 1405.

After the first decades of the fifteenth-century, great structures such as the Shāh-i Zinda complex, the Gūr-i Amīr, the shrine at Rūḥābād, and the mosque of Bībī Khānum as well as many garden pavilions had already been built and become important parts of

Samarkand’s landscape. After his father’s death, building grand structures remained important to Shāhrukh and many subsequent Timurid princes; Shāhrukh’s own son Ulugh

Beg built widely in Samarqand.44 It is probably during this second period of building that the shrine and khānaqāh of ‘Abdī Darūn was built; however, the exact patron of the

Timurid period shrine is unknown.45

The shrine was built upon the site of the original grave and mausoleum of the saint. If this original mausoleum was built in the twelfth century, during the Saljuq period as has been argued, then it was located very far to the southeast of the original city of

Afrāsiyāb (fig. 3). With regard to the city (Samarqand) that developed after the Mongol destruction of Afrāsiyāb and the new Timurid walls of this city, the shrine is still outside of the main urban center and outside of the city walls. In the fifteenth-century, there was great growth in Timurid metropolitan centers and a great many suburbs soon came to ring the original urban cores.46 Samarqand is no exception and indeed the burgeoning population spread outwards from the city centers. Timur and his descendants also seemed to favor building and residing in great gardens that surrounded the city centers. It is

44 Donald Wilber, “Qavam al-Din ibn Zayn al-Din Shirazi: A Fifteenth-Century Timurid Architect,” Architectural History, Vol. 30 (1987), 32.

45 Lisa Golombek and Donald Wilber, The Timurid Architecture of Iran and Turan vol. 1 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988), 267.

46 Lisa Golombek, “The Resilience of the Friday Mosque: The Case of Herat,” Muqarnas 1 (1983): 95.

-204- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity among one such garden, the Bāgh-i Fīrūz, that the shrine complex of ‘Abdī Darūn and that of the nearby ‘Ishrat Khāna developed.47

A: Afrasiyāb, B: Old Citadel, C: Shāh-i Zinda, D: Registān, E: Iron Gate, F: Gūr-i Amīr, G: Gok Saray, H: observatory, I: namāzgāh, J: Shrine of ‘Abdī Darūn, K: Ishrat Khāna, L: 17th C. namāzgāh, M: Madrasa of Ulugh Beg, N: Madrasa of Shīr Dar, O: Madrasa of Tilla Kar, P: Bībī Khānum Mosque, Q: Bībī Khānum mausoleum

Figure 3: Map of Samarkand. From J.M. Bloom and S. Blair, eds. The Grove Encyclopedia of Islamic Art and Architecture, Vol. 3 (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009), 170.

47 Karoly Gombos, The Pearls of Uzbekistan: Bukhara, Samarkand, Khiva (Budapest: Corvina Press, 1976), 65.

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No waqf or other document exists to accurately explain why the shrine of ‘Abdī

Darūn was built so far from the old city of Afrāsiyāb. However, the Samarqandī shrine manual Qandiyya-yi Khurd mentions ‘Abdī Darūn teaching at the site where the current shrine sits. He most likely taught out of his home as was common in the early Islamic period and it was just as common to build a saint’s tomb either at the site of his home or place of teaching. While no textual sources point to the exact reason why someone during the reign of Ulugh Beg decided to build onto the existing foundation and structure, there is precedent for this sort of action. From the time of Shāhrukh and increasingly so under his successors, renovation and refurbishment of architectural structures became an important princely and noble endeavor. Lisa Golombek demonstrates this tendency in her work on the Friday Mosque in Herat, which was continually renovated. She also mentions the great number of monuments, bridges, and other buildings that ‘Alī Shīr

Navā‘ī either rebuilt or repaired. There was a sense among these elites that patronage and upkeep of civic and religious buildings was an important responsibility.48 And as mentioned in earlier chapters, the financial incentives of such building projects made them popular among elite members of Timurid society.

‘Abdī Darūn had links to the earliest periods of Islam, the Arab conquest of

Transoxiana, and a possible relation to the Prophet Muḥammad; therefore, his tomb would be seen as a valuable site to build on. It is likely at this time that there was still a continued reverence for the saint and any Timurid ruler or bureaucrat could increase his/her prestige by building there.

48 Golombek, “The Resilience of the Friday Mosque: The Case of Herat,” 95-102.

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The ‘Ishrat Khāna was built later, most of it was complete by 1464, and it was purposefully built across from the shrine of ‘Abdī Darūn, in order that the royal dead buried there could partake in the baraka and shafā‘at of the saint. The question of why another location was not chosen arises, perhaps one closer to either the urban center where Gur-i Amīr was located or in the northeastern suburbs of the city in the Shāh-i

Zinda complex, where many other royal women were entombed. There could be a number of reasons this location was chosen, one being the space needed to build such a grand structure. Shāh-i Zinda as well seems to have been quite crowded and the shrines built there are of a more modest size compared to ‘Ishrat Khāna. Also, one might consider that Ḥabība Ṣultān Begūm had the ‘Ishrat Khāna built for her beloved daughter who died very young.49 The charming atmosphere of Bāgh-i Fīrūz may have suited her idea of a child’s afterlife better than other possibilities. 50

‘Abdī Darūn’s shrine was built in the vicinity of an important hawż (pool) that figured into the life and miracles of the saint (see Chapter 3).51 Because this pool continued to be an important part of ‘Abdi Darūn’s shrine complex and created a tangible

49 Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya, 191.

50 The way in which medieval Europeans understood the nature and place of their children has been the subject of long debate among Medievalists; however, this question is just beginning to be asked of the Middle East, Iran and Central Asia. Some studies of medieval Europe that raise this question include: Goody, The Development of Marriage and the Family in Medieval Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 324.; Hanawalt, The Ties that Bound: Peasant Families in Medieval England (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989), 364.; Herlihy and Klapisch, Tuscans and Their Families: A Study of the Florentine Catasto of 1427 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989), 404.; Kuehn, Law, Family and Women: Toward a Legal Anthropology of Renaissance Italy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991), 430.; Aries, Centuries of Childhood: A Social History of Family Life (New York: Random House, 1962), 448.

51 Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya, 78-9.

-207- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity reminder of the saint’s legacy. Pilgrims who visited the shrine complex could touch this very pool and enjoy the quiet around it (fig. 4).

Figure 4: Hawż at the Shrine of ‘Abdī Darūn, Samarkand. From Harvard Fine Arts Library, Digital Images & Slides Collection 1990.19721, downloaded May 2018.

It also speaks to the importance of water in shrine culture, be they canals, fountains, rivers or the bridges that facilitated crossing these bodies of water. Similar to the ubiquity of shrines at gates and intersections, many important bridges in Herat were flanked by a shrine. Khwāja Awwalīn’s tomb is found near Pul-i Nigār, where interestingly it is said that riders cannot pass through there because of his sanctity.52

Khwāja Chahār Shanba’s shrine is near Pul-i Dil Qarār.53 Khwāja Rukh is buried near

Pul-i Mālān.54 Pools such as that found at ‘Abdī Darūn’s shrine and fountains were common around shrines. These served to cool the usually hot areas, provide water to thirsty pilgrims, and generally add comfort to the pilgrimage experience.

52 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, 63.

53 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, 63.

54 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, 65.

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The fact that shrines existed in almost every locality, not just in congested central locations, also tells us about the situation of builders and patrons of shrines. A great many shrines were built during the Timurid period and patrons often had to find creative ways to raise new building works. One strategy was to simply build in the open spaces in the outer suburbs and outlying towns of important cities. For example, the area called

Ziyāratgāh became an important place of pilgrimage during the Timurid period. Earlier it had been a far off outpost of Herat, but with the building efforts that capitalized on preexisting popularity of the site, Sultan Ḥusayn added to the number of shrines and religious sites in the area in the latter part of the fifteenth century.

Mazārs were often built around other religious buildings or connected to other buildings, such as a masjid, a khānaqāh, or a madrasa. Its main function was as a religious building so it makes sense that this would be the case. In terms of the spatiality of the religious experience of ziyārat, those who came to the shrine would take it in as part of the landscape of piety. Often times it was built of the same materials, endowed by the same patrons, designed by the same architects as to evoke a sense of connectivity between the different edifices. In practice, it was quite normal to have a mausoleum contained within a khānaqāh or a madrasa. This added to the baraka and importance of the khānaqāh or madrasa. We see examples of this throughout Herat. Shaykh Kamāl al-

Dīn ‘Abd al-Razzāq al-Kāshānī was buried inside of the Khānaqāh al-Zaynī al-Māstarī, which itself was located near the Masjid-i Jāmi‘ of Herat.55 Here we see all three important religious structures in the same vicinity. Golombek, in her study of Gāzurgāh,

55 Terry Allen, A Catalogue of the Toponyms and Monuments of Timurid Herat (Cambridge, MA: Aga Khan Program for Islamic Art at Harvard University and MIT, 1981), 154; Faṣīḥ al-Dīn Aḥmad Khvāfī, Mujmal-i Faṣīḥī vol. 3, ed. M.N. Naṣr Ābādī (Tehran: Intishārāt-i Asāṭīr, 2008), 49.

-209- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity discusses similar incidences in other Timurid regions: the ḥaẓīra enclosure that houses the tomb of the famous Sufi Shaykh Khwāja ‘Abd al-Khāliq Ghijduvānī in Ghijduvān contains a madrasa and there is a building that seems to be a masjid with a funerary enclosure in front of it at Anaw for Shaykh Jamāl al-Ḥaqq al-Dīn.56 For practical purposes, this arrangement offers devotees the convenience of visiting all three with relative ease. The clustering of buildings was a common practice for Timurid patrons.

This was particularly true if a popular site, whether a tomb or other pilgrimage site, was already in existence, it was easy for a ruler to erect new buildings to capitalize on that popularity. Beatrice Manz points to several incidences of this during the Timurid period, including extensive building during Timur’s reign around the tomb of Shāh-i Zinda in

Samarkand and Sultān Ḥusayn’s building activities at Ziyāratgāh, which was already “a popular pilgrimage and burial spot.”57

‘Alī Shīr Navā’ī’s famous Ikhlāsiyya complex in the Khiyābān area of Herat was one of the most extensive grouping of religious buildings, including a masjid-i jāmi‘, a madrasa, a khānaqāh, a dar al-huffāz, a dar al-shifā’, and a bath. The aforementioned structures, along with a residence and small garden for his personal use, were built and endowed during the life of ‘Alī Shīr and after his death. His mausoleum became a central part of the complex as well.58 The owner of a waqf was often interred at or around the site of their endowment, another example is found in the madrasa of Gawhar Shād, the wife

56 Lisa Golombek, “The Timurid Shrine at Gazur Gah: An Iconographical Interpretation of Architecture” (Ph.D. diss., The University of Michigan, 1968), 241.

57 Beatrice Manz, Power, Politics and Religion in Timurid Iran (Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 192.

58 For extensive details on the Ikhlāṣiyya Complex see: Allen, A Catalogue of the Toponyms and Monuments of Timurid Herat, 94-97.

-210- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity of Shāhrukh. Terry Allen and other art historians describe it as a “muṣalla ensemble” that was endowed and built by Gawhar Shād in the Khiyābān neighborhood of Herat near Pul- i Injīl between 1417-1438/820-841 AH.59 Within this complex is a mausoleum in which

Gawhar Shād and many members of the royal family related to her were buried, including her brother, a few of her sons, and a grandson. Because this was a royal tomb as opposed to one of a religious figure it is not mentioned in Maqṣad al-Iqbāl. However, the mausoleum was probably built in the vicinity of a religious building, the madrasa, in order to connect it to the religious atmosphere of that building. This aligns with the very common practice of building royal mausoleums as well as graves and graveyards of regular and elite people around the mazārs of holy saints. The Ishrat Khana, a secular tomb built to house royal women and children in Samarkand, was built right across from the shrine of ‘Abdī Darūn, an important saint linked to the family of the Prophet

Muḥammad.

As discussed above, shrines were found all around Herat and its environs, yet, the ones listed in Maqṣad al-Iqbāl are all concentrated around the walled city and a few other locations. Of the 202 known locations mentioned in the shrine guide, 150 of them were located in just 14 general areas. The majority of shrine locations are concentrated within a few key areas: in the Khiyābān area north of the walled city, in Gāzurgāh a few miles to the northeast of the walled city, around Darb-i Khush, within the walls of the city (shahr band), in the Guzara district (bulūk) particularly in an area known as Ziyāratgāh, at Īdgāh north of the city, Khwāncha/Khwānchābād just outside of Darb-i Fīrūzābād, around the other gates of the city and a few important gardens (bāghs) (figs. 5 and 6).

59 Allen, A Catalogue of the Toponyms and Monuments of Timurid Herat, 122.

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Figure 5: Close-up View of Herat Shrines Map

Shrines Indicated in Map:

1 ‘Abdullāh ibn Ja‘far al-Ṭayyār 2 Shāhzāda Abū al-Qāsim ibn Ja‘far al-Ṣādiq 3 Fakhr al-Dīn Rāzī 4 Gawhar Shād Masjid 5 ‘Abdullāh Taqī & Maqbara-yi Darb-i Khush 6 Khwāja ‘Abdullāh Anṣārī & Gāzurgāh 7 Takht-i Mukhtār (Kūh-i Mukhtār) 8 Abū al-Walīd (Qariya-yi Āzādān) 9 Eidgāh 10 Darb-i Khush Area 11 Khwāja Kula 12 Mazār-i Shuhadā’ 13 Bibi Siti Rukh & Bazār-i Khush 14 Imām ‘Abdullāh al-Wāḥid ibn Muslim 15 Khwāja Chahārshamba

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Shrine Location Number of Shrines Khiyābān 40 Kuhandaz-i Masrikh- 4

Maqbara-yi/Gurestan-i Khiyābān- 4

Gāzurgāh 23 Darb-i Khush 21 Maqbara-yi Darb-i Khush-3

Within Walled City 18 Masjid-i Jāmi‘-4

Ṭiflikān Neigborhood-4

Ghazān Neighborhood-1

Shama‘ Rīzān Neighborhood-1

Qużāt Neighborhood-1

Mirān Neighborhood-1

Chahār Sūq-1

Darb-i Fīrūzābād Bāzār-1

Darb-i Khush Bāzār-1

Buluk Gozāra 12 Ziyāratgāh- 5

Īdgāh 6 Khwānchābād 6 Darb-i Qutb Chāq/Qutb Chāq St. 5 Darb-i Malik 2 Darb-i Fīrūzābād 3 Darb-i ‘Irāq 3 Kūh-i Sayyid ‘Abdullāh Mukhtār 4 Bāgh-i Zaghān 4 Bāgh-i Zubayda 3 TOTAL 150 Figure 6: List of Major Shrine Sites Chart

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(A: Darb-i Khush, B: Darb-i Firūzabād, C: Darb-i ‘Irāq, D: Darb-i Malik, E: Darb-i Quṭb Chāq/Qipchāq, F: Masjid-i Jāmi‘)

Figure 7: Map of Walled City (Herat) and Immediate Environs, from T. Allen, A Catalogue of the Toponyms and Monuments of Timurid Herat (Cambridge, MA: Aga Khan Program for Islamic Art at Harvard University and MIT, 1981). (lettered location markers added here for clarity)

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Places such as Khiyābān, Ziyāratgāh, and Gāzurgāh already had mazārs before the Timurid period. Under the Timurids, particularly Shāhrukh, these areas grew considerably in terms of the building of funerary and religious structures. This was part of the Timurid efforts of establishing their legitimacy as Sunnī rulers of a largely Muslim population. They were able to capitalize on already existing devotion to local saints and their shrines and simply direct it in the directions they wanted. In this way, Khiyābān became a very important suburb, filled with religious buildings and more than 40 shrines.

These included the main Ahl-i Bayt shrines of 'Abdullah ibn Mu'awiyya ibn 'Abdullāh b.

Ja'afar al-Ṭayyār and Shāhzāda Abū Al-Qāsim b. Ja'far al-Ṣādiq as well as a ḥaẓīra of the descendants of the Prophet’s uncle Ḥamza ibn ‘Abd al-Muṭṭalib. Places such as Qarīya-yi

Āzādān, Khwānchābād, and Kūh-i Mukhtār became popular places of ziyārat during the

Timurid period because of contemporary and near-contemporary saints being buried there.

Most of these shrines are located in public and accessible locations. For example, many shrines can be found near the important bazaar areas of Herat and around the various gates of the walled city, particularly Darb-i Khush. In Timurid period texts darb and darvāza are used to mean gate; in Maqsad al-Iqbāl, the author almost exclusively refers to the main gates of the city as darb. The walled city of Herat was surrounded by five important gates: Darb-i Khush, Darb-i ‘Irāq, Darb-i Fīrūzabād, Darb-i Malik, and

Darb-i Qipchāq or Qutb Chāq (see Fig. 5). All traffic into and leaving the walled city

(shahr band) would have to pass through these gates and bring inhabitants into the areas where shrines were prevalent. Similarly, every Friday, the majority of male inhabitants of

-215- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity the city would be attending Friday prayers at the Masjid-i Jāmi‘ in the walled city, bringing them to the vicinity of still more shrines.60

Mazārs were considered public spaces in the same way that the bazaar was a public space. Both fulfilled important functions of society and were present in the day to day lives of inhabitants of the region. The bazaar was necessary for the sale and purchase of comestibles, clothing, and other items. However, the bazaar area was used in other ways as well. Using various descriptions of public gatherings, such as wedding and birth celebrations, public trials and investitures of government officials, Michele Bernardini argues that the bazaar served as a special space for ceremony. This ceremonial space was open to both the commoners and the elite, unlike more exclusive ceremonies that took place in Timurid garden pavilions in the city suburbs.61 Shines similarly can be viewed as dual purpose spaces. Some were easily accessible and frequented often or as needed by local residents. These would be the shrines with the lowest level of travel friction. Indeed, these were the shrines that were present all around local residents, the one they would see on their way to the vegetable market or to the Friday Mosque for prayer. The way certain shrines are described give evidence to their connection to everyday activities of urban residents. For example, the Herati shrine of Fakhr-i Sānī is located “outside of Darb-i

Khush, near a bāzārcha (small market) that is on your left as you are leaving the city.”

60 Oher congregational mosques did exist around Herat including the Masjid-i Jāmi‘ of Gawhar Shād’s madrasa, the masjid at ‘Alīshīr’s Ikhlāṣiyya complex, Masjid-i Gunbad in Ziyāratgāh, and masjids in many of the villages surrounding the city. For more on the Friday mosque see: Lisa Golombek, “The Resilience of the Friday Mosque: The Case of Herat,” Muqarnas 1 (January, 1983): 95-102.

61 Michele Bernardini, “The Ceremonial Function of Markets in the Timurid City,” in Environmental Design: Journal of the Islamic Environmental Design Research Centre 1-2, ed. A. Petruccioli (Rome: Dell’oca Editore, 1991), 92.

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The Mazār-i Dokhtarān is also outside of Darb-i Khush and close to the caravanserai in that vicinity.62

Friction and Liminality

The movement of people across space is an important consideration in terms of pilgrimage. As discussed in an earlier chapter, many scholars counted the journey to a shrine as part of the sacred ritual. Departure from home as well as the actual walk to the shrine was couched in ritualistic terms complete with the appropriate litanies to accompany the activity. But how exactly did people set forth on pilgrimages to local and not so local shrines? Did they travel long distances regularly to complete ritual supplications at particular shrine or were they more likely to frequent local shrines? Long distance travel was an important part of medieval life; however, it was not the reality for most people. Islamic scholars have had a long tradition of traveling to far places in order to gain and share religious knowledge. As one historian puts it, for some Islamic scholars the long journey was a sort of “metamorphosis” necessary to validate one’s status as a scholar.63 Similarly, there is ample evidence of people who had enough wealth to make the expensive journey to Mecca to perform the Hajj pilgrimage. For the majority of

Muslims in the eastern Islamic world, however, local and regional pilgrimages were as far as they traveled.

To help evaluate the difference in a pilgrim’s experience of visiting various shrines, concepts found in transport geography are helpful. Transportation geography is a

62 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, 59.

63 Houari Touati, Islam and Travel in the Middle Ages, trans. L.G. Cochrane (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 2010), 1.

-217- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity sub-category of geography and is focused on the mobility of people and things. Central to this approach is the idea of friction of distance or friction of space. Any sort of constraint placed upon transport, such as long distance, topography, time, costs, administrative borders, serve as a sort of friction to transportation and limits the movement of a person.64 When trying to ascertain how far people may have regularly traveled in order to make ziyārat, taking the friction of distance into consideration is important. The friction of distance and the financial and security costs involved served to limit how far people could easily travel. With this in mind it helps us to better understand trends in the sources that liken local tombs and religious places to important universal Islamic places, such as the Ka‘ba in Mecca. The majority of medieval Muslims could not make the long and expensive trip to Mecca, so they found circumambulation of other shrines fulfilling.

While the sources are clear that making the pilgrimage to Mecca made a ḥājī (one who has performed the Hajj pilgrimage) worthy of special honors, visiting other religious places might be nearly as important. For example, the more convenient pilgrimage to

Mashhad became increasingly popular during the Timurid period.

Under the patronage of Shāhrukh, his wife Gawhar Shād, and other elite

Timurids, many public religious buildings were constructed in Mashhad in the fifteenth century and the city became a major pilgrimage hub. The number of pilgrims attracted to the tomb of ‘Alī al-Riżā’s tomb grew dramatically during this period. As was argued in the last chapter, the shrine to this Shi‘i Imam did not impede Sunni veneration. Rather,

Sunni appropriation of ‘Alid and Shi‘i spaces was extremely common such that Timurid patrons actively sought out possible ‘Alid shrines to either build or renovate. Mashhad

64 Jean-Paul Rodrigue, The Geography of Transport Systems (New York: Routledge, 2017),

-218- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity provided a great opportunity for Timurid elites to showcase their patronage and devotion to religious architecture, particularly that which was connected to a mazār. Even before the great building projects during Shārukh’s reign, Mashhad already had a special place with regard to pilgrimage. Ruy Gonzalez de Clavijo, the Spanish ambassador who met with Timur in Samarkand, visited the tomb of ‘Alī al-Riżā and called it the “chief place of pilgrimage in all these parts…” He continued saying:

[A]nd yearly come hither people in immense numbers of pious visitation. Any pilgrim who has been here, on returning home to his own country, his neighbors will come up to him and kiss the hem of his garment, for they hold that he has visited a very holy place.65

This reverence for pilgrims who visited Mashhad is similar to that accorded to those returning from Hajj. Mashhad’s special place for Khurasanian pilgrims was celebrated by the widespread belief that making pilgrimage to it during the time of Eid al-Adha (the feast of the sacrifice) was equal to the Hajj.66 The historical sources also show that Shāhrukh made repeated pilgrimages to Mashhad in order to show his pious devotion alongside his ostentatious patronage of buildings in the city.

Mashhad and other important regional shrines, such as that of ‘Alī at Mazār-i

Sharīf which became important at the end of the fifteenth century, required a long journey that would not have been frequently undertaken by most Muslims because of the distance, cost, and time commitment involved. Because so many shrines, including those connected to Ahl-i Bayt, companions of the Prophet Muḥammad, and early saintly

65 R. G. de Clavijo, Embassy to Tamerlane: 1403-1406 (New York, London, 1928), 185.

66 See Khwāndamīr, Ḥabīb al-siyar, 4: 324. And May Farhat, 84.

-219- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity figures, were abundant in Herat, it is likely that people were able to fulfill their ziyārat needs locally. As shown above, there was a shrine of some importance to be found in practically every place a person might find themselves. As such, many local sites were also spoken of in terms likening them to the Hajj in Mecca and even to visiting the tomb of the Prophet Muḥammad in Medina. The lower level of friction to travel with regard to local sites made them more accessible to inhabitants of a particular city. Language comparing local pilgrimage to Mecca or Medina adds a dimension of specialness or even liminality to the experience of visiting particular shrines. For example the Maqṣad al-

Iqbāl calls the shrine of Khwāja Shād Gham, located in Qariya-yi Sham‘ān, “Ka‘ba-yi murād.” In Samarkand, the shrine Mazār-i Juzaniyān is called the “Ka‘ba of

Transoxiana.”67 Ibn Karbalā’ī makes it clear the mazār of Amīr Muẓar ibn ‘Ajīl was particularly an important place of ziyārat for people who lived in Tabriz. They visited the shrine of this saint, said to be a descendant of the Prophet Muḥammad’s grandfather, Abū

Muṭṭalib, in hopes that their wishes and supplications will be fulfilled. Ibn Karbalā’ī compares this shrine to the Ka‘ba and states that local pilgrims would circumambulate

(ṭawāf) the shrine as part of their ritual practice.68 Even shrines that were not referred to as a Ka‘ba of its region still may have held a special esteem beyond that of other shrines in the area. One caveat to this discussion is that the use of ka‘ba in Persian literature did not always have a religious resonance. However, in the case of shrine guides, which had clear religious content and motivations, one can argue that the use of ka‘ba be taken at face value.

67 Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya, 31.

68 Ibn Karbalā’ī, Rawżāt al-Jinān va-Jannāt al-Janān vol. 1, 25.

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I argue here that even among the local shrines, there was a difference in the ziyārat experience and, therefore, some important shrines that were not explicitly referred to as special still could have had a special status based upon factors increasing friction of travel. Using shrines in Herat as a test case, I calculated the elevation profiles of a few different routes to certain shrines in order to understand what the journey to each shrine was like. For this exercise, I compared the distance and elevation involved in traveling to four popular shrine areas: Gāzurgāh, Darb-i Khush area and the shrine of Hazrat Khwāja

Abū ‘Abdullāh Taqī al-Sijistānī al-Harawī , shrine of Hazrat Khwāja Abū al-Walīd in

Qariya-yi Āzādān, and the Khiyābān area around the shrine of Fakhr al-dīn Rāzī. I chose these particular shrines and shrine areas because of the way in which they are presented in the Maqṣad al-Iqbāl. Gāzurgāh, Khiyābān and Darb-i Khush have the largest concentrations of shrines in Herat as well as are home to very famous and popular saints.

The shrine guide also highlights how well-visited these places were, how people wanted to be buried in these areas, and also uses these places as reference points when giving directions to other shrines.

The shrine of Hazrat Khwāja Abū ‘Abdullāh Taqī (d. 460AH) is located right outside of Darb-i Khush, the eastern gate of the walled city (dar birūn-i darb-i khush).

Both Shāhrukh and Sulṭān Husayn were said to have built up this shrine and frequently visited it, sometimes together. Taqī was a Hanbalī and a Sufī and one of ‘Abdullāh

Ansārī’s teachers. His excellence in sharia and ṭarīqa as well as his ample miracles established his position as an important Heratī saint. Also, in the general vicinity of his shrine, around Darb-i Khush, there are a total of 21 shrines mentioned in Maqsad al-

Iqbāl. I would argue that the presence of Taqī and the other important and sometimes

-221- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity more secondary shrines in this area made it a popular ziyārat location. To model a possible trip a pilgrim might make to get to the shrine of Taqī, I plotted a course from the center of the city, at the Chahār Sūq to the shrine itself outside of Darb-i Khush. Because a road existed connecting these well-visited points it seems reasonable that this could have been a possible path taken by a pilgrim. Obviously, pilgrims lived, worked, and came from many different parts of Herat and its outlying areas. Because of the impossibility of plotting every possible permutation of travel, I am using a model route to make various observations about travel to shrines in Herat. The elevation profile for this route (Chahār Sūq to Darb-i Khush/Mazār-i Khwāja Taqī) shows that the distance was a little bit more than one kilometer and showed no significant changes in elevation (fig. 8).

This indicates a pretty flat and easy walk between the two points.

Figure 8: Elevation Profile Journey to Darb-i Khush & ‘Abdullāh Taqī

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The next shrine considered is that of Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī. Al-Rāzī was a well- known twelfth-century theologian and exegete who wrote a great many works on kalām

(theology). Herat’s shrine guide gives him a rather short entry based on his importance in the scholarly world and for the number of other saints buried around him, but does say of him that he was “among the great imams and ‘ulamā’ of his day” and that because of the great esteem he held in the city, Sultan Ghiyās al-Dīn Ghūrī (r. 558-598/1163-1202) made the Masjid-i Jāmi‘ of Herat Shāfi‘ī so that al-Rāzī could preach there and give

“nasīḥat” to the Muslims of Herat.69 The general area where he is buried in Khiyābān was also where important sayyids such as ‘Abdullāh ibn Mu‘āwiyya ibn ‘Abdullāh ibn

Ja‘far al-Tayyār and Shāhzāda Abū al-Qāsim ibn Ja‘far al-Ṣādiq were buried. Because of the great building projects undertaken by the Timurids, including Gawhar Shād’s madrasa and ‘Alī Shīr Navā‘ī’s great Ikhlasiyya complex among others, Khiyābān became a growing neighborhood for funerary architecture. Maqṣad al-Iqbāl lists 40 shrines in the immediate area, making it an oft-visited site. The elevation profile for this area, and specifically for Takht-i Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī as it is called in the sources, is taken from Darb-i Malik (fig. 9). Darb-i Malik makes a reasonable starting point as it provides the most direct road to the shrines in the Khiyābān area. From Darb-i Malik, the shrine of al-Rāzī is a little less than 1.5km and the elevation is negligible, only about 20 meters. This would indicate that this particular path was also one that would not be too arduous on pilgrims traversing it.

69 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, 39.

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Figure 9: Elevation Profile Journey to Khiyābān & Fakhr al-Dīn Rāzī

Figure 10: Mazār of Abū al-Walīd, Qariya-yi Āzādān. From Harvard Fine Arts Library, Digital Images & Slides Collection d2009.02875, downloaded May 2018.

Khwāja Abū al-Walīd was buried near the town where he lived; Qariya-yi Āzādān

(fig. 10). Ziyārat of Abū al-Walīd was popular in the Timurid period: in order to make clear where certain more secondary or tertiary shrines are located, the author of Maqṣad al-Iqbāl says that they fall along the way to the mazār of Abū al-Walīd. In another instance, the shrine of Shaykh Abū al-‘Alā’ is mentioned as an important shrine where pilgrims go after they complete their ziyārat of Abū al-Walīd. To plot out the elevation of the journey to this shrine, I used Darb-i Malik as my starting point and plotted a course that passed through Bāgh-i Zaghān based on the information Maqsad al-Iqbāl gave about the other shrines that come along the way to Abū al-Walīd. The resulting elevation was

-224- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity not significant, about a 10 meter rise over the course of the first kilometer of the approximately 2.5km journey (fig. 12). The distance is greater than ziyārat opportunities closer to the walled city, near Darb-i Khush and in the Khiyābān area. Nevertheless, the actual journey would not be too taxing in terms of elevation.

Figure 11: Elevation Profile Journey to Abū al-Walīd

The last example reflects a different sort of travel experience for pilgrims.

Gāzurgāh was perhaps one of the most important ziyārat destinations in Herat during this period and was home to the shrine of Shaykh al-Islam Hazrat Khwāja ‘Abdullāh Ansārī

(d. 481 AH) as well as many other saintly figures and members of the nobility. For the

Timurids he was a patron saint of the city and called the Pīr of Herat. Maqṣad al-Iqbāl counts him as the quṭb (pole) of his time in the mystical hierarchy discussed in an earlier chapter. Gāzurgāh is located about 2.5km northeast of the walled city of Herat at the foot of the Zanjīr Gāh mountains. This area was already a waystation and place of visiting before Anṣārī’s shrine was first built up by Shāhrukh in 828/1425.70 It was frequented by

Sufis and other spiritual seekers for various reasons and this earlier purpose continued to influence Gāzurgāh in the Timurid period as well. Because of its distance away from the

70 For an extensive treatment of Gāzurgah’s history and architecture see: Lisa Golombek, The Timurid Shrine at Gazur Gah (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1969).

-225- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity busy city and its cooler climate due to its proximity to a mountain and water sources, the shrine complex retained a peaceful atmosphere (figs. 12 and 13). This peaceful atmosphere is important in the following discussion of the pilgrimage experience to

Gāzurgāh as a liminal one.

Figure 12: The Shrine Complex of ‘Abdullah al-Anṣārī at Gāzurgāh. From Harvard Fine Arts Library, Digital Images & Slides Collection 1981.24487, downloaded May 2018.

Figure 13: Example of Vaulting in the Jamāt Khāna of the Shrine Complex of ‘Abdullāh al-Anṣārī at Gāzurgāh. From Harvard Fine Arts Library, Digital Images & Slides Collection 1979.12869, downloaded May 2018.

The elevation profile for Gāzurgāh roughly follows the road Khiyābān-i Sulṭānī that leaves the city from Darb-i Khush and passes through Bāgh-i Safīd in a northeasterly

-226- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity direction (fig. 14). This follows directions given in Maqsad al-Iqbāl which hints at this being a good way to get to Gāzurgāh. This route is almost 4km in distance with a steady increase in elevation when one gets about 1km outside of town. The elevation from this point on is quite substantial, rising almost 90 meters. This would prove a long and taxing, but not prohibitive, journey. This elevation is greater, and therefore more taxing, than that of going to the shrine of Shāh-i Zinda in Samarkand, which had some elevation and an appearance of even more elevation based on the way the buildings are arranged.

Figure 14: Elevation Profile Journey to Gāzurgāh & ‘Abdullāh Anṣārī

Geographers have calculated an average distance that a person would easily travel in a day. In modern studies, this sort of data helps researchers figure out the best places to place public transportation, retail locations, and other essential places. While the distances given vary considerably, a commonly estimate found in the literature regarding foot travel in the United States of America is around 0.25mi or 0.40km. In contrast, the premodern person would naturally have walked a much greater distance daily. Jean-Paul

Rodrigue estimates that the premodern person probably walked about 5km a day and could complete this distance in about 1 hour.71 In the medieval Middle East and Central

Asia, people were more likely to walk to fulfill their daily needs rather than make use of

71 Jean-Paul Rodrigue, The Geography of Transport Systems (New York: Routledge, 2017), https://people.hofstra.edu/geotrans/eng/ch2en/conc2en/ch2c1en.html.

-227- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity animals or wheeled transport.72 Based upon Rodrigue’s estimate of 5 km being a reasonable amount of walking on a daily basis, the majority of the shrines in Herat could be easily visited on foot on a normal day. Indeed, the advice for visiting shrines recommends weekly visits on particular days and the brief ritual performed at the shrine adds little extra time to the visit. When these short excursions occur in the context of other daily tasks, such as visiting the mosque, the markets, neighbors, they become non- taxing parts of daily life.

In contrast, making the longer journey out to Gāzurgāh indicates something out of the daily norm. The round-trip journey itself exceeds the daily 5 km walking limit, the elevation increases considerably during the walk making it more difficult, and because

Gāzurgāh was primarily a huge necropolis it did not lend itself to other daily tasks of life.

The experience of ziyārat of ‘Abdullāh Anṣārī and other important saints at Gāzurgāh, which of course includes the journey to the shrine, can be understood as a liminal experience. The term liminal, particularly in conjunction with ritual practice, is most commonly attributed to the work of Victor Turner. I use liminal here loosely in accordance with the way that Turner explained it, as an ambiguous space that is “betwixt and between the positions assigned and arrayed by law, custom, convention, and ceremonial.”73 His definition focuses on the way that religious adherents move away from the mundane into the liminal which allows for a special encounter with something other than self, and finally returning to communitas which is remade by the liminal

72 Richard Bulliet, The Camel and the Wheel (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990), 227.

73 Victor Turner, “Liminality and Communitas,” in A Reader in the Anthropology of Religion, ed. M. Lambek (Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers, 2002), 359.

-228- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity experience. In communitas the constraints of society are reaffirmed and the person returns to the normal structures of life.

Liminality in the case of medieval ziyārat is a physical movement from one’s mundane space to the blessed spaces of the mazār. It is in this space, consecrated by its saintly inhabitants interred underground, that God and other supernatural beings are thought to be responsive to the needs of the pilgrim.74 This sort of liminality had to have been present in every shrine that was thought to be sacred regardless of the where the shrine was located. However, I argue here that the physical separation of certain shrines from people’s everyday life, made ziyārat of that particular shrine more liminal, more of a break with the mundane than the more easily accessible shrines. In the earlier chapter on ritual, I examined the ways that much of the ritual connected with ziyārat mirrored regular, daily practices of Muslims, thereby making ziyārat part of one’s habitus.

However, here the added dimension of space and movement through space makes clear that there was more involved in the ziyārat than just ritual utterances. In this case, the journey takes on more importance because of the time and even monetary investment necessary for a longer, more arduous ziyārat.

These longer ziyārats are often presented in ways to maximize the time invested in undertaking it. Maqṣad al-Iqbāl discusses possible circuits of shrines to be done in one long ziyārat. These circuits inevitably end or begin with the more important shrines of

Herat. For example, the way to Gāzurgāh is one of the longest treks a pilgrim might make. On their way to Gāzurgāh, other shrines come along the road and pilgrims are

74 This idea comes from Edmund Leach’s explanation of Turner’s liminal stage of ritual, where ritual is necessary to transform time and space into something that is transformative and sacred. See Catherine Bell’s discussion of Leach in: Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice, 44.

-229- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity advised to visit these as well. The way that shrines were alternatively spread out and clustered together facilitated this. For example, if Gāzurgāh’s many important shrines, such as that of ‘Abdullāh Anṣārī and of the Mazār-i Khalvatiyān was the goal of a pilgrim, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl helpfully provides information on other shrines that come along the way as one travels to the further site of Gāzurgāh. For instance, the shrine of Hazrat

Khwāja ‘Alī ibn Muwaffaq Baghdādī (d. 265 AH), a Sufi saint who had been a companion of Dhu’l-Nūn Maṣrī and is mentioned in Anṣarī’s tabaqat work, is located on

Quṭb Chāq “near the road to Gāzurgāh (rāh-i Gāzurgāh) and Bāgh-i Safīd.”75 The shrine of Muḥammad Māhrūī falls along the way to Gāzurgaāh, outside of Darb-i Khush.76

The journey to Khwāja Abū al-Walīd’s shrine in Qariya-yi Āzādān similarly is part of a circuit of shrine visitation. As one travels out of the walled city, the Mazār-i Sar- i Kucha is said to come at the head of the road that goes from Shād Bara on the north side of Bāgh-i Zaghān on the way to the mazār of Abū al-Walīd.77 This shrine’s name is based solely upon its location, there is no biographical information on who may be buried there, though the author believes that the mazār belongs to a sayyid, or descendant of the

Prophet Muḥammad. Its importance comes from its location along the way to Abū al-

Walīd’s shrine and it is likely this made it easy for pilgrims to stop there on their journey to Abū al-Walīd. The shrine of Pīr Qavām al-Dīn Tabrīzī (d. 828/1425), a virtuous ascetic, is said to have been buried “along the pilgrimage way (rāh-i ziyārat) to Abū al-

Walīd.”78 No other information is given on the location of this mazār, Wā’iẓ expected

75 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, 16-17.

76 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, 59.

77 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, 62.

78 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, 77.

-230- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity his audience to know what he meant because this path was a popularly traversed one.

Similarly, the mazār of Shaykh Abū al-‘Alā’ is given importance because of its proximity of that of Abū al-Walīd. Wā’iẓ says that this shrine belongs to one of the important awlīyā’ but the only additional information given is that pilgrims come to this shrine after they complete the ziyārat of Abū al-Walīd.79

The guides often allude to the various circuits or courses of shrine visitation.

Wā‘iẓ mentions the various shrines that Shāhrukh and Sulṭān Ḥusayn would visit during their reigns. As discussed above, this is helpful in highlighting some of the most important or most-visited shrines during the Timurid period, but it also hints at the sequence of shrines visited in one journey. We are told, for example, that twice a year

Shāhrukh would make a circuit of the shrines of Herat, including that of Sultān Majd al-

Dīn Ṭālib.80

Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda, a shrine guide for Bukhara, is organized in such a way as to encourage the visitation of many shrines in one visit. It is structured based on shrine location, unlike Maqṣad al-Iqbāl which presents shrines chronologically based on death date of the saint. For example, Mullāzāda opens with the important shrines around Til-i

Khwāja and gives information on the important saint, al-Shaykh al-Islām Khwāja Abū

Ḥafs and the various saints buried around him.81 Throughout this work, the locations of shrines are given in a manner that makes it easy to follow if you are simultaneously undertaking ziyārat. Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā’, the author of Mullāzāda, will give the name and biography of an important saint in a particular location, and then list the neighboring

79 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, 62.

80 Aṣīl al-Dīn Wā’iẓ, Maqṣad al-Iqbāl-i Sulṭāniyya va Marṣad al-Āmāl-i Ḥāqāniyya, 37.

81 Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā', Tārīkh-i Mullāzāda: Dar Ẕikr-i Mazārat-i Bukhārā, 19-20.

-231- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity shrine or state that the shrine in front of this one is such and such. Mu‘īn al-Fuqarā’ also reiterates the importance of prioritizing shrines connected to the Prophet Muḥammad and other prophets. For example, he says that if you go to a cemetery or place with many shrines, you must first visit those shrines that belong to a prophet or are significant to the

Prophet Muḥammad. In Bukhara there are a few strands of the Prophet Muḥammad’s hair said to be buried with five important saints, their shrines are listed as important visitation sites.

Ziyārat in Samarkand is also written about in terms that encourage visiting multiple sites in one journey. For example, in a section discussing the shrine of Shāh-i

Zinda, Qandiyya recommends that the pilgrim head towards the Iron Gate (Darvāzā-yi

Āhanīn) and pray nafl or supererogatory prayer at the monastery of Muḥammad ibn Vasī’ before going to other shrines.82 Throughout this guide, the unknown author exhorts prayer at a number of little monasteries and masjids that are located near graveyards and shrines. In one case he gives support to this practice by linking a particular small masjid to Khizr, a supernatural figure mentioned in the Qur’an and important to both Sufi and folk traditions.83

The grouping of certain shrines together based on proximity or importance and the grouping of various religious buildings together shows the interconnected nature of the religious architecture of the city. Inhabitants of a city had many different opportunities to visit, pray at, and experience sacred spaces. Shrines were an important part of people’s daily life as well as part of special excursions. The fact that these spaces

82 Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya, 28.

83 Samarqandī, Qandiyya va Samariyya, 29.

-232- Chapter 5: The Geography of Sanctity could be simultaneously ubiquitous and liminal adds to their importance in the religious experience of medieval Muslims. Perhaps no other religious architecture could have such a complex significance in people’s lives. Their increased accessibility and visibility in

Timurid cities, along with the relative flexibility of ritual involved in ziyārat, helped to center them in the religious culture of the time. That they could be both everywhere and yet remain special, made mazārs distinctive sacred spaces where one could go to fulfill all sorts of spiritual and material needs.

-233- Conclusion

Ziyārat was a ubiquitous demonstration of religious piety in the medieval lands under Timurid rule. It provides a point of analysis through which medieval piety and religious practice can be examined. Ziyārat was made up of particular ritual behavior, often alongside a well-constructed saintly narrative, and a tangible space that commemorates the saint. These three aspects were central to the discursive construction of a sanctified place and illuminate important ideals of piety of the time. In other words, ritual, story, and place were centrally important in weaving together the fabric of piety in this time. As a practice, this ritual incorporated movements and litanies that were well known to Muslims of the time. The Fatiha or Sura Yāsīn could drift easily from the lips of the pilgrim. Similarly the journey to local shrines was, for the most part, an everyday occurrence. So many shrines covered the cities and neighboring villages, that it would have been harder to avoid a shrine than to intentionally seek one out. This ubiquity and convenience of ziyārat makes it clear that while the spiritual aspects of this endeavor may have been liminal and otherworldly, the physical and corporeal aspects were very much quotidian.

The characterization of ziyārat as a routine or ordinary experience is balanced by elements of liminality inherent in the practice. The sacred nature of shrines and the physical movement to shrines located some distance away from the activities and spaces of a pilgrim’s normal life create a feeling of liminality.

The saintly narratives upon which the greater part of this study focuses point to the centrality of a seemingly incongruent mix of esotericism, miracle-working and a rigorous adherence to the Sharia in constructing a template for, as Christopher Taylor puts it, an

“ascendant paradigm of exemplary piety”.1 Taylor’s work on Egypt in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries demonstrates the importance of qualities such as a mastery of personal

1 Christopher Taylor, In the Vicinity of Righteousness, 89.

-234- Conclusion desire, poverty, generosity, eccentricity, and a resistance to unbelief and hypocrisy. In the case of

Timurid biographies of saints, it took much more than a few miracles to prove sanctity; lineage, scholarly learning, and issues of collective memory were among the most important issues to medieval Muslims. When a saint is presented as integrally part of the city or region he/she is buried in, as well as having great virtues by way of religious knowledge, participation in the Sufi hierarchy of saints, fighting in the early Islamic conquest, or by descent or connection to the

Prophet Muḥammad, he/she proves worthy of ziyārat. Conversely, shrines that were already well visited are often included by the authors of shrine guides with spurious biographies fitting this worldview manufactured for them.

Lastly, the physical journey of ziyārat and the spatial placement of shrines throughout medieval cities are as equally important as the ideas of ritual and saintly narratives. The

Timurids, in particular, with their grand building projects and artistic innovations, participated in creating a unique ziyārat experience for those in their realms. While neighborhood shrines may have remained untouched by Timurid patronage, most of the shrines and shrine complexes were built and rebuilt or augmented in some way during this period. It provided pilgrims with different levels of experience; the local ziyārat could have been a quick visit to a nearby mazār en route to the market. However, more involved ziyārats were also possible without having to leave one’s own city. Other important shrines placed outside city walls and away from busy metropolises made for more of a liminal pilgrimage experience.

Shahzad Bashir says of the medieval mazār:

It should be noted that there is no absolute one to one correspondence between the reputation of a master and the scale of a shrine built for him immediately after his death. If and when shrines would be constructed and become focal points for visitation and patronage depended ultimately on the confluence of masters’ reputations and the interests of those willing and able to sponsor them. Overall, then, what matters is

-235- Conclusion

that shrine construction and visitation were significant cultural preoccupations in this historical context as a whole. As in the case of the great masters’ personalities, the reputation of a shrine depended, in the last instances, on the production of narratives about the site that could well add to the posthumous reputation of maters but were also independent venues for socioreligious elaboration…What mattered was the production of a compelling narrative, backed up by the interests of those in power. The shrines can then be seen as new physical manifestations ---new ‘embodied’ forms—that were first justified through narratives about their material connection to saintly persons’ bodies but then took on lives of their own in new symbolic and ritual contexts.2

The popular pious activity of grave visitation illustrates the intersection between the motivations of different sectors of Timurid society: that of the political rulers, religious elites

(the ‘ulamā’), Sufis, and the general population of pilgrims and devotees of various shrines. The groups both shared and negotiated the borders of ritual practice at shrines which resulted in a vibrant religious tradition. The ‘ulamā’ of this period had been long conditioned in condoning and giving legitimacy to things that they might not have in the past. From accepting Mongol rule to the widespread practices and beliefs that came with both the Mongols and the Turko-

Mongolian groups that pervaded the Later Middle period, the scholarly and religious class was extremely accommodating. It is only normal that they would also lend legitimacy to the widespread practices of ziyārat, while trying to maintain some semblance of control over the practice. We see strains of this control in the shrine guides early presentations on the manner of ritual, in prescribing proper behavior and giving acceptable litanies for the pilgrim to recite.

However, in many cases, this careful presentation gives way to a more inclusive description of the behavior that was likely to be taking place at Timurid shrines. The practices of seeking saintly intercession, healing, and worldly benefit was normalized and even formalized by certain litanies and advice found in the shrine guides.

2 Shahzad Bashir, Sufi Bodies, 211.

-236- Conclusion

The ‘ulāmā’ and Sufis also benefitted from shrine visitation, whether financially or through the spread of their religious ideas. Similarly Timurid elites pushed forward their own plans of controlling the narratives of orthodoxy in their domains and proving their own legitimacy through their construction and patronization of various shrines and saints. The audiences of shrine guides written by scholars and the visitors of the great shrine complexes built and maintained by Timurid rulers did not just idly accept the ziyārat as presented to them. The pilgrims too participated in the construction of what was sanctified and what was important to them in terms of the holy dead. The shrines visited and revered by the pilgrims, the oral narratives provided by the pilgrims for shrine guides, and the types of activities performed by the pilgrims at the shrines are all part of the discussion of piety and religious practice.

Through the study of the shrine and all that went into making it a central part of medieval

Muslim religious life, we gain more insight into the moral imagination of people at this time. The religious ideals that were important to them and the ways they incorporated these ideals into their daily practices and even into the sacred topography of their cities, makes what their lives might have looked like a little clearer. It is my hope that this work contributes to a better understanding of how Islam as a discursive tradition informed and was informed by the piety and religious practice of medieval Muslims of all classes. It challenges a vision of a monolithic Islamic orthopraxy by showing how the very fabric of Islam in medieval Iran and Central Asia represented both continuity with an Islamic past and a catering to local and contemporary needs.

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