CHAPTER TWO

DARD'S LIFE AND TEACHING

Khwaja Mir Dard is buried in a small graveyard inside Delhi near Turkoman gate in what is now a slum area. Few people know the place, fewer visit it. And still, the man who has found his last resting place in this modest tomb was, in his time, one of the great mystical leaders of Delhi, and was, at the same time, the first to write mystical verse in . Those, who visit his tomb to recite a fiiti~a will probably more admire his poetical heritage than his achievements in mystical theology, but it is mainly the latter aspect of his work that concerns us here.l For we have to remember that this influence worked under the surface upon the 19th century theologians of Delhi: Sir Sayyid Ahmad Khan was related through his mother to Dard; to trace these influences would be an interesting study that might con• tribute much to our knowledge of Indian Muslim revivalist move• ments.

EARLY YEARS

Towards the end of his life, Mir Dard wrote a chapter which sounds strange to a modern reader but reflects in a certain way some feelings of the Indian Muslims in the 18th century. Dard's contemporary Azad Bilgrami had tried to collect in his Sub~at al-marjiin all those Prophetic traditions which pointed to Indian subjects, thereby proving that India is the real homeland of Is• lam, for Adam, the first in the line of prophets, came from

1 Besides some articles by the present writer (see Bibliography) there are barely studies on Mir Dard available. The article by S. A. Bazmee Ansari in the El, 2nd. ed., is valuable; Yusuf Husain Khan was the first to discuss Dard's theology in 'Glimpses of Medieval Indian Culture' at some length. In Urdu, Dr. Waheed Akhtar's study deals mainly with Dard's theology, and the long introduction into his Urdu Diwan by Khalil ur-Rahman Da Judi offers important material. Some of Dard's works are practically non-existent, like Wtiqi(lit-i Dard and Soz-i dil, which were published by the Matba (a Ansari from 1309/1891 onwards. Quite a number of manuscripts of Dard's poetry are available; the first edition was prepared in 1847 at the request of Dr. Alois Sprenger by Maulana Sahba i. 32 KHWAJA MlR DARD OF DELHI

Paradise directly to Ceylon. Dard, however, finds another reason for the belief that his beloved country was blessed more than any other place by the sun of the Islamic religion, so that the tradi• tional connotation of Hindustan, e.g., 'black,' or 'infidel,' as used since the Middle Ages in Islamic poetry and prose, was in his time no longer valid. He writes: True, other countries like (Iraq-i (Arab and (Iraq-i (Ajam are closer in distance to the radiant than India and have been illumi• nated by the sun of Prophecy earlier due to their proximity, and this remained so as long as that Candle of Reality was shining in the visible world and the twilight of this sun (namely the time of the caliphs and the guiding imams) lasted. But after the setting of this soul-enlighten• ing sun from the visible horizon of humanity and the disappearance of its twilight from the eyes, India, which because of its outward dis• tance, appeared like the dark night, became full of splendour from the light of this world-embracing sun thanks to the mirrorholding of the moon of the sphere of sayyidship and the Shah of the dynasty of the imamat (namely the noble existence of the Exellence, the Prince of the Muhammadans) and thanks to the radiance of this moon which is the individuation (ta( ayyun) of the First of the Muhammadans, with strange subtlety of manifestations of Divine Beauty. Now, until the morning of Resurrection the spreading of the light of the spiritual bounty of the Muhammadan Path will firmly continue for the world and its inhabitants. And God and are always Helper (Nasir) and friend, and everybody who has not found this light has, in fact, turned away his face from the Muhammadan light, for the light of the moon is taken from the light of the sun (D 275).

With these words, Dard introduces us to his theories about the pariqa Mu~ammadiyya which was founded by Muhammad Nasir, who was for him both real father and mystical leader, and to whom he owes his whole spiritual formation. Khwaja Mir Dard's paternal family came, like many nobles, from Bukhara; they led their pedigree back to Baha luddin Naqshband, after whom the order is named, and who was a descendant in the 13th generation of the 11 th Shi ( a imam al-Hasan al- Askari. Khwaja Muhammad Tahir reached Delhi in the 17th century. He was granted by Aurangzeb high offices; for the religious mentality had turned, at that point of history, in favor of the Naqshbandiyya; the time of 'intoxication,' the dream of a mystical religion which might bridge the gap between Hinduism and was over; and the seed of 's teachings grew both in the Subcontinent and in Central Asia.