[IO Islamic 1313] سير العارفين

Siyar-al’ârifîn.

This manuscript is now IO Islamic 1313 in the India Office collections.

[metadata: Hermann Ethé, Catalogue of Persian Manuscripts in the Library of the India Office, 2 vols. (Oxford: India Office, 1903): volume 1, number 637 here with notations and hyperlinks].

637

Siyar-al’ârifîn (سير العارفين).

Biographies of fourteen renowned Shaikhs and holy men of India, all belonging to the Ćishtî order, compiled by Ḥâmid bin Faḍl-allâh, known as Darwîsh (or Mullâ) Jamâlî, see fol. 2b. ll. 2. and 3. Other copies of the work are described in Rieu I. p. 354, and W. Pertsch, Berlin Cat., p. 556. According to A. Sprenger’s Cat. Oudh, p. 446 the poet Jamâlî of Dihlî died A.H. 922 or 925, the author of the Safînah also fixes his death in 925 (A.D.1519) , and refutes the statement of the author of the Ṭabaḳât-i-Shâhjahânî, that he had lived until A.H. 942 ( comp. Bodleian Cat., No 376, 43).

According to the same Safînah, Jamâlî was born near Dihlî, went to Khurâsân under Sulṭân Ḥusain Mirzâ, made the acquaintance of the poet Jâmî, undertook extensive journeys, returned afterwards to India and was in high favour with Sulṭân Sikandar Lûdî and also with the emperor Bâbar. This book is dedicated on fol. 4b, last line, to Humâyûn, and since the epithets given to his name seem to imply that he was sovereign ruler already at that time, the book must have been finished after A.H.937 = A.D. 1530 (the date of Humâyûn’s accession to the throne), and the poet cannot have died already, A.H. 925. A.H. 942 (A.D. 1535, 1536) seems therefore, after all, the more correct date of Jamâlî’s death; comp. also Bodleian Cat., No. 1274. In the preface the author gives us a short statement about his pilgrimage to Makkah, and his travels in Maghrib, Yaman, Palestine, Rûm, Syria, the two ’Irâḳs, Adharbaijân, Gilân, Mâzandarân, and Khurâsân, and tells us, that after his return to Dihlî his friends requested him to write a book on the learned Shaikhs of all the countries which he had visited. But he found that too great a task, and resolved, therefore, to write a work exclusively on Indian Saints.

The fourteen biographies deal with the following Shaikhs:

1. Sulṭân-almashâyikh Mu’în-aldîn Hasan Bin Ghiyâth-aldîn alḥusainî alḥasanî Sijzî [ed note: more generally Muʿīn al-Dīn Chishtī] (سِجْزِى   as explained in a marginal gloss : بكسر سين مهملَه و سكون جيم و كسر زاى معجمه ), on fol. 5a . He died, A.H. 633 (A.D. 1236), in Ajmîr, see further down in the Safînat-alauliyâ, No. 110.

2. Ḥadrat Shaikh-almashâyikh Badr-almillat wa-aldîn Maḥmûd Mû’înadûz (the furrier) Khujandî, on fol. 18b.

3. Ḥaḍrat Shaikh-alislâm Bahâ-almillat wa-aldîn Zakariyyâ, on fol. 20b (see the Safînat-alauliyâ, No. 152).

4. Ḥaḍrat Sulṭân-al’âshiḳîn Burhâu-alwâḥidîn Ḳuṭb-aldîn Bakhtiyâr Ûshî [ed note: more generally Quṭb al-Dīn Bakhtiyār Kākī], on fol. 54b (see the Safînat-alauliyâ, No. 112).

5. Ḥaḍrat Shaikh-almashâyikh wa-alauliyâ Farîd-almillah wa-aldîn Mas’ûd (i.e. the well-known Ganj-i-Shakar, see the Safînat-alauliyâ, No. 113), on fol. 74a.

6. Ḥaḍrat Sulṭân-almashâyikh Ṣadr-aldîn ‘Ârif, on fol.111b. (see the Safînat-alauliyâ, No. 155).

7. Ḥaḍrat Sulṭân-almashâyikh Niżâm-aldîn Muḥammad Badâ’ûnî (i.e. Shaikh Auliyâ, see the Safînat alauliyâ, No 114), on fol. 128b. He died A.H. 725 A.D. 1325).

8. Ḥaḍrat Malik-almashâyikh wa-alauliyâ Rukn-aldîn Abû-alḳâsim Abû-alfatḥ, on fol. 168b. He was the son of Ṣadr-aldîn ‘Ârif (see the Safînat-alauliyâ, No.156).

9. Ḥaḍrat Malik-almashâyikh Shaikh Ḥamîd-aldîn Nâgûrî, on fol. 178b (see the Safînat-alauliyâ, No. 111).

10. Ḥaḍrat Malik-almashâyikh Shaikh Najîb Mutawakkil , on fol. 189b.

11. Ḥaḍrat Sulṭân-almashâyikh Shaikh Jalâl-aldîn Abû-alḳâsîm Tabrîzî, on fol. 197a.

12. Ḥaḍrat Shaikh-almashâyikh Naṣîr-almillah wa-aldîn Maḥmûd Audhî (i.e. Ćirâgh of Dihlî, see the Safînat-alauliyâ, No.116), on fol. 207b.

13. Ḥaḍrat Malik- almashâyikh Ma’rifat-shi’ârî Siyâdat-dithârî Sayyid Jalâl-almillah wa-aldîn Makhdûm-i-Jahâniyân Bukhârî, on fol. 214a (see the Safînat-alauliyâ, No. 157). He died A.H. 785 (A.D. 1384).

14. Ḥaḍrat Samâ almillah wa-aldîn Sulṭân-almuḥaḳḳiḳîn u Burhân-al’ârifîn Sulṭân-almashâyikh Samâlmillat wa-aldîn, the author’s spiritual guide, on fol. 226b.He received the investiture from Shaikh Kabîr-aldîn Isma’îl, and died A.H. 901, the 17th of Jumâdâ-alawwal=A.D. 1496, February 2 ( see fol. 243a, ll. 6-10, where the following ta’rîkh is given by Jamâlî : هشت خلد آمد بنام او اگر پرسد كسى – سال تأريخش بگو هشت آمده بر نام او , i.e. هشت = 705, came upon ( was added) to his name , viz . سماء الدين = 196 , total 901 ) .

Of these fourteen Shaikhs, No. 2 is wanting in Rieu’s copy and No. 14 in Pertsch’s, so that the present copy is the fullest yet met with.

Beginning of the preface, on fol. 1b: حمدى كه ابواب سعادت بر ارباب عبادت مفتوح گردانيد و سپاسى الخ

An index on the fly-leaf. Copied in Shawwâl, A.H. 1043 (A.D. 1634, April), at Lâhûr; this copy belonged formerly to Mr. Richard Johnson.

No. 1313, ff. 244, ll. 13; inelegant Nasta’lîḳ; illuminated frontispiece; size, 97/8 in. by 53/8 in.