Bābur, whose original name is Ẓahīr
al-Dīn Muḥammad, is a descendant of both the Mongol rulers of Genghis Khan, was
born in 1483 in the principality of Fergana. He is mostly notorious for
founding the Mughal Empire in 1526 because of his tenancy of North India.
Although his reign lasted only four years which was followed by his exile in
Persia and where his son Humayun made different treaties with the Safavid
empire. This alliance can still be seen through the heavy impact of the Persian
culture from clothes to culinary dishes up to architecture. This impact was
deeply rooted to the point where the Mughal’s official government language was
Persian and it was used amongst the intellectuals. When Babur’s grandson, and
humayun’s son, Akbar became the new emperor of the Mughal empire where he ruled
between 1556 and 1605. His reign was known to brought about the pinnacle of the
Mughal Empire mainly because he inherited a shriveled empire that did not
extend beyond Delhi and the Punjab but embarked on multiple military campaigns
that extended his geographical boundaries and enabled the Mughals to be one of
the most powerful empires of the era in the region. His main tactic was to turn
his defeated opponents onto allies by allowing them to retain their powers and
privileges as long as they pledge alliance to the Emperor. Moreover, he
demonstrated great tolerance to non-Muslims and non-Mughals in his states. His
policies deemed to be so successful and were inherited to several generations
to come. Despite being illiterate, he was one of the few emperors to open
different religious conversations in the Mughal Empire, allowing him to gain
the confidence and allegiance of the vast majority of his subjects across the
region. (Smith, 1917). However, his open-mindedness got him a lot of criticism. Bada’uni, was one of Akbar’s Muslim advisors
who specialized in Islamic and religious studies as well as linguistics but was
also knowledgeable about theology and jurisprudence due to the several years he
spent as an apprentice for many famous Muslim scholars. So he was considered to
be from the upper-class society. However, Bada’uni was perceived as an
extremist because of his complete and utter reject to anything not purely
Islamic or any changes concerning the doctrines of the religion. Naturally, he
expressed his resentment towards the revolutionary policies of Akbar openly.
The primary source we are evaluating today is written by Bada’uni, and was
taken from his memoir “Muntakhab-ut-Tawarikh” that discussed Akbar’s reign and
policies from an Islamic perspective. Bada’uni spent five years writing the
memoir from 1590 to 1595 and was divided into three volumes where he talked
about the rulers of India, Akbar’s life and the life of the scholars around
Akbar respectively. (Sengupta, 52-54)
The source originates from India
and despite its pertinence in the country, it did not travel outside of the
Mughal Empire. Moreover, the source is a second version that got reprinted in
1988. The writer of the source Bada’uni is a primary and direct contributor of
the source because he lived in the era of the ruling of Akbar and witnessed or
was directly affected by all the main events he wrote about. The goal of the
memoir to cause a public outrage in India among the subjects during the reign
of Akbar and fuel the hatred among scholars in the country.The extract we are studying starts by narrating
Akbar’s theological studies after reaching his peak wealth and power across different
territories. Akbar’s main policies included: opening different religious,
philosophical and ideological discussions which led him to leaving Islam after
studying it throughouly. This decision came as a shock to the Muslim majority
of the Mughal Empire and especially Bada’uni. After that, Akbar carried on to
study and analyse many other religions such as hindiusm since it was a
prominent religion in the empire. This particular attention made Bada’uni
furious. Furthermore, Akbar expressed immense interest in Christianity then he
moved on to more ancient religions such as Zoroastrianism. In 1580, Akbar
decided to create a new foundation for a religion that cherry picked elements
from Islam, Hinduism, Christianity, Jainism, Sikhism, and Zoroastrianism and he
called it “the religion of god” in the hope to create a religion that would
unify all his subjects and empower his tolerance theories.
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