Indian Antiquary Vol 52

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Stephen Meredyth Edwardes, Krishnaswami Aiyangar
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 223

AUGUST, 1923)
SOME PROBLEMS IN NAQSHBANDI HISTORY
207
Sultân-ud-Din al-Káshghari, (but his real name was almost certainly Sa'id-ud-Din,
and the Tarikh-i-Rashidt calls him Sa'd-ud-Din). He is however sometimes described not as a disciple of Nizâm-ud-Din Khâm úsh, but of Saiyid Sharif 'Ali b. Muhammad al-Jurjani, who died in 816 H. (A.D. 1414), and was the author
of the Sharh Muwagif: Nassau Lees, Nafahat al-Uns, pp. 6, 2-3. Ubaid-ullah Samarqandi (Khwaja Ahrar). Le Chatelier again assigns not only Alai-ud-Din and Ya'qûb Jarhi (Charkhi obviously) as disciples or rather successors to Baha-ud-Din, but also gives him a third successor in Nasr-ud-Din of Tashkand. Thus it seems clear that the Order began to show symptoms of disruption on the death of Baha-ud-Din. Le Chatelier however says that it was under the pontificate of Nasr-ud-Din Tashkandi (who is not at all generally recognised as a khali fa of Baha-ud-Dîn) that the Order split up into two branches, that of the West under him as Grand Master, and the other of the East under another khalifa, Sultân-udDîn al-Kâshghari. But the Turkish versions of the pedigree seem to acknowledge only the last-named.
The Western Naqshbandis. Of the fate of the Western Naqshbandis little seems to be recorded in Turkish literature. From 'Ubaid-ullah al-Samarqandi the 'descent' passes to Sh. 'Abdullah Alahi (as he was known in poetry), Arif billah 'Abdullah, “the God-knowing servant of God," of Simaw. He followed the jurisprudent 'Ali of Tùs to Persia, quitting Constantinople; and devoted himself to the secular sciences until he was impelled to destroy all his books. His teacher, however, induced him to sell them all with the exception of one oontaining the dealings of the Saints, and give the proceeds in alms. From Kerman he went to Samarqand, where he attached himself to the great Shaikh Arif billah 'Ubaid-ullah (the 'little servant of God'), and at his behest he accepted the teaching of the Naqshbandis from their Shaikh Baha-ud-Din. Later he went to Heråt, and thence returned to Constantinople, but its disturbed condition on the death of Muhammad II drove him to Yenija Wardar, where he died in 1490 A.D. He left at least two works, the Najat al-Arwah min Rasan il-Ashbah, The Salvation of the Soul from the Snares of Doubt,' and the Zád al-Mushtaqin, The Viotuals of the Zealous,' sometimes described as the żad al-Talibin or the Maslik at-Talibin ("The Victuals of the Seekers,' or Regulations for them): Hammer-Purgstall, Geschichte der Osmanischen Dichtkunst, I, p. 207. This sketoh does not hint that Alahi was head of the Western Naqshbandîs. But it suggests that the Order was not popular with the imperial authorities at Constantinople in his day and that people who wrote about its history were obliged to omit facts of cardinal importance in it.
6 Here Le Chatelier, who actually cites the Rashahat as his authority, has fallen into a two-fold error. On p. 150 of his Oonfréries musulmanes du Hedjaz, he gives an account of "Sultân-ud-Din al-Káshghari and his resistance to 'Baber.' But the future conqueror of India was not opposed by the Naqshbandi Shaikh. The prince in question was Mirza Babur, and the Shaikh who opposed him was not Sultân-ud-Din al. Kashghari but Khwaja Ahrar. So far from being hostile to the branch to which the great Babur belonged, the Khwaja Ahrar fended off Mirza Babur's attack in the interests of Abu Sa'id Mirza, grandfather of the future emperor: H. Beveridge in JRAS., 1916, p. 69. And so far from being opposed to the great BAbur at Samarqand, the latter Asserts that Khwaja Ahrar appeared to him in a dream and foretold his second capture of the city : Memoirs, I, p. 139. Strangely enough Brown (The Dervishes, p. 136) makes " our Lord Maulana Sa'id-ud-Din KAshghari" the opponent of Mirza Babur, and this too on the authority of the Raahahat, thus endorsing one of Le Chatelier's errors. It seems then possible that more than one recension of that work exists, but even if that bo so, a consideration of the dates involved proves that it was Mirza Babur, and not the conqueror of India, who was thwarted at Samarqand by a Naqshbandi Shaikh.
The great Babur made his first attempt on the city in A.D. 1498, and could not possibly have been opposed by the precursor of Khwaja Ahrar, who had died in A.D. 1490, at least eight years earlier.
• The Tarikh-i-Rashich adds that Sa'd-ud-Din had & disciple in the "Shaikh al-Islam," Maulana Abd-ur-Rahman Jami: p. 194. This was of course the famous Persian poet Jami' (A.D. 1414-92): .1., 7, 1, p. 1011. To the poet he is credited with having appeared in a vision.