Akbar #4: Religion

One of the reasons Akbar was “so willing to look beyond Islam for truths and validation” was the relative recency of the conversion of the Mongols to Islam, says Ira Mukhoty in Akbar. Thus, as a group, they were “less tenacious in their allegiance to religion alone”.

 

As mentioned in an earlier blog, this trend existed from Babur’s time. Babur had pragmatically added many Hindustani noblemen into his court. Very strict adherence to sharia would have been “politically catastrophic”. Being a Muslim was not mandatory to be in the good books of the Mughals.

 

Further, Akbar encouraged the entry of Persian Shia and Hindu Rajput noblemen into the ranks of the Mughal aristocracy. Why? To reduce the “worrying influence” of one large clan in the existing setup.

 

Of course, Akbar went far beyond what those reasons alone could explain – he was almost “cavalier” in his attitude towards the ulemas! This wasn’t entirely because Akbar was, to apply a modern word, secular. Rather, Akbar was running into trouble with the conservative ulemas on a key matter, namely how many wives he could have. The ulemas said as per Islam, no more than four. For Akbar, who was marrying both for alliances as well as a way to reduce the power of other groups, such a constraint was a problem…

 

So he was looking at other religious views for multiple reasons. Sometimes, it was out of sincere curiosity when he didn’t find the Sunni version consistent or satisfying in philosophical terms. A lot of it was driven by the incoherent and often contradictory arguments he heard from the ulema. Hindus, Jains, Sufis, Shia, Zoroastrians … he wanted to hear them all debate and explain their perspectives.

 

At other times, Akbar’s interest in other religious views was just a signal to the ulemas that Islam was not the only game in town. If they tried to impose too many constraints on him or became too big an alternate power center, well, they had better be careful.

 

Lastly, he was looking for any religious view which was more amenable to legitimizing his growing wife count. After all, those marriages were critical to his goal of weakening powerful groups in his empire by bringing in aristocrats from other communities.

 

The one group which completely misunderstood how far Akbar would be willing to go with his secular outlook were the Jesuits. This shouldn’t be a surprise since Christianity is heavily into conversion. And all the power that can come with it. Imagine how much the Christian count could increase if the Muslim ruler of one of the largest empires in the world converted. But they never stood a chance for three reasons: (1) the Muslim harem was dead against the influence of the Jesuits and did everything they could to undermine and badmouth them; (2) the Hindu wives considered the Christian doctrine that a man have only one wife an existential threat and united against the Jesuits; and (3) Akbar himself, who

never had any intention of ever rejecting Islam. He understood that would be a suicidal to him continuing as the Padshah.

~~

 

On the other hand, Akbar was indeed sincere in many aspects of his religious openness. He actively sought out the most respected proponents of different views. He even tried them out:

“He prayed to the sun, he whispered mantras, he worshiped fire, he kept fasts, and he examined his conscience.”

 

All this led to charges that the Hindu noblemen and the Rajput wives had developed too strong a hold over the Padshah. A new festival, Merijan, was celebrated in Fatehpur Sikri. It was based on the worship of fire in Persia. Many orthodox Muslims were livid. Did Akbar now believe he could criticize and overturn any aspect of Islam?

 

This “understanding of the many faiths and practices he encountered” is what drove Akbar to create a “loose collection of guidelines” for those who wished to follow them. He left it optional for people to join this new faith, and decreed that it not be imposed on people by violence (or threat of it).

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But no matter how you deal with religion, it is dangerous. The salutation for this new faith was “Allahu Akbar” to which the other would respond “Jalla Jallaluhu”. Were these harmless Arabic phrases? Or was the fact that they were based on his own name (Jalal-ud-din Akbar) a sign that he wasn’t just ignoring Islam but declaring himself to be a God, fumed the Islamic conservatives.

 

Even as the ulemas resented Akbar’s dallying with other religions, they didn’t dare declare him a kafir. They understood the principle Stalin would express so well centuries later:

“How many divisions does the pope have?”

 

Until, that is, a half-brother who had been relegated to Bengal, Mirza Hakim, decided to stake his claim. In sync with him, an ulema in Bengal declared Islam was under threat with a Padshah like Akbar, declared Akbar a kafir and urged all righteous Muslims to take up arms and revolt against the Padshah. Who supported this uprising? Mostly, the disgruntled old guard at whom Akbar had been chipping away with his alliance with the Persian Shias and Hindu Rajputs, and also those whose riches had been impacted by the centralization of revenue collection by Akbar.

 

The Rubicon had been crossed. Akbar used this as an opportunity to execute the most troublesome mullahs. Quietly, of course. Doing so publicly would only add fuel to the charges of him being a kafir!

 

Akbar would eventually win the war with the contender and cut down the ulemas’ power significantly. The murmurings of resentment in the conservative Muslims would never die away, but it would never raise its head up in open revolt either.